Welcome back to a Wumbo Wednesday edition of the BattleBots Beat, where we’ve been waiting for info on BattleBots: Bounty Hunters for… a couple months now? To no avail.
But guess what? We have avail now! And we have knowledge about this Golden Bolt is, as we knew it wasn’t for the normal awards. BattleBots Champions, or: Let’s take the Bounty Hunters tournaments, and weld them onto a version of Robot Wars All-Stars. Sure, I never understood why the Robot Wars All-Stars competition existed, but hey, this’ll count for something!
The format: The Bounty Hunters competitions from last year are back, kinda. They’re being referred to now as the Sin City Slugfest qualifiers. Same idea, eight-bot bracket, and the winner faces the five bounty bots, winners of the Bounty Hunter battles (Gigabyte who beat Son of Whyachi, Rotator who beat Bronco, Skorpios who beat Icewave, Lock-Jaw who beat Beta, and Witch Doctor, which defended its bounty over SubZero).
Wait, Senor, you may ask. Weren’t there six bounty bots? Where’s Tombstone? Also I don’t remember any of this, where are most of the posts? Well, to answer the second part, I got busy, and we had some things happen here that made it all but impossible. To answer the first part…
The winners of the five bounty fights move onto the finals with the three actively competing champions of BattleBots: Tombstone, End Game, and the newest champion, Tantrum. (Bite Force and Paul Ventimiglia remain Sir Not Appearing in this Season due to financial holdouts. He’s fighting the good fight.) Anyways, the winner of that receives the Golden Bolt.
Also, I guess, housekeeping note, the Beaties will be after this, then.
Anyway, here’s the Gigabyte bracket. Was it spoiled for us during re: MARS? Actually, yes, so congratulations to the winner, and we’ll see them in the finals! (I am obviously not going to spoil that here.)
Speaking of re: MARS, when is BattleBots going to post the fights? I want to see how the hell HyperShock pulled that off considering it absolutely got beat up against Tombstone. Did they switch to the other chassis for Blip and Hydra? (Oh yeah, HyperShock won that. Even better, Will Bales was the substitute Kenny Florian for color commentary, so it was his wife, Alex, who drove everyone’s [okay, my] favorite speedyboi to victory. Will he get an eternal amount of shit for it at the Bales household? Oh, no doubt in my mind.)
As for tonight, what’s on? I’ll be on my way back from Yanks-Mariners (seriously, Gerrit Cole? 6 in the 1st?) with Senorita Weaselo, which will include dinner… somewhere. She’s in charge of that portion. (Update: We went for Szechuan. Don T can confirm my affinity for eating the peppers until it starts to hurt.)
Elsewhere on the national TV…
You can watch MLS get pantsed by Liga MX on ESPN? Yeah, check your local listings, because god forbid major sports networks have live sports on! BattleBots is tomorrow, so you can’t watch it today. Dual screens with the Hall of Fame Game, right?
It might be all we gots together. For today. ONE DAY MORE.
…Hey, you make a Les Mis joke when you can. Go write things!
More Jackson Pollock abuse (I prefer “reimagining” or rebooting”):
This cricket-looking bug just pranced across my bed. I squealed and told Gumby to get rid of it, because I am skeered of insects. So what did Gumby do? He threw the cat at it. Hero! (NOT a hero) I screwed my courage to the sticking point and grabbed the evil little fucker with a kleenex. I tossed it in the toilet and it fucking LEAPED at me!
Arrrrrggggghhhhh! I slammed the lid shut and flushed the monster down. I am a badass bitch!!! Fear my wrath, you nasty jumping freak!
You are a braver woman than I.
This LA vs America game would have been better if they started Bale instead of having him come into the halfway thought the second half.
At least Club America won this one.
‘Merika survives the civil uprising from LA. News at 11.
I can’t give a proper Vin Scully tribute more than I already have. I’ve referenced him in multiple posts including Sunday Gravy.
I will say that I wouldn’t have been the baseball fan that I am without him.
My first memories of the game were Dodger games with Vinny on the mic.
I remember my grandfather listening to a Dodger game on a transistor radio while staring out of the kitchen window.
I’ve told this story many times but I thought my grandfather had a hearing aid because while he was a deacon in church he had this thing in his ear.
Turned out he was listening to a Dodger game on his radio while he was passing the collection plate.
Vinny was a God and it was a straight pleasure to listen to him call a baseball game.
Any doubters out there just answer this question: When was the last time you heard a one man announcing crew?
We SoCal people were also spoiled with Chick Hearn (Lakers) and Bob Miller (Kings).
And I have a leak in a garage pipe that won’t get fixed until tomorrow afternoon.
Probably related to Scully’s passing, world falling apart. (And the X-Files creator named Agent Scully for Vin)
Don’t forget Dick Enberg calling the Angels. We had it all back in the day.
Jim Brockmire before he got saddled with a broadcast partner
Props to Archie for creating a character named Lynette “Squeaky” Fields.
I mean Riverdale.
Taj and I were discussing this and I think I’ve seen more Padre games than any other team and I’ve always had a soft spot for them. Same with the Angels.
I’ve seen a shitload of Cubbies games but nowhere close to Padres games.
I hope they do well and seeing a full house this early in August is cool as fuck.
So a hat tip to Rocking Dog, go Padres!
This is a fun team.
Lot of talent in SoCal.
Baseball players aren’t too bad either.
Tuesday night Padres against Mariners, I think it’s the 13th of September ish. It’s Hello Kitty night and me and the girls will be there.
I’ll update my calendar
I left that Friday night open too.
I remember a pizza place that you were interested in.
Busy week, then.
Don’t you hate it when you go hiking and come across a pit full of skulls?
Somewhere in Northern Ontario:
No
ICYMI Congresswoman Jackie Walorski (R-IN) was killed in a car crash today. People seem to be being pretty mature about it and not making any jokes, which is made easier by that fact that she wasn’t named Seatpeltski or Flairbagski or something like that.*
*joke blatantly recycled from company twitter
Skidmarkski was a name I used in an earlier draft of this joke. I like to keep a window open so people can look in on the joke-making industry from time to time.
It’s nice to see Congresspeople getting killed like average Americans for once
She voted to reject Biden’s electors in January so I’m just glad she can’t run for office again.
Boom. Roasted.
When you’re hanging your dick off a a public bridge, don’t let the tip touch any live electrical wires. It will electrocute you and also cause many trains to be late.
“I’ve had to learn that lesson the hard way.” — Milton Berle
Don’t fuck with Reddy Kilowatt
The artwork for the BOLTMAN comic book series has evolved considerably over the years.
LA vs America?
The 2nd Civil War has started with a surprising enemy.
ESPNU is showing Michigan’s 2000 bowl win over Alabama. Did anything happen to Tom Brady? Do I need to release the confetti?
There’s a parallel universe where Tom Brady graduated U of M, rose to the level of junior executive at some insurance brokerage, only to be arrested and imprisoned for making out with his children at the company picnic.
A much improved night of hockey as opposed to last week.
I’m going to go buy Cuphead & the Delicious Last Course and Strange Horticulture. Now the question is which to play first? Or play some more Stray? Not Civ right now since it’s been crashing my laptop with some pretty serious memory issues since the last update…
For somereason, Strange Horticulture made me think of a Goth prostitute being lectured by Prof. Henry Higgins.
Strange Horticulture looks interesting.
Just played the first day and it seems my style. Although I could have done better at avoiding Rising Dread.
Haven’t really played anything lately. A bit of Wildermyth, and started a new game of Stardew Valley in the spring, but haven’t done much.
I should get back into civ. I just got back into Skyrim thanks to the Skyrim together mod.
I start a new character on Skyrim, play it for about a week, then stop.
There’s only so much stealth archery you can do before you get bored
I surfed yesterday, and was pretty bad. I surfed today, and was even worse. I’m just not ready to be taking off from a crowded point. My skills aren’t what they used to be and it drives me crazy (and really throws me off) because my fitness level – thanks to swimming – very much *is*. In fact my fitness level for this kind of activity is probably better than it’s ever been.
It’s like you were pretty good at soccer but didn’t play for ten years, but kept running as exercise, and then tried to play again. You could get to where you needed to be on the field but you couldn’t actually fucking *kick* the ball properly. That’s where I am right now.
That’s interesting. I agree with you that surfing requires a whole set of skills that general physical fitness doesn’t apply to.
However, I don’t know about those skills diminishing with time. You’ve been surfing quite a bit lately. I would think you would be sharpening up those skills by now.
I think the biggest thing that’s going on with you right now is that you’re surfing in a more crowded lineup and you’re more self-aware and conscious of others and that’s getting in your head and affecting your surfing.
Maybe the ticket is to drive to Ventura and surf those isolated breaks by the train tracks where there’s hardly anyone there.
I’ve always maintained that the best thing about surfing for me is that it gets me out of my head. For those hours I’m in the water, the only thing I’m focused on is the water and the surf and the pure feeling of riding the waves. The rest of the world disappears.
Twice last week and twice this week. Maybe four times (once a week) prior to that? One of the frustrating things is the regression. Three sessions ago I immediately made a drop on the left coming off Gillis that turned into a great ride, then couldn’t replicate it for the rest of the day. So the next session I spent working on my drops and thought I’d had things under control better, and then today just couldn’t make anything happen.
Yeah, I’m thinking I need to just find myself some quiet beachbreak and get my shit sorted out. Or take my beater board out to Sunset Beach and crash into beginners until I’m okay with slamming into people.
Isn’t the solution obvious? A really hot surf instructor. I’m sure the Rev Mrs Deadly Esq would be fine with it.
There’s a ton of little support muscles and other soft-tissue infrastructure that’s really important for the little nuanced tasks that separate a skill from general fitness. I didn’t ride horses seriously for about 9 years, and while I kept all the muscles in shape with yoga, tennis, etc, it was probably 6 months of riding 2-3x/week before I felt like my body was working how I expected it to. It’ll come back, and probably come back better, because all the things that drove your bad habits got weaker too, but it’ll be slower than you want it to be
Any surfing is good surfing.*
And we all have good days and bad days. So big deal you didn’t surf as well as you’d liked on a bad day.
*has never surfed**, but its on the bucket list
** has body surfed in waves on a board, just not standing up
You get your ass to SoCal and I’ll get you on a board and I’ll get you standing up.
I’ve never regretted going surfing before, and certainly am not feeling anything like that now. I’m just very unsatisfied with my performance.
This is going to be Game Time Decision’s quote next week that ends with “IN BED”.
It is now
Muhahahahaha
It’s kind of funny you should link it to that; I don’t know if it’s the same for Balls (or tWBS, God rest his soul) but I’ve caught roughly the same number of waves as the number of times I’ve had sex (by “roughly” I mean within an order of magnitude or so) and there aren’t all that many cases where I’ve retained very distinct memories of the details of the specific instance. Probably an evolutionary thing; it would be bad for reproduction if our brains were content to sit on past laurels.
https://getyarn.io/yarn-clip/c1f1cbb2-fb0b-4106-9c31-c7d0823d3156
Ok, that’s funny you make that parallel because not only do the numbers match up, so does the frequency. In both, you tend to go through patches where you’re riding all the time and then you go through patches where nothing is happening.
The best is when you have hot streaks at both at the same time.
AKA South Africa for you.
I’ve been trying to have a healthy week, and did pretty well on Monday and Tuesday, and was all set to continue when work decided to be hellish today.
Major reorg announced (of course, it’s been too quiet recently and this always happens when I’m getting a lot done) and then I spent most of the day arguing with what turned out to be a badly skewed query. The highlights of my day were actually the 2 hours of meetings I had on what is supposed to be no-meeting day.
Not even sure I have the energy to be unhealthy, leaving the house to go get cold booze or ice seems like a lot of effort, as does overpaying and waiting for delivery. It’s too warm in here for non-cold booze.
What about the time honored equation, booze + ice = cold booze?
Are you offering to bring me ice? Because I have no ice.
What are you, in fucking Europe? That’s crazy talk.
I don’t have room in my freezer. I have experimented with ice makers over the years, but they’re difficult to keep clean and the one I have right now only makes contaminated blue ice because I tried to de-mold it with something that fucked up the chrome
Warm booze is better than no booze.
Frequently true, but just not the sensation I want right now
“And in light of falling production and failed growth metrics, we’ve decided to add 6 more layers of middle management”
There needs to be a demotion mechanic for people who promote shitty reorgs, or at least something resembling accountability
About to take flight 4 of the last 10 days, but it’s ok, I’m not flying again til Friday.
/passes out
Can’t you let the co-pilot drive so you can get a nap and may be a couple cocktails?
Co-pilot bailed out earlier just like that guy did at RDU.
Some people will do anything to beat the rush from the gate to baggage claim.
You need to get an intern you can send places
Forged In Fire is on, go watch people make stabby things and watch the judges beat the everluvvin shit out of them. Hey, it’s like a less technological Battle Bots!
Do the judges beat them with their failed creations while mocking their craftsmanship? Because that would be awesome.
Oh, they beat the shit out of the creations, sorry, my bad.
They have broken several of the weapons during testing, which is demoralizing to the smith after working for hours to forge something.
I’m more of an old school “Sticks And Stones” guy myself. Some of the battles outside the Lascaux Caves were freakin’ epic!
So, you’re saying there’s nothing worth watching tonight?
You can watch the Battle Report for the Tyranids vs. Space Marines, over 2.5 hours of nerds battling using beautifully painted models, while continuously talking about obscure rules and rolling handfuls of dice.
Thanks to the internet, there is porn on every night.
Yeah, but the wife might object to step mom milf midget porn.
I saw the results for Marbula One. I had given up on Balls of Chaos but now I’ve been dragged back in.
BTW, Dunstan called it. NFL appealed today the Watson suspension. Which I liked.
Yeah, it’s a win-win for Goodell if he increases the suspension. If a court upholds it, great, Roger gets to break his losing streak; if not, then he’s happy to get publicity as “the guy who was TOO tough on sexual violence.”
Re, peppers: I give faith. Warm regards to Señorita.
Don’t we need to make 24601 Les Mis jokes?
I don’t have that kind of bread