BSR

Once Novak shot himself in the foot, Domi became my favorite, even though I doubted he could handle the speedy courts. Apparently Ashe was playing a lot slower than the lightning-quick outer courts, which helped Dominic out some. Even more helpful was that as nervous as he was in the final, Zverev was dropping a 40-pound cow in his shorts. First first-time Slam winner since Marin Cilic (US Open 2014), first male Slam winner born in the 1990s, and first Slam won by someone outside the Big 3 since the 2016 USO. Domi's a great guy and works harder than just about any guy on tour. Congratulations, Dominic Thiem!

The pictures of Felix in just a pair of boxer briefs come from a hazing of sorts. Apparently it is a Canadian tennis tradition (don't ask me who started it or when) that all Canadian Davis Cup players have to go through a practice session in just their underwear.

A friend's story, but worth posting, I think. A friend was at an after-hours spot in the Alphabet (back when NYC still had an Alphabet City) when she ran into who she thought was her old high school crush. Quite inebriated, she confessed she had the world's biggest crush on him for all of high school because he looked exactly like actor Matt Dillon. The guy told her that she was mistaken, he wasn't her old high school classmate. "Oh, sorry, so what's your name?" "Matt" Only after the fog of alcohol lifted did she realize she had been talking to Matt Dillon.

Let me state for the record that I am a die-hard Novak fan. In his weekly mailbag, SI columnist Jon Wertheim responded to one of my questions, which I signed "from the world's biggest Novak fan not of Serbian descent." My take on this: First, I was furious at him for doing something so stupid. Once I calmed down, I started reading & watching all I could about the incident. Yes, Novak apologized. Even though it was obviously crafted by his publicist, I thought his apology was sincere (no fan bias, I swear!). But as Martina Navratilova pointed out, apologizing via Instagram is like breaking up with your girlfriend through email. Show your face, face the music, and get through the damn presser. You're a 17-year veteran of the tour -- suck it up. What troubles me most about this is how self-destructive it was. He knows the rules, he knows that hitting anyone on court is an automatic disqualification, yet he smacks balls around with line judges, ballkids, and photographers all around. He smacked a ball earlier in the general direction of the photographers' pit. It hit a barrier, not a photographer, but had the ball strayed a bit ... Then he smacks a ball behind him knowing full well that there are line judges & ballkids back there. It was just a matter of time before something like this happened. During the 3-year drought between Novak's 1st & 2nd Aussie Open titles, a commentator once described Novak as "a troubled young man." The remark got me all upset, which meant it was true. Obviously, Novak figured things out & got his act together. But this disqualification makes me think that Novak still has a few demons to wrestle.

They tried something similar in Las Vegas -- drive up & the stripper comes out to you. But the club had to stop, something about lap dances had to be behind closed doors, not in the great out of doors.

Borna Coric http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YnHQqx4tRFo/WK-f5PxhtOI/AAAAAAAAC0g/c8WvjqgV0I4aXb0d34WM9BVqkBIQhDgAACK4B/s1600/16_zpsj4gudctm.jpg

I was stunned by disbelief that Novak, who turned pro back in 2003, was defaulted. Holy ****! Smacking a line judge with a ball?? That's something a hotheaded 17-year-old does (and I would dare say it's stupid when a 17-year-old does it). Shocking stupidity for someone who's been on tour for coming on 2 decades. BUT ... Novak's exit leaves the field wide open. And for the first time since the US Open 2016, a player outside of the Big 3 (Roger, Rafa, Novak) will win a Slam. Also, no one left in the draw is a Slam champion. Note that of the ~2,000 men with a current ATP ranking, only 7 players have won a Slam, mostly because the Big 3 are such hogs. My head tells me Medvedev will win it now. My heart wants Vasek Pospisil to pull a rabbit out of a hat (his boyish face just melts me, he's the nicest guy on tour, and he's been playing great tennis since coming back from back surgery). And the horny depraved bastard in me wants Borna Coric to hoist the trophy. With the super-fast court, I just don't see Dominic Thiem winning it because his long backswings can't adjust to the speedy surface.

How are they dealing with Covid19? Are masks required at all times? Any new restrictions on interaction with the dancers? How busy were the two spots?

I always wear a mask in public indoor spaces because 1) I believe it makes a big difference and 2) the governor of NV issued a mandate that all businesses require a mask. Instead of "no shirt, no shoes, no service," the sign you see at the door now says "no mask, no entry." I never wear a mask outdoors because I never get all that close to anyone. Whenever I pass someone while outdoors, I leave them a wide berth. Risk of transmission in those circumstances has to be pretty close to zero. Besides, it was 109° yesterday, it'll reach 111° today, and 113° tomorrow. If I had to wear a mask in this heat, I'd suffocate.

I saw a feature about a retiree who went back into the work force at a fast food restaurant. He quickly went from an entry-level position to the regional director of training. One of his biggest challenges was getting kids to understand the importance of showing up on time for their shift. He said most of them simply cannot grasp the concept.

I'm so glad I saw your post because I never would have discovered Gameboys otherwise. It's very Filipino -- the characters constantly overreact, with just way too much drama, to the point that I almost groan during some episodes. On the plus side, the acting is excellent, I love Gav & Pearl, and some of the storylines are really well done. Cairo's guilt about his father's illness was particularly touching. I found it interesting how much English the characters spoke, with English words in almost every sentence and whole sentences in English sprinkled throughout. I thought my relatives used so many English words/sentences while speaking Tagalog because they've been living in the US for decades, but apparently even Filipinos in the Philippines intersperse tons of English in with their Tagalog. I have a crush on the Gav character. Sure, the actor's cute, but it's Gav's personality that really wins me over. His cheeky grin just slays me. New episodes come out once a week on YouTube. I binged through the first dozen in 3 days. Now it'll feel like an eternity between episodes. Anyway, if you're looking for a good binge-watch, I'd recommend Gameboys. Although a bit overdramatic at times, it's fun, sweet, and heartfelt.

Wow, Eric Heiden sure as hell aged gracefully. I had no idea he was so smokin' daddy hot. Thanks for the pic.

I'm glad this thread was revived & that I spotted this post. "Trémulo" was terrific - a sweet, simple story with a couple of very good, and hot, young actors. If you search for "Tremulo Julian Hernandez" on YouTube, a version pops up with English subtitles.

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I posted this in the general binge-watching thread, but thought it was worth re-posting here: Toy Boy has been renewed for Season 2! No specifics yet on production or projected release dates, but at least they definitely got the green light.

Yuppers, it's true, some 13K Manhattan apartments were empty in July, the highest number in 14 years. Rents have dropped 7.6%, and landlords are throwing in all sorts of incentives (paying broker fees, cleaning services, a free month's rent). So the Manhattan real estate market hasn't crashed but is experiencing a helluva dip. Note that Lehman collapsed in Sep 2008 but NYC real estate sales hit their low point in Mar 2011. It will take a while for the full impact of Covid19 + the George Floyd riots + rising crime rates to sort themselves out.

The landlord must maintain a rent-stabilized apartment to code, but that bar is set awfully low. I've been inside some real sh*thole NYC apartments that were supposedly up to code. As for property taxes, the assessment on rent-stabilized units is adjusted in line with the rent collected. So the landlord can pay the property taxes, but he's not making much of a profit.

It sounds like you know more about bullfighting, at least the specifics & terminology, than I do. All I remember is that the torero (technically the rejoneador because he's on horseback) remains on horseback from start to finish. If he dismounts at any point, it's a big no-no, and he'd probably get booed out of the bullring. The obvious barrier to entry is that a bullfighter must master superb riding skills. The other barrier to entry I would think is even more of a challenge: training a horse to obey his rider when faced with a pissed-off, charging, 2,000-pound bull. Since horses are skittish by nature, to find & train ones that can handle the stress of a bullfight has to be a helluva tall order.

Wow, a fellow bullfighting fan, this board is more diverse than I thought! I've seen rejoneos in Salamanca & Madrid, but on both occasions, it was advertised as a special event. I don't know if any plaza de toros offers rejoneos on a regular schedule. The number of bullfighters who learn their art on horseback is vanishingly small, I'm guessing.

As a big tennis fan, my bucket list includes attending matches at the Australian Open, Roland Garros, and Wimbledon (been to the US Open a bunch). For places to see: Buenos Aires, Santiago de Compostela, the Taj Mahal, and Stonehenge. Two other things I want to do: see a "rejoneo" (a bullfight in which the torero is on horseback) in Ronda, the cradle of bullfighting, and dine at Abac, the 3-star restaurant of Jordi Cruz, my favorite judge on Spain's Master Chef. OK, I'd have to meet Jordi too, get my picture taken with him, and tell him he's the Simon Cowell of gastronomy (brutal critiques but always tells the truth).

The producers of "Money Heist" have confirmed that the upcoming fifth season will also be the last for Netflix's most successful non-English language series. Alas, all good things must come to an end. As much as I love the show, I don't see how they could stretch it out beyond Season 5, and nothing is worse than a great series that goes to sh*t because the producers dragged it out for too long. Miguel Angel Silvestre from Sense8 & Narcos will be joining the cast, so we'll have some eye candy to look forward to. Show runner Alex Pina said that they've been working on the series finale for almost a year and seems confident that this last season will be the best ever. Shooting to start soon, but of course no word yet on when Season 5 will debut on Netflix.

I'm a big Toyota fan, although I've read that not all models have the brand's vaunted reliability (the C-HR ain't so hot, for example). But if you go with a Corolla, a stalwart of the brand and a model within your price range, you should be OK. Besides reliability, another big advantage of Toyota is maintenance costs do tend to be lower compared to most other car companies.

I've read In Cold Blood twice, once in my teens and again ~15 years ago. I'm sure I'll re-read it at least one more time. I just finished Espía de Dios (God's Spy) by Juan Gómez Jurado, the pulpiest pulp fiction I've ever read. It's about a serial killer within the Vatican who is killing off cardinals who are possible papal successors to Pope John Paul II. Wow, what a damn page-turner! I have to applaud the author for his research. While the story is fiction, the author definitely has a lot of details down pat about the Catholic Church and the Vatican in particular. And the fictitious elements are so much damn fun, like the Holy Alliance (basically a secret Vatican version of the CIA, covertly shaping religion & politics since the 1500s) and the Hand of St. Michael (an elite corp of Jason Bournes within the Holly Alliance). I just started La Peregrina (The Pilgrim), a story (fiction) about the trials & adventures that established the origins of the Catholic pilgrimage, el Camino de Santiago (the Way of St. James). Even though I am about as lapsed a Catholic as you'll ever meet, I do plan on making my own pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela one day. As a Filipino, I acknowledge that our lives & culture would be very different if Spain and by extension the Philippines had not been catholicized.

14 Marlins have tested positive for Covid19 but so far not one other player on the other 29 teams. The Marlins might be sunk, but predictions that the entire MLB season is finished are premature.

How do you like the show? I've heard good things, and the trailer is awesome.