Bartimaeus

ya remember how I said we'd need to play perfectly, get lucky, and not ever fall behind by more than a score? we fell behind by 4 scores, got a bunch of bad bounces, and played horribly. whoops.

lmao

Infinity Train. First season had a lot of hype for it, but I only thought it was solid at best. Second season came out last week and I honestly wasn't sure I was going to watch, but a friend pushed me to and I was glad they did - marked improvement over the first season in a lot of ways. The "new" protagonist (who I was not sold on whatsoever) was awesome and a huge part of why I liked S2 a lot more, in addition to the season just being more consistent, fun, and interesting.

Yeah, it's definitely concerning, especially when you consider that while the Packers receivers have been pretty poor (but not terrible as we have at least had Davante Adams) as a unit for a couple years now, we have had a good to great offensive line pretty much the entire time. Still has had trouble being consistent. If you look at years from other elite/great QBs who have "mysteriously" had bad years, like Tom Brady this year, it almost always follows having a bad offensive line that year...but Rodgers hasn't had that excuse. So...not great. I say "two years" because I remember him looking pretty great to start the 2017 season, even if the team itself did not (and we did start 4-1 due to a lot of heroics by him before he broke his collarbone in the 6th game). His final game against the Panthers put a bit of a malus on his stats for the year, but I thought it was pretty clear that he had not recovered from his broken collarbone yet and he had only played because it was be eliminated otherwise (I remember him not even having the strength to throw the ball downfield that game - borderline irresponsible to have let him play just to save an already virtually lost season).

Some employers'/managers' fixation on qualifications vs. actual quality/body of work is utterly asinine. That sucks.

Well, QBR wouldn't personally be my stat of choice, but yeah (...usually better to look at a few different things for a more complete picture than just one composite stat anyways - QBR and passer rating are the "let's boil it down as simple and contextless as possible" stats). He has been uncharacteristically inaccurate this season, lots of trouble throwing downfield, not as quick on his feet anymore, is more paranoid of interceptions than ever before to the point of preferring to throw stuff away than give receivers a shot if there's even a slight chance of an interception... I wouldn't close the book on him yet, being that it's literally only his second scheme/playcaller in his career (outside of like half a season back in...2015 when McCarthy temporarily let the OC call plays so McCarthy could focus more on the team as a whole?) and it's possible he's still recovering from his injuries to a degree, but he has definitely been playing well below his normal level the past two years. He's still been pretty good, but...inconsistent. He's my favorite player (and a big reason I got into football in the 2013 season), so I hope he can have another elite year or two a la Drew Brees, Tom Brady, et al. have had before at advanced ages...but those guys haven't gotten hurt like he has.

I'm sitting at 4-4 for my pick'em, although one of them was me picking against the Packers for superstitious reasons - still counts, though. It's been a (thankfully) chaotic playoffs year.

Of the JRR-Christopher books, I only ever read Hurin, which was pretty messed up but decent. Never was the biggest Tolkien prose fan, but nevertheless RIP.

that image is too small homey

Gromnir is great when people are attempting to partake in serious discussions - he's a seasoned lawyer, so he's able to consistently follow everything everyone says in ways that the rest of us simply are not trained and do not have the experience to do, which can be awesome when it's directed at people who are selling obvious bullcrap. Especially because it seems like he has the infinite time to pursue and pontificate that rest of us do not. On the other hand, he is the most "beat the dead horse until not a single proton or electron remains bonded at the atomic level" for silly discussions that began with a single off-the-cuff remark/sentence...for which the explanation is the same as the previous: he's a lawyer. You just gotta learn to ignore a post(er), man. Don't want to get in an argument with Gromnir over a silly witty remark you thought up in 30 seconds? Don't reply. If he argues with me over something I said in THIS post, you know what *I'm* going to do, . In that, you did indeed make the same mistake Gfted repeatedly has. (e): discretion better part of valor and all

Yeah, that's where the first part comes in - what they actually post. I know TrueNeutral, Guard Dog, KaineParker, et al. aren't astroturfers since they write like actual people as opposed to...the constant ridiculous and character-like absurdity and nonsense that posters like SonicMage, Skarpen, ComradeMaster, et al. write like. Somebody is a little more convincing when their writing is clearly informed by the actual lives they're living, which these posters basically never seem to be - not counting useless fluff like "I've always been considered a tough guy and my wife thinks I'm very cool" like SonicMage used to embarrassingly write. Obvious playing-a-character is obvious.

Yeah, I put ComradeMaster on my ignore list literally after the first post from him that I saw, especially after I read his username which just positively screams astroturfer. Those sorts of random word combinations are very commonly used by astroturfers in other places like reddit, and (I decided to just look up now) the fact that the name cannot be found anywhere else on the internet except two posts on a random Battlefield thread and a handful of posts on some Russian forums suggests it was probably made up specifically to be used here. Not to get all conspiracy theorist or anything, but I try to minimize my time being wasted by trolls going on joyrides here as much as possible. Alternatively, not a troll and still not a poster I want to read from. Either way, win/win for me.

To be fair, Goebbels was from a very different time with very different political sensibilities: even if he was an obviously evil, evil person, he might actually well make a better debate moderator vs the trash we have now, . Being evil doesn't make you disgustingly incompetent (or even necessarily corrupt), after all...sometimes just the opposite! (editor's note: Bartimaeus is not actually in favor of Goebbels moderating any debates)

Yeah, I may have gotten a little a hyperbolic there, but man, CNN's was just so bad. Joe Buck and Chris Wallace would definitely be better options. I read once that an organization called the League of Women Voters used to be the hosts for presidential debates in the 70s-80s and supposedly were much better at it (but I didn't see them, so don't quote me on that), but both the Republican and Democratic parties started demanding ridiculous stuff of them and they kicked them to the curb. Too bad.

CNN debates make me want to blow my brains out. I think Fox News may legitimately hold (mildly) better ones...

Seahawks got pretty well handled by both the Rams and the Cardinals late season. Definitely could see it for the 49ers game, but if the Seahawks had won that game, the Packers would've been the #1 seed and the Saints the #2 while the Seahawks were merely the #3, so, uh. Though if the Seahawks had won the final 2 weeks instead, I think the Saints would've been the #1 seed and the Seahawks the #2 (..."I think" because it's a circle of I-beat-you-but-not-thems - Packers over Saints, Seahawks over Packers, Saints over Seahawks). Hoping for Titans-Packers, expecting Chiefs-49ers. Based on everything I've seen, Packers should get pretty well walloped in the NFCCG. We match up horribly with the 49ers, Packers have a history of getting wrecked by NFCW teams in the playoffs (and were especially bad west coast this season), Packers are limping into the game while the 49ers are stronger than ever with recent star returns from injury. I'm hoping it's a close game, but I feel like even that's asking too much. Expecting something like a 34-17 score. To have a chance, the Packers will need to execute very well and get lucky to start the game - don't think we have much of a chance of staying in it if we're down even a score early, and it'll become positively futile if it extends to two scores.

I played about an hour of it a couple of weeks back and thought it seemed very promising with both interesting and entertaining writing, hope to get back to it soon - had the complete opposite feeling in my initial impressions of Pillars of Eternity and Torment: Tides of Numenera, and I tried to stick with Pillars of Eternity and ended up hating it, so I'm hoping that my intuition is correct again here.

Naturally, literally just a couple of days after Bernie takes a projected lead in Iowa for the first time a couple of weeks before the primary (with Elizabeth Warren in second), a story leaks about how he claimed a woman would not be capable of becoming president directly to Elizabeth Warren. Ignoring that he asked Elizabeth Warren to enter the 2016 race (before he did so himself when she declined), ignoring that he campaigned for Hillary in 2016 after he was defeated, ignoring that he has been saying publicly for 30 years now that a woman absolutely could and should become president. What a dirty bit - politics are so fun.

Seems like every time a wildcard team has a big upset win in the first round, they get absolutely crushed in the second week. ...was what I was going to say until this Titans-Ravens game happened.

Summarized on reddit: "US kills Soleimani after Iranian-backed militias try to pull off Benghazi 2.0. Iran's response? (1) January 7: During the funeral for Soleimani, in the midst of burning American flags and speakers touting the impending destruction of the United States of America, a panic-driven stampede kills 56 people and injures 200 in Kerman. (2) January 8: Iran's "hell on Earth" response against the U.S. (Operation Martyr Soleimani) is ultimately a very mild airstrike against U.S. bases with no casualties. Even radical Iranians are left confused at the extremely tepid "retaliation." The Ayatollah's threat of Washington in flames winds up being the most anti-climactic moment in world history since the end of Kill Bill Volume 2. (3) January 8: After Rouhani condemned the U.S. for its downing of Iran Air Flight 655 on January 6, Iran goes oopsie daisy and shoots down a plane - Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 - killing 176 people, 147 of whom were Iranians, in the process. (4) January 8: After the airplane goes down, Iran gets extra silly, immediately puts out a statement within 30 minutes of the crash that says, "It was a technical issue. Nothing to see here. Move along now" which immediately makes everyone twice as skeptical. (5) January 9: The U.S. ultimately responds by announcing even tougher economic sanctions against Iran...and Tehran doesn't respond, ending the 3 day brawl with an embarrassed Iran, 200+ dead Iranians, 0 killed by the U.S., and now Iran can no longer crow about Iran Air Flight 655 for another 3 decades without reminding their own citizens they killed 176 innocent people, mostly Iranians, due to a freak accident while trying to make a flex on the world stage." I, uh, guess Trump wins this one? Somewhat accidentally? Alright, I guess. Still bad to murder people in other people's airports, especially after asking them to come into talks with you, but this was an incredibly weak response. Maybe there's something to the "lunatic leader is intimidating" factor...

Poe's Law, man.

@Mannock I don't know about you, but even though the Packers should be favored in pretty much every matchup besides QB, I'm still having PTSD flashbacks to that 2014 NFCCG. @Injuries: One thing I'd like to see is the cap being adjusted for time lost to injuries. Something with a lot of conditions like if a guy is injured pre-season (or near the end of a season) and loses the entire ensuing regular season, don't count his salary against the cap at all, while maybe if they're lost for the season mid-season, count the games lost only half against the cap (half is better than nothing, but it's "only" half to reduce gaming the system which I'm sure teams would do with minor injuries if they got the full number back), etc. The cap is so, so important to constructing a football team that having a couple of key injuries can absolutely cripple a team, so it'd be nice to make the team's job a little easier on this front in at least regards to injuries.

Good job, Guard Dog. You really blew it for the rest of us!

That's one of very few teams I didn't want to see him go to. Oh well!