see more Epic Fails

The NYT has assembled an "Olympic Musical", with tones representing the differences between athletes for a variety of Olympic events. When they are racing one by one, it's hard to fully appreciate how close some of these are, especially the sliding events (luge, skeleton, bobsleigh) where these differences are after 4 runs.

Listen here.

Interview with a six year old.

In early 1995, one of the great (if not the greatest of) comic strips was retired when Bill Watterson pulled the plug on Calvin and Hobbes.

His first interview since 1989.

I'm no stamp collector, but I would like to have a Calvin and Hobbes stamp.

It's National Signing Day, the day when my mood is directly affected by the whims of a bunch of high school kids. It's probably not a good sign to put that much stock in the actions of hyper-athletic youngsters.

Revenge through Facebook. (Could be NSFW, due to naughty words in print ... and laughter.)

This isn't the type of thing I would have ever expected to say, but I'm glad I'm not running the Goofy Challenge this year. It's going to be even colder than when I first did it in 2006. Low of 1 the night before the Half, high of 3 with AM showers that day, low of -2 the night before the Full, and a high of 8. I don't think people go to Florida to race expecting those temps.

Good luck to everyone taking part. Dress warm.

I'm at work, and as you can imagine, there's not a lot going on here today. However, I am (amazingly) getting some stuff done, but that stuff requires running programs that take 5-30 minutes to finish before I can check results and edit and re-run (or compile the results and be finished). So I need some entertainment. Blogs, Youtube, anything that will fill a few minutes and won't get me fired.

Please. I'm begging you.

I dare you.

Borrowed from an ESPN column, as an email exchange between ESPN's Bill Simmons and author Malcolm Gladwell. I give a lot of weight to this theory. (But if you've ever seen me give the TV the finger whenever Gary Bettman is on-screen, you'd probably have guessed this.)

SIMMONS

Speaking of crazy theories, what about the idea that Stern planted Bettman in the NHL knowing he would screw the league up? Follow this timeline.

Fall 1992: Stern sees the NHL coming on strong: Gretzky in Los Angeles; a potential Lemieux/Jagr dynasty in Pittsburgh; Lindros looming in Philly, Messier leading the Rangers back to prominence; three other potential superstars (Alex Mogilny, Pavel Bure and Steve Yzerman); and four major markets (Detroit, Boston, Montreal and Chicago) contending for the Cup. Well, he has to sabotage this immediately. When the NHL owners come to him for a recommendation, he pushes his assistant Bettman on them. It's like Michael Corleone convincing Moe Greene to let Fredo run his casinos. No, really, he'll be great!

Feb 1, 1993: Bettman takes over. At this point, he is saying all the right things and not hinting at his desire to overexpand, lower the number of Canadian teams and effectively destroy the soul of the league.

June 1994: The league finishes its greatest 18-month run ever -- Montreal beating Gretzky's Kings in the '93 finals, then the Rangers ending a 54-year drought by winning the '94 Cup -- and if that's not enough, Jordan "retires" (sorry, I have to use quotes) and baseball has its damaging strike. Sports Illustrated cements hockey's coming-on-strong status with its memorable "WHY THE NHL'S HOT AND THE NBA'S NOT" cover. Even in video games, the NHL was crushing it: That year, "NHL '94" became the single biggest time-waster other than the O.J. trial. There was no cooler/hipper/hotter sport.

Looking back, how can you screw that up? Bettman did it. Forget about all the other reasons the NHL fell off a cliff for 12 years (only recently have there been signs of life) and concentrate on this one: The league had 24 teams when Bettman took over, including eight in Canada. Now they have a whopping 30 teams, including more warm-weather American teams (L.A., Phoenix, Nashville, Carolina, Tampa, Florida, Atlanta, Anaheim) than Canadian teams (only six). Here's Canada, the country that loves hockey more than anyone loves anything … and it only represents 20 percent of the National Hockey League. This is the single dumbest true fact in sports right now. And it happened on Bettman's watch.

GLADWELL

It's incredible, isn't it? What I don't understand is how a country that is obsessed with hockey and supplies the lion's share of players and diehard fans to the NHL allows its national sport to be run by an American working out of New York City. It's as if the Super Bowl were moved, permanently, to Winnipeg. I think the Canadian teams should simply secede from the league and start over. And we'd take any northern American teams that wanted to come as well, particularly those in the upper Midwest and greater Ohio Valley which, if you'll remember your War of 1812 history correctly, is an area that really ought to belong to Canada anyway. But maybe that argument is best left for another time.

Thanks everybody for your kind thoughts, etc. yesterday. I'm in fine shape, just some minor surface injuries, and the swelling/bruising is already going down. I'll be back out in full force tomorrow.

Now, who would be willing to pay $5 for me to take part in a Polar Bear Dip in Lake Ontario on January 1? The pool's closed, so I need to get in my swim somehow. (All donations go to charity, which doesn't include the Testicular Retraction Foundation.)

I had my first spill on the bike in probably 7-8 years this morning. Nothing serious, just washed out the back wheel in a corner. With the weather hovering around freezing and the sun not quite up yet, there can be a frozen sheen in some less-traveled areas. I wasn't gong fast, so the impact was just me hitting the ground. Skidding was kept to a minimum. The cars around me at the time were nice enough to drive around me. No one stopped to see if I was OK. (Aside: I stopped to give a guy in a car directions this morning. And the comments section of every cycling article in the Star is filled with what assholes bike riders are.) A little bit of road rash on my elbow and knee (more on the jacket), and my hip is tightening up now that I've stopped moving. I can use this an excuse to get up and walk around every 30 minutes or so.

Zombie-rock:

4x4 makes you go, and is very helpful in adverse conditions, but it does nothing to help you stop. Just because you can get your car up to 60 in the muck doesn't mean you should drive it, because you might not be able to stop.

In related news, at least 50% of Toronto drivers shouldn't be allowed behind the wheel of a motor vehicle in anything less than ideal conditions.

Interesting article on Starbucks' attempts at being like ninjas.

Maybe the reason it's not working is that the coffee still sucks.

If you want to meet one of Canada's most successful Olympic athletes (one Gold, one Silver), head to Gears in Mississauga tonight.

( Too big picture )