No Poker? No Problem

So, its been a long time without online poker for me, but I've found many ways to effectively pass the time and also occasionally scratch that little gambling itch.

I've played in 3 of the 5 monthly poker tournaments near my neighborhood. There's usually 2 tourneys a night and anywhere from 12 to 20 players. I've cashed all three nights I've played to put myself in good position for the year long payout. I'm currently sitting in 2nd place.

I've recently joined Draftstreet to see if I can figure out how to beat daily baseball leagues. It's been a mixed bag so far, I've cashed in only 1 event. So I'll keep on the low and free tourneys until I get a good grip on the scoring system. I think if you use that handy little link there I and you will get some sort of bonus for playing $ games, so hook a brother up.

The WSOP has begun so I can begin sweating my horsies. The Leak should make things interesting.

I've been actively seeking out new music and keep finding old stuff. I have been picking through the Grateful Dead library and been getting some good bootlegs. I've also filled out my library with older Massive Attack, Acen (yes I went though the early 90's rave scene), the entire Daft Punk library, the new Beasties, and a Joy Division remaster.

I keep expanding my role at work by digging in to Wordpress (not that this site shows it), Sitecore, and some other CMS. Enough so that I know I will never have the patience and attention to detail to be a real programmer.

OK, I think I had a point at the beginning of this post, but I gotta go home. See you kids soon.

WSOP BEGINS!!

Cheers to all those headed to Vegas, may the chips be with you! For those of us living vicariously through others we have props. Jordan has the details here: WSOP 11 props

Additionally he and I bet on ME entries. I thought I was going high at 5635, but jordan went higher at 6319. CK was nice enough to be the arbitrator in our guesses. So where are you at?? My initial guess was 5300, but I moved it up. I've seen guesses as low as 4000 and CK set the line at 5000 after getting our guesses.

I'll be watching for those updates so lets gettem started!!!!!!!

The rapture

Really People?

How did this nutjob gain global pub for this shit? Guy adds a few numbers up and poof! The world is ending.

Seriously people.

Your life is not ending. God is not coming to save you....especially you. You will still have your life, your loved, ones, your world. I suggest you start controlling the things you can control and leave God alone. He has better to do than come and save you....especially you. Now go home, kiss your wife, kids, and whoever else you hold dear. Remember to live today and let tomorrow work itself out.

-Skidoo

Reality 86'd

The intranets showed me this awesome documentary about Blag Flag in 1986. Just when I was starting to cultivate a taste in music, this stuff smacked my brain.

I'm glad that David Markey had the wherewithal to chronicle this.


"Reality 86'd" A film by David Markey from David Markey on Vimeo.

Edit: you have to go to Vimeo to watch it. Give yourself an hour.

So what happens?

I'm beginning to think that Party Poker will have a real good chance to return to the US before the other two big poker sites. They followed the rules the the US laid out and are viewed as legit by the UK.


Could Party Poker have a leg up on reentering the US sooner than other sites given their compliance so far??

New game in town

I played a new neighborhood game for the second time last night. A good friend of mine turned me on to a juicy traveling game last month. It rotates houses every month and takes a very small rake for an end of the year leader board. Last month I played a little too tight and ended up 3rd in the first tourney. Bad beat in the second. This month I had a better understanding of my opponents, and outplayed/outdrew them all night. I won both tourneys last night chopping with the 2nd place guy both times. I now am atop the 2011 leader board. Then I won another 100 or so playing dealers choice. It was so nice having a great feel for the cards and players. A perfect storm of awesome. Pulled in a little over 5 bills then woke up this morning and played three sets of winning tennis.

Like I told Waffles, you gotta play like a champion for things to happen, I'm starting to do just that in cards and life. It's a great feeling sometimes.

Otis reminded me.

I read this post by Otis just a few minutes ago and was reminded of this story:

Some background:
My soon to be wife and I decided we wanted some very special wedding rings. We are both of Irish descent, but not thoroughly steeped in the Irish traditions other than a healthy (or not so) taste for adult beverages. However it was our bright idea that we would have crafted for us, unique Irish knot wedding rings. We researched our lineages for designs and found a unique and not-too girly design that we would have fashioned into rings. Long story short we had these beautiful yet heavy rings crafted in 14K gold with a nice diamond nugget for my wife being the only real design difference. These were expensive rings.

Fast forward a few years and we were at my cousin's lake house. I was teaching my children to hang on for dear life to the inner-tube while my cousin sped. I remember thinking about removing my ring, but decided, nah we won't be going too fast because of the kids. Well, I decided to let my cousin pull just me and he punished the everliving crap out of me. I distinctly remember my final dismount as he ran me into a huge wake going about 30mph. I was floating gleefully through the air, arms and legs splayed and I felt the tug of my ring leaving my finger. I tried shifting my body towards the giant golden circle floating towards the cool blue water (that slo-mo NOOOOOOOOOO in my head) but to no avail. It sank like so many shiny lures before it and lays at the bottom of Lake Sidney Lanier.

My wife got a real nice shiny new ring for that one, and I have a nice cheap band of white gold.

HeadsUp

HighOnPoker, always a font of good ways to separate me from money, is getting together some sort of prop bet for NBC's Heads Up Championship. Poker, gambling, and not dependent on MY ability...SOLD.


Here is the lineup of talent:


Jason Alexander
Patrik Antonius
Eric Baldwin
David Benyamine
Andy Bloch
Liv Boeree
James Bord
Doyle Brunson
Joe Cada
Daniel Cates
Johnny Chan
Don Cheadle
Nicolas Chouity
Allen Cunningham
Jonathan Duhamel
Annie Duke
Tom Dwan
Peter Eastgate
Eli Elezra
Antonio Esfandiari
Chris Ferguson
Ted Forrest
Phil Galfond
Phil Gordon
Barry Greenstein
Bertrand Grospellier
Joe Hachem
Gus Hansen
Jennifer Harman
Phil Hellmuth
Phil Ivey
Faraz Jaka
John Juanda
Gabe Kaplan
Frank Kassela
Eugene Katchalov
Phil Laak
Howard Lederer
Erick Lindgren
Ayaz Mahmood
Thomas Marchese
Mike Matusow
Jason Mercier
Michael Mizrachi
Sorel Mizzi
Chris Moneymaker
Daniel Negreanu
Scotty Nguyen
Annette Obrestad
Dennis Phillips
Dwyte Pilgrim
John Racener
Greg Raymer
Vanessa Rousso
Kara Scott
Huck Seed
Erik Seidel
Vanessa Selbst
Emmitt Smith
Gavin Smith
Jennifer Tilly
Melburn Whitmire
David Williams
Justin Young


I think it would be a good idea for each participant to pick 5 players one of which must be a celebrity, one WSOP champ, one female, and 2 wildcards. Also, maybe as a tiebreaker we could use the card suit brackets that are set just before the filming. Check in with HOP, and lets get this moving...

More Music Please

I've been searching high and low for new sources, avenues, and applications of music. I'm by no means a music snob or whatever, I try to do my best and listen with an open mind....even to that crap my kids like. I found this via my love of post-punk and joy division and it hit me so hard I had to share. I'm sure this isn't up everyones' ally, but heregoes.





Feel free to put me on a path if you think you have suggestions, and big thanks to Mary for sharing Musicophilia and for opening my music brain again.

Fantasy Baseball

Hey there kids, I'm interested in running a Head to Head league on yahoo this season. It will be 6x6 format with the following setup (these can be changed if necessary).


Ideally I'd get 12 owners, but will accept 10-16. So if my 4 readers will tell 3 friends a peace, I should get a full league by opening day. (March 31'st)

Cost is negotiable, but I'm thinking between $20-50 for the season. Post here or email me if you are interested, once I have a minimum of 10 interested, I'll proceed.

WOOOT Baseball!! You kids be careful out there.

This was fun....must of been the drugs.

I stayed home Tuesday and Wednesday for a fever and flu like symptoms. Somewhere in my tussin-fueled fog I managed to win my first non-blogger MTT in awhile. I'm officially addicted to the turbo and super tubo versions of On-Demand and Rush On-demand tourneys in values of 2.50-11. This tournament officially had 215 entrants and took just UNDER 2 hours.

Joy Division FTW

VIA Mary
VIA DANGEROUSMINDS

The Ugly

Well my memories of WPBT and Vegas have all but faded into oblivion, however I did want to address something mostly for myself. If I didn't manage to link you or mention you in the past 2 posts, but I did in fact meet you, well I'm slack. Its not you its me.

What I did want to get out for me to remember is that I'm a junkie. I'm reckless, thoughtless, and plain ignorant at times. It's something that's hard to admit when you pretend to be a pretty smart guy. I simply don't have an excuse for Thursday night. I can't convince myself that it was actually me. I ran through my bankroll in a matter of hours. When I was done with that I hit the ATM and damn near drained my checking account. I didn't walk upstairs and go to bed, I didn't sleep it off. I didn't listen to the me that said on the plane 'Don't be an idiot...please'

Nope, I kept pushing the throttle....oblivious to anything other than the fix, the gamble, the booze. It makes me sick to think about what I put in jeopardy. For the sake of....nothing. selfishness, hardheadedness, greed, stupidity? I don't know. I couldn't shake that pit in the bottom of my stomach the rest of the weekend, so please forgive me if I was a little off. I was scared shitless of myself, of fucking up again, of losing. So, no more Vegas for me. Some guys just can't handle it.

Peace.

The Bad

Saturday's tourney.

OK Kids, I got a few minutes to try and knock this out. We last left your hero with missing brain cells and a lack of fundage.

After a fitful sleep, I got up and showered, watched some tube while waffles snored and don cackled. I fell asleep again for a minute and then roused the dudes. I needed some food, since I failed to eat on Friday. We got dressed and decided to cab it over to Aria, I wanted buffet, so we walked about 14 miles around Aria until we found it. Totally worth it.

I had my home made omelet, and various other sundries from the huge buffet. The real bad part is that my hung over brain and shrunken stomach couldn't really take advantage. The shrimp were awesome and the prime rib was bloody, I just couldn't eat very much. I sucked as much down as I could and had a leisurely brunch before the tourney.

My last longer partners were wolfie and xkm1245. We were seated separately, but close enough I could keep an eye out. Neither of them looked particularly enthused, myself I was drowning in missed flops and picked off at least twice when I thought my raise should have been respected. I tightened up and was able to take a couple small pots, but I never got above my starting stack, I was terribly frustrated. I made a stand with ATo and was called by KTo which obviously paired on the river.

I enjoyed meeting Astin, who was to my right until he busted early. His printed photos of the view from Bellagio were spectacular.

I hung out and watched most of the rest of the tourney, getting up to give JOOOO reports on buddy once in awhile. She taught me how to play some penny slots and I bled away about 15 bucks but I did get a beer! woot.

I sweated several notables including Bayne, Mary, DawnSummers, Veneno, Garth, Gracie and Sweet Sweet, OhCaptain, Gnome, Drizz, and the eventual winner MiamiDon.


It was a treat to catch up with Gnome, and meet his wonderful wife who insisted on calling me ScoobyDoo. She was great, and a coupon meister. I also caught a Cat sighting, he told me about red rocks and seeing Dave Matthews unplugged, good stuff.

There's a particularly large hole in my memory here....I'll need to figure out what happened next cause i can't really recall, but there was more to Saturday night that included parading the golden hammer, more poker and drinking, but I'll end here for now.

Coming up, the ugly, an epilogue and things I remember that I forgot.

Interlude

I hurt too much to write, I just want to curl up in a cool dark place.


Look at these pictures here. They made me feel a little better.

The Good

For as many as five years I have wanted to join in WPBT festivities in Vegas. It just never was really feasible with its vicinity to the holidays, and y'know I'm just a poor old southern boy. Anyway I'd like to first say that I'm grateful to those that put their hard work, time, and effort to make this an unforgettable weekend in many ways. In no particular order I'd like to thank Al, Pauly, Iggy, CJ, April, FullTilt, Pokerstars. These are the lynch pins that make all this goodness go down...

Lets go ahead and skip to Friday night, cause well, the only thing I can remember about Thursday I'd rather forget. Maybe I'll come back to it in another post.

I woke up in darkness and had a mild panic attack. I wasn't exactly sure where I was. Luckily my phone was in my pocket. The clock read 8:05PM. I went to the shower and cleared my head, looked at the clock again in disbelief, and head out towards the MGM. I took the walk since I seriously needed it. The air was crisp but not cold and I grabbed a water on the way that went down way too fast. I sauntered past the MGM bar and noticed some bloggers there, not really sure who was there, but I smiled and nodded and moved along to the poker desk. I knew I had a hole to get out of.

I sat down and bought in for 100, which is not my preference, but i needed a stop gap. Pokergrump was already sitting there, and I didn't recognize anyone else. I played abc for a while and realized I could open up a little. I chipped up nicely gor a solid hour or so. Another blogger sat down that was either Soxlover or Penner. I'm really sorry that I got your name at one point and lost it. I think I called you sox on the way out of Legasse's hoping you'd correct me if I was wrong. By the time BrainMC sat down I had about 400 in front of me. The only hand I remember was with him when I flopped the nut flush draw (crubs) vs his set of tens. Didn't get there and I doubled him up. I got myself on the HORSE list and shortly started the blogger mixed game. I know the other CK was there, grump came too, we were joined by Josie, Yestbay, and CJ...maybe 2 more I can't remember right now. You can read about the oh so fun hand of razz I played vs Josie in the grump and josie links above. Good times. Bottom line, donks always win.

After awhile I retired to the bar and chatted up FromtheMorning, who was in town for less than a day, sox/penner/?, Waffles, CA April, Numbono, Ftrain, Iggy, Pauly, STB i think...and possibly more. My brain wasn't working so good, and now the memory is foggy and bleeding together.

We ended up back at the IP, where MiamiDon, Iggy, and I drank until about 5:30. A little aside about MiamiDon. I must admit I was not looking forward to being around him. We have butted heads on a couple occasions and I just wrote him off as an asshole. Well maybe some life moments have softened him up or whatever, but I had a hell of a time chatting and hanging out with Don. He's one of the good ones in my book and what's past is past.

If I met you and didn't mention it, please don't take it personally, I'm not that great in crowded social situations. I tried to get over my phobias as much as I could. It also doesn't help I was recovering from the massive hangover of Thursday night seemingly all weekend and there are several holes in my memory.

Next up: The Bad, Then The Ugly.

Recovering

I had back spasms all day yesterday, also sore throat cough, all that fun stuff. Those of you who didn't see me in Vegas can safely assume that other than meeting some really fun people, things didn't exactly go as planned. Full post coming at some point.

Finishing touches.

About this time tomorrow I will no longer be able to function as a rational human being. Too bad I'll be at work most of the day.

I'm still holding out hope of getting my bounty delivered today, if not, someone gets an IOU or I pull an Astin and just win the damn thing.

I got this:

to read for the trip. Hopefully the good Doctor can sign it for me.

I had to finish getting our big ass tree set up and decorated last night. We sat around after finishing up and played 'I spy' with the ornaments as the kids sipped hot chocolate and munched on chocolate chip cookies. Norman Rockwell would be proud. Here is said big ass tree:

Tonight I have to pack and spend some more quality time with the kids and the wife. Tomorrow will be like a trip to the dentist until 5PM est.

See you kids soon!

EDIT: I also found another picture compilation that is pretty neat. Pencil VS Camera

Far out

I don't know how many of you see the daily mail, but this is great.


Clouds



I plan on recouping from a massive hangover about this time next week W0000T!

One week!

AAAARRRRGGH

It's finally coming and I can hardly contain myself!!

I've got to get a to-do list together so I don't forget anything. At my advanced age I've finally learned not to depend on remembering more than three things at a time, so here goes.

I need to get my travelling music together. My 60GB iPod bit the dust early this year and I did not replace it. It was probably my 5th ipod, so I gave up. I have my phone though, so I'm culling together a 5-10 GB list for Vegas. In the last couple days I replaced some older music I had been longing for for awhile, namely Sebadoh's Bakesale, The Cure's Three Imaginary Boys, and Fugazi's13 Songs. I also got ahold of some newer music such as Fang Island, Vampire Weekend, and Kings of Leon. I'd also like to give the gang over at Coventry music blog a big high 5 for finding the complete Mushroom Jazz series online.

I ordered a bounty the other day, hopefully it gets here in time.

I've taken Paulys 'Invading Vegas' post and taken most of his tips to heart.

I plan on packing as light as possible, so I won't be winning any best dressed awards this year, also I'm on the fence about bringing my laptop. Other than the plane ride, I don't seeing it being of much use, but we shall see. I'd be happy to hear an opinion or two on this. What else, Oh money. I've withdrawn some $ from FT, I'll be crossing my fingers that it gets here in a week, if not, no worries. I don't really plan on eating any insane meals. With 3 kids and a wife to provide Christmas for, its hard to justify dropping three bones on some fancy hunks of meat, although I must admit I'd really enjoy it.

As far as extra curriculars I want to just go with the flow. My only real appointments would be Saturday's tournament and tilting back a few glasses of yummy brown liquid with OhCaptain et al.

What else? ahhh, the last longer challenge. I have filled the final spot on the team with xkm1245. XK has been playing the blogger series for a pretty long time and will certainly be a great additon to the Rock and the maniac.

I'm really looking forward to seeing some folks I havent met and those of you I have.

You kids be careful out there, at least for one more week.