archer

I'd eat those if the doctor didn't think I was bleeding internally. They sound delicious.

There's always some secret Russian, US, or mad scientist notes lying around still on genuine microfilm. Microfilm has been around since the 1800's. I wouldn't be shocked if every masked avenger who ever existed in the modern era hadn't run across it and/or used it. "Only the Crimson Cowl ever discovered the location of the real entrance to Hollow Earth and he took that secret to the grave with him. Except maybe not since his journals recently turned up at...."

Sure to a certain extent. Then writers became more careful that artists had to give Superman and Clark slightly different hairstyles. Clark slumped and became a klutz to reinforce the "he's just a nerd with glasses" image that the glasses were supposed to sell in his secret ID. So it became "handwave plus some effort on the character's part".

Federal agents raided Rudy Giuliani’s Manhattan home and office Wednesday, seizing computers and cellphones in a major escalation of the Justice Department’s investigation into the business dealings of former President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer... The dual searches sent the strongest signal yet that he could eventually face federal charges. https://apnews.com/article/rudy-giuliani-trump-investigation-warrant-7a413e1bbb819cb52cd402d64a982185

Geez they still manufacture DDT in three countries and use it on three continents (South America, Asia, and Africa). You'd think someone would have found a way to sell it, even the sludge, rather than dump it near a major US city and eat a loss.

"Magic beans! Magic beans for trade! Come get your magic beans! Guaranteed results! All trades are final!"

I'd think you'd get a lot more of "actual guards watching locked doors and watching other guards" than relying on video surveillance and unmonitored locked doors. Guard 1 watches Guard 2 who watches Guard 3 who watches Guard 4 who watches Guard 1. An intruder would have to take them all out simultaneously or someone is going to raise the alarm. Or Guard 1 is tasked with watching the length of the north wall. Guard 2 from a distance watches Guard 1. Guard 3 watches Guard 2 from another position. You might also see some brute force aspects to building at least some of the cells. A door that must be lifted a bit before it swings out but it's too heavy for a single person to lift and move, etc.

Explain to everyone that "microfilm" isn't a teeny tiny showing of Star Wars.

At one point before vaccines were available, there were headline articles about how doctors were thinking that COVID could be linked to impotence. If those stories had remained in the headlines of the mainstream media, you could guarantee that at least 50% of the adult population would be scrambling to get shots. https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20210407/erectile-dysfunction-risk-6-times-higher-in-men-with-covid

Well, dead middle of the pack was a heck of a lot better than what Denver had so.... Anyway, the cost of the trade was minimal to get a serviceable QB. Yeah but do you really want your best or only option to be to throw a rookie QB into the meatgrinder in the first game of the season? Carolina was looking to get rid of the guy. But there was a decent chance that any team looking to package a trade to Carolina might hope to get Bridgewater as a throw-in to sweeten the deal. Better to get him on your roster at a minimal cost now than to lose out and have to try to get someone worse at a higher cost when other teams know you're more desperate after a draft that didn't snag you a franchise QB. 2 cents edit: This article from a week ago talking about a possible Bridgewater trade to Denver speculated that Denver would have to give up this year's 4th round pick to get him. In comparison, a 6th round pick looks like a steal. https://www.yardbarker.com/nfl/articles/three_broncos_trade_scenarios_for_the_2021_nfl_draft/s1_12680_34702928

Batters tweaking their stances in order to change their strike zones would probably have to go by the wayside, under an automated system, until we get computers which can integrate video on the fly and adjust strike zones dynamically. As for calling up players from the minors, they'd have to be put into the system before being allowed to play. It shouldn't be too hard to film the 100 at bats against a pitching machine and having the computer assess where the strike zone is. It isn't like you'd be able to hire a computer programmer for doing it as a one-time job and let the system run on autopilot forever without human input anyway. The league would have to keep people on staff to do things like that. I don't like the "automatic runner at 2nd" idea. It's irritating without addressing the underlying problem of dropping batting averages making the games boring. It isn't the extra innings making the game boring, it's the lack of scoring which is making the game boring and that lack of scoring is leading to more tied games going to extra innings. If there's a really good chance that "any team on any night is likely to score up to ten runs", you just aren't going to have as many tied games as you do when "any team on any night is likely to score up to four runs". In the past, they've addressed lower batting averages by adjusting mound height, distance from the mound to the plate, and/or adjusting bats and balls. Honestly though, I don't know why batting averages would be declining. I'd have guessed that COVID and restricted practice would have negatively affected pitchers MUCH more than fielders. But maybe pitchers aren't feeling so overworked and aren't having to deal with crowd noise and all the other distractions? Maybe some of the cooler weather is keeping pitchers from overheating. And a baseball will travel further in warm air than in cold so maybe that's helping. Maybe pitchers have a more effectual prayer game after practicing so extensively during COVID.

The only reasonable way to do it is if "the act of putting on a heroic or villainous mask" completely defeats facial recognition technology and prevents accurate recounting to sketch artists and prevents accurate film/video. You can do that from a mystical energy field encompassing the universe, infallible tech which is so common that no one attempts facial recognition software, or handwave which is enforced against both PC's and villains. But there's no way even a Batman-style cowl conceals an identity when everyone as a cell phone to take video/photos from every possible angle, much less a domino mask concealing an ID.

Unfortunately, there's some number of purists who would throw up their hands in disgust and vow to never watch another inning. And those are the kind of fans who talk up the team to casual fans and who buy tickets, merchandise, and the MLB TV package. I have no idea how many purists would give up on some level in disgust. But a lot of the smaller teams depend on their hardcore fans to prop up revenues. I'd imagine it'd take a lot to convince those owners to do something which might alienate them. Look at how long they've been arguing among themselves about adopting the designate hitter, something like 106 years now? And I'm sure at least the current umpires' contract would prevent MLB from experimenting around with automated strikes/balls during actual games. Now I don't doubt that MLB could itself measure the strike zone of every player in the league as he's in his batting stance and program that into a machine so there could be an individual strike zone on file for each player. Have each one do a hundred "at bats" from a pitching machine and measure the stance. That'd make adjusting the strike zone very simple for the people operating the equipment: just put in the player's identification number from the batting order into the computer and tell the computer to change each time a new batter comes up to the plate (Cardinals #28 Arenado).

Since you aren't required to prove you're vaccinated and aren't even going to be questioned by anyone about it so that you'd even have to do so much as go through the effort to lie about it, I don't take it as being an incentive on any level.

Very disappointed in President Biden coming out yesterday and stating that the CDC has changed it's recommendations: vaccinated people don't have to wear masks while outdoors. With Biden's de facto State of the Union address happening tonight on his 99th day in office, the change in the recommendation appears at least on the surface as politically motivated to publicize his success from his first 100 days in office. You don't have any control over whether the people who aren't wearing masks are vaccinated or not. You have very little control over people coming close to you (and practically none at all when almost everyone can move faster than you). None of the vaccines are 100% effective against even the original strain of the virus. And with all the mutations spawning so quickly that the news doesn't even bother reporting them individually anymore, who the hell actually knows if the vaccine is very effective (or not) against whatever you might be exposed to? The administration has been very effective at getting vaccine out to people. IMO it doesn't need landmarks set up at politically opportune moments in order to drive that home. They were reporting on MSNBC that 68% of US seniors are fully vaccinated, which is an astounding feat. And in less than 100 days, the country has gone from people staying up until all hours of the night trying desperately to get vaccine appointments to widespread news reports of public officials begging people to come in to be vaccinated because they have more vaccine than willing arms to put it in. As an individual, your chance of being infected outdoors is small. But as a country, if people don't wear masks outdoors, a large number of people will be infected who wouldn't have been otherwise. 100% of those people will be coming indoors as some point. A huge percentage of those people will be maskless indoors with family or friends at some point and pass along the disease.

While I'm sure that COVID measures were a major factor, "recorded" influenza cases are (by the CDC website's definition) the listing of virus samples from state and local labs. With so many people scared to death of going to doctor's offices and emergency rooms, I'd be shocked if there weren't whole swaths of people who didn't go to a doctor at all even though they had flu symptoms. That's also thought to be one of the reasons that cases of COVID have been underreported. My GP doctor's offices and the offices my wife's GP doctor were each closed to in-person visits for any reasons for months. I think it was something like December before my doctor's office reopened in a limited manner. And my wife wouldn't have let me go to an emergency room for anything less than being on my death bed. You can't test for influenza virus through tele-visits.

Spaceballs-style helmets are the biggest problem with people today taking the older uniform versions seriously. Back in the 1980's if you wanted to cram advanced tech into a helmet (and you weren't Tony Stark), the helmet needed some bulk. Today with everything done with chips, people expect a helmet that's minimal but can do vastly more functions than a cell phone, laptop, and high-tech nightvision binoculars combined.

Yeah, the time to fire him was BEFORE he gave away $50 million of your dollars to bribe another team into accepting one of the best players in baseball to be traded from your roster onto theirs.

Okay, what's your fax number?

Seriously, you have left-over pizza after the game? Maybe we should start a companion thread "How Many of You Have Left-Over Pizza After a Game?"

For what it's worth, some of us are just very old, to still be a child.

"The Forgotten Precedent for Our ‘Unprecedented’ Political Insanity" https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/04/24/forgotten-precedent-unprecedented-politics-age-of-acrimony-484072

You hit the nail on the head. Most terrorist groups operate in unfriendly territory. They have to commit the act then scatter unless they're planning on being martyrs to the cause. Otherwise massive amounts of authority figures pile into the area whether FBI, Interpol, UNTIL, local police, intelligence services, military, or some combination thereof. There's a few places like Palestine or Northern Ireland where terrorists could commit acts then at least be on a neutral playing field of finding civilians and people in authority who'd look the other way or give them shelter. In those places, terrorists could try something convoluted or cute. Eurostar has the power to not care about the massive number of officials who could flood into the area chasing after them. Any force large enough to be a serious threat to them would also be a serious threat to flatten the city or at least do more in collateral damage than Eurostar did themselves.

Dear April, I remember you well. Your production assistant is supposed to collect your phone, calculators, and any personal equipment shortly before filming starts. This should have all been explained to you in an email when you were accepted onto the cast. Maybe you should check your spam folder.

It's not good...it's the news.