October 11, 2021
Monday
Still The Goat
Merck asks FDA to authorize antiviral Covid pill for emergency use (cnbc.com)
And now begins the delicate dance of launching an effective oral antiviral for COVID while still working to convince people to take a vaccine. The availability of molnopiravir will embolden some who refuse the shot, I suspect. Why take the shot when there's a pill?
Don't look now, but the NFL's golden boy, Patrick Mahomes, has a losing record (2-3). And he really should be 1-4, since the opening week win over Cleveland was enabled by a horrible call. I'm hoping the comparisons to Tom Brady will be dialed back a bit now.
Matt Amodio’s ‘Jeopardy!’ Streak Ends After 38 Wins (nytimes.com)
Ken Jennings retains GOAT status.
‘Scheisse’: Germany’s Universal Swear Word (berlinspectator.com)
I learned something today. Scheisse yeah!
I struggled a bit with photo uploads through the iOS Shortcuts all. The interface for creating scripts is a little janky...still. After struggling with the logic of the photos script, I realized that it was a problem with the interface that was borking things for me.
Basically, the script calls a Get Contents of URL action to send a POST request to the API. The photo is included as a file in the form data. When you add a field to the form data in Shortcuts, it defaults to a text field, but allows you to change it to "file" when tapping on it. This doesn't actually change the field to a file, though. Rather, it allows you to pick text attributes of a file to send as text. I had changed it to File, and thought, for hours, that I was in fact sending a file.
I finally reconstructed the action from scratch, adding each field one by one. When initially adding fields, a separate text v. file option appears. Setting that to File actually sets the field as a file. In the list of fields, the file fields are right-aligned while the text fields are left aligned. I wish I would have known that a couple hours ago!
Anyways, the Shortcut is now working. First photo posted through the Drafts-Shortcuts-API conduit coming next!
This seems as good a photo as any to be the first posted through the Shortcuts app on iOS. I remember taking it at a gas station on a drive home from Florida. In southern Georgia, I think. The grammar police are everywhere...thankfully!
Kiké Hernández walkoff sacrifice fly in bottom of ninth lifts Red Sox past Rays, into AL Championship Series - The Boston Globe (bostonglobe.com)
This is why they play the games.
No one saw this coming. The Rays were the unbeatable force rolling into the playoffs, and the Red Sox were off the rails a bit. The teams flipped roles in this series though, and now the Rays are headed home and the Red Sox will play for the American League pennant.
Man I love baseball.
