Posted inSports

Spain deserved to win the World Cup. Pleasingly, Trump hates Spain.

It took several hours of dedicated concentration, keeping the focus on a clear goal, not being distracted by extraneous goings-on. I could be speaking about the Spain soccer team's marvelous 1-0 win over Argentina in the World Cup final today, but actually I'm referring to me. Because I exhibited world-class television-watching discipline in how I managed to leave our house at 12:30 pm, half an hour after the final started, returned home at about 3 pm, and managed to watch all of the recording I'd made of the World Cup final (except the halftime show) without learning the outcome. Didn't…
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Posted inSports

Today I became a soccer fan. Thank you World Cup!

I had a breakthrough in my soccer watching today. My habitual joke -- which isn't really a joke because it's been true -- is that the only way I can watch soccer is record the match, then fast forward at triple or quadruple speed until I see the score has changed, then go back a minute or two to see how the goal was scored. Something changed today. I started watching my recording of the England vs. Norway World Cup quarterfinal match and didn't feel an urge to fast forward. Yes, I did press the 30 second advance button a…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Salem

Mention of possible Salem data center on Facebook stirs up fears

While lots of people, me definitely included, find AI models like Claude (my new cyber friend) really helpful and interesting, the data centers that make AI possible are viewed with considerably more skepticism. For good reason. Data centers typically consume huge amounts of electricity, need lots of water to cool the massive amount of computer servers, make plenty of noise, and in general have become a flashpoint for communities who don't want them to harm the quality of life of residents. So it wasn't surprising that a post today on the Salem City Council Forum Facebook page stimulated numerous concerned…
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