M I made some coffee

R I made you some coffee!

M True, I just pushed the button…  Want some?

R sure.  You got up an hour ago?  I wish I got up with you!

M Sleep is one of the great things about this vacation.

R Yeah?  What’s the OTHER thing?

M All of them, babe…

---

Ten days!  Unreal.  Thanks LeeAnn and Bob for letting us dog-sit good old Charlie.

Friday, drove the Tesla out, what a joy.  Charged at the Food Lion and perused the shipwrecks on the only interesting T-shirt in the all-Trump freedom headquarters (resisted buying a Trump wig-in-a-hat).  Got a face photo at Dirty Dick’s.

Saturday, got up for an expensive and inconclusive 3-hour kite board lesson.  Learning to fly.  Most importantly, got me past the fear and feeling ready for next time!

Sunday was one of those perfect rainy beach days, with windows open to the storm and constant wind and rain.  Dope Thief finale, Jon Hamm entertained in Friends & Neighbors, and we discovered another amazing Korean drama When Life Gives You Tangerines, with perhaps the greatest one-two punch ever written.

Monday had us cruising the south end of the Outer Banks.  The cutest bookstore, Buxton Village books, was nicely curated, with local authors on display, and sections devoted to subjects like shipwrecks and southern lit.  Speaking of, the Graveyard of the Atlantic shipwreck museum was just down the road by the ferry at the southwest tip of the island, with an actual Enigma machine and plenty of tales of disaster, thanks to the ever-shifting shoals of the churning OBX sea.  We wrapped the day watching a wedding while sipping dirty Marys, at the Inn on Pamlico Sound, followed by a nice dish of tofu and veggies at Cafe Pamlico.

Pretty obvious what the problem is here!

All better.

Watch your six, Uncle Al.

It’s robot fighting betting time!

Loser buys Winner his favorite snack!

There are 32 teams in the single-elimination tournament, all ranked based on prior performance in the group stage.

RULES

For each day of competition, pick the winners of each battle.

If your bot wins, you score points!

Points Scored = (contestant rank difference) / 4 rounded to nearest integer – so root for the underdogs when it makes sense!

PLOT TWIST! If we pick the same robot to win a battle…
… if the robot loses, the point leader after the round cannot pick the winner to win in the next round.
…if the robot wins, the point leader after the round MUST pick that bot to win in the next round.
…if the point leader has conflicting rules in a battle, the rules are all invalidated.

Round of 32

Ep11 Mike Skorpios Minotaur Copperhead Glitch/WitchDoctor Hijinx P1 Huge Riptide
Ep11 Dan EndGame Bloodsport Lucky Glitch/WitchDoctor Sawblaze Hypershock Huge Riptide

Ep12 Mike Ribbot MadCatter Blip Tombstone Whiplash Yeti Rotator Tantrum
Ep12 Dan Hydra/Defender BlackDragon Blip Tombstone IceWave Cobalt CaptainShredderator Gigabyte

Dan	2 – 2 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 4 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 6 – 7 – 8 – 8 – 8 – 8 – 15 …
Mike	2 – 4 – 5 – 5 – 6 – 7 – 7 – 7 – 7 – 7 – 7 – 8 – 9 – 10 – 11 – 11 …

Round of Sixteen

Dan EndGame WitchDoctor SawBlaze UpperCut Hydra Blip Cobalt Tantrum
Mike Minotaur Copperhead SawBlaze Riptide BlackDragon Blip Cobalt Tantrum

Dan	15 – 15 – 18 – 21 – 22 – 25 – 25 –
Mike	11 – 15 – 15 – 15 – 16 – 19 – 23 –

Quarterfinals

Dan Minotaur Sawblaze Blip Cobalt
Mike Minotaur Riptide Hydra Tantrum

Dan	25 – 26 – 26 – 26 – 26 – 26 –
Mike	23 – 23 – 24 – 30 – 31 – 31 –

Semifinals

Dan WitchDoctor Hydra
Mike Sawblaze Tantrum

Finals

Dan WitchDoctor
Mike Tantrum

Dan	26 – 26 – 31 – 31
Mike	31 – 32 – 32 – 33