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Day 5

This was the reason we came to Orlando – this was the day we were going to Legoland!

Legoland opened at 10:00 that day. We left in time for the 30-minute trip and parked the van at 9:55. There were a couple hundred people already in line, but they had all the gates open and the delay wasn’t too bad.

Our first stop was at Miniland. They had various cities re-created in Lego bricks.
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This is part 3 of a 5-part series, containing both photos and commentary. If you haven’t already, you should start with part 1 of the vacation recap.

Day 4

We drove 2 hours to the headquarters of Cru, on the east side of Orlando. We caught the 10:30 tour of the Jesus Film project. The tour tells people about the film and demonstrates how it is translated. The 2-year-old did not care for it at all, and the 4-year-old didn’t last long either. I’d say 1st grade on up for this.

They have displays of a (simulated) hut that a field worker might use:

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Day 2

We left Knoxville, TN and drive a few hours to Atlanta, GA. Our destination was the aquarium. We spent all afternoon there, then headed to our hotel about 30 minutes away in McDonough, GA.

At the aquarium:

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To get away from the land of ice and snow, we took a trip to Orlando, FL. I’d say we timed it right – it was 5 when we left (-5 with wind chill), and it was sunny and 80 in Orlando when we were there. It was very easy to adjust to the nice weather. The only problem was that we had to come back, although it had warmed to about 15 degrees when we returned. And I can’t take too much credit for timing it right – that’s just when the kids had their break from school. And the week after we left, Orlando had rain just about every day and it was in the 70s.

This is part 1 of a series.

Day 1

We drove all day.

Tune in tomorrow for more.

The midwest and northeast parts of the USA had a disastrous winter, due to the effects of the polar vortex. Some would have you believe the abnormal polar vortex patterns are due to global warming. Some would have you believe it is due to fracking, or Putin, or cell phone radiation.

But I have the real story.

I stumbled upon the cause by accident. I was thinking about how this was a prolonged, dreary winter. One might even say it is like it is always winter but never Christmas. Which means that the polar vortex is being caused by

Jadis

That’s right – the White Witch of Narnia fame.

She has somehow travelled between worlds and ended up in ours again. She setup her reign in the arctic north and is gradually expanding her kingdom.

That’s my theory anyway. It might need a little more research.

If that doesn’t pan out though, the other option is that the polar vortex is a massive publicity stunt for Disney’s Frozen.

As if that needs any more publicity …

Transcript
Father: Are these your mobile devices?
Son: Look, dad, it’s not what you…
Father: And what is this? Minecraft??
Son: Dad, I …
Father: Answer me!
Father: Who taught you how to do this stuff?
Son: You, alright!
Son: I learned it by watching you.
Partnership for a Mobile Device-Free America

What are you teaching your kids?

The last time I added a method of predicting the winners of NFL games, it wasn’t all that impressive. That was YPP, and it was not an improvement over MPW.

MPW has been the leading indicator for the last few years, better than any other automated, statistics-based predictors.

But now MPW is pushed to second place, because MPWHFA has taken the lead.

I added MPWHFA (and its results) to the list of NFL game-predicting methods.

It wasn’t just slightly better than the old leader – it averaged a full percentage point better.

Of course, that’s not entirely fair to MPW. HFA stands for “Home-Field Advantage”, and MPWHFA is really just an improved version of MPW. Take MPW, add a few points to the home team, and see which team has the larger number. That team should be the winner.

Next step: predicting not just the winner, but also the point spread. MPWHFA does that too (and at around a 60% success rate, I might add). MPW and MPWHFA are based on net points. That should be all you need to know to figure out point-spread predictions.

Enjoy!