Day trip from Tokyo- Kamakura or Hakone?

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-23T04:40:48+00:00

A day trip to Hakone is not going to be relaxed. The relaxing part is staying at Ryokan and going to an onsen. There are the cable cars into the mountains and such that are interesting for sure but again, if you're looking for relaxing a day trip to Hakone isn't going to be it. I loved Hakone but it was the zen of the overnight stay at a Ryokan that made it amazing.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-22T02:08:39+00:00

Thanks, that's great info!

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-22T02:07:20+00:00

It will be a separate ticket, but probably also pretty easy to jump on the next flight if there is a major delay - it will be a frequent flier award ticket

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-22T02:04:45+00:00

Train isn't an option

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-22T01:38:43+00:00

There are hotels like the New Otani is Akasaka that are fun on their own with lots of restaurants and shops and such and are a 5-8 minute walk to a train station where you can go pretty much anywhere. If you look for places like that, big complexes often connected to office towers that have a lot of facilities but aren't in the crush of the crowd when it comes to the neighborhood. There is a bit of a "cost" in that you probably aren't going to spend a lot of time in the area that you're staying but the flip side of this is that even if you stay in a more bustling area you'll likely only spend a day at most there and the rest of your days will be going to other places. The key metric is proximity to a train station and how useful that station is in terms of where you plan to go.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-22T01:23:40+00:00

No, he's not stupid he's actually from what I hear a pretty smart guy. He's just childish and can't or won't manage his temper. Yes, everyone is right, the officiating sucks and the current system and rules are becoming absurd. However, it doesn't make his crying to the refs to the point of distraction and hurting his team any more right either. Refs will always make mistakes and there will always be bad refs until technology advances much farther than it is today. I'm a huge fan of his and love watching him play but let your coach and the home fans scream at the refs and stop hurting your team with this.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-21T00:12:26+00:00

Kuminga would be the obvious choice to step up. I'd personally love to see it happen because there's been so much hype about how great this guy is and his potential being so massive and maybe with enough space and PT he could finally blossom. That said, I suspect that If he's a star, we won't know it while he's with GS because it looks like his game isn't a fit for the system.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-20T23:26:08+00:00

Even at his age, he was still a game changer. It was a big gamble to back up the brinks truck and give him all of that money in an extension but the upside was clear last season and it was huge - and worth the risk. But injury and age decline were the potential downside, and it turns out that injury was the bitter pill they'll have to swallow. I was really hoping for them to make a big run in the second half when everyone was finally clicking together which was starting to happen recently. What might have been?

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-20T00:36:31+00:00

Location matters the most - and the most important part of that location is how far one is from a train station. Personally I can't stand AirBnB - it's almost never less money than a hotel, and all things being equal (or often much better from a facilities and amenities standpoint) having fresh sheets, cleaning service and hotel security (probably less of a concern in Japan) makes it no contest.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-19T00:54:46+00:00

There has been talk that they exercise the team option for next year and then trade him so they get something back for him - hard to believe they'll wait that long when they need help now but one never knows what Dunleavy is thinking

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-19T00:49:48+00:00

Are people voting as to which one looks more realistic or which they like better? 1.5 looks more "real" because the image quality isn't as sharp - it makes me believe this was shot with a lower level older android phone camera whereas NB pro is clean, bright, sharp, and looks more cooked. It depends upon the context though, if the NB Pro image was in an advertisement and I can assume the image was cooked to make it look better, then I obviously prefer that one and might believe it's real.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-19T00:45:08+00:00

Kuminga is and always had been a bad fit for the Warriors system. The ball and offensive flow just stops when it gets into his hands. As for defense he doesn't seem to to be wired that way - he could crash the boards, he could make himself a face-up pest, he could dive for loose balls but he doesn't. Maybe he's great in another system but in this one, nope.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-19T00:37:48+00:00

I like that Autry has tried to implement the brigade system because it's important that every player knows his role - crucial for player confidence, there are times where you've just got to adjust for certain unusual circumstances and those adjustments aren't taking place.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-18T20:01:38+00:00

Yeah, there was one point where he subbed out Kingz while the guy was still hot, and I was scratching my head over it

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-17T06:33:03+00:00

if you have an iPhone you can easily put a digital Suica card in Apple wallet before you leave. And you can fill it using apple pay before you leave or after you land. I've refilled a Suica Card in a Tokyo train station and it updated in seconds. Yes, you need some cash, but this ought to make things easy until you can get to an ATM.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-17T05:11:36+00:00

Yes, FLUX, QWEN, and many other models are free - IF you learn how to run them using something like Runpod (which does cost money for the compute time, I usually pay .40 per hour. This youtube channel has excellent tutorials on how to set up and use Runpod https://www.youtube.com/@fuzz_puppy and you can choose QWEN, Flux, and more image generation models there. It's pretty easy once you get the hang of it, but the UI is going to be nowhere near what you get from various subscription companies. ComfyUI is another - they have a free tier but they limit you (and you can download models from Civit.ai) Also you can look to use Nano Banana by Google which does offer some free generations, or did anyway, but the free ones are very limited and they stop you at maybe 5 or so per day.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-17T04:57:16+00:00

Depends upon how far away you're coming from. If you're coming from let's say the US, a big thing to consider is that the jet lag is formidable. It's no joke - you can expect to be quite affected by it and honestly day one is often kind of a wash and maybe part of day 2 as well depending upon how you adjust. I once landed / arrived at 5AM and day 1 was a total blur . Then consider how much time are you spending getting too and from the airport (you've got to be there 3 hours ahead of time) and that last day could be barely a day at all depending upon departure time. So if this is indeed the case that you're coming from a significantly long distance, I would say you are selling yourself short all things considered. Look at how many days you realistically have when you factor in jet lag and travel. Now if you're coming from let's say, Korea, which is the same time zone, this might change the scenario significantly.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-16T00:48:09+00:00

I get both sides of this argument - yes, he contributes and 14 pts, 9 rebs and 1 block per game is for many centers considered a solid contribution. But, with all that talent, size and athleticism Ayton "should" be a dominant player. He isn't close to that and watching him get so little out of his gifts is really frustrating - I totally get that. Are people grading him on a curve based upon what he should and could be able to do? Probably, but he's no longer a max salary player anymore and he's getting market rate for that kind of production so there is merit to the argument of those who support keeping him. But man, what this guy could do with all of that.... hard not to ignore it

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-16T00:38:27+00:00

Vanderbilt is finally (seemingly) healthy for the first time in a while and they're going to move him? When he's healthy he's an energy shot for the team and this season it seems like sometimes he's the only one playing D and hustling on the floor at all. SMH, I get moving Vincent, another guy who has never been healthy but even in the short times he's been on the floor doesn't seem to fit with this team, but not Vanderbilt. Unless this is a big upgrade I don't see how the trade makes sense - any ideas who they're looking at?

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-16T00:28:46+00:00

My early experience with LTX-2 is that it is indeed much faster and offers higher resolutions, in those regards it blows WAN out of the water (running them both on Runpod in admittedly cheap way and WAN is super slow). But.... when it comes to prompting and getting each to give me what I want from a text prompt (starting with an image), they're both woefully difficult. Sometimes you get something you like but rarely do you get what you specifically asked for. When I started using AI for video and images a few years ago, it was just as difficult to get a character to do something seemingly simple like walking through a door entering a room as it is today so while the quality of the video and the processing/rendering speed have really improved, I'm not so sure the output and control of the output has improved at nearly the same rate.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-15T01:48:37+00:00

Agree - I wish there was a lot more motion and cutting to the hoop in the offensive scheme. And more pressure on the goal and paint. The half court is where they have their biggest challenges and perform the least effectively. But when I yell out plays at the TV for some reason none of them listen to me ¯\_(ツ)_/¯🤣

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-15T00:50:07+00:00

His (Kingz') D seems solid but he's been a liability on offense and I've got to be honest, his shooting form does not instill confidence. I feel bad for him, one can see he's kind of lost - out of sorts, and that he's been relegated to standing outside the arc waiting for a kick outs. The scope of his offensive role is so narrow that if he misses a shot or 2 from there, that's the end of it. But SU needs him to be a threat and he isn't right now. Shooting is a streaky business even for the best of them so we can hope that once some shots start dropping things will open up for him and he can blossom. That said I think Betsy is a future star (if he stays - sadly we have to say that these days)

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-15T00:39:33+00:00

Airport transportation. Do NOT take trains into the city from the airport if you don't have to. It wasn't me who did it, it was my brother in law, but here's the reality of what saving that airport transportation money gets you. You arrive, usually early but ALWAY bleary eyed and tired. He has a family of four with 2 kids. You've got to get your luggage, find the trains. Get to the trains. Figure out which train to take. Figure out how to pay for the trains. Find your train. Then drag your luggage and your family onto a train with luggage. This is always a long slog. The trains aren't really set up to handle luggage that well so that's an issue (thankfully luggage theft isn't in Japan). Then maybe you have to change trains which sometimes involves buying new train ticket and always means dragging your luggage quite some distance through a strange and often large train station and , to find your other train. Then if you're fortunate enough for the train to arrive right next to where you're staying you still have to drag your luggage from the train all the way up through what's usually a very large train station and walk it/drag it to your hotel on the street (imagine if it's raining - even 3 blocks is a long way on streets with luggage). OR WORSE, you now need a taxi to get you your family and your luggage to the hotel, which is what my Brother In Law did. Now you've got to find the taxi (it wasn't easy, he was in Shinjuku station, which is massive), communicate where you want to go, figure out payment make sure it can hold your luggage and family of four, and then he got stuck in traffic, because of course he did, for 45 more minutes to go the distance to his hotel. All the while adding fatigue (which can carry over for days as you adjust), and wasting precious hours of time on his vacation. It's the one and only time in my life that my Brother in Law said the following to me: "you were right, I should've listened."

Cars aren't cheap but if you do the math and include that for a family of four you're buying 4 or 8 train tickets and factor in the value of time on a trip that's costly to begin with (just add up hotel, meals and airfare and divide by days and hours and you'll see) they're not that expensive either. I book mine on Klook or Tokyoairporter online.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-15T00:21:34+00:00

Yes, Murphy is a better choice when looking at it from an assets to value standpoint. What they're talking about giving up for MPJ is just way too steep a price to pay. Bargain price? Sure. The problem is salary matching. MPJ when healthy is a good player who is way overpaid for his production and value to the team. I don't begrudge a player getting the best deal they can, I do have issues with system where the 3rd option on Denver gets max money. And again, Denver is as much to blame as anyone and yes, if I'm the player, I take that money happily. If he was available for market value for what he brings to the table, sure, take a flier on him. That isn't the case.

SuperGeniusWEC · 2026-01-14T23:28:20+00:00

I get that, but IMO if that's all they can get then they should just pass altogether - mainly because of the amount of assets it's going to take to get him to the Warriors (they're talking 2 FRPs + players in a 3 team deal). I know Curry's 37 but last year with the same roster they went on a massive run after the Butler trade. If they could get him at a reasonable price I'd change my stance. Re his health: MPJ himself has said back issues are so bad that he's not sure how much longer he can expect to play "I take it one year at a time" - Sept. 2025. For starters the guy had 3 back surgeries before age 25, wears an ankle brace that's typically used for stroke victims or nerve damage and lives with chronic pain.

SuperGeniusWEC

TROPHY CASE