Steve Fischer's Random Blog

Author: fish1964

  • Oversharing

    … is the default. Via xkcd.

    sharing_options

  • So Cold

    I was in Atlanta Tuesday for their horrible storm that they closed schools and government offices for. Horrible, it rained for about an hour. Bonus was that traffic was super light since everyone stayed home.

    But the last two days in the Midwest and Northeast were seriously cold. Reminding multiple people of this:

    cold_2x

    I grew up in Wisconsin and it was way colder. And get off my lawn…

  • Click the Clown

    If I were a Saints fan I’d probably still be fuming. There’s a local New Orleans Gumbo joint that is advertising Super Bowl catering. I just got an amusing email from them with NFL Commissioner Goodell:

    The Saints may have gotten #robbed, but you can still celebrate the game with us Cajun-style! Check out out our party packages available to order now.

     
    CLICK THE CLOWN BELOW TO PLACE YOUR SUPER BOWL ORDER NOW!

    Cajun style wings, yum…

  • Top Marginal Tax Rate

    I know, clickbait headline. Some interesting charts from Brad DeLong. It would appear that reducing the top marginal tax rate increases income inequality.  Go figure.

    6a00e551f080038834022ad3d52198200b

    This one is just interesting for historical reasons. Michael Dell (of Dell computers) was asked about a 70% top marginal tax rate at Davos a day or two ago and said, “where has that ever worked?”. The interviewer, to his credit, said “the United States?”. People forget that we had a 90% top rate during the extremely strong 50’s.

    6a00e551f080038834022ad3b5724c200d

     

  • Enter Sandman

    I’m so happy to be proven wrong. Mariano Rivera becomes the first person to be elected to the baseball Hall of Fame unanimously.  From his teammate Bernie Williams:

    When it comes to Mariano Rivera, I had the best seat in the house from center field watching him pitch.

    It was mind boggling to see him literally just mow down hitters. Mariano would cause more broken bats in one inning than most starters had in an entire game. If we had a lead in the ninth inning – the game was over. He achieved a level of consistency for such a long time, and that is very hard to do. You just don’t really see that in a reliever. That’s what made him so remarkable. Everyone in the stadium knew he was going to throw that cutter – and they still couldn’t hit it.

    The broken bats were amazing. I have never seen a pitcher break so many bats…

    And from Derek Jeter:

    1825a438-mariano_quote-card2

    There’s no “persona” with Mariano. He’s never had a character that he portrayed. He’s always just calmly and coolly done his thing. He’s quiet. Thoughtful. Intense. He’s a man of faith.

    He has an incredible eye for detail.

    Have you ever seen a Mariano Rivera autograph? Google it when you get a chance. With a lot of guys, their signatures are these quick little scribbles. But Mariano, man, if he’s signing something for you, he takes his time. He puts care into it, until he gets it just right — like with everything else he does. To me, right there … that’s Mo.

    And like I said: It was always the same thing on the mound. There wasn’t much mystery if you were facing Mariano Rivera. No smoke and mirrors — nothing to hide. The scouting report was the same every time. Mo knew he was going to throw that cutter. The guy at the plate knew he was going to throw that cutter. Fifty thousand plus at Yankee Stadium knew he was going to throw that cutter.

    And it wouldn’t matter.

    Because Mo wasn’t trying to trick you.

    And in the end, like it or not, he was just going to flat-out beat you.

     

  • Mo

    I’m a Yankee fan and Mariano Rivera is my favorite Yankee. He will get voted into the Hall of Fame tonight. He should get 100% of the votes but he probably won’t because baseball is weird. It doesn’t really matter, he was a hall of fame player and a hall of fame person.

    https://twitter.com/JimmyTraina/status/1087715706202931200

     

  • Zinkydoink

    Via SMBC, of course…

    Bonus: Every 'but is it art' conversation maps to this one.

  • Origami Risk Best and Brightest – Again

    Ho hum, Origami Risk was named one of the Best and Brightest companies in the nation to work for.

    Again.

    Three years in a row.

    But who’s counting…

    Bokeh silver and white Sparkling Lights Festive background with texture. Abstract Christmas twinkled bright defocused. Winter Card or invitation. Vector

  • Don’t Be Late

    I have zero military background but the “on time is five minutes late” rule makes total sense to me. I am rarely late and often early. Large meetings that routinely start 5 – 10 minutes late are my personal enemy. Large meetings are often a bad idea, but if there are 12 people on a call and you show up 5 minutes late you wasted a bunch of folks time.

    Seth Godin, typically, has a good take on people who are often late.

    They don’t want to be late. In fact, their good intentions are probably the reason that they are late. They might try one technique or another, and even apologize for being late, and yet it happens again.

    There is one reason and one amplifying factor.

    The amplifying factor is that when they’re late, people wait for them.

    You might notice that things that leave on time (commuter trains, airplanes, live TV shows etc) almost never have a crowd of people showing up five or ten minutes late cursing out the system. For those things, the things that are known to leave on time, they manage to show up. That’s because their good intentions are not welcome here.

    If the meeting starts at 10:00 start it at 10:00…

    (If you want the one reason, click the link)

  • No Señor

    As a Packer fan, the whole thing was fun to watch, but in Spanish it’s way better…

    https://twitter.com/barstooltweetss/status/1082119637221994499

    I especially like when he breaks into song towards the end.