i have a lousy superpower.

[orichalcum]

When I actually watch contests I care about, my candidate or team loses. I figured this out first at the Yale/Harvard Games, where we lost three years in a row until I turned my back in the stadium in my senior year and refused to watch the field and we won. I was in Spain in 1992 and didn't even get results till it was all over; I don't even remember where I was in 1996. (Well, where, yes, but not the details.) I pulled nigh-all-nighters in 2000 and 2004 watching tv, and look what happened. Thursday night, I was in rehearsal and didn't hear about Iowa till it was all over.

I should never have logged onto NYTimes.com tonight.

All right, I get the message. I'm going to make myself very busy on Saturday, January 19th, looking at ancient maps with ladybird97 and maybe going out for a nice dinner as an early celebration of A's birthday. January 26th I'll do something else fun. And suggestions for February 5th are welcome; I'll be just back from San Francisco.

Comments

[julianyap.livejournal.com]

Actually, if memory serves we all watched the returns in '96 in TC 1151, so that was okay.

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

Did we? Ah, okay. Maybe it's only in close races that I matter. I can also claim the 2003 and 2004 Yankee/Red Sox matchups, though. :)

[ladybird97.livejournal.com]

You are never allowed to watch a Red Sox game, ever :)

And yes, let's all do something not near TVs on the 19th.

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

No, no, you want me watching Red Sox games. I cheer for the Yankees desultorily, remember?

[ladybird97.livejournal.com]

Oh, right! Yes, watch. Watch all Red Sox-Yankees games, please! :)

[holmes-iv.livejournal.com]

Come to New Haven and play Xen'drik! <grin>

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

Ah, I see, that's "something to do on the 19th" not "holmes_iv wants a TPK."

[holmes-iv.livejournal.com]

Oh, I've got things to do, they'd just be more fun with more cool people to play with. :-) (And yeah, I came probably as close to a TPK as it's possible to come without actually killing anybody last night, so I've had my fix for a while.)

[meepodeekin.livejournal.com]

Really? Wow, either I wasn't there or memory really doesn't serve. I don't remember the election at all. Aging sucks...

[amethyst73.livejournal.com]

Ooo, you're going to be in San Francisco? Any free time on your hands while you're there? ;)

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

Probably not, unfortunately. We'll be in Berkeley, but likely only from late Friday night through Sunday evening with Sunday being entirely busy and Saturday likely being taken up with family. We'll keep you apprised, though.

[amethyst73.livejournal.com]

Right, that's about what I guessed. Have a good trip!

[mrmorse.livejournal.com]

Let's see. Clinton had a 3% victory in New Hampshire. That could be because, after a week of sexist attacks on Hillary Clinton, women responded by voting for her in a way that they didn't in Iowa. (Poll analysis suggests that in Iowa, women were slightly more likely to vote for Clinton because she's a woman. However, men were more likely to vote against her because she's a woman. In New Hampshire, women voting for Clinton because she's a woman was a larger effect.)

Or it could be because you happened to visit The New York Times website as the votes were being counted.

Those explanations seem pretty equivalent in their descriptive and predictive power, so I would stay away from the news any time anything important is happening.

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

Well, one way, I have agency; the other way, all the power belongs to old white people in New Hampshire. :)

It's only narrow contests. I don't have the civil-war or natural-disaster powers of my extended family. I guess our bloodline is degenerating.