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Make some Salvador Dali surrealism art with magazines using this fun idea from Artolazzi.
Here are some cute Valentine’s Day Sudoku puzzles you can print out and share courtesy of Homeschool Creations.
Make a lovely cherry blossom painting with this idea from Homeschool Creations.
The Kansas City Royals are finally good after many years of being bad.
Same with the Pittsburgh Pirates.
How'd they do it?
Spoiler Alert: With a few exceptions, they built their teams in the 2004-2009 drafts.
And they are finally good ... now. In 2013.
And there are lots of win totals that start with "6" or "7" in between (and a few that start with "5" -- ugh).
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Chad Young wrote an excellent article about hitters who showed early signs of "losing it" or of leaping a plateau. He used batted-ball distance to ID five sleepers and five land mines:
| Player | 2013 distance as of Apr 23 | 2012 distance | Change |
| Dexter Fowler | 342 feet | 279 | +63 feet ! |
| Todd Frazier | 331 | 280 | +51 |
| Todd Helton | 334 | 283 | +51 |
| Colby Rasmus | 319 | 274 | +45 |
| Salvador Perez | 331 | 285 | +46 |
| Matt Kemp | 240 | 313 | -73 |
| Rauuulll | 224 | 292 | -68 |
| Joey Votto | 246 | 301 | -55 |
| Neil Walker | 340 | 292 | -48 |
| Kendrys Morales | 247 | 286 | -39 |
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Independently, Dr. D had been worrying about how hard Morales was hitting the ball, and this article didn't soothe his jangled nerves. and who else is in that "losers" column? Rauuuuull. He seemed like an obvious candidate to pull a John Olerud. (Oley, in his last year, was exactly the same hitter he'd always been, except his 370-footers started going 320 feet.)
But Morales has bounced back, with interest, and Rauuulll? We know how that turned out.
So did that chart have any value, or did it have reverse value?! I mean, the names also looked suspect ... why would Joey Votto be a big loser? Why would Todd Helton, at this time of the day, suddenly gain a bunch of power?
When we think of "poetry" and "suffering," most of us probably conjure up thoughts of the starving artist living in an unheated garret apartment. But over the years, many poets have suffered much worse things than voluntary poverty and artistic obscurity. These poets were imprisoned, tortured, and in some cases killed as a direct result of their poetry.
Chilean poet Pablo Neruda is the latest famous figure to be exhumed in order to test a hypothesis. Neruda died 40 years ago, officially from prostate cancer. But many people have long asserted that his actual cause of death was poisoning, due to his outspoken stance against the junta.
I am a HUGE fan of the Golden Girls. I always have been.
... being as we're running the M's an' all. :- )
SSI waves the white flag on this one, and with gusto. Kelly sez,
I know you see a starter in Wilhelmsen, but there is value to leaving well enough alone :) .... Maybe he's figured something out that he can implement on the mound no matter what his role is, but maybe he is mentally/emotionally better suited to relief pitching.
What goes through the minds of those who wish to lose weight the unhealthy way, via anorexia, is something I have a hard time grasping. The same friend that suffered a traumatic incident of attempted suicide wishes to be pre-incident thin again. I feel that the need to want to be thin was one of the factors, among others, that made want to jump four stories down in the first place. It’s an ugly and vicious cycle!
