Good morning, RVA! It's 33 °F, and today we emerge from our Hoth-like week to sunshine and highs in the 50s—we could even see 60 °F on Sunday.
Water cooler
Amazon released the 20 finalists for their second headquarters and Richmond was, gasp, not on the list. Washington D.C., was, however, on the list three times in the form of Montgomery County, Washington D.C., and "Northern Virginia." I think this means the company is interested in the area, but would like Maryland, D.C., and Virginia to duke it out over who can offer the most enticing incentives to the company owned by the world's richest man. Governor Northam's press release has a few more details, including a pity shoutout to Richmond near the bottom.
Kerri O'Brien at WRIC has the word that the RRHA will begin repairs on the heat in Creighton Court next week. Additionally, RRHA CEO T.K. Somanath is currently scheduled to update City Council—one would assume about the lack of heat—at their regularly scheduled informal meeting on Monday (4:00 PM in Council Chambers).
Justin Mattingly at the Richmond Times-Dispatch details how the local school systems will make up the time they lost to the recent snow days. I get the idea behind whatever law forces school districts to have a minimum amount of educational time, but Chesterfield adding five extra minutes to every day after April 13th does not make up for lost time in the classroom. That's five extra minutes kids spend packing up their bags and waiting for the bell to ring.
Dang, this piece in Richmond BizSense really hits home the explosion going on in Scott's Addition right now: A three-story building that went for $390,000 in 2015 is now on the market for $900,000!?
Julia Battaglini, owner of Secco Wine Bar, has a charming memorial of Richmond food-scene giant, Hollister Lindley. I never met Lindley, but I certainly enjoy stories about formative Richmond folks.
Alix Bryan at WTVR says that someone's opening up an international grocery store in the old Martin's née Ukrop's at the Brook Run Shopping Center. Consider me interested! Now if we could only nudge the bus up there...
The Washington Post has an ominously red government shutdown countdown clock on their homepage at which you can stare. Vox has a more informative and useful piece about where everything stands as of 11:17 PM last night. Using the Children's Health Insurance Program as a bargaining chip continues to make me barf.
Sports!
- Rams host George Washington on Saturday at 12:30 PM.
- Spiders welcome La Salle on Saturday at 2:30 PM.
- Hokies tip off against Florida State in Cassell Coliseum at 12:00 PM on Saturday.
- Wahoos whipped Georgia Tech, 64-48, and head to Wake Forest on Sunday at 6:00 PM.
This morning's longread
The Unexpected Beauty of Basketball Synchronicity
Mostly just watch the gif at the top of this article over and over and over again.
Back in October, in the opening days of the current N.B.A. season, something wonderful happened during a game between the Portland Trail Blazers and the Phoenix Suns. After a bad pass from one Blazer to another, the Suns’ guard Eric Bledsoe—who has since complained his way out of Phoenix and onto the much more promising Milwaukee Bucks—ended up with the ball, then torqued his body toward the other end of the floor, ready to catalyze a fast break. So far, so normal: that sequence, turnover into all-out sprint, is one of the most basic in basketball. The remarkable thing, though, was that Bledsoe’s teammates—Devin Booker, Tyson Chandler, T. J. Warren, and Josh Jackson—mirrored his movements almost exactly, down to the subtlest twitch, as if urged by some outside force. Each player planted his right foot, swerved his torso just enough to make the next step, now with the left foot, then flew off, chopping his arms through the air—right, left, right, left—like swift, mechanized scythes. They all ran with their heads slightly forward, their backs ever so hunched, and their feet kicking gently and freely behind them as they went. It was eerie. Suddenly, the team was a swarm of doppelgängers, hoping, it seemed, not only to score the bucket (as, incidentally, they did, on a smooth dunk by Jackson) but also to win, via coördination, some other, more celestial recompense.
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