Monday, April 17, 2017

Easter Monday is also Patriots Day in Boston!


It's Boston Marathon Day aka Patriots Day!  A 26.2mi race!  PhD*Son is running in the first wave.  

It's going to be grueling for the runners with beating sunshine and hitting 71°F for Heartbreak Hill.
The saving grace may be a west wind blowing 14-17mph, since they're running east. 🐰

Here he is, in the red cap, a half mile to the finish line in 2016:




14 comments:

  1. Stories From Another Time, for Our Times: ‘We Do Our Part’ [Click] --James Fallows

    Rumbling on the Left in France [Click] Given up for dead just a few weeks ago, Jean-Luc Mélenchon has come roaring back and threatens to turn the French presidential race upside down. [I admit to a prejudice in favor of underdogs.]

    When the American dream becomes a Canadian reality [Click] Boston Globe

    --Alan

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  2. Daydreaming is crucial for creativity[Click] “Our brains are at their most innovative when they are resting, so why aren’t we making time for quiet reflection?”

    —Alan

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    1. I've been concerned for a couple of decades (since my grands showed up) about how programmed children are now. I remember back to my long summers as a child, pretty much with no TV. Hours spent on one's belly, watching ants. Also remember that homework didn't start until junior high--before that, home time was free time. Even then it was an hour or less.

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    2. I could never see the point of an iPod, which paved the way for the iPhone. I regularly wonder if so many people are afraid to hear their own thoughts, and must continually obscure them with music or whatever. It is abandoning a significant part of their humanity.

      I remember when transistor radios became available, and suddenly one could hear music in all sorts of unanticipated places--at the beach, for instance. In that case, depending on the frequency, one might be able to tune one's own "transistor" to a first harmonic (the lower one, as I recall) of the offending device, causing the latter to emit a continuous loud shriek.

      --Alan

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  3. Today is also Emancipation Day in D.C. Which is why our taxes aren't due until tomorrow.

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    1. Got 'em into the mail today, with tracking numbers. I think it was two years ago the state tax bureau lost our return (and payment), and we had no proof it had been sent. It was finally straightened out, but "once burnt, twice shy."

      Alan

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  4. Charting Hillary Clinton’s Course Into the Iceberg [Click] Book review: Shattered

    Trump’s Unreleased Tax Returns Threaten Tax Reform [Click] "…his refusal to release his own tax returns is emerging as a central hurdle to another faltering campaign promise…”

    Preemptive Suicide? [Click] "…people in the region are more worried about rash action from President Trump than North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, which is really quite an achievement if you think about it."

    The Trump & Russian money story as of now… [Click]

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    1. first living giant shipworm discovered [Click]

      Receding glacier causes immense Canadian river to vanish in four days [Click] To be re-routed, actually…

      Le Pen and Macron woo Paris as French election enters final stretch
      [Click] "Just days before first round of voting in presidential race, polls show frontrunners not dead certs to face each other in runoff"

      --Alan

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    2. Out of idle curiosity, I looked up YouTube videos of the four principal candidates for the Presidency of France, to get a feeling for their relative skills as public speakers. Melanchon was clearly the best; Macron and LePen are OK, and Fillon is pedestrian. I was struck by the clear differences among the people in the crowds they attracted.

      --Alan

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    3. I looked up Melanchon’s political organization, La France Insoumise;[Click] and what should I find but this:

      “The idea of the creation of Unsubmissive France is rooted in the conviction of the need for a transverse movement that leaves traditional organizations, starting from the observation that traditional political parties no longer make democracy. It is inspired in particular by the Spanish party Podemos and the candidacy of Bernie Sanders to the Democratic Party presidential primaries of 2016, in the United-States.”

      -Alan

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  5. PhD*Son ran the marathon with his best time yet! 2:58:38! That's amazing given that it was so hot he couldn't feel the wind at all. I tracked his course and was most impressed that he poured on the steam for the last 5 miles or so! 26.2miles (more than 40km) is a long race in heat. 🐰 He's rather fast!

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    1. Not my cuppa, but that's about 8.7 mph average--definitely enough to impress me.

      There's a young fellow in our lab who is a runner--marathons, etc. I noticed a new trophy at his desk and asked him about it; it was a 24-hour (9 AM to 9 AM), 100-mile race, and very few people completed it in the allotted time--I think he said three--and he was one. He allowed as how it was difficult...

      Alan

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  6. Excellent trip. A friend and I took the bus to Madison, where another friend who lives there picked us up and drove us to the Twin Cities for Minicon. For the return trip we left after dinner Sunday, drove back to Madison where we spent the night at John's house, then took the bus back to Chicagoland this morning. Picked up lunch at a Mexican place on the way there, then had dinner at a brew pub. We really liked their Black Rice Lager(!) and one of my friends was ecstatic about their pizza. For the return we had a dinner that had been organized by the con at a different Mexican place; one of their beers was a pilsner that distinctly reminded me of the one I had in Prague 17 years ago.

    I got a pleasant surprise at Registration: Since I hadn't heard back from Programming, I assumed they hadn't put me on any panels. Turned out I was on six! For unknown reasons, a number of panelists never got their schedule emails. I really enjoyed all six panels, thanks in part to excellent fellow panelists. And as always, Minicon had an outstanding con suite and bar. Excellent food and excellent conversation with people you might or might not have known before. I definitely ate too much throughout the trip. Also, unfortunately, got far too much salt despite half-hearted attempts to be good.

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    1. The reason we eat healthy most of the time is so the occasional transgression won't knock us dead. Average the salt out over time. Indeed, it does sound like an excellent trip.

      Alan

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