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I am starting what I hope will become a regular blog theme – The Street Where They Lived. I have collected loads of information from census returns about the places where my ancestors lived. Sometimes I have the house number and street name and sometimes just the street name. Often in rural locations there is just the name of the hamlet or village.
I have a few old photographs in my own personal collection which I can post. And by using Street View I can see images of the locations as they are today. I will try to do some research about the street, hamlet or area and include this. in the post.
Look out for the first post coming soon. I hope you will enjoy reading this new theme and thanks for your continuing support.


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| 17.7°C Dublin
The Highway Agency is carrying out urgent safety investigations and repairs after a 15 foot-deep hole appeared on a central reservation on the M2.
The hole, between junctions 5 and 6 of the M2 near Sittingbourne in Kent, measured around 16ft (5m) by 6ft (2m) and was 15ft (4.5m) deep.
A spokesman said: "Our engineers are on site carrying out an investigation and this includes the cause of the hole."
Drivers were warned of delays of 15 minutes eastbound and 30 minutes westbound in the area while traffic heading to and from Dover should use the M20 instead.
A 10-mile section of the busy motorway has been closed in both directions. Lanes would reopen "as soon as it is safe to do so," the spokesman said.
Professor Stephen Glaister, director of the RAC foundation, said: "We already have the most congested road network in Europe and our motorways carry a third of all traffic. This will have a major impact on a main route in and out of the country.
"The surprise is that something on this scale hasn't happened before yet everyday our highways are literally being undermined by the rain. When the deluge finally stops we will be left with a huge repair bill on roads across the country."
Most areas in the UK susceptible to sinkholes are relatively small or are in upland rural locations. They have also been known to occur in areas including the Mendips, parts of Wales, and the northern Pennines including the Yorkshire Dales.
Old coalmine shafts in Yorkshire have been known as a cause of holes which could "theoretically" be the case in Kent but is it "more likely to be related" to the probable chalk or limestone make-up of the area along with the rainfall, according to Sarah Fray, director of Engineering and Technical Services at the Institution of Structural Engineers.
She described the M2 hole as "unpredictable" adding that "it could potentially not be visible when there was construction and water has been know to be a mobilising influence" to cause an underground cavity to collapse.
She said: "Chalk and limestone is alkaline and rainwater is acidic - if you put acidic water on it, it dissolves over a period of time which can happen over a millenia".
Areas of chalk can be susceptible to sink holes especially where it is covered by younger clay and sand deposits. Ms Fray said: "Then when you have a lot of rain, this can mobilise the soil".
Dr Vanessa Banks, of the British Geological Survey, said: "This process occurs over thousands of years. During this period the growing void in the chalk remains bridged by the overlying deposits until infiltrating water is sufficient to physically remove the finest particles into the underlying void, thereby destabilising the 'soil bridge' and ultimately resulting in total collapse of the 'soil bridge' into the void.
"If surface water drainage was finding its way into such a feature, as is likely in a motorway setting, this would increase the likelihood of collapse. "
Professor Amir Allani, professor of civil engineering at Greenwich University, said: "It may be due to the current rain and flooding underground has created the erosion which, in time, has facilitated the layers above the weak strata to collapse."
He noted that when the ground is weak "the lorries above that exert pressure to the road" adding: "When you do not have support of the ground anything can disturb that cavity."
Earlier this month a sinkhole measuring 30ft (9m) deep swallowed up a car after opening up on the driveway of a house in High Wycombe.Nobody was inside the VW Lupo when the ground on Main Road in Walter's Ash gave way. Firefighters said the hole was about 15ft (4.5m) diameter.
PA Media

subset: commoncrawl


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I need more text! The internet is withholding the texts I want to blog. And I know those texts are longing to be free.
Did you know the phrase "Information wants to be free" has its own Wikipedia entry?
The expression is first recorded as pronounced by Stewart Brand at the first Hackers' Conference in 1984, in the following context:Ah, but now that Andrew Breitbart is offering $100,000 for the full Journolist archive, the paradoxical desire of information can finally be fulfilled! It can be both free and expensive!
On the one hand information wants to be expensive, because it's so valuable. The right information in the right place just changes your life. On the other hand, information wants to be free, because the cost of getting it out is getting lower and lower all the time. So you have these two fighting against each other.


text:
IRAs, ESAs, & HSAs: Rates
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or Humboldt County.
Site Map
Provident Credit Union
Most of this site's content requires a browser capable of displaying frames.


text:
There's an old saying in marketing and public relations: When there's no news, do a survey, market report, or study. Despite this naysaying in the face of what is arguably over-used industry fluff and puff, ThoughtWorks would have us believe that its so-called "technology radar" tracker is still worth its salt.
The firm claims to have produced an "honest assessment of trends significantly impacting software development and business strategy" that developers should pay attention to.
Company CTO Dr. Rebecca Parsons and ThoughtWorks' technology advisory board member Neal Ford encourage companies to create their own radar, enabling (in theory) a more proactive approach to technology choices.
"Having a radar helps people think about which technologies they should investigate, when to be more or less aggressive about adoption, and allows for more intelligent decision making," said Ford.
The notable themes in this edition of Technology Radar include churn in the JavaScript world — JavaScript used to be a "condiment technology," says ThoughtWorks, and always used to augment other technologies. It has kept that role but expanded into its own platform with a staggering rate of change.
Also worth thinking about are microservices and the rise of the API. "We are seeing an incredible amount of interest in microservice architectures, as well as an emphasis on the importance of the API both within an organization and as a bridge to the outside world," said Parsons.
Also of note is Conway's Law — some companies are mired in siloed structures that add needless friction to engineering efforts, while more enlightened companies use team organization to drive the kinds of architectures they want. And finally, re-decentralization, where over 90% of the world's email moves through just 10 providers. Prompted in part by revelations about the U.S.'s stranglehold on Internet infrastructure, and a desire to maintain more individual and organizational control, ThoughtWorks sees a new trend in "re-decentralization" of both data and infrastructure.


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Hey there! Today we're having soup.
It's a simple tomato soup thickened with couscous, spiked with spices, dolloped with yogurt.
I'm going to level with you – the first bowl didn't wow me. It was too thin. The couscous seemed like an afterthought. The cumin and thyme competed with one another. So I left the pot on the counter to cool and went out to work on breaking in my new hiking boots (Machu Picchu, here I come!).
But a few hours later, I stuck a spoon in the now cold soup to see if maybe I had missed something. Wow! While it sat, the couscous did its thing. As it absorbed the liquid, it thickened the broth, it united the spices.
I should have known it would all come together. Yotam Ottolenghi wrote the recipe.
And, no, I didn't forget that it's the fourth night of Hanukkah. I have two brand new recipes for you to open as you light candles five and six. Here's a hint – neither of them is fried. (If, however, you can't wait and do want to fry, check out last year's sufganiyot.)
Tomato couscous soup
Adapted from Yotam Ottolengi's Plenty. I replaced the semolina with cooked couscous because I had some left over after making a tagine. If you don't want to make couscous separately, I suspect that you can add uncooked couscous during the last ten minutes of cooking (which is how the recipe directs you to add semolina).
Makes about 3 quarts
– 1 1/2 C cooked couscous (about 3/4 C uncooked)
– 1 medium onion
– 2 stalks celery
– 3 T olive oil
– 1 T cumin
– 2 t coriander
– 1 t thyme
– 1 1/2 t sweet paprika
– 2 T tomato paste
– 1 28-oz canned whole peeled tomatoes
– salt and pepper
– 7 C water
– 1 1/2 t sugar
– 1 lemon for juice
– Greek yogurt (optional)
Make couscous. I've had good luck with this method, or just follow the directions on the package. Or add uncooked couscous later.
Chop. Finely chop the onion and celery.
Sauté. Heat the olive oil in a medium pot (I used a 4-quart). Add the onion and celery, and sauté over medium heat until the onion is golden and soft, about 8 minutes. Stir in spices and tomato paste until incorporated.
Crush. Crush the tomatoes between your fingers into bite sized pieces and add to the pot. Stir and season with salt and pepper.
Simmer. Add the water and sugar and bring to a boil. Then turn the heat down and simmer uncovered for 20 minutes. Stir in the cooked (or uncooked) couscous and simmer for another 10 minutes. Cover the pot at this point if you opted for the uncooked couscous. The couscous will absorb some of the liquid, so don't worry if it starts out looking thin. If the soup gets too thick (more likely if you added uncooked couscous), add water until you get the right consistency.
Serve. Squeeze in the lemon juice and taste for salt and pepper again (I found the soup needed quite a bit of salt). Ladle into bowls and spoon some Greek yogurt on top. Sprinkle with cumin.


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Sunday, June 12, 2011
You have to make a choice
I'm of the opinion - the opinion - that if you're a fan of a team (let's say, for example, the Toronto Blue Jays), then you're a fan of a team Win or Lose. Win or fucking Lose.
Now, I'm not here to give anybody shit. I'm not your dad. But whoever said this would be easy? You know what's easy? Being a fan of, say, today's Boston Red Sox. They are built to win now. They have the financial resources to build a winner and spend the cash to fill the holes as Theo sees fit. Ownership has set that precedent; need an arm? Go get one. Short a power bat to fill the 6 hole? Who's available (statement not question).
So this is where the cynical fucks tell me to look at Rogers' balance sheet. Remind me of the resources that should be available then point to the stopgap options and roster fillers filling the major league bench.
And this may surprise you, but I'll tell you that you're right.
I'll also tell you to fucking get over it, because it is what it is and no amount of twitter bitching or otherwise is going to change any spending habits.
Me? I take comfort in seeing that The Plan put forward has been unwavering - build internally, throw big money at the draft (all indications are, 2011's should cost.... a lot), develop a homegrown roster of stars, and strike at free agency when the time is right.
Now is pretty clearly not yet that time. There have been setbacks - big ones with Travis Snider, Brett Cecil, and Kyle Drabek. Not all prospects will develop as hoped - whatever happened to the Adeiny Hechavarria hype machine? But that's what happens when you shoot for "ceiling" (as a scout might say). They aren't always going to hit.
But seems to me the squawking was never louder than during the Ricciardi era where safe reliable talent and big money free agent signings where the method to roster construction.
So take your pick. I know which route I prefer.
Back to the statement up top - it's easy to be a fan of today's Boston Red Sox. But it will be entirely more satisfying to be a fan of tomorrow's Toronto Blue Jays.
69 comments:
- The Asian Guy said...
that last line should be a slogan
- June 13, 2011 at 12:15 AM
Yes, it's easy to be a Boston Red Sox fan NOW, but it sure wasn't at the beginning of the season. Last year wasn't all fun either as half of the Red Sox went down with injuries. (I still loved the team and all its "band-aid" players -- Nava, McDonald, Lowrie, Cash, etc., even though some are back in AAA for good.) Still, I get your point. And you're right -- it will be satisfying when the Blue Jays eventually win and win big.
- June 13, 2011 at 10:48 AM
What about this collection of dopes makes you optimistic? What if all these young pitchers who look good awful turn out to be nothing?
The next generation is Stewart, Jenkins and McGuire and their stuff is universally seen as worse than Romero, Drabek and Morrow.
Halladay 9-3. Marcum 7-2. I'm tired of looking forward to the future (and I don't care that I doing what you said I shouldn't), this team sucks and is going to suck next year too.
- June 13, 2011 at 11:00 AM
- Tao of Stieb said...
Halladay wasn't staying (in any situation) and Marcum is a pitcher who has had arm and shoulder trouble who is about to turn 30. Stop fucking crying over yesterday's players.
- June 13, 2011 at 11:36 AM
- Jeff said...
I know the core faithful have been saying the same thing since Spring Training started.
Lose - Nix, Patterson, E5, Rivera.. even if you have to outright release them
Promote - Cooper, Lawrie (when healthy), Snider, Thames
You nailed it bang on. We're not going to win, so lose and lose often and give the kids the exposure needed to make them valuable moving forward.
I gave AA a C- grade earlier and it's falling by the week.
Nice post
- June 13, 2011 at 11:45 AM
Great FanGraphs blog up today about this topic, kinda.
- June 13, 2011 at 12:04 PM
Nice post Ack. Everyone needs to chill the fuck out. Jays are still not ready for prime time, but it's edging closer.
Advance request for the next Friday rock-out: Hold the Line, Toto.
- June 13, 2011 at 12:18 PM
Amen brother
- June 13, 2011 at 2:10 PM
What The Ack said.
Also, I haven't felt this okay about losing in a while.
- June 13, 2011 at 4:53 PM
- DawsonBergmann said...
While we're bitching about Halladay, why cant we just create a time machine and grab Babe Ruth and Cy Young? Fucking cheap ass fucks at rogers
Signed: Dipshit
- June 13, 2011 at 6:27 PM
- DaveC said...
Ack nailed it.
Jeff, I'm curious as to your methodology for giving AA a C- grade. He got Escobar for nothing, offloaded Vernon Wells' salary, and has been signing low-cost extensions with our core players (Bautista, Lind, etc). Some misses on the relief pitching side, but I think we're in great hands with him as GM.
- June 13, 2011 at 7:56 PM
God, Toronto sports fans are such pushovers. A real city would be pissed with all these loser teams, but golly gee willickers we're just thrilled to have a GM that says, by gosh, that we'll be good in 2015.
- June 13, 2011 at 9:07 PM
- Paul said...
Dumping Wells' salary only does the team good if Rogers re-invests the money in the team. Sure, they used some for Bautista, but there was enough left over to pay for some form of veteran pitcher to help out the youngsters.
Who's to say AA won't trade Bautista for some more precious prospects at the trade deadline?
- June 13, 2011 at 11:13 PM
- The Ack said...
I'm not usually one to criticize commenters, but Paul.... come the fuck on, man. I know you're being facetious (hoping?), because the suggestion that AA might be inclined to listen to prospect offers for Bautista is just a little bit ridiculous.
Who's to say Rogers isn't investing the Wells money in the team? Locking up JoBau + spending big in the draft (yes, remains to be seen....) is a pretty solid start, if you ask me.
- June 13, 2011 at 11:33 PM
Ahhh the mythical contention date. Every year it keeps getting pushed up and all the hardcores are lining up to wash the GM's balls. Farrel hadn't even filled out a lineup card yet and this blog was ready to put him in the Hall of Fame. Now we are getting shit for actually giving a fuck about the embarrassment that was last weekend when all the proprietors of this blog were tweeting about the carnival sideshow that was Mcoy pitching. That was more embarrassing than the beating at the hands of the RedSox.
You want to take the elitist high road TAO and tell people to stop bitching but it's okay for Drabek to act like a petulant fucking child without a word of admonishment from the fanboys. Give me a break.
- June 13, 2011 at 11:55 PM
- DaveC said...
Ahhh the old hysterical bleating anonymous commenters. Writing without a shred of reason or thought. You'll be looking for DJF, boys- you'll find more of your ilk in the comments section there.
If people are that upset with the team and the direction, they can go watch the Red Sox. I'll cheer for the Jays, and be there when they do get better.
Not worth getting worked up over three games in a 162 game season- we knew there'd be stretches like that with a young team. I'll leave the hysteria for the Sox and Yankees fans.
- June 14, 2011 at 12:34 AM
- bkblades said...
You want to take the elitist high road TAO and tell people to stop bitching but it's okay for Drabek to act like a petulant fucking child without a word of admonishment from the fanboys. Give me a break.
Let's ignore that Kyle Drabek is still a kid himself for a second, but where has any of these so-called "fanboys" on this site suggest to implicitly follow this team with nary a complaint or justified criticism?
Up to this point of the season, I've read countless number of snide articles and remarks about "The John Farrell Experience" being too reactionary and confusing. Yet, somehow, pre-season positive vibes about Farrell suggests that questioning him is forever impossible?
That during the course of a 162 game season, since a faction of Blue Jays fans aren't flipping water coolers around spewing bile of liquid hate at animals who vaguely look like Paul Beeston due to a single weekend series, their views on this team are suddenly invalid and inaccurate?
A team with much more baseball money and baseball talent at their disposal destroyed a team with less baseball financial might and less current talent. Funny how that works.
That's why there's a difference between the measured response and the "draining all of Lake Ontario to douse the fire I set on High Park that spells 'Blue Jays LAYOFFS'" approach in the giving-a-fuckery spectrum.
- June 14, 2011 at 1:12 AM
Yeah because calling yourself Dave C. on a blog is really putting yourself out there huh Dave? Yeah, let's all leave our social insurance numbers, home addresses, telephone numbers etc. just so Dave C. doesn't have to deal with, wait for it, anonymity on the internet.
- June 14, 2011 at 1:37 AM
- Paul said...
Rogers telling Jays fans that they'll spend the money when they get competitive is like me saying to my kids I'll stop at Walt Disney World if you see it from the 401. Eventually kids grow up and realize you've been bullshitting them for years.
- June 14, 2011 at 4:17 AM
- Paul said...
@Ack. You have obviously never worked for a company that is controlled by bean counters. If Rogers determined that they could make more money by trading Bautista than keeping him, they would do it in a heartbeat. Not saying it's likely, but definitely a possibility.
If the Jays are 15 games out at the trade deadline and no one is watching on TV, anything is possible.
- June 14, 2011 at 7:29 AM
- The Ack said...
@ Paul.... "You have obviously never worked for a company that is controlled by bean counters.
Well my friend, I spent a lot of years of my life and four harrowing days writing a brutal exam to become just that, so I think I know how the gig works.
Trading Bautista for prospects in the first few years of this contract is inconceivable. At the back end? Sure, maybe. But now in his prime? No chance. That's just silly.
- June 14, 2011 at 9:47 AM
- The Ack said...
Here's my underlying point to all this:
If following this team, cheering for this team, causes you so much grief and consternation and you wake up every day hating the Jays and it's ruining baseball for you and making life miserable..... just fucking stop watching and get off Twitter and tune out.
I mean, what's the point?
- June 14, 2011 at 9:50 AM
re: anon above, you're totally right, Jays fans are such pushovers. We should definitely be hard-nosed, passionate baseball fans like the ones that cheer for the Cubs or Mets. That'll really get ownership to spend money and bring in championships.
- June 14, 2011 at 10:09 AM
- Paul said...
Here's my take on the team.
As stated in the article, there is ZERO chance of Rogers spending enough money to compete salary-wise with the big boys. Like it or not, complain all you want, it's just a fact.
Rogers owns the Bluejays, and every other entity in their empire for one reason and one reason only, to make money. That's not a bad thing. I have no problem with companies making money. We live in a free society and Rogers can make as much as they can.
So our only hope as a Jays fan is to wait for a time where a bunch of prospects peak at the major league level at the same time, but before they demand too much money, in which case Rogers peels them off the payroll for the next wave of prospects. Not much to hope for us as fans I'd say, and I have every right to complain about it.
You sound so high and mighty swearing at your readers and telling them they're not REAL fans if they don't drink the company Kool-aid. In reality, you just sound childish.
- June 14, 2011 at 10:25 AM
- The Ack said...
Right Paul, because as the contract extensions given to Bautista, Romero, Lind - and even the recent "unsuccesful" spending on Hill and Rios show, Rogers won't pony up the dollars to keep homegrown players in the fold.
And I guess being amongst the biggest spenders in the draft these last few years shows there's no commitment to spending to win either.
You talk about me being a fanboy and drinking the company kool-aid or whatever, and that's your prerogative. But when did anyone get the idea by looking at the opening day roster the Jays would be contenders this season?
Everyone was on board with the rebuild and acknowledged it would take, you know, more than one or two seasons to do properly.... until it actually does take more than one or two seasons, and people start losing it and stomping their feet about how they're sick of all the losing.
That's not childish? Or at the very least, maybe just a little short-sighted?
I'm sorry if you're offended. But I'm offended by everyone going off the rails when in reality, nothing should have changed with regards to expectations from opening day. And if you expected this club to see the post-season in 2011... well, I don't know what else to tell you.
- June 14, 2011 at 10:43 AM
- Tao of Stieb said...
I love that this is happening. How convenient that it's right after Boston left town.
All the cynics who can't wait to be the first off the bandwagon, calling out the fans for their naiveté...it's such an easy stance, and it's twice as dumb as people think.
Here's the point: Competing is fucking HARD. And you don't do it by filling your roster with a bunch of mediocre $5 million players. What the Jays have done and are doing is creating a critical mass of prospects that are either going to allow them to trade for legitimate stars at the end of deals or develop those prospects into contributors in their first 5 seasons.
Stomping our feet and demanding that Rogers go out and spend $140 million on the big league payroll is JUST FUCKING STUPID. BEYOND STUPID.
Sure, Rogers could have gone out and shelled out big dollars to fill up the bullpen with Joaquin Benoit or Rafael Soriano...but how's that gambit working out?
And you know why Boston is kicking ass and taking names? Because they are a smart team that has developed enough talent internally (Rat Faced Prick Pedroia, Jed Lowrie, Youk, Ellsbury, Lester, Bucholz, Papelbon) to field a great team and to trade for the pieces that they need to put themselves over the top (Rizzo and Casey Kelly for Adrian Gonzalez).
Yes, they have money, but they spend it pretty wisely...And that's the whole point of the plan.
Also: I think most of the smart Jays fans with whom I spoke before the season figured that this was a sub-.500 team this year, but a good team in the next few. To suddenly change direction because the team took an uncomfortable shit-kicking this weekend is reactionary.
And multibillion dollar integrated corporations don't get to be that way by panicking when faced by adversity.
And if I'm too elitist for you, then go fuck yourself.
- June 14, 2011 at 11:17 AM
- Tao of Stieb said...
Also Paul: Stating "It's a fact" doesn't actually make something a fact. It just reinforces your position in your own mind.
If the revenues are there (and TV numbers have been good, as has the gate), then the payroll numbers will be there. They won't spend on spec.
And do you understand how many years you actually get with young players before they can even start to demand too much money? Six years! Plenty of time to have two or three successive quality draft classes emerge into everyday players.
And if all this seems like too much for you to withstand, go cheer for the Cardinals, or some other mid-revenue team in a chump division. We don't need you.
- June 14, 2011 at 11:22 AM
- Tao of Stieb said...
Or get the fuck out.
- June 14, 2011 at 11:27 AM
Wow, go fuck ourselves, hey Tao? Yeah because the Jays have sooo many fans that snobby fucks like yourselves can simply just tell people to go away. Pretty embarassing when the Red Sox come to town and there's more of their fans in the stands at the RC than ours.
Also, just for the record fuckface, I've been following this team since 1977. Just because you write some blog doesn't give you any monopoly as a fan of this team. If people are sick of 18+ years of mediocrity, then that is what it is. But when you write a piece pointing out how irrational and stupid everyone is and then get called on it, don't stomp around like a little fucking child in complete bewilderment. And I know all your little trained seals are going to be calling me every name under the sun but so be it.
- June 14, 2011 at 11:49 AM
- DaveC said...
Way to miss the point, anonymous.
I don't agree with Paul's reasoning, but at least he's presenting it.
Here's what gets me: If we genuinely believe that the team will never get better, what's the point in being a fan? If you're a fan of the sport, surely you can find a team that's interested in competing.
For me, the perspective of people like the Ack makes more sense: this team was meant as a long term venture, and we knew that- or should have known that- coming into this season. I watch the games, I cheer for the team to do well, but I watch it with the understanding that yes, it would be a building year.
I certainly think some cynicism is warranted, given Rogers' handling of the team over the years. But I can't see how you can argue that there haven't been some good signs. Low costs extensions for the core, and a lot of money spent in the draft.
The Jays' record hasn't been good with big money free agents. Do we really want to repeat Frank Thomas, BJ Ryan, and AJ Burnett? I don't. This homegrown focus seems to be sound so far. That doesn't mean it'll happen right away, or that it won't be difficult.
If Rogers is a bean counter, they can see the value in AA's reasonable extensions relative to the market for a lot of those players he signed. Hopefully Toronto can support the Jays if/when they become a winner.
I've been surprised by the amount of vitriol I've seen from Jays fans, and I imagine that's the perspective here. There's not a lot of sense getting angry, on one side or another. But calling for rational thinking when the team is struggling is almost always a good idea.
- June 14, 2011 at 12:09 PM
- DaveC said...
Talking to Anon 1:37 from the 14th in the prior comment, obviously not the one above me, who I don't really have a beef with.
- June 14, 2011 at 12:17 PM
- Paul said...
Really classy guys. Very easy to swear at people through the safety of a web page. Try doing that face to face with someone and see what you get.
I for one never thought that the team would be even close to contending this year or next. But the Jays have been touting we're two years away for the better part of 19 years, and even though rationally they are still another two or three years away at best, it still gets frustrating, and everyone has a right to complain.
Solutions, I really don't see any. I'd like for the Jays to prove me wrong and actually field a proper contending team a few years from now, but history says that two years from now the jays will still be preaching that we're two years away. Short of stop watching and going, which would hit Rogers in the pocketbook indirectly, there's really no hope of doing much else but wait yet another "two more years".
- June 14, 2011 at 12:22 PM
should of signed jon lacky
/Crashburn Alley'ed
- June 14, 2011 at 12:44 PM
There are apparently two sides to this discussion: the Rogers apologists and the fun-sucking cynics.
I don't think Tao is being true to his own character by siding with Rogers.
- June 14, 2011 at 12:48 PM
- w3leong said...
You guys want a team that spends money on legitimate free agent big league players? Go follow the Orioles, how's that working out for them?
- June 14, 2011 at 12:53 PM
I'd love to watch a team that spends money on legitimate free agent big league players. The key is signing the right guys, the Orioles don't.
- June 14, 2011 at 1:01 PM
You couldn't be more wrong! This team would be in first place if only:
DH Manny Ramirez/Vlad Guerrero platoon
1B Derrek Lee
SS JJ Hardy
3B Mark Reynolds
2B Orlando Cabrera/Felipe Lopez
C Jason Varitek
Plus Rick Ankiel, Pat Burrell and Bill Hall in the outfield.
- June 14, 2011 at 1:06 PM
Paul isn't exactly wrong to believe that Rogers doesn't have a real committment to winning. I mean, they've only had an above-average major league payroll one year out of their entire ownership run (2008). And this isn't some small market like Kansas City or Oakland here. Really, Rogers has been saying that the money's coming for years, pushng back contention year after year. Some, rather understandably, have run out of patience.
I have to say, though, that if they can sign most of their draft picks, that will be a good sign of things to come.
- June 14, 2011 at 1:06 PM
- Christopher Jones said...
The Jays spent money on Lind, the draft, etc but it's a drop in the bucket compared to what the Red Sox and Yankees spend. Look at our payroll.
Rogers is fucking cheap. I won't be surprised if our payroll never goes above 90 million.
I agree the Jays won't trade Bautista this year but it might make sense. He's what, 30 or 31? By the time the Jays are ready to contend he will probably be 34 and declining.
Heck, Keith Law thought Yunel Escobar would be too old by the time the Jays started to contend.
- June 14, 2011 at 1:08 PM
It's not a matter of siding with Rogers that gets me, it's blind optimism, year after year, without any accountability. Pointing to the failed free agent acquistions of the Riccardi era isn't fair either, because there was no clear direction at that time. Draft, sandwich picks, trade all you want, at some point to contend in this division, or any division for that matter, you are going to have to supplement the prospects, draft pickets etc with proven major league talent and Rogers talks a good game when addressing this but history suggests otherwise.
- June 14, 2011 at 1:17 PM
"Pointing to the failed free agent acquistions of the Riccardi era isn't fair either, because there was no clear direction at that time."
And then...
"... you are going to have to supplement the prospects, draft pickets etc with proven major league talent and Rogers talks a good game when addressing this but history suggests otherwise."
If history suggested that Rogers was unwilling to spend on free agents (i.e. "talks a good game"), then we wouldn't have the failed free agent acquisitions of the Ricciardi period to point to.
It seems to me that people in the organization, whether it's Rogers or people on the baseball side, have learned that neglecting to stock up, and STAY stocked up, on high-upside draft picks and prospects is a failed strategy and are changing it.
Instead of putting the cart before the horse by signing big money free agents with no solid core in place, they look to be turning the order around.
I don't see why a fanbase should somehow be more discouraged by that. I'd be discouraged if they were doing the same things they've always done, and expecting better results.
- June 14, 2011 at 1:28 PM
- Paul said...
Looking back at the last decade, the Jays' highest team salary was just under $100 million, putting them 12th highest that year.
Currently, even with the long term deals of local talent, they are at $62.5 million, which ranks them 23rd.
I personally don't see this as an either or proposal. Signing a couple of mid-range starting pitchers as free agents may not improve your win-loss record, but would give guys like Morrow and Drabek the time in the minors to learn how to pitch more effectively, if that's what the team deemed necessary. The way the Jays are set up now, there are very few other options to replace Morrow and/or Drabek if they wanted to give them time to mature down on the farm.
- June 14, 2011 at 1:57 PM
- The Ack said...
Doesn't that kind of fly in the face of everyone's preferred philosophy though, Paul? Throwing dollars at mediocre mid-range arms?
It seems everyone is in one of two camps....go with young players or spend BIG on all-star calibre players.
Paying free agent dollars to lure the Kyle Lohses and Carl Pavanos of the baseball world means you're still not winning & remain in the dreaded "holding pattern" mode... and that would boil more blood than the comments above.
Well, maybe not that much, but...
- June 14, 2011 at 2:10 PM
- Gil Fisher said...
Hey, what's goin' on on this side?
- June 14, 2011 at 2:11 PM
- Gil Fisher said...
Free agents are usually completely unappealing. You have to target the stars before they get to the age of free agency. To do that you need a stable of prospects.
Is anybody really excited about the prospect of giving Prince Fielder 7 years and $140m? Seriously?
- June 14, 2011 at 2:13 PM
- Gil Fisher said...
I mean besides a Leafs fan?
- June 14, 2011 at 2:14 PM
I guess I have trouble understanding why a team would want to spend extra money on mid-range starting pitchers if it's not something they expect will improve their win-loss record. Don't forget that mid-range starters, the #3 or #4 types, aren't exactly growing on trees, and teams that DO expect to contend get a chance to sign them too.
Here's an example: Probably the fourth-best starter in Milwaukee is Randy Wolf (arguably behind Gallardo, Marcum, Greinke). To get him, they had to shell out 3 years/$29.75M (2010-12), plus a 2013 club option, according to Cot's Baseball Contracts. $10 million a year for a #4 starter, on a team that seriously expects to contend. Now, granted, Wolf would be closer to a #2 guy in Toronto, but if the team is not expecting to contend with the rest of the pieces they have, I just don't understand why the Blue Jays would want to commit almost $30 million over three years to have him. He'll be 36 by the time the contract is up, and Toronto probably would have had to spend more to get him there anyway.
I suppose a team could go even cheaper and sign a guy like Brad Penny to be a 3 or 4-type starter, but even he's costing the Tigers $3 million this year.
In either case, those guys cost real money, which is likely going to come at the expense of other priorities (like the draft).
Meanwhile, Morrow and Drabek make less than $3 million between them. They're not dominating, but you have to hope from a player-development perspective that they're figuring out how to get big-league hitters out.
The question is, is it worth another $10 million to your organization to have middle-of-the-pack place-filler starters on the big league club, while Morrow and/or Drabek pitch in the minors? And with no expectation that the extra $10 million will result in an appreciable increase in wins?
Or I guess you could go out and sign Kevin Millwood to eat those innings for you. Me, I'd rather watch Kyle Drabek walk a few guys than be subjected to that.
- June 14, 2011 at 2:18 PM
- Paul said...
Getting the mid range pitchers would only be a good option if in fact the Jays management believed that the best option would be for a starter or two mature in the minors rather than on the major league team.
Right now the jays kind of have all their eggs in one basket. They have no choice but to keep Morrow and Drabek in the majors, becuase they have nothing better. What you don't want is to screw up these two great arms by throwing them to the wolves too early. If that's what they really think is best for them, then who am I to say differently, but it would be nice to have that optioon.
- June 14, 2011 at 2:18 PM
Everyone has got to stop throwing Morrow and Drabek in the same boat.
FIP, people! Use it.
- June 14, 2011 at 2:31 PM
For the record, I would LOVE Prince Fielder at that price. And don't call me a fucking Leaves fan for it--I hate hockey.
Fielder at first forming a monstrous 3-4 combo and Lind back to DH where he belongs. I also think we should go aggressively after Yu Darvish, although the record of Japanese pitchers is poor overall, he is half Turkish, a bigger dude, and more likely to be durable when he comes to the majors (which is why the Yankees are going to be all over him.)
I get development. I want Lawrie, Cecil etc. up as soon as possible. Why I don't understand is why, if we all knew we'd be shit in 2011 (and we damn well are horrible), why not play ALL the kids all the time?
And why not supplement this with a long-term contract for a young 1B just entering his prime?
Do you really think any of our prospects are going to be as good as Fielder? Hell no!
Rogers is a motherfucking BILLION DOLLAR COMPANY who has no problem squeezing every last penny out of poor and middle-class Canadians and yet we're not allowed to attack them and their bullshit spending policies as it pertains to the Jays? Fuck that corporate bullshit. They should spend, sell the team, or move them out of the city if we have to put up with another 5 years of crap to develop high school arms and pray we get lucky with Type B free agents.
- June 14, 2011 at 2:37 PM
I fully believe that if they wanted Morrow or Drabek in the minors, they would be there. There are plenty of other cheap options in the system to eat innings. It wouldn't be pretty, but again, it's not like it matters a great deal.
- June 14, 2011 at 2:37 PM
Small point: backing a truck full of money up to Prince Fielder's back door, even if you CAN afford it, doesn't mean he'll sign with you.
- June 14, 2011 at 2:39 PM
And just like that, they send Drabek down and call up Zach Stewart. SEE! TOLD YOU THEY HAVE OPTIONS!
- June 14, 2011 at 2:45 PM
Yeah, put me on the side of bringing Prince Fielder to Toronto.
- June 14, 2011 at 2:49 PM
hahahahha! fucking liars. Drabek won't be back for a LLLLOOOOOONNNNGGGG time. He'll be down their with Cecil.
- June 14, 2011 at 2:58 PM
- Paul said...
"There's been no discussion of sending Kyle to Triple-A or to suggest that what he's dealing with, in his own maturity right now, is leading to that. So that needs to be squelched right now," Farrell said. Jun 12, 7:15 PM
Um yea, that's the ticket. :)
Let's hope Stewart is really ready for the big leagues, and just just the best of the worst options.
- June 14, 2011 at 2:58 PM
- Samson Effect said...
What's baffling me right now is how there are a bunch of commenters totally flipping their shit over one weekend against Boston. The first time the Jays have been swept all year. Doesn't matter if you lose 35-6 or 3-0 over three games, it's three losses. A big loss is still just a loss.
Three games, guys. THREE FUCKING GAMES. Let's have some perspective here. Grand scheme of things, this weekend isn't a whole lot.
- June 14, 2011 at 3:05 PM
Obviously our supposedly brilliant GM is freaking out too, because he sent down Drabek after LYING repeatedly about how he would stay up no matter what (through his dopey manager).
I can't wait to see what the corporate lackeys say about this one: "Drabek really was struggling, look at his xFIP and drTPOP." "AA is so smart and handsome, I can't wait to blow him again." "Stewart's secondary and thirdendary numbers are better than his ERA, I'm sure his terrible strike out rate will be mitigated by the geniuses we have running this team."
Man, we really know how to fuck with all our young players: watch out Lawrie, you're next--you better not have a bad week or struggle is some stat category that no one understands, or else you're going to AAA for a few more years.
(SNIDER, CECIL, LAWRIE, DRABEK, MORROW): fucked up development. What other team does this shit?
- June 14, 2011 at 3:11 PM
if anyone compares this to Halladay, I am going to fucking kill them--his re-development was once in a lifetime. Drabek is now on Snider prospect suicide watch.
- June 14, 2011 at 3:14 PM
Yes, it's abundantly clear that sending a pitcher down to compete at the AAA-level for the first time in his fucking career is a harbinger of his imminent flame-out as a prospect.
- June 14, 2011 at 3:18 PM
- Paul said...
This is exactly the scenario I mentioned earlier today. Somehow I can't see bringing upo a guy with a 4.50 ERA in AA as a valid replacement. The Jays are just tapped out of options.
You can only "go with all prospects and wait a couple years" scenario if you have enough players to at least compete at the major league level, and if you don't, you may need to look elsewhere, bite the bullet and spend a few bucks. Switching Stewart for Drabek seems a little like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic to me.
- June 14, 2011 at 4:41 PM
- Paul said...
Gee, no more swearing at me. Maybe I AM making at least a bit of sense. Backpeddal much?
Seriously, even if you want to go with waiting for the prospects to mature, you should really have them in a place where they will mature the best. Looking at our starting pitching in particular, can you honestly say some of these guys wouldn't be better off learning their trade in the minors?
The Jays choices as of now seem to be which prospect can we hurt the least by bringing them up. Not the best scenario for either the present or the future.
- June 14, 2011 at 6:32 PM
- The Ack said...
Who are you even talking to there Paul?
- June 14, 2011 at 6:41 PM
Burn!!!! Lol this post clearly got peoples backs up. BTW I still believe in The Plan.
- June 14, 2011 at 7:11 PM
Viva The Plan!
Kudos to Ack and Tao for writing the post and then defending their turf. You guys are spot on.
Throwing big bucks at high-priced free agents is just a crap-shoot.
The organization must be strong from the minors to the majors in order to become a contender year in and year out... or do we all wanna keep rolling the dice in hopes of that one magical year?
As Always,
Go Jays!
- June 14, 2011 at 9:18 PM
I agree with this post entirely.
And to take it even one step further, the team really isn't doing too badly... 2 games under .500 in the toughest division in baseball is not terrible. If you are one of those who are complaining that "this team sucks", I really have to question what it was that you were expecting coming into this season. Seriously.
- June 14, 2011 at 9:54 PM
- Paul said...
Who was I talking to? Look above and see who swore at me. I still think the Jays would be better off on their two year plan if they let some starting pitching learn in the minors, and today's movement of Drabek only solidifies my beliefs.
I think I made my case. You don't have to agree with my opinion on the Jays, but I have a right to have it.
Seems like it's my way or the highway and fuck you for thinking differently on here.
- June 14, 2011 at 11:31 PM
- The Ack said...
Cmon Paul, there's really no need for that kind of language around here.
- June 14, 2011 at 11:36 PM
- Mike D said...
- June 15, 2011 at 8:35 AM


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text:
Down The Rabbit Hole
Last week, I described how I almost traced a bug to the wrong program. Having come this far, I would like to describe the actual source of the bug — such a strange source that I would never have suspected it when I began looking.
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After several false starts, I had found that an early pass in a multipass compiler was sometimes producing output in which widely spaced, apparently random characters were replaced by
'0' characters (i.e., not characters with all bits zero, but rather the representation of the digit 0). The question remained unanswered as to why this might be happening.
As before, the first thing I did was to look at the circumstances. I found that this early compiler pass was being run as follows:
- Run the preprocessor on the program's input and put the results in a temporary file.
- Create a second temporary file, and copy data into that file, which represents the compiler's output from the standard library. This stop avoids having to recompile the standard-library declarations every time the compiler is run.
- Run the first compiler pass with its input coming from the temporary file that contains the preprocessor's output, and its output being appended to the second temporary file.
In UNIX shell terms, then, this compiler pass was being run as follows:
preprocessor <input >temp1 cp library temp2 phase1 <temp1 >>temp2
Here we are following the usual convention that < precedes a file used as a program's input, > precedes a file used as a program's output, and >> precedes a file to which output is being appended. The
cp program works with file names as its arguments, so it doesn't need < or >.
As usual, an important early step in debugging any program is to recreate the problem with as little extra context as possible. Accordingly, I started by saving the preprocessor output in a file that I will call
testprog. I then reproduced the rest of the process:
cp library temp2 phase1 <testprog >>temp2
Sure enough, the output in
temp2 would occasionally include spurious
'0' characters.
The next step was to note that the compiler did not actually look at the library file, so I did not need to use it. The resulting simplification was
phase1 <testprog >temp2
To my astonishment, this simplified version worked every time, even though
phase1 did not even have read permission on its output. Could it be that the file append operation was broken? To find out, I tried appending to an empty file:
cp nullfile temp2 phase1 <testprog >>temp2
This version also worked perfectly every time. Perhaps there was something about a nonempty file that caused a failure.
To find out, I created a file that contained
"Hello, world!\n" and used that file as input:
cp hello temp2 phase1 <testprog >>temp2
Again, this version worked perfectly.
At this point, I was really confused. How could a program that is not capable of reading its output file possibly behave in a way that depended on the prior contents of its output file? To prove that the compiler was not reading its output file, I tried breaking things up this way:
cp library temp2 phase1 <testprog >temp3 cat temp3 >>temp2
cat program stands for catenate; it copies each of its input files to its output file. In this case it has only one input file, so it effectively appends the contents of
temp3 to
temp2. Running
phase1 in this way guaranteed that it would not have access to the contents of
To my utter astonishment, this revision of the program failed. Not every time — but it never failed every time. In fact, I could execute
phase1 <testprog >temp3
and then repeatedly execute
cp library temp2 cat temp3 >>temp2
and I would still see occasional failures.
In other words, I had just proved that the compiler bug I was hunting was not in the compiler at all, but rather in the operating system — specifically, in the part of the operating system that implemented the >> operation. Moreover, whatever the bug was, it depended somehow on the contents of the file on which the >> operation was being run. At this point, I could hand the problem off to the operating-system development group.
The entire experience had a distinct Alice-In-Wonderland feel to it. At first I thought there was something wrong with my program, because the compiler was producing error messages. Then I realized that I could compile the same program twice and have it sometimes compile and sometimes fail to compile, so I suspected that part of the compiler was producing the error messages. Then I realized that when that compiler phase produced its error messages, it was doing so because it was getting incorrect input from the previous phase — which, in turn, was producing incorrect output because of a bug in the operating system. So every time I thought I had found the problem, I was just going one step further into indeterminacy.
This whole episode taught me several important lessons about debugging:
- Be sure you know what's broken. What looks like a bug in your program might be a bug in the compiler; what looks like a compiler bug might be an operating-system bug.
- Part of knowing what's broken is proving it. The way to prove it is to come up with a failing test case that is so simple that the problem cannot be anywhere else.
- Even if a failure looks like it's impossible, it might be happening anyway. In this particular case, even though the compiler was not reading its output file, the operating-system bug made the compiler's success depend somehow on the output file's initial contents.
- It is possible to learn quite a bit about what is wrong with a program, even if you have neither a debugger nor the program's source code available.
These lessons are worth taking to heart; they have saved me an enormous amount of trouble over the years that would otherwise have been spent chasing bugs that weren't.
Believe it or not, this story is still not over. Next week, I'm going to explain what the operating-system developers told me about the problem once they finally found it. Somehow I doubt you'll be surprised to learn that their first attempt to reproduce the problem failed, despite the simple test case I had given them.


text:
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Chat night tonight! Come if you want. Stay away if you want. It's your call. For those of you who may have forgotten, chat gets started around 9:30 PM for those of us on the east coast, 8:30 PM for those of you in Chicago and 7:30 in other parts of fly over country such as Denver. I guess that means 6:30 PM on the left coast. If my calculations are correct everyone in NZ needs to join us at 1:30 PM Thursday and Australia at 11:30 AM on Thursday for those in Sydney and eastern Oz. It will be an ungodly 3:30 AM in Israel and Helsinki, 2:30 AM in Paris, and Berlin, and 1:30 AM in London. Of course it is all worth the sleep deprivation. Come in early and see who is here. Don't be late!!!!! (I hope I have the time changes down.If not, let me know!)
The fun starts HERE!!!!!!


text:
The goal of writing reusable software is as old as programming, and is so well ingrained into programmers that we take it as an axiom. It's accepted and non-controversial. Of course, we all strive to produce reusable software, but as I look back on 35 years of programming, I note with chagrin that practically none of the code I've written has been usable in another project. I will "reuse" code by copy-paste-modify, but that's cheating, and even that doesn't happen too often.
While it might seem that I have missed the boat somewhere, I've asked other long-time programmers, and many of them seem to have the same frustrating experience. This starts out, then, as journey into figuring out what went wrong. Why does that compressor I wrote before not work in another project? Why is my macro expander not reusable? Why did I chuck all my carefully written UTF code? Why do I write symbol tables over and over again? Why is that disassembler I wrote completely unusable in another application? Why do I keep reinventing the wheel?
My first thought was that I am now a better programmer than I was, and so rewrites are justified. That's just too easy a rationalization, though. A more careful examination turns up two troubling characteristics of my components:
- The abstractions are leaky. I have failed to encapsulate the problem, and the component's dependencies have leaked out into the surrounding application, and the surrounding application's dependencies have leaked into the component.
- The components are too specific. They are not about generic type
T, but about specific type
X. The implementation contains and takes advantage of specific information about
Things need some rethinking. Let's go back to first principles, and think about what a component is.
What is a Component?
One aspect of a component is that it is reusable software. But being reusable isn't enough. In C, for example, there are lots of available reusable libraries for all kinds of things. But they aren't necessarily components. A component has a predefined interface that it conforms to. Most C libraries roll their own unique interfaces, and the developer wishing to use them has to build custom scaffolding for each one.What sort of defined interface could possibly be general enough to work for a wide range of software components?
Paring a program down to its fundamentals, they are:
- Read input
- Process that input
- Write output
Even if a program itself doesn't fit that model, it is usually composed of subsystems that conform to it.
Let's rewrite this in pseudo code:
source => algorithm => sink
Chaining things together makes sense:
source => algorithm1 => algorithm2 => sink
and so on. This looks awfully familiar. It looks like the UNIX command line the files and filters model. Files form the sources and sinks, and the algorithms are called "filters." The UNIX command line is a brilliant innovation where the components are files and filter programs. Each filter program does one smallish job. To get things done, the command line user strings them along, the output of each feeding into the input of the next, and the final sink is a file or the console. (There are endless examples of how successful this component style is.)
Because UNIX is largely written in C, this model has found its way into common C usage, and is the ubiquitous file interface. Component programming in C relies on being able to express sources and sinks as files, and use algorithms that operate on the file interfaces. This is so successful that there are often pseudo-file systems.
Of course there are limitations. The approach shows the usual characteristics of something that evolved while retaining backward compatibility, rather than being designed up front, as anyone trying to figure out ioctl can attest. Worse, it views data as a stream of bytes, and that's awkward for a lot of uses, as certain algorithms imply specific supporting data structures. I'll get into this shortly.
Looking Back At My Code
With these thoughts in mind, I look back at all my failures at reusable code and notice something else: It looks nothing at all like: source → algorithm → sink.
In fact, it looks like a bunch of nested loops. The source data enters at the top, and gets swirled around and around in ever smaller and tighter loops, and leaves via the sink in the center of that maelstrom. For example, here's a simple program in pseudo-code that reads a text file from
stdin line by line, tests to see if each line matches a pattern, and writes those lines out to
void main(string[] args) { string pattern = args[1]; while (!feof(stdin)) { string line = getLine(stdin); if (match(pattern, line)) writeLine(stdout, line); } }
No wonder it is not reusable. There's no way to separate out the looping part from the source and that darned sink in the middle of it all can hardly be composed with other loops and sinks. Also bad is that it isn't immediately obvious what it does. Compare it with this pseudo-code version:
void main(string[] args) { string pattern = args[1]; stdin => byLines => match(pattern) => stdout; }
The loops have vanished, along with the intermediate variable
line that was used to glue things together. The code is easier to reason about (and hence, more likely to be correct), shorter, and is made up of composable items.
The Next Design
In the 1980s, along came C++. It brought OOP to the C world, but somehow C++ OOP did not produce better component programming. (There are many successful C++ OOP libraries that have stood the test of time, and can be viewed as component libraries, but as far as components as discussed here, I don't think there was much improvement.) C++ did update the C file design and generalized it a bit with
iostreams. Things started looking like our desired source → algorithm → sink with iostream's
>> operator. But that just didn't seem to catch on, either, and didn't see much use outside of reading and writing files. I think the
iostream style could have been generalized and expanded beyond mere serialization, but that never happened.
In the 1990s, Alexander Stepanov introduced the C++ Standard Template Library (STL). At last, components could be more than files; and algorithms could be generic and automatically adapt themselves to the data types being processed. Components followed a common interface. They could be composed, and could be compiled to highly efficient code. But even that didn't quite get us where we want to be:
The syntax doesn't resemble source → algorithm → sink. It keeps winding up looking like loops
for (i = L.begin(); i != L.end(); ++i) ... do something with *i ...
just like my old C code.
There is some improvement in getting rid of loops with
std::find(), etc., but there are composition problems with them. For example,
std::find() returns an iterator, but where is the other end of the range? The components don't fit together easily. Also, the STL's design was marred by the absence of lambda functions in C++ at the time. This rendered many STL-based idioms awkward (to the extent that STL containers tend to enjoy much more usage than STL's higher-order algorithms).
Iterators are an abstraction of pointers. But pointers don't know where the beginning or end of their data is, so when using iterators one finds himself passing around pairs of iterators. This is exactly analogous to C's passing arrays around as two separate items a pointer to the start of the array, and the dimension of the array. I have characterized this as C's greatest mistake, and it has unfortunately been propagated into C++ and the STL design.) Needing to pass around two disjoint pieces of data to embody an abstraction (as opposed to raising the abstraction to first-class status) hurts composition and forces designs into pedestrian manipulations of fragments. A better component design would combine the two.


text:
These are the guest stars and events that the networks have planned for the third week of Novembersweeps:
Monday, Nov. 18
Almost Human(Fox)On Night 2 of the season premiere, Detective John Kennex and Dorian are dispatched to investigate a murder and high-profile ...
These are the guest stars and events that the networks have planned for the third week of November sweeps:
Monday, Nov. 18
Almost Human (Fox)On Night 2 of the season premiere, Detective John Kennex and Dorian are dispatched to investigate a murder and high-profile missing persons case that leads them into the highly profitable world of IRCs - Intimate Robot Companions - also known as sexbots.
Beauty and the Beast (The CW)Guess who's coming to dinner? When Cat invites Vincent to Thanksgiving dinner with her biological father, the night ends in disaster.
2 Broke Girls (CBS)Max applies to pastry school, where she meets Nicolas (Gilles Marini), the handsome French master baker who owns and teaches at the school. Mary Lynn Rajskub guest-stars as Bebe, a neurotic pastry chef who works at the front desk.
9:30/8:30cMom (CBS)In this "Very Special Episode," Allison Janney's character falls off the wagon when she loses her job and struggles to piece her life together
Castle (ABC)Castle and Beckett investigate a pair of murders whose victims bear striking resemblances to Lanie and Esposito. Is a serial killer taunting the 12th Precinct? 24's Annie Wersching guest-stars as a cosmetic surgeon connected to the case.
Tuesday, Nov. 19
8/7cMarvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (ABC)On the Thor: The Dark World crossover episode, the agents deal with the aftermath of the film's events, which pose a danger to one member.
iHeartRadio Album Release Party with Lady Gaga (The CW)Lady Gaga performs in Brooklyn as she celebrates the release of her new album Artpop. Ryan Seacrest also interviews Gaga, and artist Jeff Koons discusses his collaboration with the singer on art installations.
NCIS (CBS)Ziva's replacement, NSA Analyst Ellie Bishop (Emily Wickersham), joins the team.
Brooklyn Nine-Nine (The CW)When a local pizza place burns down and the fire marshal (Patton Oswalt) blames on the owner, Jake pulls out all the stops to prove him wrong.
9:30/8:30cDavid Blaine: Real or Magic (ABC)On the new special, Blaine entertains stars and newsmakers, including Will Smith, Olivia Wilde, Woody Allen and Stephen Hawking, to get their reactions to his magic tricks. He also travels to Africa to explain how he learned one of his most recent moves.
The Mindy Project (Fox)Jenna Elfman guest-stars as a PR guru who's supposed to give Danny media training and instead ends up seducing him.
Person of Interest (CBS)Carter and Reese try to move HR leader Alonzo Quinn through New York without being discovered. But as the battle with HR heats up, the Machine spits out Reese's number, putting the entire team on high alert.
Wednesday, Nov. 208/7c
Arrow (The CW)After Diggle's blood is laced with Vertigo, Oliver realizes that The Count (Seth Gabel) has broken out out of prison and has been distributing his drug again.
Revolution (NBC)On the fall finale, the relationship between Rachel and Gene remains strained, as Charlie shows her mom how much she's grown.
Modern Family (ABC)On the Fred Savage-directed episode, Cameron takes Mitchell and Lily to visit his farm for the first time. Ann Gilbert guest-stars as Grams. Fred Willard returns as Phil's dad Frank.
Criminal Minds (CBS)New section chief Cruz (Esai Morales) returns goes into the field with JJ.
Thursday, Nov. 21
Big Bang Theory (CBS)Sheldon protests when the gang drags him to Mrs. Wolowitz's house for Thanksgiving. (And no, you won't see Mrs. Wolowitz's face.)
Glee (Fox)The seniors are preparing for "Movin' Out" by paying homage to Billy Joel.
Parenthood (NBC)Election Day has finally arrived - can Kristina pull out a win?
Friday, Nov. 22
Bones (Fox)As the team investigates a murder involving human remains served in a school cafeteria (yuck!), Angela throws Brennan a belated bachelorette party. And of course, things quickly get out of hand.
The Neighbors (ABC)Reginald Veljohnson and Meredith Baxter guest-star as Jackie's parents for the comedy's Thanksgiving episode.
Hawaii Five-0 (CBS)Carol Burnett guest-stars as McGarrett's Aunt Deb, who visits and brings with her a shocking secret.
Nikita (The CW)On the fourth and finale season premiere, Nikita finds herself alone and on the run, hunted as the most-wanted woman in the world.
Sunday, Nov. 24
American Music Awards (ABC)Live from L.A., the event will feature performances from Miley Cyrus, Imagine Dragons, One Direction and Florida Georgia Line.
The Simpsons (Fox)Eva Longoria guest-voices Lisa's new best friend who turns out to be her opponent in the second grade class representative election. Anderson Cooper also voices as himself.
9:30/8:30cAmerican Dad (Fox)Mariah Carey makes a guest-voice cameo on the show's Thanksgiving-themed episode.
The Mentalist (CBS)Jane has his final showdown with Red John.
What are you looking forward to watching?
View original November Sweeps Roundup: Week 3 at TVGuide.com
Other Links From TVGuide.com 24NCISAllison JanneyJenna ElfmanMary Lynn RajskubPatton OswaltRyan SeacrestAnnie WerschingJeff KoonsEmily WickershamLady GaGaGilles MariniCastle2 Broke GirlsThe Mindy ProjectMarvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.Almost HumanBrooklyn Nine-NineMomDavid Blaine: Real or MagiciHeartRadio Album Release Party With Lady GagaTV Guide iPhone App TV Listings New Tonight on TV


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The second-generation Samsung Galaxy Tab has been delayed because the company needs more time to get its software working with Android 4.0—specifically, Samsung's TouchWiz skin. IDG reports that the 7-inch and 10.1-inch tablets are now set to ship at the end of April.
Samsung created the flagship Android 4.0 device, the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, and recently started rolling out the new OS version to its Galaxy S II. But the use of TouchWiz on Android 4.0 hasn't impressed users much so far: The Verge felt that the TouchWiz-ified Android 4.0 on the Galaxy S II kept the OS looking and feeling very much like Android 2.3 Gingerbread.
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