29 thoughts on “February 8 7, 2022: Seven Hours”

  1. I tried watching the downhill skiing on Peacock but the action kept on getting interrupted by ad breaks. Is Peacock always that bad for live sports ?

    1. I opted for the premium plan since I intend to cancel right after the Olympics and I detest ads (we don’t have cable or broadcast TV). No commercials so far, but there’s some extremely stilted announcing interrupting the curling.

    2. I watched short track speed skating with Newbish last night. He initially loved it, but man does it suck when nearly every race is decided by a dude looking at a monitor after the fact.

      Oh, hey, that Hungarian who gave it his all and won gold in a photo finish? Nah. He lost. He's out. Second place won. Third place won second. Fifth place won third, because fourth place got DQ'd, too.

      And the commentators just nervously chuckle and shrug and say "hey, that's short track for ya!"

      1. Yes, thinking about climate change. I glanced ahead — the 2026 Winter Olympics will be in Milan & Cortina d'Ampezzo. The 2030 site has not been chosen, but there apparently is an emphasis on reuse of existing facilities to mitigate environmental affects; Vancouver, Sapporo, & Salt Lake City are considered potential sites. (But not 2026 runner-up Stockholm or any of Lillehammer, Nagano, Alberville, or Calgary?) In any case, that emphasis seems to go directly against the IOC’s rent-seeking behavior.

        But…there are at least two emerging fronts for World War III, so it doesn’t have to be climate change that does in the Winter Olympics.

        1. In any case, that emphasis seems to go directly against the IOC’s rent-seeking behavior.

          I think the IOC is staring to see a bunch of pushback from Countries on going all in with regard to the Olympics, needing new facilities, etc. Bidding hasn't been as fierce as events past. And going to the more authoritarian countries that have received recent events (China for Winter Olympics, Qatar for World Cup) appears to be a short term solution. I doubt if we ever see a new country or City take on the Olympics and will see a basic rotation among a select few big cities. IMHO.

  3. My uncle Rock passed away from Covid over the weekend. He was too young, and this was likely a preventable death, so there are lots of emotions beyond just the regular sadness.

    4. It's strange, I have a lot of right wing relatives who were all about Trump, but so far none of them has chosen to eschew medical science for the sake of a political identity. At least none that I know of. I spoke with an orthopedic surgeon at the Orlando airport on Wednesday, he said every one of the COVID cases in his hospital are unvaxxed. Sorry for your loss, Philo.

      1. The strange part about this is that this uncle wasn't even overly political. Moderately so, at most. I think it's largely a case of putting trust in the wrong places, and forgetting that "the fact that there are questions to be asked" doesn't mean there aren't answers to be given. Indeed, this makes me even more upset - if he were chosing to not use a seat belt on his own, that'd be awful and sad. But if he's not using a seat belt because someone else convinced him they were bad, that's infuriating.

        1. We just had an interaction with an older friend, who shared that her adult son and his wife (vaxxed with J&J) are declining to have their kids (between 5 and 12, I think) vaxxed with any mRNA vaccine because the son (an engineer) has "done his own research" and has concerns that they are "too new" or something.

          I am continually disturbed by the course that socalled "citizen research" has taken, because it is so stupid.

    5. So sorry for your loss, Philo. My mom has had a couple of cousins recently die under similar circumstances, and she's also been sifting through a lot of emotions.

  5. There’s a French version of Wordle! And I just barely know enough words to play it!!

    Spoiler SelectShow

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