OK, everything I wrote Friday remains true today. Not even going to bother talking about Punto's heads-down baserunning or the three straight walks in the 9th or Joe Nathan's continuing lack of clutch. (Also, Nick Punto had one of the best series of any Twin, so I can't hate on him too much.)

Rooting for the Phillies the rest of the way.

I declare a moratorium on people talking about how scrappy the Twins are and great their fundamentals are. Let us review tonight's game.

• Carlos Gomez has another baserunning error, costing us one full run.
• In fairly obvious running situations (for example, in the 5th with Cabrera on first, two outs, and Mauer at bat), they didn't even try.
• Joe Nathan is so driven to distraction by the presence of a fast baserunner that he throws the ball into center field.
• Joe Nathan lacks the proper dominating spirit of a closer, and is too scared to throw hard fastballs in a tough situation.
• With the bases loaded and no outs in the 11th, two straight hitters went after the first pitch instead of taking a pitch or two to let the pitcher have a chance to fall behind in the count.

This moratorium may end as soon as next season, if the Twins re-learn the basics of running and fielding. In the meanwhile, the Yankees, despite all their power, seem like a stronger fundamental team than the Twins. It's been a great run, but New York clearly deserves to advance in the playoffs.

An MTA theme song, to be sung to the tune of Katy Perry's "I Kissed a Girl":

I took a bus, and I liked it,
A ride on the public transit.
Just hop right on, and take a seat.
No telling who you'll meet.

This is primarily a question for speakers of languages with grammatical distinctions between formal and informal speech, such as the pronoun-pairs tú/usted, tu/vous, ты/Вы, du/Sie or the dizzying system of Japanese honorifics.

Which forms do you use when addressing an animal? I don't mean a mythical talking animal like Osiris or Mickey Mouse, but a real-life animal. I assume that most people use tú/tu/ты/du to tell the family pet to roll over, but what about a particularly noble animal, such as a recent Kentucky Derby winner or a wild lion? Or what about an animal belonging to someone whom you would address as tú/tu/ты/du? Do you ever address any animal as usted/vous/Вы/Sie?

This page speculates that North Korea may have a secret subway system for Kim Jong Il and friends. The main evidence is that they ordered way more subway cars than needed given the length and timing of their two official subway lines.

I just watched Star Trek VI for the third or fourth time, and I finally figured out how the Klingon knows that Kirk is the real Kirk and the shapeshifter is the fake Kirk. The real Kirk still has his shackles on, while the shapeshifter slipped out of hers in a previous scene. I thought of two other theories as well, but this is the best one.

Do any of you maintain websites for major chain banks, retailers, restaurants, etc.? If so, I have a suggestion for you.

When I search for locations near me, I'd like to be able to filter for locations that are actually open right now (or at a time of my choosing). This should be easy, since your websites already know the hours of each location. It's really annoying that I have to click through half a dozen Bank of America locations to find the one location near me that's open until 2 instead of 1 on Saturdays.

kthxbai

Minneapolis people should recognize this list.

Aldrich

Thomas Bailey Aldrich; Cyrus Aldrich.

Bryant

William Cullen Bryant.

Colfax

Schuyler Colfax.

Dupont

Samuel Francis Du Pont.

Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Fremont

John C. Frémont.

Girard

Stephen Girard.

Humboldt

Alexander von Humboldt.

Irving

Washington Irving.

James

George P. R. James.

Knox

Henry Knox.

Logan

John A. Logan.

Morgan

George N. Morgan.

Newton

Isaac Newton.

Oliver

Deacon A. M. Oliver, whose widow was a generous donor to Macalester College and Oliver Presbyterian Church.

Penn

William Penn.

Queen

Nobody in particular.

Russell

Roswell P. Russell, a pioneer who arrived at Fort Snelling in 1839 and opened the first store in St. Anthony in 1849.

Sheridan

Philip Sheridan.

Thomas

George Henry Thomas.

Upton

Emory Upton.

Vincent

Thomas M. Vincent, assistant adjutant general of the United States during the Civil War.

Washburn

Cadwallader Colden Washburn and William D. Washburn.

Xerxes

Intended to fill in the alphabet. Presumably in reference to Khshayarsha I the Great of Persia.

York

Intended to fill in the alphabet. Presumably in reference to the English city.

Zenith

Intended to fill in the alphabet.

Abbott

E.T. Abbott, a Minneapolis surveyor and civil engineer; Seth Abbott, another Minneapolis surveyor, whole daughter Emma was a singer.

Beard

Henry Beach Beard, who donated land around Lake Harriet to the city.

Chowen

George W. Chowen, county register of deeds and clerk of the district court.

Drew

Unclear.

Ewing

Unclear.

France

Unclear. Possibly the nation-state.

Principal source - Minnesota Geographic Names, by Warren Upham.

1. There should be a 2nd Ave subway (as is planned). But when it gets to 125th St., it should take a sharp left turn and go all the way crosstown on 125th (which is not planned).
2. There should be a 96th St. subway, which should continue out to LaGuardia, Shea Stadium Citi Field, and then down to Jamaica to connect with the JFK Airtrain.
3. The 7 should stop on 1st, at the UN.

Other nominations?

ETA: I've retracted the 96th St idea, in favor of continuing the 125th St line to LGA/Citi/Flushing and creating a 96th/86th/Astoria line. Also, I suggested a few cross-Bronx and cross-LI lines below. There are some other good ideas too, like extending various lines and creating express bus or rail service across 125th.

Let C(n) be the number of ways to write n as the sum of consecutive non-negative integers. The terms from C(0) to C(10) are 1, 2, 1, 3, 1, 2, 3, 2, 1, 3, 3. Find an ordinary generating function for C(n) in closed form, in terms of elementary functions if possible. Prove that the series 1/C(n) diverges. When about the series 1/(n C(n)). What is the tightest order-of-magnitude estimate of C(n) that you can find? Prove that C(n) is unbounded. How frequently does it occur that C(n) is equal to a given number k? Tell me something I don't know about C(n).

The strength of a gravitational or electromagnetic field is inversely proportional to the square of the distance to the source of the field. Do the weak and strong forces behave the same way?

Don't go to a garage, which will charge you $80-150 to diagnose it. Instead, go to Autozone, which will read the on-board computer's diagnostic code. Then, go to a repair shop if it's something that actually matters. This will save you money if it's something dumb like needing to tighten the fuel cap.

ETA: It looks like AAMCO thought of my idea for repair shops to offer free OBD scans. They'll do the OBD scan, and then fix whatever's wrong.

Molly Mathematician has two closed rectangular boxes, Box A and Box B, which she notices have the same volume and the same surface area. Box A's longest edge is longer than Box B's longest edge. Which box's shortest edge is longer? The four plausible answers I can think of are:

• Box A's shortest edge is longer than Box B's.
• Box B's shortest edge is longer than Box A's.
• Either case is possible.
• The question is ridiculous, since two boxes with the same volume and surface area must always have the same dimensions.

But only one answer is correct. Which is it?

What about 4D Freddy? He has two 4D boxes is the shape of a four-dimensional analog of a rectangle, and he notices that they have the same hypervolume, surface volume, and 2D-facet area. His Box A's longest edge is also longer than his Box B's longest edge. Which of his boxes has the longest shortest edge? Can you say anything about which box has the longest second-shortest edge or the longest second-longest edge?

I'll screen comments for a day or so.

In other news, I can now easily calculate George Bush's remaining time in office in minutes in my head. This says more about his time in office than it says about my counting ability, which makes me happy.

There's no racquetball game on the Wii, but the question "real racquetball or Wii racquetball" makes a great tongue-twister.

A question for people who understand technology. When I view my laptop's LCD screen from a low angle, the blues become bluer, the reds become redder, and the greens become blacker. When I view my laptop's LCD screen from a higher angle, the reds and blues become their negative colors (for example, dark red becomes light cyan), and the greens become lighter. There is no apparent variation if I view from the side, no matter how steep the angle. What explains these behaviors?

Edited to add: OK smartypantses, stop mocking my confusion about LED and LCD, and answer the question for LCD.

My cat has never taken any interest in the television before, but has now spent 20 minutes on the edge of my coffee table staring at the Sox-Rays ALCS game. Who knew that a cat could be such a baseball fan!

Interesting thing I just noticed while looking at Pascal's triangle: The number of twos in the prime factorization of comb(2n,n) (that is, the nth number in the central column of the triangle) is equal to the number of ones in the binary representation of n.

The Cowboys are playing the Packers right now. I'm not sure which one I want to lose more.

I live in a first-floor apartment facing out on a major street, which means that I often hear loud music driving by. Usually it's top 40 stuff -- Rihanna, Justin Timberlake, etc. But a car just drove by playing the Numa Numa song (a.k.a. Love from the Linden Trees) at full blast. It was the part at the beginning -- Ma-ia-hii, ma-ia-huu, ma-ia-hoo, ma-ia-haha.

My cat Humphrey was just stretching on the coffee table, and rolled off, falling onto the floor. It stood up very quickly, and looked around to see if anyone saw, in the same way that people do when they slip on the ice.

Still, my cat is not nearly as much of a doofus as Desean Jackson of the Eagles. Mr. Jackson, allow me to explain: You are supposed to drop the football and start dancing after you reach the end zone.

THIS is the place to hold your illegal bare-knuckle boxing tournaments! Like the better-known Northwest Angle, it is a part of Minnesota separated from the rest of the United States by Canada and the Lake of the Woods. Unlike the Northwest Angle, nobody lives there. It's also closer to the mainland by boat than the Northwest Angle is.