Two UK Cheerleaders do impossible stunts: Maria, don’t get too many ideas.

If Ron Swanson Quotes were motivational posters: Truth.

Survival Guide to Starting and Finishing a PhD: Specific to statistics, but useful advice throughout.

Vanguard after the (Sabrmetrics) Revolution: Small sample stats, taken out of context. That’s what Bill James loves. Or not.

No, not the Lorde song. Though it was hilarious that a San Francisco station banned the song during the World Series.

In case you weren’t aware, the Royals lost to the Giants in Game 7 of the World Series, thus compiling the best postseason record ever for a team that DIDN’T win the World Series: 11-4. While I’m not a Royals fan, I was certainly rooting against the Giants.

1. Should the Royals have sent Gordon?: Game 7, Royals losing 3-2 in the bottom of the ninth, 2 outs, no one on base. Gordon hits a single to center that is misplayed and rolls to the wall. Gordon rounds second and is pulling into third as the ball is retrieved and thrown to the shortstop in shallow left. I think the Royals should have sent Gordon home and demanded a play at the plate. While it would have been sad to get thrown out at home, I thought there was a great chance he makes it (slow relay, poor throw, not caught at home), and I also thought that Bumgarner was killing it on the mound and would get the last out if he was stuck at third (which he did). This link suggests a 30% chance of success means he should have been sent home. I think he had that. Other sites disagree.

2. Pain Demands to be Felt: Cleveland fans are nodding. Great article.

Coder’s High: Article by a current writer/former coder about being immersed in coding to the extent that you can block out the world. I’ve done that on occasion and made some really complex code. Now I’m more practical and use the same coding strategy over and over again (for similar problems), which means I don’t get into that high as often.

How the Other Half Works, an Adventure in the Low Status of Software Engineers: Stuff to think about if you’re a technical worker and looking to position yourself in the workforce.

CIA Starbucks: Busiest in the world, perhaps. Who knows. They don’t keep frequent drinker cards.

The Art of Roughhousing: More play-violence makes Jack a well-rounded boy.

Blackjack Payout Change: This makes me angry. Blackjack is the only game I’ll play at casinos. Boo on you, Venetian and Palazzo.

Awesome video of traffic close calls: Makes your heart jump.

Should Only Winners Get Trophies? Yes. How do little kids learn how to win if there is no incentive to win? Additionally, not keeping score at little kid ballgames is crazy talk.

Why Amazon has no profits- And why it works. Interesting exposition on a dominant internet commerce giant.

10 Questions to Ask in a Job Interview: I especially like ‘What is the history of this position? Is it newly created? If not, why did the previous person leave it?’ and ‘What’s the company culture like? Do co-workers eat lunch together? Do you have regular team events?’

95 Student Discounts: Scroll to the bottom to see the fast food savings you could reap. I had no idea.

In Defense of Model Simplicity: Examples from Laura McLay about problems in data science and optimization that respond better to a simple model than a complex one.

Learning from the Best: Good write-up on Kaggle’s blog about suggestions from past data science competition winners. Spend the most time focusing on extracting the right features to solve the problem. Without the right features, it doesn’t matter how complex your model is, it won’t work.

Albert Einstein: “Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler.”

MLB Blackout areas

MLBAM may be close to revising its asinine blackout policy: I live in Bloomington, IN, which is about 2.5 hours from Cincinnati. Cincinnati Reds games are broadcast locally in Cincinnati on Fox Sports Ohio. I don’t get Fox Sports Ohio. I get Fox Sports Indiana. Because I’m in Indiana. Fox Sports Indiana carries SOME Reds games, but not all. Fox Sports Indiana will broadcast 95 Reds games in 2014; mostly they show Reds games when no Pacers games, live wrestling, or live racing are in line for broadcast on Fox Sports Indiana. About 10 other games are on national TV. All of which makes sense. Here’s where it gets stupid: Major League Baseball classifies Bloomington as Cincinnati Reds territory. And it thus feels justified in blacking out Reds games on MLB.TV in Bloomington, so that I have to support my local broadcasters and watch it on TV. Except I don’t get about 60 of the Reds games in Bloomington on TV. There is no way, outside of satellite TV options, for me to watch about 60 Reds games in 2014 IN REDS TERRITORY! I can watch all 162 games involving the Houston Astros, though, if I bought MLB.TV. Thanks, MLB.TV. Good idea. At least, maybe, possibly, it will be fixed in the future. Like in 2018, once I’ve left Bloomington.

NFL broadcast maps from 506 Sports: Ever wonder what NFL games your local CBS and FOX stations are going to carry this week? Bookmark this site and check back a few days before the game. Then you can see if your stations are going to show an interesting game. If not, you can go ahead and make other plans for that Sunday time slot.