GAME05

Raiders also had a similar offer for Mack from the 49ers.

I had Toronto picked to come out of the East even before they beat the Bucks in Milwaukee. That defense is amazing. And I wonder if the Bucks are going to see that similar strategy going forward: let Giannis have his, but focus on stopping Lopez and Middleton. Jimmy Butler's agent must be pulling his hair out in frustration. All Butler had to do was keep his mouth shut with the 76ers for 2/3rds of a season. That way other GMs could just chalk up his attitude to a problem with Minnesota. But nope, he's a headache in Philadelphia, too. Who would actually want this guy on their team, let alone pay him a ton of money?

There's hard (alcoholic) sparkling water now? Once you're adding alcohol to even your water, maybe you just need to admit you have a problem.

That same reasoning is why Suppan got the start in Game 6, and look how that turned out. Past history is no indication of future success.

I'd think the Titans will still give Mariota a few more years. The Jaguars, though, could well be a team that gets back into contention if they had a QB who could step in and play from Day 1. That or maybe the Broncos would prefer a good, established QB, only because Elway is gone if he whiffs on another QB draft pick.

And the Vikings are stuck paying Cousins guaranteed money for two more seasons. Though I wonder if it's time for the Lions to trade Stafford. Not a bad QB by any stretch, but they're not going anywhere anytime soon, and with this bad QB draft class maybe the extra draft picks will help rebuild that team.

Considering the expense of travel, why would anyone want to visit Green Bay in winter, especially when the bowl probably wouldn't be all that special of a game? A lot of people go to bowls just as an excuse for a get-out-of-winter vacation.

It's Maker's third season and from the start there was always talk about him trying to gain weight and having to eat so much all the time. I get he's young and works out all the time, but it doesn't look like he's gained a pound from his first year in the League. I feel like the offseason plan for him should be to quit doing cardio altogether and do nothing but lift weights and eat. Do this until he's gained 30# and then you can talk about cardio and basketball drills. It's not outrageous for a dedicated weightlifter to gain 6-8 pounds of muscle in a month.

I've already noted I'm a Maker fan, but it's not even that Maker isn't big enough to bang, more that he just won't. Wilson isn't really a huge guy, either, but I totally agree that he's been good at throwing himself in there and being the kind of aggressive that Thon is supposed to be.

As far as hating dogs or even allergies, and pets vs. service dogs in the workplace, those are two very different things. I AM expected to accommodate and deal with service dogs absolutely everywhere, but not pets.

No, I think I actually mean "Gen Z" but instead got the letter wrong. My bad.

A positive attribute that has coincided with the rise of hipsterism and the appreciation of old ways is self-sufficiency. The skill of homesteading is popular, more people are canning and making food from scratch, etc. With the growth of do-it-yourself tools it seems natural that more people are doing their own investing, too. That and it can help correct some pitfalls of the past. Baby Boomers invested as if they were bulletproof, Gen X and Y took it to a whole 'nother level of reckless, and this current Gen Z seems to be a lot smarter about things and more careful.

Yeah, only one headset on a console and there's basically no games where one uses the headset and the other uses a regular controller. But yes, what the person sees in the VR headset gets displayed on the tv for anyone else to see. Five square feet of space is roughly what you'd want playing a VR game. I've been able to reign that in the more I play. I've also seen brand new people to VR use a good bit more room because they move around more--it takes some people a bit to realize they don't have to physically walk toward something in a game. I've seen people fall, so take the coffee table away until you get your legs. It's more fun to stand up and play, but you can also put a chair in front of the camera and sit on that if there's worries about falling. I've bumped into my overhead lamp once, lightly touched a wall, but haven't hit anything hard or broken anything. But I have heard of people punching their televisions playing Creed. Unless you're in a space that is particularly cramped, injury or punching things isn't a tremendous concern. I've begun standing on a bath mat so that I can tell when I've stepped off my mark without looking. Since you can't have dual headsets, I can't think of too many games off the top of my head which would be particularly competitive against another person in the room. If you don't care about regular video games at all, something like the Oculus or the Vive might be a better VR unit instead of the PS4 because you wouldn't have to buy a pricey video game console just for VR. I'm not sure about the particular computer processing requirements for those headsets, though.

Even in hindsight that was a great add by the Patriots. They paid basically nothing and at least get a top WR for a few games. Maybe that's one game they otherwise wouldn't have won. Now they're as good as they were before.

Not all, of course, but a lot of Park Rangers hate dogs that aren't theirs because we've been bitten enough times by "don't worry he's friendly" dogs in the past. I haven't had to get my baton out for people yet, but I've done so several times for dogs. But someone's allergies aside, even if it were just a general dislike, it seems unreasonable that someone would just have to accept having a dog in an office environment unless "we allow dogs" were something stated in the job application process.

Since the Browns are pretty much every NFL fan's second-favorite team lately, it's nice to see they clearly, and finally, have themselves a franchise QB in Mayfield. I thought for sure they'd screw it up somehow, but it looks like they picked the best QB in the draft.

All game I was simultaneously hoping they'd win and hoping they'd lose. But mostly was interested in seeing Darnold play. Sometimes high-pick QBs just don't have that magic yet the team gets committed to them for a few years like TB and Jameis Winston. But I thought Darnold looked good and could well be a good QB in the League. Seemed like he moved around the pocket really well and didn't immediately think "Run with it!" whenever there was the slightest pressure, like a lot of young QBs do. Obviously the Giants got an immense talent at RB, but it's sure harder to find a good QB, especially with Eli clearly losing it and with no superstar QB prospects in this year's draft class.

I was an English major, so the week before Finals I always had a 30-page research paper due in each class, too. So I'd agree there's a lot of stress even with preparation because there can just be a lot to do or learn in a short time. I hate dogs and have a co-worker deathly allergic to them. I don't know how an office place could deal with having both people like me there and also allowing dogs. For me the idea of it is frustrating because to some degree cry-rooms, safe spaces and stress animals probably isn't the best way to be teaching grown-up college kids how to deal with stress. They'll be getting it in their workplaces later, but those won't offer places for people to run away to when tensions get high. At what point are people just being coddled?

Teachers get paid more than me and I have the same yearly mandatory training, pay freezes and benefits. I also work weekends and don't have breaks. Teaching isn't the best job in the world, but it doesn't seem like the worst.

A co-worker is a tattle-tale, for even the smallest little things. I feel like I'm going to get fired for accidentally taking a 61-minute lunch. I recently got in trouble for forgetting the gate counter readings and making a half-mile trip back to get it.

Looks like about 10" of snow last night with predictions to snow until late evening today. Then changing over to occasional rain tonight. And as always around here, every snowstorm includes 2" of ice on the roads. Fortunately my park system proactively closes for big snow storms, because not long ago it wasn't like that. My power has flashed off twice this morning, so more than likely I'm going to lose it for good in the coming hours. So realize I didn't update on the hurricane that came through here. We actually got two, though the second one was a lot quieter. A few deaths reported with the first one along the coast, because when they issue mandatory evacuation orders, a LOT of people do the "I've been living here all my life!" thing like the dude at Mt. St. Helens and get into trouble. I was deployed to a shelter for a week for the homeless/poor/immigrants who truly didn't have anywhere else to go, and that went pretty smoothly with only a few little troubles. The immigrants from Cameroon did a song and dance for everyone from their home country, which was pretty neat. I guess some other co-workers were sent to a shelter directly on the coast, and it turned out to be security work for a shelter of deployed EMTs/National Guard. That of course meant zero real security issues whatsoever, and so they instead went out with the First Aid folks to help in the community.

I was really curious what Horst was going to have to do to get rid of those bad contracts, and a first-rounder which won't even convey for three years is pretty incredible. I didn't realize you could even trade injured players. Not a bad move by any of the teams, really.

More like we get an "additional" vacation time code which we can't really use. It becomes beneficial if we were to take a LOT of time off during the year. In addition the State decided to up the salary floor, which led to brand new hires suddenly making as much money as people who'd been there 10 years, which was great for morale.

I have Sick Leave, Vacation Leave, Comp Time, Gap Hours and Special Bonus Leave. We don't get paid overtime, so any time we work over is Comp Time to be used within 12 months (or else they have to pay you for it, which'll get you yelled at). In 3+ years I've still never used a vacation day because there's always enough Comp Time--I've taken about four weeks off this year and I still have 50 hours to burn up. The 80 hours of Vacation Leave rolls into the 80 hours of Sick Time if unused and accumulates. Most people retire with about two years' time built up. The Gap Hours nobody knows what it is. I looked for it once and there's not even a code available to use it. The Special Bonus Leave is a new invention. Instead of a pay increase, we got this. If you have over X hours saved up (which most everyone has), you get charged double for using it. So use 16 hours of Special Leave and they subtract 16 from Special Leave but also another 16 from Vacation. But it also doesn't accumulate for your retirement, so its also worthless if you save it. I believe there's little complaining about it only because the details are so complex and confusing that nobody actually knows what it is. I emailed a higher-up about it recently and she had to research it herself to explain it to me.

I wasn't thinking as a Lakers pickup this current season, but picking up Middleton as a FA in the offseason. The Bucks have the second-best record. When you're doing that well why would you trade your second-best player mid-season? The Bucks have a realistic chance at making the Finals this season. Ah, you're right. The NBA salary cap stuff can be odd. Small article from Bleacher Report noted that to keep the status quo next year, the Bucks are really going to have to dip into the Luxury Tax threshold. I wonder if the owners will be willing to do that.