On Pacific time
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Moderator's Pub
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I think this shot of the sky and the mountains near Sochi is pretty stunning. I'm looking forward to the opening ceremony Friday night.
Just wondering what events AN members like to watch. I like speed skating, downhill skiing, and the event where the participants go up into the air and do all those elaborate 'acrobatic' feats. Not sure what it's called exactly. Just love it though! I read that 57% of those polled think there might be some sort of terror event. I so hope that's not true and that all goes well for the whole two weeks. What events are you guys looking forward to seeing, if any? |
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Space Pirate
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Atlanta
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More tweets about f*cked up hotel rooms.
It's sadly my favorite new event. ... |
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¡Damned!
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Purgatory
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My favorite of the Winter Olympic sports is slalom skiing. No reason other than it looks fucking difficult, and that to me is what the Olympics should be all about. I don't want any fancy shit, just give me sports that are really, really hard to do and a handful of competitors that excel at them.
That said, I'll be taking a pass on this one. It doesn't interest me this year, at all. I could feign outrage and go all "Putin is an asshole / gays something something / IOC is a corrupt bunch of bought and sold pricks / hashtag dogkillers" etc., but truly, I'm just not into it this year. So it goes. I may bitch about any of the above and more, later though. Who knows? So it goes. |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Promise Land of Trustafarians
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¡Damned!
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Purgatory
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Oddly, I'd be much better at shitting in front of a panel of judges than I would be at competitive shitting ala the side-by-side toilets.
"Randy, what did you think of my pinch? Simon, of course you'll hate me saying this, but when I felt that last corn kernel pass, I thought of you." "Paula… Paula? Are you OK? Do you need me to hold your hair?" So it goes. |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2004
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Paris, France
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Like everyone on the planet, I saw the photos of the twin toilet in Sochi, and I was duly surprised.
But just a few days later I visited the Louvre-Lens art museum in Lens, a city in the north of France near the Belgian border. This museum was designed by hotshot Japanese architecture firm SANAA, cost €150 million to build, was opened just last year, and won the Prix d’architecture de l’Équerre d’argent in 2013. It’s fair to say every detail of its design was agonised over. Here’s an iPhone photo I took in the men’s toilet: (There’s a fourth toilet outside the frame.) What do you make of that then? I think no-one is going to use these toilets for anything other than peeing, and few of us are squeamish about peeing side by side into a row of urinals. So why be prissy about peeing into a row of toilets? It sure is eye-catching though! … engrossed in such factional acts as dreaming different dreams. |
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Mr. Vieira
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Tennessee
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In high school, my first two years, the boys' restrooms had no stalls/walls. Just 3-4 toilets all out in the open like that. In the break between my sophomore and junior year, stalls were put up. But no doors.
The girl bathrooms had stalls and doors the entire time. |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Paris, France
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Interesting. Perhaps there are (or were) thousands of these open-layout toilets scattered across the prissy, oh-so-civilised west! Or perhaps they were common in schools because boys couldn’t be trusted to not do who-knows-what in the toilet if they had a door to hide behind.
The women’s toilets at the Louvre-Lens had traditional, individual stalls (with doors). All that said, three or more side-by-side toilets – as in the Louvre-Lens or pscates2.0’s old school – seem slightly more appropriate than just two as in Sochi. With a bunch of them it becomes communal and the individual pee-er is ignored. But just two highlights the shared nature in a particularly privacy-invading way. Sorry Windswept! I don’t follow winter sports at all. I wish the Olympics all the best, of course. … engrossed in such factional acts as dreaming different dreams. |
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Right Honourable Member
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The opening ceremony starts soon. I quite want to watch it, but part of me wants nothing to do with it. Damn you Putin and your gay bashing government.
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Ice Arrow Sniper
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Normally I'd be glued to the hockey tournament. I will not be watching this year. Putin disgusts me. Between the worsening anti-gay sentiment, the neo-Nazis he has basically been letting run the country, and his power play to attempt annexing Ukraine as a legacy for himself, I really just want nothing to do with it.
Authentic Nova Scotia bagpipe innards |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2004
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So you'll be watching the figure skating instead...
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careful with axes
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Hillsborough, CA
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And to think Salzburg was another bid for 2014. I wonder how big the bribe was.
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Hates the Infotainment
Join Date: May 2004
Location: NSA Archives
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Good thread idea / great picture post, Carol.
As for toilet theatre... I need to go look for some Sochi hashtags. This is going to be fun. "In Soviet Russia, toilet flush you!" ...into the light of a dark black night. |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: State of Flux
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I'm looking forward to the Ice Hockey. There's something different about the Olympic game which keeps my interest longer than a 'modern' NHL one.
Next Saturday, 1:30 pm Geneva time, I will be glued to TV for the Men's USA-Russia preliminary round game. That should be a real cracker with the Russians playing in front of the home crowd. The first hockey match is tomorrow morning, USA-Finland, Women. USA-Canada Women will face each other in the prelims, too. Hockey schedule here: http://www.sochi2014.com/en/ice-hock...le-and-results |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: State of Flux
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Edit: OMG, I see toilet brushes! Edit 2: How to get toilet paper if you're seated in the middle? |
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BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope. Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
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Gah. Nm...
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careful with axes
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Hillsborough, CA
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That's not actually a little girl on wires, but three stray dogs stacked on top of each other.
Also t.A.T.u's "Not Gonna Get Us" played for the entire Russian team procession is delicious irony...or is it since they were apparently only fake gay? |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Paris, France
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Go Finland! (My mother’s Finnish. Heck, I was born there!)
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You see, it must be some kind of ‘make yourself at home’ idea. It may only make sense to an architect. Why, just ask your neighbour of course. How antisocial are you? “Eight pieces please, stranger. Nope, gonna need four more. What did you think of the Rubens?” One billionth of a metre? … engrossed in such factional acts as dreaming different dreams. |
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Selfish Heathen
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Zone of Pain
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This is what I'm expecting from the Sochi Opening Ceremony:
Actually, I'm also ignoring the olympics this year. Even before taking into account my distaste for the political climate and hypocrisy of it all, nothing about the olympics is compelling enough to draw my attention nowadays. The quality of this board depends on the quality of the posts. The only way to guarantee thoughtful, informative discussion is to write thoughtful, informative posts. AppleNova is not a real-time chat forum. You have time to compose messages and edit them before and after posting. |
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BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope. Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
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Nah, that would be nm. Nm is the Newton-meter, one of the metric units of energy, and my personal favorite.
I was actually abbreviating nevermind since I should have back read through the thread before replying... |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Paris, France
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BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope. Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
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Actually, yes. Strict adherence to capitalization rules of abbreviations is part of the system. Though I doubt very much most people would begin a sentence with nm, and I am hard pressed to identify an example that isn't grammatically incorrect or a sentence fragment, as in 'what unit was that? nm.'
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careful with axes
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Hillsborough, CA
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Hates the Infotainment
Join Date: May 2004
Location: NSA Archives
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It probably has to do with the fact that Olympic hockey is how the game was meant to be played. Less cramped ice surface, zero NJ Devils style hockey clogging up the middle of the ice, and no goons / fighting for reasons that are usually hard to justify. Every player out there is highly skilled and forced to play a fast, two-way game without being a clutchy douchebag.
...into the light of a dark black night. |
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careful with axes
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Hillsborough, CA
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But enforcers need jobs too.
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2004
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I don't want to derail the thread but they could do two things today that would transform NHL hockey for the better.
Widen the ice. They don't have to do full Olympic 100 ft, maybe just an extra five feet, so 90x200 instead of 85x200, and some rinks were even smaller than that! (Boston, Chicago, Buffalo come to mind) 5 feet isn't a lot, I don't think it changes the more intimate nature of the NHL ice, it just gives one quick step extra to step away from a clutching defender or someone trying to run you into the boards. And standardize the equipment. Take away hard plastic armour in the elbows, shoulder and chest. Spec a soft pad that will absorb a 100mph puck and require equipment made to that spec. Except for goalies outlaw any hard plastic armour except for the cup, gloves, knee and shin guards for players. The current stuff is the equivalent of brass knuckles. Players are getting their bell rung because you can just wallop a guy with all the plastic protecting your upper body and not really feel it. If the guy delivering the check felt it even half as much as the target, they'd probably re-prioritize trying to lay the guy out and stick to an effective hit that takes someone out of the play, not out of the season. Fewer late hits, blind hits, and less damage too. Safer players will play a faster and more fluid game. Ever wonder why Rugby players have so few concussions and football players have so many? It's the padding. ......................................... |
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BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope. Join Date: May 2004
Location: Inner Swabia. If you have to ask twice, don't.
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It's the speed.
While I certainly agree that american footballers are more likely to bash into each other because they feel safer in their padding, the overall trend in the sport is less and lighter padding. Ultimately, the difference between rugby and football isn't the padding, so much, as the fact that in football the players are running full sprint when they hit each other, whereas in rugby, the hits have very much less velocity... Last edited by billybobsky : 2014-02-07 at 15:36. |
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Hates the Infotainment
Join Date: May 2004
Location: NSA Archives
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...into the light of a dark black night. |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2004
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Funny what you remember, I remember Hockey Night in Canada always making a big deal about the smaller home ice in a couple of arenas. I do think the league enforced the 85x200 dimension at some point, more than a few years ago now. FWIW, I believe the books always read 85x200 with the radius of a 28' circle describing the corners, but each of those was slightly massaged, particularly in old buildings.
I played hockey as an adult for a couple of seasons, real beginner mens league stuff, no checking, most of us had never played as kids. I took one really bad crash, just once, on my back to make me think about this. I hit the ice hard enough to take the wind right out of my lungs, which is a freaky sensation. I knew everyone could hear the crunch based on the silence. The back of my head hit the ice and I just gasped for a second. I had basically got some air and came down with my torso parallel to the ice and my feet up. Bell. Rung. The equipment did its job fantastically well. I didn't have a sore back, or ribs, or head, or any concussion that I know of. But, we were just a couple of idiots who can't generate much speed somehow making the highlight reel for America's Funniest Home Videos. In a league where everyone can really accelerate and hit (like the NHL), that armour makes the body immune to impacts, so you can accelerate and hit even harder; but it protects the body at the cost of increasing the rapid acceleration and deceleration that causes brain injury, not just impact of helmet on ice, but soft spongy grey matter against the inside of the skull itself. You can test it right now if you have hockey equipment. Strap on a modern elbow pad with the rigid plastic cone. You can bash it with a shovel and you won't feel but a small pulse through your arm. Now, some of the most devastating hits have come from high elbows, and players are appropriately penalized, but I think there's now a fundamental lack of awareness, not players who don't care about the well being of others, but players who actually don't feel the consequence of a violent impact. You could argue that elbows are illegal, OK, but the shoulder pad ain't far behind in hardness or construction. Combined they've turned the upper body into a fairly dangerous weapon, which leads to more padding around the chest and sternum, and less sensation surround the delivery of a hit. Even just taking the hard armour out of the arms (elbow to shoulder) will mitigate violent hitting enough that most well conditioned athletes will opt for thinner padding in the chest, if only for better mobility. Check this out: http://thehockeyguys.net/concussion-chatter/ Far from the last word on the subject, but a worthwhile perspective. ......................................... |
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