Andrew Tobias: "Hats Off to Ameritrade (and My Coat, Please)" (from 29 Jan 1999)
This is my 750th and last daily column in this space. (Well, it's actually my 751st, but 750 sounds better.) And as for you terrific people, I can't thank you enough for the hundreds and hundreds of interesting, amusing, insightful, constructive comments, questions and, yes, criticisms. I have learned a great deal from you, and hope you will keep me bookmarked as this column moves to www.andrewtobias.com. It may or may not acquire other sponsorship, may or may not remain daily forever. But let's just see where it goes.
The 1908 Summer Olympics was the only one to feature motorized sports, but after these games the IOC decided that the Olympics was not intended for motorized competition. What motorized vehicles were utilized only in these games?
At the 1908 Summer Olympics, three motorboat racing events were contested. Various sources refer to the sport as "water motorsports", "motor boats", and "power boating". These Games were the only one to feature motorized sports; although it was featured in 1900, those events were deemed by the IOC in later years to be non-Olympic.
All three events used the same distance, five laps around an 8 nautical mile course for a total of 40 nautical miles (70 km). In each of the events, multiple boats started but only one finished, due primarily to the gale that was blowing during the course of the competition. Events were held on 28 August and 29 August 1908.
The water motorsports event was quickly abolished because after these games the IOC decided that the Olympics was not intended for motorized competition.
Source
Alan J was first, and correct, with:
Motorboats.
Randall wrote:
motorboats
Mark. said:
Motor boating.
Dave answered:
Motorboats. 3 gold medals were awarded, but no silver or bronze medals because in all 3 contests only one motorboat completed the 40 nautical mile races. Sounds as stupid as the Olympic equestrian events. Especially dressage.
Jim from CA, retired to ID, responded:
motorboats
Kevin K. in Washington, DC, replied:
Sometimes a cigar boat is just a cigar boat. The answer is motor boats.
Deborah responded:
Apparently motor boats were featured in the 1908 Olympics. Until now I never knew that fact.
Very cool and pleasant over the last couple of days. Lovely patio weather.
Dave in Tucson replied:
Just a SWAG...motorcycles?
Barbara, of Peppy Tech fame said:
The answer is motorboats.
Cal in Vermont took the day off.
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BttbBob has returned to semi-retired status.
~~~~~
BANDCAMP MUSIC YOU WILL PROBABLY NEVER HEAR ON THE RADIO
Song: "I Want More"
Artist: Bangs
Artist Location: Olympia, Washington, USA
Info: "I consider Bangs to be a riot grrrl group. I love 'I Want More,' which is about excessive consumerism. When I got this 6-song EP, I listened to it once, and then I listened to 'I Want More' 10 or 15 times in a row." - Bruce
Bangs:
Sarah Utter - guitar, vocals
Maggie Vail - bass, vocals
Peter David Connelly - drums
Genre: Pop Punk, Riot Grrrl
Price: $4 for 6-Song Album, $1 for one song, $15 for Digital Discography (1 EP, 2 LPs)
If you are OK with paying for it, you can use PAYPAL or CREDIT CARD
Out lesbian musician Anna Egge grew up in North Dakota and New Mexico - quite a change in climate. She remembers North Dakotaas "a really beautiful, vastly open space. There's nothing there, so you have so much space and time in a day . Just a lot of sky and land, great sunsets. It was beautiful." North Dakota, of course, gets very cold during the winter. Fortunately, people know to be prepared. Ms. Egge remembers, "On the school bus, we had to have a bag that was kept under our assigned seats that had an extra snow suit, an extra set of shoes, a can opener and two cans of food in case we got stuck in a blizzard!"
Opera singer Hans Hotter made a number of movies early in his career. In June 1939, he received his first film offer. His first film test was with middle-aged actress Kδthe Dorsch, and it was not a success. However, Ms. Dorsch spoke with the movie producer and convinced him to have Mr. Hotter test with a younger actress. This second test was a success. Of course, Ms. Dorsch and not the younger actress starred in the film, and when Ms. Dorsch had a scene with Mr. Hotter, with whom she became friends, she would whisper to him, "Sorry it's me again, but imagine I am the younger one!"
Henry Lewis was talented in more than one way. At a Catholic school, he played a recital, but he forgot the middle of a composition by George Frideric Handel. No problem. He improvised some music that sounded as if Handel could have written it, and he got through the recital. Henry's father wanted him to go out for the football team. Henry went out for the team, made it, and immediately quit. Henry said, "I wasn't interested, but I wanted to show him I could do it." Later, Mr. Henry Lewis became a noted conductor.
Even when she was a child and needed to be babysat, Lady Gaga enjoyed shocking people. She used to strip completely naked, hide, and then jump out of hiding and surprise her babysitter. Lady Gaga's parents called her "Loopy." Of course, Lady Gaga grew up and started performing in small venues in New York City. Audiences there can be hard to please. When one audience began to ignore her, Lady Gaga stripped down to her bra and panties and then sang. The audience stopped ignoring her.
Punk
Ian MacKaye, co-founder and owner of Dischord Records, and member of the punk groups Minor Threat, the Teen Idles, Embrace, Fugazi, and The Evens, remembers going to a Ramones concert in 1979 in Virginia. Lots of people showed up for the concert wearing torn jeans because the Ramones' "uniform" consisted of T-shirts, leather jackets, and torn jeans. Unfortunately, the Ramones fans discovered that the concert venue had a dress code: no torn jeans. The fans went to a nearby pharmacy, bought needles and thread, and then went to the parking lot and started sewing up the rips in their jeans. Mr. MacKaye is an interesting guy with a strong work ethic and common sense. At concerts, he used to become angry when people would do senseless things such as bust up bathrooms. On stage, he would tell the audience, "The toilet is our friend - it takes the sh*t away. So what the f**k is going on? Every show, you f**king idiots break the toilets. It doesn't make any sense." Punk has a lot of sub-genres, and Minor Threat inspired a movement known as straight-edge, in which people abstain from alcohol and illegal drugs. (Henry Rollins, former singer of Black Flag, abstains from alcohol and illegal drugs.) Mr. MacKaye is credited with inventing the term "straight-edge." Fans who were straight-edge would sometimes draw an X on both of their hands because bars would draw a symbol on patrons' hands to indicate that they were of legal age and could buy alcohol - the X's were a counter-symbol to the bar symbols. By the way, Mr. MacKaye says that he was not a good student while he was in high school. He disliked writing book reports, and almost always he would not read the book. When he had to write a book report on One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, he ended up calling the home of the author, Ken Kesey. (Mr. MacKaye says, "I called 555-1212 and asked for Ken Kesey's number in Oregon.") Unfortunately, Mr. Kesey was out of town, but his wife talked to Mr. MacKaye for 45 minutes and relayed to him a number of Mr. Kesey's ideas. Mr. MacKaye says, "Not only did I immediately write a report and get an A on it, but I f**king read the book because I couldn't believe she had been so kind to me. [ ] Kids are always calling me about sh*t. I'm always happy to talk to them."
Monday in the 70s; Wednesday up to the 90s; Saturday in the high 60s! Bet there will be some people getting sick.
Sort of like the roller coaster from "America's Mayor" to "International Disgrace." Makes ME sick when I see his disgusting face or hear his idiotic spewings.
Linda >^..^<
We are all only temporarily able bodied.
CBS opens the night with a FRESH'The Neighborhood', followed by a FRESH'Bob Hearts Abishola', then a FRESH'All Rise', followed by a FRESH'Bull'.
Scheduled on a FRESHStephen Colbert are Hillary Rodham Clinton, Chelsea Clinton, and Wilco.
Scheduled on a FRESHJames Corden, OBE, are Christian Slater, Kaitlyn Dever, and Gary Clark Jr.
NBC begins the night with a FRESH'The Voice', followed by a FRESH'Bluff City Law'.
Scheduled on a FRESHJimmy Fallon are James Spader, Ruby Rose, Elvis Duran, and DaBaby.
Scheduled on a FRESHSeth Meyers are Chris Hayes, Sean Casey, Kevin Millar, Avril Lavigne, and Roy Mayorga.
Scheduled on a FRESHLilly Singh are Barbie Ferreira and Alexa Demie.
ABC starts the night with a FRESH'Dancing With The Stars', followed by a FRESH'The Good Doctor'.
Scheduled on a FRESHJimmy Kimmel are Jonathan Van Ness, Lucy Boynton, and Jon Pardi.
The CW offers a FRESH'Penn & Teller: Fool Us', followed by a RERUN'Whose Line Is It Anyway?', then a RERUN'Whose Line Is It Anyway?'.
Faux has a FRESH'9-1-1', followed by a FRESH'Prodigal Son'.
MY recycles an old 'L&O: SVU', followed by another old 'L&O: SVU'.
A&E has 'Live PD: Police Patrol', another 'Live PD: Police Patrol', followed by a FRESH'Live PD: Police Patrol', then another FRESH'Live PD: Police Patrol', followed by a FRESH'Live Rescue'.
AMC offers the movie 'Cast Away', followed by a FRESH'The Terror', then a FRESH'Lodge 49'.
BBC -
[6:00AM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 4 - EPISODE 17-Night Terrors
[7:00AM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 4 - EPISODE 18-Identity Crisis
[8:00AM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 4 - EPISODE 19-The Nth Degree
[9:00AM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 4 - EPISODE 20-Qpid
[10:00AM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 4 - EPISODE 21-The Drumhead
[11:00AM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 4 - EPISODE 22-Half a Life
[12:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 4 - EPISODE 23-The Host
[1:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 4 - EPISODE 24-The Mind's Eye
[2:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 4 - EPISODE 25-In Theory
[3:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 4 - EPISODE 26-Redemption (Part 1)
[4:00PM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 1-Redemption (Part 2)
[5:00PM] A KNIGHT'S TALE (2001)
[8:00PM] THE PATRIOT (2000)
[11:30PM] A KNIGHT'S TALE (2001)
[2:00AM] MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE (1996)
[4:30AM] DOCTOR WHO - SEASON 8 - EPISODE 1-Deep Breath (ALL TIMES EDT)
Bravo has 'Below Deck Mediterranean', another 'Below Deck Mediterranean', followed by a FRESH'Below Deck Mediterranean', another 'Below Deck Mediterranean', then a FRESH'Watch What Happens Live'.
FX has the movie 'Ride Along 2', followed by the movie 'The Hangover Part III', then the movie 'Daddy's Home'.
History has 'Ancient Aliens', followed by a FRESH'Ancient Aliens: Alien Invasion Edition', then a FRESH'Hunting UFOs: Investigating Alien Hotspots'.
IFC -
[6:00A] Conquest of the Planet of the Apes
[8:00A] King Kong
[11:00A] Saving Private Ryan
[3:00P] That '70s Show - Eric's Panties
[3:30P] That '70s Show - Baby Fever
[4:00P] That '70s Show - Jackie Bags Hyde
[4:30P] That '70s Show - Hyde's Christmas Rager
[5:00P] That '70s Show - Ice Shack
[5:30P] That '70s Show - Who Wants It More?
[6:00P] Two and a Half Men - Apologies for the Frivolity
[6:30P] Two and a Half Men - Repeated Blows to His Unformed Head
[7:00P] Two and a Half Men - Release the Dogs
[7:30P] Two and a Half Men - Corey's Been Dead for an Hour
[8:00P] Two and a Half Men - Kissing Abraham Lincoln
[8:30P] Two and a Half Men - Walnuts and Demerol
[9:00P] Two and a Half Men - Castrating Sheep in Montana
[9:30P] Two and a Half Men - Don't Worry, Speed Racer
[10:00P] Two and a Half Men - That's Summer Sausage, Not Salami
[10:30P] Two and a Half Men - My Damn Stalker
[11:00P] Two and a Half Men - Young People Have Phlegm Too
[11:30P] Two and a Half Men - I Merely Slept With a Commie
[12:00A] Two and a Half Men - You Do Know What the Lollipop Is For
[12:30A] Two and a Half Men - That's Not What They Call It in Amsterdam
[1:00A] That '70s Show - Eric's Panties
[1:30A] That '70s Show - Baby Fever
[2:00A] That '70s Show - Jackie Bags Hyde
[2:30A] That '70s Show - Hyde's Christmas Rager
[3:00A] That '70s Show - Ice Shack
[3:30A] That '70s Show - Who Wants It More?
[4:00A] Cheech & Chong Still Smokin' (ALL TIMES EDT)
Sundance -
[6:00am] M*A*S*H
[6:30am] M*A*S*H
[7:00am] M*A*S*H
[7:30am] M*A*S*H
[8:00am] M*A*S*H
[8:30am] M*A*S*H
[9:00am] M*A*S*H
[9:30am] M*A*S*H
[10:00am] M*A*S*H
[10:30am] M*A*S*H
[11:00am] M*A*S*H
[11:30am] M*A*S*H
[12:00pm] M*A*S*H
[12:30pm] M*A*S*H
[1:00pm] M*A*S*H
[1:30pm] Ghost
[4:30pm] Road House
[7:00pm] The Outsiders
[9:00pm] True Grit
[12:00am] The Judge
[3:00am] The Andy Griffith Show
[3:30am] The Andy Griffith Show
[4:00am] The Andy Griffith Show
[4:30am] The Andy Griffith Show
[5:00am] The Andy Griffith Show
[5:30am] The Andy Griffith Show (ALL TIMES EDT)
SyFy has the movie 'The Hitman's Bodyguard', followed by the movie 'Beetlejuice', then the movie 'Jeepers Creepers II'.
TBS:
On a RERUNConan (from 5/8/19) is David Cross.
Whether onscreen or off, Robert De Niro's never been one to mince words. Now, his straight talk has turned the air blue at CNN.
De Niro, currently starring in the new Martin Scorsese film The Irishman, appeared on CNN's Reliable Sources on Sunday morning, where the outspoken Trump critic once again lashed out at the president.
"This guy should not be president, period," the Oscar winner told CNN host Brian Stelter.
"F*** 'em," he said of his critics, raising his arms for emphasis. "F*** 'em."
"This is cable, so it's not an FCC violation, but it is still a Sunday morning," Stelter said. "Why do you choose to go that way?"
Mark Hamill has made no secret of his disdain for Don-Old Trump (R-Crooked). But some are accusing the Star Wars actor of crossing the line by firing back at first daughter Ivanka Trump (R-Vapid) and her family.
On Sunday, Hamill, famed for playing Luke Skywalker in the film franchise, responded to an Instagram photo of Trump with husband Jared Kushner and their three children, the youngest of whom, Theodore, is seen showing off his Star Wars love by rocking a Stormtrooper costume.
"The Force is strong in my family," the proud mom joked - but a certain cinematic Jedi disagrees.
Hamill took to Twitter to shut down Trump, writing, "You misspelled 'Fraud.'" He added the hashtag #GoForceYourself for good measure.
Despite the backlash, the tweet has already received thousands of retweets and likes. Some fans defended Hamill's stance by arguing that the Trump grandchildren are fair game given the treatment of migrant children at the border, an issue that has resulted in the frequent trolling of the first daughter's family posts.
Spitting Image will soon return to television, 23 years after the groundbreaking puppet satire last produced new episodes.
Roger Law, the show's co-creator, confirmed to The Guardian that a pilot for the new series has already been filmed, with funding from the producers of Catastrophe and US talk show Last Week Tonight with John Oliver.
The show will be ran by Jeff Westbrook, a comedy writer best known for his work on The Simpsons and Futurama.
Law, who has been working as a fine artist since the original series ended, told the newspaper that "the current [political] situation warrants the effort" of putting together the show's puppet stars. He also said that the new series will feature puppet incarnations of Donald Trump, Prince Harry, Meghan Markle and Vladimir Putin - the latter of whom will be outfitted in S&M garb.
Law said he hoped the series will be "public service satire", adding: "It's pretty chaotic out there. As far as I'm concerned, it's better than shouting at the television set, isn't it? So I thought, let's give it a go."
A collection of 25 supercars seized from Equatorial Guinea's vice president as part of a Swiss money-laundering probe fetched nearly 27 million Swiss francs ($27 million) at an auction held by Bonhams on Sunday.
A 2014 white Lamborghini Veneno Roadster sold for 8.28 million francs including commission, about 50% more than its pre-sale estimate, in heavy three-way bidding.
The buyer was anonymous, but the saleroom burst into applause as the hammer came down at the event in a 12th-century abbey in the grounds of Bonmont golf and country club in the village of Cheserex, 30 km (19 miles) from Geneva.
Geneva prosecutors said in February that they had closed an inquiry into Teodoro Nguema Obiang for money laundering and misappropriation of public assets with an arrangement to sell the cars to fund social programs in west African state.
Known as Teodorin, he is the son of President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, who has ruled Equatorial Guinea for 40 years. Rights groups label his administration as one the world's most corrupt.
Pope Francis on Sunday scolded countries that produce weapons for wars fought elsewhere and then refuse to take in refugees fleeing the very same conflicts.
The 82-year-old Argentine pope, whose parents were of Italian immigrant stock, has made the defence of migrants and refugees a plank of his pontificate and he has often clashed over immigration policy with U.S. President Donald Trump and populist anti-immigrant politicians in Europe.
Francis has also criticised the arms trade repeatedly and his sermon for 40,000 people in St. Peter's Square on Sunday linked the issues of war and migration as the Roman Catholic Church marked its World Day of Migrants and Refugees.
"Wars only affect some regions of the world, yet weapons of war are produced and sold in other regions which are then unwilling to take in the refugees generated by these conflicts," Francis said.
Francis said the world is becoming increasingly "elitist and cruel towards the excluded", adding that it is the duty of Christians to look after all those left behind in a "throwaway culture" taking root in society.
The loss of Arctic ice from glaciers, polar land and sea is declining faster than many scientists expected, as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's (IPCC) report on oceans and the cryosphere said this week.
That's bad news for polar bear populations, a top expert involved in field studies on the endangered animals has told the Guardian.
This year's annual minimum of the Arctic sea ice tied with the second-lowest extent on record, a mere 1.6m sq miles, and badly affected polar bear populations that live and hunt on the north slope of Alaska, plus those that live on the ice floes in the Bering Sea.
"Now the ice has gone way offshore we know that the bears aren't feeding, and the bears that are forced on to land don't find much to eat. The longer the sea ice is gone from the productive zone the tougher it is on the bears," said Polar Bears International's Steven Amstrup.
The loss of sea ice this year was so pronounced early in the season that tagging crews from the US Geological Survey (USGS) concluded that the sea ice offshore in the western arctic was too thin and unstable to be able to conduct their studies - the first time the team have pulled their studies because of safety issues.
President Don-Old Trump (R-Grifter) is raising a large chunk of the money for his border wall with Mexico by deferring several military construction projects slated for Guam, a strategic hub for U.S. forces in the Pacific.
This may disrupt plans to move Marines to Guam from Japan and to modernize munitions storage for the Air Force.
The tiny island of Guam holds a naval base with fast attack submarines and an Air Force base with bombers that rotate in from the mainland.
The U.S. currently plans to start moving 5,000 Marines there from Okinawa in southern Japan around 2025. This is part of a decades-long effort by Tokyo and Washington to relieve the congested Japanese island's burden of hosting half the U.S. forces stationed in Japan. The total cost of relocating the Marines is $8.7 billion, of which Japan is paying $3.1 billion.
The projects put on hold by the border wall are a small share of this total, yet critical to the relocation.
To the confusion of medical researchers, being teetotal is no guarantee you'll avoid the kind of liver disease that tends to affect heavy drinkers. Now, one strange medical case could get us closer to understanding why that happens.
The patient, a 27-year-old man in China, was suffering from a form of liver inflammation called nonalcoholic steatohepatitis, and had a rather strange history of becoming drunk without actually... drinking.
To get a high blood alcohol reading of somewhere around 400 milligrams per decilitre, most of us would need to down at least a dozen shots of hard liquor.
Not this guy. The subject of this case study only needed a good supply of fruit juice and a few plates of carbs.
It's a rare condition known as auto-brewery syndrome (ABS), and this patient's case could help to explain the liver damage that happens as intestinal bacteria turn last night's pasta into their very own homebrew.
The DreamWorks animated adventure "Abominable" topped the box office with $20.9 million in ticket sales over the weekend, according to studio estimates Sunday, while the Renee Zellweger-led Judy Garland tale "Judy" got off to a strong start.
"Abominable," the weekend's sole new wide release, is a co-production between Universal's DreamWorks and the Shanghai-based Pearl Studios. So the $75 million-film's performance when it opens Tuesday in China will be vital to its worldwide success.
One of the weekend's biggest successes was "Judy," which opened with $3.1 million on 461 screens. The film, directed by Rupert Goold, is about the final act of Judy Garland's life, when the "Wizard of Oz" star was plagued by drug addiction, health woes and financial troubles. The film's main draw is Zellweger's lauded performance as Garland, which has made her the best-actress Oscar front-runner.
The two-and-half-month break from superheroes atop the box office is expected to end next weekend when Warner Bros.' "Joker" hits theatres, along with Fox Searchlight's "Lucy in the Sky" and Netflix's "Dolemite Is My Name."
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theatres, according to Comscore. Where available, the latest international numbers for Friday through Sunday are also included.
1. "Abominable," $20.9 million ($8.8 million international).
2. "Downton Abbey," $14.5 million ($10 million international).
3. "Hustlers," $11.5 million ($3 million international).
4. "It Chapter Two," $10.4 million ($11 million international).
5. "Ad Astra," $10.1 million ($18 million international).
6. "Rambo: Last Blood," $8.6 million ($9.5 million international).
7. "Judy," $3.1 million.
8. "Good Boys," $2 million ($1.5 million international).
9. "The Lion King," $1.6 million ($3.7 million international).
10. "Angel Has Fallen," $1.5 million ($1.5 million international).
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