Something to Crow About

Last night Subrata and I played ultimate frisbee. Our respective legs had pretty much recovered from their various pulls last week. We each took more care not to hurt them again. I actually did get a little twinge while I was doing a warm-up run, and by the end of the evening both of them were mildly sore, but neither was anywhere near as bad as last week, and I played the whole evening without much trouble. I think Subrata had a similar experience.

I'm definitely having a better season on the field this year than last. I'm doing better at making cuts, and I made my first deep cut into the end zone last night. Alas, I managed to drop the frisbee, I think because it was a really long point and I was already looking forward to a rest on the sideline. Concentration is key!

Happily, things worked out later, as I made another dash in the end zone on a later point and someone threw me a long hammer (an overhand throw which results in the disc coming at you upside-down; it's a bit trickier to catch). One of the defense was covering me, but I realized that either he'd bat the disc away or he wouldn't, and that there wasn't much I could do about that, so I focused on catching the disc as it was coming in. Happily, he timed his leap a little early and missed the disc, and I made the catch. Woo-hoo!

My endurance is still not the greatest, but I can motor around for a good while before being completely exhausted. I'm definitely getting in better shape.

Also, after a game each team has to come up with a cheer for the other, and I contributed our second cheer last night, so hopefully I'll be off the hook there for a while.

And to top it off, I was only somewhat sore this morning, and definitely not like I was two weeks ago. So my body must be adjusting to this running around.

Also on the game front, you may remember that on Friday John and I played some pool on the table in John's building at work. This afternoon, Tom and I (and our boss, Stan) were over in his neck of the woods for a meeting, and Tom and I gave the pool table a whirl. I tried out a few things I'd noticed John doing on Friday, such as a different "bridge" (the way I hold the hand which steadies the cue), and putting a little spin on the cue ball. Sure, this probably sounds terribly elementary to someone who plays pool, but I've never played pool with any regularity.

For whatever reason, I did quite well against Tom. John came by as the game was nearing its end (I had one ball left, Tom had five), and Tom turned his position over to me. I won that game, and John challenged me to a full rematch. He offered to handicap himself, but I declined, figuring I might as well practice in a "real" scenario.

Surprisingly, I did very well against John, and won the game by a respectable margin. To be fair, I had a much-better-than-expected game, and John's game seemed considerably off from Friday (just bad luck, probably). Still, it was a very unexpected triumph, and those always feel good!

Of course, we weren't playing a particularly competitive game. John gave me several pointers which helped, such as adjusting my grip on the cue for better accuracy (I'm not entirely sure it helped, but I'm also not sure how to analyze that element in isolation), and how to make a shot on a ball which is right against the edge of the table (aim the cue ball so it hits both the wall and the ball at the same time, thus sending the ball straight down the edge into the pocket). I actually had a lot of success with that shot: After making such a shot from a fairly short distance, I managed to make another (much to my own surprise!) from more than halfway across the board.

Yes, I'm insufferably pleased with myself. I doubt I'll see success like that again for a while.

(And I full expect to get some snarky comment from John about this, probably chastising me for my terminology.)

The actual work part of work has also been going well this week.

Two weeks ago I checked in and submitted to our build a whole bunch of substantial changes to our system, and once we actually got them to build, they've actually worked quite well, as far as I can tell. No actual bugs in the code have yet been reported to me.

The fallout from this has actually mainly been people coming to me with bugs which look like they're in my code (or, at least, in my area of responsibility). Though there have been some genuine problems at times, the actual changes I submitted have not (so far) been responsible. Woo-hoo!

I spent much of today chasing such problems down, which actually turned out to be pretty rewarding: I managed to identify a pretty well hidden bug, and constructed a work-around for it. And I fixed another bug, and helped a couple of people with problems which were blocking them. That's always a good feeling.

Moreover, my main project is humming along pretty smoothly this week. I checked in a chunk of it yesterday, and I think I've gotten a substantial portion of the rest nearly ready today. We have a deadline coming up, and I think I ought to be able to meet it.

As you've no doubt heard, George W. Bush has been certified the winner of Florida in the Presidential election, and if that ruling holds, then he will be our next President.

Here's my reasoning about the election: Statistically speaking, nobody won.

Nobody won the Presidency. The margin of victory - either in Florida or in the nationwide popular election - is almost certainly smaller than the margin of error given our archaic voting mechanisms and counting systems. We'll never know who truly received the most votes, no matter what interpretation of the laws were to be upheld.

Nobody won control of the Senate. The Senate (barring a Gore Presidential victory, in which Lieberman would step up into the Vice Presidency and would be replaced by a Republican appointee) is split 50-50, and Democrats are pushing for fully shared power between the two parties, and through use of a filibuster may well be able to get it.

The Republicans won narrow control of the House, but it's so narrow that it will be hard to get things done there.

Moreover, the Democrats will be able to use the added leverage of the votes that went for Nader to help stave off a conservative agenda. (After all, it's not like anyone else can use that leverage.)

Although the law clearly will result in an actual Presidential victor, both the legislative and executive branches of the federal government will be so conflicted that it will be hard for anything to get done (though I do expect some movement on Social Security). Which all-in-all is certainly much better than a runaway Republican victory.

And on top of that, a few economists are apparently starting to worry that the country is heading for a recession, or at least that the economy is slowing enough that the Federal Reserve Board will lower interest rates next month (good news for us prospective home buyers).

So take heart, Democrats! A Bush victory could result in a weak President presiding over a conflicted Congress, and ripe to be pummeled into the ground in four years.

And that would be something to crow about.