My 3.5-year-old Macbook Pro went on the disabled list Wednesday. Symptoms: Normal start up, but then, as the blue screen and desktop icons appeared, so did the spinning beach ball of death…and a queasy stomach. Interior sirens wailing, I rushed to my not-too-far-away Apple Store where, amid dozens of milling i-enthusiasts, the patient was taken [...]
Category Archives: Sports
A Captain and the Majors
April 12, 2011 – 5:57 pm
Time and situation award only a few in each generation with an opportunity to take a place in history. How much smaller is the number who are twice-touched by fate. Today’s post is about one such man. It starts with the differences between North and South and ends with the thin line that separates fair [...]
Final Four Math — 2011
April 2, 2011 – 11:50 am
This year’s March Madness has brought us a Final Four with no #1 or #2 seeds, unique in NCAA tournament history. But the absence of high-seed teams has not dulled enthusiasm for the last three games. In fact, some sports pundits are trumpeting the “Cinderella” factor: can a #11 seed, Virginia Commonwealth University, pull off [...]
Teaching Contract Bridge to Intelligent Women
February 17, 2011 – 3:16 pm
I learned contract bridge at 13 and played through grad school. Then came almost 40 years without a bid. But for the last year or so, I’ve been teaching bridge to a group of women. It has been a particularly satisfying endeavor for two reasons: 1) they are members of AAUW—American Association of University Women—and [...]
Zorb in Slovenia
July 12, 2010 – 5:42 pm
The Zorb In 2002, my son and I toured Slovenia by car. Rarely featured as a travel destination, Slovenia is a gem: fabulous scenery, interesting and friendly people, inexpensive (comparatively) accommodations…and it has Zorb. What is Zorbing? Well, the website states: Imagine yourself suspended inside a clear inflatable plastic ball of about 3 meters in [...]
LeBron’s Choice
July 7, 2010 – 3:44 pm
LeBron James, 25, is arguably professional basketball’s biggest star. A member of the Cleveland Cavaliers since jumping straight from high school in 2003, he has led the Cavs to playoff berths for six consecutive seasons. In addition to his basketball salary, he makes many millions each year from endorsements. In December 2007, James was ranked [...]
Betting the Final Four–2010
March 30, 2010 – 9:16 pm
If you bet on the Final Four (or on almost anything), the bookie’s odds always include a built-in percentage for the house. Last year I calculated the Las Vegas Final Four edge at 9.8%. This year the edge is so big (20.8%) that something must be wrong!
“Muslim” March Madness
March 22, 2010 – 4:30 pm
Ali Farokhmanesh Omar Samhan What is the overlap between the set of all rabid NCAA Basketball Tournament fans and the set of all knee-jerk despisers of anything Islamic? I suspect the intersection is large. If so, then the first two rounds of March Madness may promote more US-Islamic tolerance than all the State Department visits [...]
How to Bet on the NCAA Final Four
March 30, 2009 – 11:19 am
You pays your money and you takes your chances, but the House always has an edge. Did you ever wonder how big that edge is? Among the simplest edges to compute is Las Vegas roulette. If your chips are on one of the numbers from 1 to 36, and you win, you get paid 35-1. [...]
Rule Book Racism: Can a Black Athlete Celebrate?
December 2, 2008 – 2:41 am
Clay mouths off after defeating Liston In 1964, Cassius Clay, then only 22, brashly boasted that he would upset 7-1 favorite Sonny Liston for the world heavyweight championship. “I am the greatest!” he shouted. In retrospect, Clay clearly was the greatest. Why did his outbursts upset so many white sportscasters and fans? One of TO’s [...]
