tennis
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South Campus Dichotomy
You are viewing stuff tagged with tennis.
“You’ve got to realize the world is a big place—try not to be so up tight.”
After his frank indictment of my character, I stared blankly at Mr. Mortenson, my high school physics teacher and tennis coach. His classroom had the idiosyncrasies of a long-occupied room: a non-standard office attached to the back wall, lined with 20-year-old physics instruction adjuncts and old tennis rackets. We had just handed in another assignment, on which I was accustomed to acing, but had flubbed a sign or made some minor error. I’m sure I looked crushed by my mistake and was redoubling my efforts and asking questions to get the concept right. I really didn’t like any grade less than 100%.
The longest tennis match IN HISTORY is currently tied, 59 games all. Some comments from the Hacker News thread on the topic highlighted the hilarious commentary from the liveblog at the BBC, covering the match:
Every Friday afternoon this fall is another round of layer tennis — it’s an online game played live where two designers face off against one another; each receives 15 minutes per volley to riff off the other’s image. The game takes the pace of design and increases it by a coupla (sic for humor) orders of magnitude, giving spectators the option to watch the creative process unfold within the minds of two talented artists. Humor, beauty, and speed combine for a truly unique experience. Playing today is a man named Chuck Anderson, who has a vivacious, one-of-a-kind style… here’s a short bio by Jason Kottke:
This slow motion video of Roger Federer gives a person a good perspective on how expertly he uses his wrists and follow-through form. It’s a nice compliment to the occasionally fuzzy but always amazing Top 10 Best of Roger Federer.
I recently developed an interest in very tall structures when I found out that the tallest supported structure in the world is not far from me: it’s in North Dakota. This structure is not freestanding, it is a guyed radio tower called the KVLY-TV mast that broadcasts to an area of 22,686 square miles (for comparison, this is more than two states of Massachusetts). For further comparison, the mast is 628.8m high: compare to the current tallest building in the world, Tapei 101, at 508m. That said, since I was overdue for a hair-brained idea, I’ve decided to drive over and see this thing up close this summer (and photograph it). We’ll put somone tall next to it for scale … even though it looks like you have to get literally about a mile away to get the entire mast in your camera viewfinder. Before I leave this topic and move on to the tangential research it inspired, I must note an interesting tidbit about the tower: the top is, apparently, accessible by “service elevator or ladder.” Is it just me, or does it seem like a really bad idea to climb a ladder that is 2,063 (4 tenths of a mile) high? Goodness.
