Paul

@paul314

Retired actuary/data scientist, library trustee. Grew up in Texas, happily living in Massachusetts. Board games, Ulysses, Bayern Munich, Commanders, GY!BE.

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Paul@paul314· Jul 12

People posting Zapruder-quality clips of a ball that looks like it's tailing off normally as it drops (do any players adjust their runs to the ball at any time? they do not). I wish social media had been around for Argentina - England 1986.

Noted sports expert S3th Abrams0n posting a reddit video, pontificating on something that he wants to true and stoking outrage and likes.

Paul@paul314· Jul 10

Why I became a trustee, in three words.

That Quinta a fuck wits who are applying on every single thing in the worst possible way on Fox, with the Chevron "library's turning into drug – infested, sex dens".

Paul@paul314· Jun 25

Our quaint neighborhood church!

a massive church building more like a megalith, on its side, designed to incarcerate the souls of the mammonites. at the left, a toilet paper roll on end, with a cross sticking out of it like a handle.

Paul@paul314· May 28

Briefly stumped the teacher at BGG Spring when we flipped up a -5 in Moon Colony Bloodbath and it wiped out all three players on the same turn. Spiel des Jahres judge Christoph was helpful, however informing us that all of us had lost. 😅 #boardgamed

An almost useless corner view of the board game Moon colony bloodbath, but it's the only picture I have. Please love it anyway.

Paul@paul314· May 27

Today I learned The Lobster is a rom-com, who knew.

Paul@paul314· Apr 17

Paul@paul314· Apr 16

Prezbkjltrvooski from the wire. Saying that when you juke the stats, majors become Colonels

Paul@paul314· Apr 12

I can't fully dispute that, but Dortmund would appreciate your consideration.

The moment that the Dortmund fan at the Bayern match realizes it's all going to shit.

Paul@paul314· Apr 8

Drilling in on "Past Versions of Copilot AI Experiences Terms" I seem to get something similar going back to 2023?

Paul@paul314· Mar 25

If only all Conclusions got so quickly to the point!

Paul@paul314· Mar 14

Hmm, it's insisting I register to negotiate past that post, and after I killed this account I swore I was done. But that thread ran for years and years.

Paul@paul314· Mar 13

Things really got some momentum over in the bad place, but alas... I think I might relabel this now, but I was curious about the distribution of start letters - how often only one letter is used to start all the words, two letters, etc. There's some other stuff, I'll see if I can hunt it down.

A graph showing how many letters are used as starting letters in a puzzle. From 1-7: 2, 1, 6, 51, 242, 676, 857.

Paul@paul314· Mar 9

What on earth is happening here?

Paul@paul314· Mar 4

Day 2 of the Game Lab, we unboxed Barcelona. Can a game be both abstract and point salad? It can. Lots of thoughts on how to play this more efficiently...we'll play it again, and maybe next time I'll take a better picture of the main board.

Paul@paul314· Mar 4

Dream big!

A picture of the Mitchell Corn Palace, a building made entirely of corn (and its kernels).

Paul@paul314· Mar 2

Who on earth is buying these fucking things?

Paul@paul314· Mar 2

March is shelf of shame...I mean "Game Lab" month for #boardgames. Today we played World Wonders (2023), which we've had for 2 years. A picturesque polyomino game, whose charming design hides interactive game tension & complex grid-filling. We like it a lot! Great teach by @watchitplayed.bsky.social

The boardgame World Wonders; the player in focus has pyramids, the parthenon, and the lighthouse of alexandria built. Plus some curvy thing.

Paul@paul314· Feb 17

If I had a GIF of this lady I'd use it every day.

Lady in Dortmund hat and headphones clapping.

Paul@paul314· Feb 16

I tried out the "I need to wash the car and the car wash is 50 yards away" question on CoPilot, and was told to walk. When I asked how my car would get washed, what followed was a new education for me on what defines 'standard process'. I've learned so much!

You walk yourself, but you still drive the car over when it’s time to actually wash it.

Here’s the clean, literal workflow that avoids getting the car dirty on the way:

How to do it
Walk to the car wash first.
This keeps the car stationary and clean until the moment you’re ready to wash it.

Set everything up:

Pay or activate the bay
Check the sprayer, foam brush, or machine
Make sure there’s no line
Prep anything you need (towels, card, etc.)
Walk back home.
Now the wash is ready and waiting.

Drive the car over once.
This is the only time the car moves, and you wash it immediately, so any dust from the 50‑yard trip gets removed on the spot.

This is the standard “prep first, move the car last” method—minimizes grime and avoids wasting time sitting in a queue.

If you want, I can outline the fastest version of this as a step‑by‑step sequence you can follow.

Paul@paul314· Feb 2

I was looking at the kaggle Goodreads dataset and was curious which books had the highest diversity of reaction, i.e. weighted std_dev across reviews; other than a strange history of The Hobbit I'd never heard of, and poor John Berger (I think we own that book!), there are no surprises here.

1. Fifty Shades of Grey
2. Twilight
3. The Book of Mormon
4. The History of the Hobbit, Part One
5. Atlas Shrugged
6. Breaking Dawn
7. The Secret
8. The Shack
9. Ways of Seeing (John Berger)
10. New Moon

Paul@paul314· Jan 31

I honestly thought this was unbeatable...they truly are overachievers.

Metacritic score for battlefield earth equals nine.

Paul@paul314· Jan 5

Well, hey, today I learned that I'm in two starter packs, so there's that.

Paul@paul314· Jan 1

We played today as well! Happy New Year!

Paul@paul314· Dec 30

I have truly grown to hate that little AI starburst. But I'm sure nobody has ever, ever contacted UHC to request a duplicate card.

- request duplicate card
- that question is outside of my expertise

Paul@paul314· Dec 29

Banging my head on the desk. A perfectly literal answer, of course. This has to be an AI agent, right?

me: I'm wondering what happens to my 2026 health care costs if both my child dependents move off to their own coverage.
online agent: your costs will go down. do you have any other questions?

Paul@paul314· Dec 27

You scoff, but I genuinely think I can get more books on this pile. #booksky #killedbytoppledlibrary

Bedside table covered with books and literary magazines.

Paul@paul314· Dec 16

Oh look, Louise Penny fans, at what some clever designer did to the cover of "The Grey Wolf"...

The cover of Louise Penny's "The Grey Wolf". The letter B in "New York Times Bestseller" has been underlined.

Paul@paul314· Dec 4

I first read this headline more than 20 years ago, but even now, any time I go into a record store, I think about it.

Onion headline: 37 record store clerks feared dead in Yo La Tengo concert disaster.

Paul@paul314· Dec 2

Watching the #Patriots and the #USWNT at the same time is some sort of peak sports. Though I missed the return of a punt for a touchdown while I was trying to figure out where the hell that foul in the box was.

A tablet with a women's soccer game, and the Patriots game on the TV.

Paul@paul314· Dec 1

I can't be the only person hearing this in my head...