BSR

He attempted a quad lutz and managed to land the jump, but it wasn't a quad. The judges gave him credit for only a triple lutz and even dinged him 1.10 on the GOE (grade of execution) because the jump was under-rotated. If you look at the following video, he completes the last half-revolution on the ice. Skip to 6:05 in the video for a slow-motion of the "quad" lutz.

Many skaters do struggle with the triple axel, but of the Big Six (Chan, Chen, Fernandez, Hanyu, Jin, Uno - the top contenders for the Olympic podium according to conventional wisdom, whatever that's worth) only Nathan really struggles with it. When was the last time he landed a perfectly clean 3A in competition? The difference between the triple and double axel is 5.2 points (8.5 vs. 3.3 on the ISU website), so a difference of 10.4 for the two programs. In both the short and free skate, an axel jump is compulsory, but it can be either a double or a triple. If Nathan plays it safe and opts to do doubles in both programs, he can make up the deficit by doing a quad lutz in both programs. I don't know why he opted out of the quad lutz at Nationals considering that it's been a pretty solid jump for him in the past. The problem with ditching the triple axel is that Nathan can probably win a medal without it, but winning gold will be very tough, and of course Nathan wants to go for the gold. I can't believe how much Nathan has improved his PCS in just a year. The difference between his skating at the 2017 US Nationals and the 2018 Nationals is amazing. He got a decent bump in his scores: 2017 short/free PCS were 44.32/91.00, 2018 short/free PCS were 46.54/94.92. But the scores fall far short of telling the whole story. His improvement in posture, positions, and body lines can't be quantified. The competition in Pyeongyang will be killer. The men's short is next Thursday, Feb 15, with the free skate the next day. I'm already defecating a brick PS: Rippon's chances of winning a medal are about the same as my chances of getting a date with Ricky Martin

Marlon Brandon circa "Streetcar Named Desire," I'd be that man's love slave. He could lock me up in his basement without food or water; as long as we had sex every single day, I'd be the happiest man on earth. Marlon Brando circa "Last Tango in Paris," I'd chew off my own hand in order to escape.

Rippon starts his free skate with the most difficult jump in the sport, the quad lutz (no one has landed a quad axel in competition yet), but never ever lands it clean. Maybe he's managed to hold on & stay on his skates somehow (two-foot landing, under-rotation, spin-out), but I've only see him fall in the attempt. I wonder if that's his way of telling himself that he belongs with the big boys ("yeah, I start with a quad lutz"), never mind the eensy-weensy detail that he falls every single time. I agree that quads are very much a matter of finesse, balance, and strength. No, you don't need huge legs. If anything, huge legs just weigh you down, which handicaps your jumps. I would add that you also need a good ratio of fast-twitch muscle fiber (like sprinters & NBA slam-dunkers) as opposed to the slow-twitch muscles of marathon runners. Of course, a high percentage of fast-twitch doesn't translate to particularly developed or large legs. Novak Djokovic is one of the fastest men in tennis, yet his legs are pretty slim.

Trust me, if the priest who hit on me were as hot as Fr. Mike, I would have rushed him home. Then again, the thought of doing it in a rectory sparks all sorts of naughty Catholic schoolboy fantasies.

Because a free program with five (six?) quads is fraught with risk, it's crazy to say he's a lock. Plus in both the short program and free skate, Nathan has to face his bête noir, the treacherous triple axel, which he crashes more often than he lands clean. A lot of Nathan fans are begging him to ditch the triple axel & opt for the far simpler double (Nathan has no problem with the 2A). True, it's a huge loss of tech points, but Nathan has so many quads in his two programs that he can bridge the gap and then some. I wish he would, but chickening out is just not the guy's modus operandi. Besides all the risk packed into Nathan's programs, five other skaters are strong, solid contenders for Olympic medals. Yes, if Nathan skates perfectly, he should medal because his tech score is so high and his PCS (what used to be called "artistry") has improved so much. But even a little bobble (reminder: ice is slippery) could knock him off the podium.

LOL, in a bar back in Boston, I got hit on by a guy. He mentioned that we'd have to go to my place because his place wasn't an option. Right away, I could tell that it wasn't an issue of a wife back home, and I needled the guy into coughing up the real reason going to his place was off the table. First he said "roommates." After a couple of drinks, he admitted that he was a priest, lived in a rectory, and his "roommates" were two other priests. Unfortunately, he was nowhere nearly as attractive as the men of the cloth in this thread, so nothing came of it, except a knee-slapping story to tell all my Catholic friends.

"much better looking in person"?? Zoinks! he looks pretty damn good in those pictures!!

Didn't Larry Ellison buy the island of Lanai, or almost all of it? I don't know what his plans are exactly, but I doubt he spent half a $billion to provide a concentration camp for pedophiles.

In all my 13 years of Catholic schooling, years as an altar boy, decades of going to mass, I have never once come across a priest I found even remotely attractive. To be blunt, I'd usually take a look at a priest and think, "Uh, I'm guessing celibacy isn't much of a battle for this guy" (I hope lightning doesn't strike me for saying that). But just now I just came across a priest who, holy poop! I think is pretty damn hot. His name is Fr. Mike Schmitz, and he's the spokespriest for a site called Ascension Presents. I don't know much about the site, just saw a couple of his videos on YouTube. So what's the verdict, gents? Does this guy make impure thoughts race through your dirty little mind??

Oh, is that who that guy was? I thought it was Methuselah.

A couple of the big Nevada health insurance companies offer free flu shots to all members. I guess they figure the cost of the flu shots is far less than the likely costs of flu cases down the road.

I've never been to Lutuce in NYC, just the Las Vegas version a couple of times. Once was the "discount" pre-theater prix fixe menu. I forgot the price, but I actually thought it was a helluva bargain given the quality of the food and service. The other time was the regular six-course tasting menu. Yup, it's pricey, but for a special occasion (it was my mother's 75th birthday), I thought it was a fair value. I don't remember what I paid but do remember that the food was exquisite. I should mention that I never order alcohol when fine dining. The tab is going to be expensive to begin with. Adding profit-margin-pumping bottles of wine to the bill is just too extravagant for my budget.

Full disclosure, I haven't been to Dick's in a couple of years, but I did have a great time when I was there. I wouldn't say it's quite the Strip Club Nirvana that tassojunior describes, much closer to Chidude's description, but I did have a helluva good time. The quality of the guys definitely doesn't rank up there with the muscle and porn gods at Swinging Richards, but there were plenty of hot guys at Dicks to tickle my fancy. The one thing I liked was that the guys at Dicks seemed genuinely friendlier. Sure, they're there to make a living, but I don't get the feeling that I'm being hustled or that I'm a human ATM like I did at SRs. Like Chidude says, Dicks is definitely seedier, far from the upscale experience at SRs, but that's actually part of the appeal for me. I can feel comfortable at Dicks as an average Joe, as opposed to SRs where it felt like if you weren't an investment banker or a tech zillionaire, you didn't belong. If you're curious and happen to be in Phoenix, definitely give it a try. If you're looking for some bang for your buck, try Sunday or Monday when VIP lap dances are just $10 (normally $20) per song. Also, you'll note the dancers are a lot friendlier if you tip your guy after your first VIP. Word spreads like wildfire whether you tip or not.

That miniature pony is adorable! Yeah, we might see more and more of this. Apparently miniature ponies can be trained to do everything that a seeing-eye guide dog does. It's not much larger than a Labrador Retriever or the other breeds commonly trained to be guide dogs, and the miniature ponies can be house-trained. The big advantage is that miniature ponies live to about 25 whereas dogs live only to 10-15. Since the cost of a guide dog can be quite substantial, the greater life expectancy of the ponies is a significant advantage.

LOL, I once saw a movie about a bunch of cockney kids, and I swear the accents were so thick that after a few minutes, my brother and I looked at each other and asked, "OMG, where are the subtitles?" After about a half-hour, you could start picking up what they were saying, but it was hard to follow the movie since we had basically missed the first 30 minutes. "Aguila roja" is available on the Internet, Aguila roja all nine seasons But before you get too excited, you need two things to watch it: 1) a VPN to trick the website into thinking you're in Spain because access is geoblocked 2) an understanding of Spanish because no English subtitles are available; Spanish subtitles might be available, not sure

"Gran hotel" started with a great premise: a poor maid in a luxury hotel goes missing, and when nobody seems to care much what happened to her, her brother shows up to find out what happened. Unfortunately, this intriguing mystery gets reduced to almost a side plot, and the main storyline becomes the soap-ish love affair between the brother (who takes a job as a waiter at the hotel to go undercover) and the daughter of the family who owns the hotel. I didn't care much for the plot lines of the series, but I absolutely loved the visuals: the clothes, the cars, the gardens, and most of all the spectacular hotel. The hotel shown in the movie is actually the former summer palace of the Spanish monarchy. The beauty of the former palace made my jaw drop, and the visuals alone made it worth watching what was otherwise a fairly mediocre show. I think there are a bunch of Spanish series available on Netflix nowadays. If it's still available, I highly recommend "Velvet," perhaps my favorite TV show of all time, in Spanish or English. It's about the great once-in-a-lifetime love between Alberto, the scion of the most prestigious house of fashion in Spain, and Ana, a poor seamstress. He takes over the reins of the family business when his father dies, only to discover that the house in financial ruin. To save the business, he has to get a massive loan, and the only man who will loan him the huge sum has one condition: that he marries his daughter Cristina, who's been in love with Alberto since they were kids. You can imagine, complications ensue. Besides, the great love story, all the side plots involving the other characters are engaging and entertaining. I think I watched every episode in the first season something like five times. Seasons 1 and 2 are brilliant, Season 3 is pretty good, Season 4 kinda sucked because Miguel Angel Silvestre wasn't available for filming until the very end. Still, all in all, I absolutely love the show, and at some point in the future will probably go back and watch all the episodes yet again. I confess, the only TV shows/movies I can watch in Spanish without subtitles are from Spain. Movies/shows from Mexico & Argentina I have to watch with Spanish subtitles (eek! reading English subtitles while listening to Spanish would fry my poor little brain) because otherwise I would miss too much.

Wow, thanks for this! No specific plans as of now, but going to Buenos Aires has been on my bucket list for a long time. I'm so happy that I have a resource like Daddy's for when I do finally get there. In the meantime, reading the board is like a crash course in Argentine slang

He looks a bit thicker with muscle in the 2018 photo, although not hugely so. It makes me think that he packed on the muscle naturally, as opposed to using steroids or whatever else. I saw Nick Jonas a while back when he had a short stint on "Hawaii Five-0." He's actually a pretty decent actor.

The story of the 300-pound pig that ran wild through an airplane cabin and even tried to enter the cockpit always cracks me up. The high jinx and hilarity continued even after the 300-pound porker got off the plane: "Once the pig was off aircraft, another passenger had to push while the two women pulled to get it in the elevator. The whole time, the pig was squealing so loudly everyone in the terminal heard it." OMG, you can't make this sh*t up!

When a big-name Italian restaurant opened here in Las Vegas, they took a similarly snooty attitude. When the local paper's food critic asked for just water, she was told that only bottled water was available. When she asked why she couldn't get a simple glass of tap water, the server told her that it interfered with the taste of the food. She snapped back, "So I assume you boil your pasta in bottled water?"

Servers aren't trying to impress anyone with their memorization ability; not writing down the order at a table is standard operating procedure for posh restaurants. Writing down the order is considered too diner-ish.

My question is who are the women who marry these "ex-gays." First of all, I would think that most 21st century women have enough of a clue to be able to spot a gay man and therefore dismiss any notions of a romantic/sexual relationship. Then, if a woman did find out that a man she was interested in was indeed sexually attracted to men but was trying to pray the gay away, you'd think she'd just roll her eyes and walk away. Maybe you're lonely, maybe you're even a bit desperate, but come on. What self-respecting woman would go ahead and get involved with a guy like that??

Thanks, Kevin! OK, let's see if this works. Instead of just cutting & pasting the link, I'll try to embed the link for Sauna Thermas (totally random website choice, not like I spend all day thinking about beautiful, naked men milling about). ETA: Success! Thanks a bunch!

I used to know how to do it but have since forgotten. Instead of just cutting & pasting a link like this: https://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/classic-scottish-shortbread-recipe there is a way to make the text read "Scottish shortbread recipe" that is highlighted in blue text and can be clicked on to open the web page with the recipe. Can I get a quick how-to? Thanks!