Tiny Tower

May 16, 2012

Seattle Mariners Successfully Play Entire Baseball Game

And that is an achievement.

Please Don't Call It "Ping-Pong"
by Michael Weinreb on Grantland

Confidence often stems from repetition, from practicing the same shots over and over again, and this is the reason the Chinese have an edge, says USA Table Tennis high-performance director Doru Gheorghe: "It's not easy to learn. It's boring." In China, children who show promise are pulled from phys-ed classes at a young age and shipped off to academies. In America, no child wants to learn Ping-Pong that way, largely because the game has no serious cultural currency other than as a social tool. There are exceptions in every generation, like Reed and like Landers, but what's the point of spending meticulous hours indoors among adult coaches, getting really good at something that, compared to other more potentially lucrative activities, will never pay off?

And so the gulf between the Americans and the Chinese, Gheorghe says, "is like the Atlantic Ocean." All weekend long, the American women struggled with a Chinese Canadian immigrant named Chris Xu, who was 25 years their senior. Xu played a style known as "chopping," a defensive tactic meant to capitalize on the impatience of the gang of American teenagers. The most promising American, Ariel Hsing, wrote the words "4 Steps" on her arm so she'd remember to take extra time (she normally takes three steps) before her returns — eventually, exhausted and frustrated, she eked out a victory and won an Olympic spot. This was all she'd hoped for; the odds of her actually medaling in London are astronomical.

The Proxy Marriage

by Malie Meloy on New Yorker

Fiction about young people who stand in as "Proxies" for other people's marriages.  Simple, heartbreaking, and sweet.

Neon Trees - Everybody Talks

I don't know why this song doesn't have more traction.  Seems like a catchy, summery song to me.  I think the video is fun, but you could describe it as creepy too.

The Comedian Comedians Were Affraid Of

Profile of Patrice O'Neal

He next bestows his approval on a black man’s date: Congratulations to you, my friend! he says. Look at that white woman you’re with! He invites the audience to consider this fine specimen: Black women get mad at that. But that is top-shelf white woman right there. He’s arranging and rearranging members of the audience on various sides of an argument that they don’t quite know they’re in yet.

You know how you tell how pretty a white woman is? The value? he asks. You look at her and then wonder how long they would look for her if she was missing. He points to the evidence already at hand: C’mon, take a look. Take a look! Look at this! Look! Everyone is laughing, but you can hear uneasiness. He appeases it by enlisting a black woman to exploit the prejudices he’s now juggling. I saw you look mad, sweetie, he says as if he’s talking only to her. If you was missing, how long you think they would look? He reports back to the crowd, mimicking her mournful shrug. He lets the sorry truth land: White woman’s life is valuable. He then asks the audience to help him remember the point he was originally getting at: What’s his name Joran van der Sloot? We find out he was a serial kill man, he kills women, that’s what he do, he says. What’s the girl in Aruba?

Natalee Holloway! people shout out.

But the one he just killed the girl in Peru, what’s her name?

Silence.

Exactly! he says. The audience cracks up and breaks into applause, simultaneously chagrined and excited to have sprung that trap he’s set for them.

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