Author's posts

Turkey Day TV: Day 3 Night

Collegiate Cow Tipping-

This project covers 6 pm to 6 am.

Don’t Buy Anything

Black Friday is a bunch of meaningless hype, in one chart

Posted by Neil Irwin, The Washington Post

November 23, 2012 at 9:58 am

When television news crews and newspaper writers go to cover the holiday crowds, they try to give the festivities some great economic import. Standard aspects of the genre include noting that holiday sales can account for about a third of retailers’ annual sales; cite authoritative-sounding projections from the National Retail Federation about what this year’s sales will be, and perhaps even note that consumer spending accounts for 70 percent of the U.S. economy (conveniently leaving out that most of that spending has nothing to do with gift-giving or holiday cheer).

In fact, sales over Thanksgiving weekend tell us virtually nothing about retail sales for the full holiday season-let alone anything meaningful about the economy as a whole. Paul Dales of Capital Economics analyzed the relationship between retail sales during the week of Thanksgiving against the overall change in retail sales for November through January. As the chart shows, the relationship is a very weak one, with dots all over the grid. But if there is any conclusion to draw at all, the relationship is actually negative!



In other words, strong sales results around Black Friday actually predict slightly weaker holiday sales overall.



Retailers know that a typical family spends whatever it will spend on holiday gift-giving, and that whether that spending comes on Nov. 23 or Dec. 23 doesn’t make that much difference in the aggregate. But retailers aren’t a monolith; they are all chasing market share from the others.



For the media, it is a ready-made story. It takes place at a time that there is little other news, and it is known in advance, so editors and TV news directors can plan in advance for coverage. And there’s no doubt that video of people stampeding through the doors of a Wal-Mart in hot pursuit of a new Wii makes for great television. That is even putting aside more cynical possibilities, such as that media depend on retail advertising and thus have a vested interest in creating a sense of hype and anticipation around an orgy of consumerism.

And what, then, of the people themselves, the consumers who line up with breathless anticipation and make the whole thing possible. From an economists’ perspective, this is a case in which the retailers are using a rationing mechanism other than price to allocate scarce goods: They price a limited number of TVs and other products at a below-market price, and then ration those goods based on who is willing to stand in line the longest.



“I think they want to bring the people here and make them tired,” a man named Saeed Yazdi told my colleagues Abha Bhattarai and Steven Overly Thursday night outside the Best Buy in Columbia Heights. “It’s veiled punishment.” Well yes, Saeed, precisely.

Our elites hate us

DCblogger, Corrente

Fri, 11/23/2012 – 11:21am

Looking at this video of shoppers at Walmart fighting over Phones I realized how much our elites must really hate us. I am sure that when members fo the Walton family watch videos like this they must laugh.

Walmart does this deliberately. They have a handful of low priced loss leaders, but nowhere near enough to meet the demand. So people line up and fight to be first, because if you are low income, getting one of those low priced items might be your only chance to own one. This is what the elites delight doing, creating situations where we are battling each other frantically for crumbs. It is not just their workers they hate, the Walton family hates their customers, hates everyone with a net worth less than a billion dollars.

THE Game.

noon

  • ABC– Michigan @ Ohio State
  • ESPN– Georgia Tech @ Georgia
  • ESPN2– Rutgers @ Pittsburgh
  • FX– Tulsa @ Southern Methodist

2:30 pm

  • NBC– Grambling State v. Southern
  • Faux– Texas Tech v. Baylor

3:30 pm

  • ABC– Florida @ Florida State
  • CBS– Auburn @ Alabama
  • ESPN– Oklahoma State @ Oklahoma
  • ESPN2– Wisconsin @ Penn State
  • Vs.– Air Force @ Fresno State

6:30 pm

  • Faux– Stanford @ UCLA

8 pm

  • ABC– Notre Dame @ USC

10:30 pm

  • ESPN2– Louisiana Tech @ San Jose State

midnight

  • Vs.– Grambling State v. Southern

3 am

  • ESPN2– Missouri @ Texas A&M

4:30 am

  • ESPN– South Carolina @ Clemson

If your alma is represented I’m sure that’s the big game to you.  The two with the most BCS significance are Stanford/UCLA @ 6:30 pm and Notre Dame/USC @ 8 pm.  Armando will be watching Florida/Florida State @ 3:30 pm.

Cartnoon

Seven Years’ War

Turkey Day TV: Day 3 Day

(h/t Herr Doktor Professor)

This project covers from 6 am to 6 pm.

Turkey Day TV: Day 2 Night

Your usual collection of marathons, movies, and holiday specials.  New College Throwball on offer from ESPN at 7 pm (South Florida @ Cincinnati) and 10 pm (Arizona State @ Arizona).  Late night repeats 2:30 am ESPN2 Syracuse @ Temple, 5 am Arizona State @ Arizona; 3 am ESPN South Florida @ Cincinnati.

8 pm NBC The National Dog Show (repeat), midnight Speed Interlagos Practice  (also, too).

Big BCS day tomorrow, Interlagos Qualifying.  This project covers from 6 pm to 6 am.

T-Day College Throwball Day 1

While not quite a pivotal in BCS Standings as tomorrow’s big games, many teams are putting the finishing touches on their seasons today with the following telecasts this afternoon.

  • 11 am ESPN2– Syracuse @ Temple
  • noon ABC– Nebraska @ Iowa
  • 2:30 pm CBS– LSU @ Arkansas
  • 3 pm FX Utah @ Colorado
  • 3:30 pm ABC– West Virginia @ Iowa State
  • 3:30 pm Faux– Washington @ Washington State

It’s also the start of College Hoopies with most schools participating in pre-season tournaments.  Individual matchups are not available because of the format but ESPN is providing continuous coverage from 12:30 pm to 7 pm and ESPN2 from 3:30 pm until 2 am.

Cartnoon

Originally posted August 18, 2011.

Ducking the Devil

Turkey Day TV: Day 2 Day

Interlagos Practice @ 11 am.  College Throwball Day 1.  More pre-season College Hoopies.  Movies!  Gold!  Hitchcock!  James Bond!

In short plenty of reasons not to shop.

Turkey Day TV: Day 1 Night

So this day 1 thing, that means you’re going to have to put up with this tomorrow at least and frankly the schedules don’t get ‘normal’ until Monday.  I haven’t yet made up my mind about Saturday and Sunday since Zap2It is undergoing some kind of site re-design to make it more ‘mobile friendly’ and it’s screwing with my crystal ball.

I might decide just to highlight specials, we’ll see.

This project covers the Black Friday overnight from 6 pm to 6 am.  I remind you it’s also national ‘buy nothing’ day, advice I intend to take myself.

Still no sign of land

‘Cannibal cop’ planned to kidnap, eat woman for Thanksgiving: prosecutor

By BRUCE GOLDING, The New York Post

8:48 AM, November 21, 2012

Forget white meat or dark meat – he wanted “girl meat” for Thanksgiving.

Gilberto Valle, the NYPD officer busted by the feds as an alleged cannibal wannabe, saw his alleged holiday hopes dashed yesterday when prosecutors said he’d planned to dine on human flesh tomorrow.



Public defender Julia Gatto argued that Valle’s online chats were only “sick, twisted” sexual fantasies he shared on the Web with like-minded fetishists.

Gatto said her own, reluctant investigation into her client’s “subculture” – which she likened to “Star Trek geeks and science-fiction movie guys who dress up and go to conventions” – had apparently uncovered the site Valle frequented.

“All over the Web site, it says: No matter how real this sounds, this is all fantasy,” she insisted.

It is well known that we now have the problem relatively under control.

Man pleads not guilty to cooking wife

UPI

Published: Nov. 22, 2012 at 8:51 AM

VISTA, Calif., Nov. 22 (UPI) — A California man pleaded not guilty to the murder of his wife, who police found dismembered, with body parts cooking on the stove and her head in the freezer.



Police found three pans of “meat” cooking on the stove and realized it was pieces of the victim, Anna Faris, 73, Deputy District Attorney Katherine Flaherty said. They found Faris’ head in a plastic bag inside the freezer and multiple pieces of freshly cut bone throughout the house.

“They also found a work area set up in the bathroom, with saws, a boning knife and other cutting instruments,” Flaherty said.

“There is no evidence of cannibalism at this time,” she added.

Cartnoon

Happy Thanksgiving.

Holiday for Drumsticks

Load more