The reason for the season

Happy Reformation Day!

What comes after "expert"?

What's up now, sudoku?

After this monumental achievement, I went outside with Pete and cleaned out the whole garage. Not bad for a Sunday afternoon. Of course, a nap would probably have been nice as well.

Whose kids are they?

This article should scare you. It scares me.

What would you do if three armed Sheriff's deputies showed up at your door, demanding that you surrender your six week old child because of a court order that opposes your sincerely held religious beliefs? What if they held him in their custody for six days, and your only recourse was to compromise on your beliefs? What if some enraged judge ruled that he was to be placed in foster care, not because he was in immediate danger (as the law requires), but because she disagreed with your religious beliefs and thought that *she* knew what was best for your own child?

This nightmare scenario played out this week in Omaha for Josue and Maray Anaya and their six week old son, Joel. Their offense, which apparently warranted having their child forcefully taken from their custody by agents of the state, was to refuse to submit their newborn son to the state's mandatory Newborn Screening program. The screening program detects a variety of genetic disorders and requires blood to be drawn from the baby. The Anayas' religious beliefs include a literal interpretation of certain Old Testament passages that state that the "life" of a person is in their blood. Acting according to their beliefs, the Anayas refused to submit their son to the state mandated testing.

This was, at least according to one judge, enough of an "offense" to have their baby taken from them. Furthermore, thanks to grandstanding and agenda-driven actions by Douglas County Juvenile Court Judge Elizabeth Crnkovich, it was enough to keep him away from his family for nearly a week. Continue reading this post »

Welcome back

Holy cow, this is good news:

Osborne named interim athletic director

The Huskers post

It was great to see Tom Osborne lead the 1997 team out onto the field in a sort of modified tunnel walk. We were in row 53 in the north endzone, so they came out just to our right. What a strange mixture of "wow, this is awesome" and "holy cow, why can't that guy still lead this program.

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Having TO and the '97 guys there was exactly what Callahan needed. Something to give his Lazarus-like team its own personal resurrection. When the 2007 Huskers met up with the 1997 Huskers on the sideline, several old players tackled, shoved, headbutted, and otherwise assaulted current players. If a flying headbutt from a helmetless Jason Peter isn't enough to get you to play your best, you probably don't have a soul.

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Having TO and the '97 guys there was exactly what Callahan didn't need. What a glaring contrast between the pathetic, lifeless play from the current team and the fiery, passionate athletes on that championship team. I get it that not every team is going to be capable of winning a national championship every year, but do you remember what those mid-nineties defenses were like? If not, here's a small reminder. Guys flying to the ball. Five and six guys around the ball on every play. Big hits. Fist pumping and chest beating after *real* big plays. When was the last time anyone on either side of the ball made a big play this season? The last thing ol' Billy C. needs right now is a reminder of how things used to be.

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Speaking of how things used to be, can you imagine what it was like for those '97 guys to watch the first half of the OSU game? The best way I can put it is like this. Imagine you've been hired on as the caretaker for the state capitol. It is, by far, the most recognizable building in the state. It is grand and glorious, and it has been there for a long time. You spend blood, sweat, and tears working on it, restoring it, maintaining it, so that it can continue to be respected as the landmark that it is. Nebraskans throughout the state couldn't be more proud of the condition of the building. After four years of pouring everything you have into making it the best that it can be, you leave for ten years. When you return, all you find is a smoldering heap of ashes. You ask somebody what happened. They tell you that everything you worked on, built, and fixed while you were here had been torn out so they could install a meth lab… something about not wanting it to be a mediocre building, wave of the future, and so on. Now the meth lab has exploded and burned down the entire structure. Nothing is left. It has all been destroyed by the "high octane" experiment that was supposed to save it.

That is, as best as I can tell, what those guys must be feeling like.

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There were kids there on Saturday who were watching their first live Husker game. I hope their dads had a long, serious talk with them on the way home explaining what their kids had seen.

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Don't tell me that it's "only football." It's tradition. It's history. It's having pride in something that took a long time and a lot of hard work to build. It's still being proud to be a Husker fan even when you feel betrayed by the people entrusted with leading *your* team.

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Don't miss this point. Nebraska football hasn't always been about winning. "Not the victory but the action. Not the goal but the game. In the deed the glory." That's written somewhere on that old stadium, probably underneath one of the new skyboxes.

Husker football has always been about character, loyalty, hard work, and trust. Pursuing these virtues in the game of football will lead to success, as it should. But, it's never been *just* about winning. That is, until Pederson came in and told us that it was going to be about winning¹ Pederson said, "Trust me. I know what I'm doing. We *have to* tear down everything in order to be able to win again. I know it's going to be hard to see the tradition, the continuity, the history all left behind. Just trust me… it'll all be worth it." Until now there have been two factions; one who believes that it wasn't worth it, no matter how many games we'd eventually win, and another who bought it, said they'd play along, and anxiously waited for the victories and championships to roll in.

Pederson and Callahan have finally reunified Husker football fans, but probably not in the way that they wanted to. Nobody trusts the leadership of this program. You guys told us it was going to be about winning. If that's the game you want to play, I'd recommend polishing up the ol' resume.

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When you bring in a pro-style coach who installs a pro-style offense so that kids who want to go to the pros will come to your school, what do you end up with? Some sort of weird, pseudo-symbiotic deal where the coaches are using the players to get them victories so they can keep their jobs and players are using coaches so they can end up in the NFL. Who do you play for? I play for myself so that hopefully I can get into the NFL and make some real money. Who do you coach for? I coach for myself so that hopefully I can win enough to keep the big paychecks coming.

Kids never walked on at Nebraska so that they might eventually get a high draft slot and big paycheck. They played for Nebraska for the glory of playing for Nebraska. Sure, bunches of them ended up in the NFL because they were that good, but it wasn't as if Nebraska was just a stepping stone for them on the way to where they really wanted to be.

What we have now more closely resembles a prostitution ring where our players are willing to sell themselves to the program in exchange for a scholarship and a shot at The League. We put 11 individuals on the field who have no common goals, no common purpose. Nobody plays "for Nebraska" anymore. Nobody.

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When you're at the games, no matter how bad it gets you only have two options. 1. Cheer for your team no matter how poorly they are playing. It couldn't hurt. 2. Shut up. Nobody needs to hear your profanity-laced exclamations about who should be fired and how soon. And, for the love of all that is good, don't boo your own team. That's just not acceptable.

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I don't know how much more proof a guy needs to see before he realizes that what we have here is inherently broken and beyond repair. If Mizzou wasn't enough, OSU definitely was. I'm not convinced that we can clean house from the AD on down, especially after the extensions that Steve and Bill gave themselves earlier this year. Something needs to be done to appease the fans, whether that's firing Cosgrove (today?), firing nearly all of the assistants, or whatever it is. I'd like to see the whole thing rebuilt from the AD on down, but I'm not sure how realistic that is. Still, if we languish through the next five games like we have the last five, it will be absolutely unbearable.

Outsourcing

Come on. Is it really that much worse than our current system?

Filled with da Spirit

Jared is right. This is funny!

"And friends are friends fa-eva… and friends are friends fa-eva…"

Word.

HD fans

This is absolutely incredible:

Of course, if our country's sports were as boring as soccer, we'd probably have to come up with something like this to keep us busy.

2 years old

It occurred to me this morning that when you are turning two years old, the term "birthday spankings" takes on a whole new meaning.

Happy birthday, Else!

Drip… drip… drip…

This morning's downpour got me thinking about a physics professor I had in high school who argued you get just as wet running through the rain as you would at a comfortable walk, except that the former might cause you to get out of breath and/or look silly running around in the rain. Here's how the theory goes, if I remember it correctly.

Consider two people, Walker and Runner, who both have to travel 100 meters through a rain shower falling at a constant rate all along the course. Runner sets out at a dead-on sprint, while Walker takes his time. If the rain is falling at a constant rate it should be thought of as an aqueous medium (i.e. x number of drops per cubic meter) rather than as individual drops. Even though Runner passes through the medium more quickly, he will still pass through the same amount of water as Walker will. Thus, neither of them is "wetter" than the other when they reach their destination.

If you're having trouble keeping up, think of it as driving in the rain on the highway vs. your residential street. You need your wipers on "high" at 60 mph, but only on "intermittent" in your neighborhood, right? Even though the rain is falling at the same rate, you encounter more drops-per-second at higher speeds. Similarly, if you are sprinting through the rain you will run into just as much rain (maybe even more?) as you will if you would just walk.

So far, so good.

However, you may have noticed that when you come in out of the rain your hair is wet, along with the front of your body. The afore mentioned theory accounts for all of the rain you run into, but not that which lands on the top of your head. Even if you're standing still, the raindrops will continue to amass on top of your head at a constant rate.

So, if we really want to know how wet Walker and Runner get, we need to know how long their heads were in the rain.

Let's assume that each of our travelers passes through a gallon of water (for the sake of round numbers) between point A and point B, regardless of their speed. Let's also assume that the rain is falling at a rate of .1 gallons per second per square foot of vertically exposed surface area (i.e. the top of your head). If it takes Runner 10 seconds to get there, he will have received one gallon of rain on top of his head, for a total of 2 gallons on his person. If Walker takes his time and clocks in at 50 seconds, 5 gallons of rain will have fallen on top of his head. Add that to the gallon he "ran into" and his total is 6 gallons of rain.

Since 6 is more than 2, we can conclude that a person does in fact get more wet by walking through the rain than running. Of course, it is worth mentioning that you can reach a point at which you are as "soaked" as you're going to get. In cases such as this, my advice would be to bring along an umbrella.