"If anyone can do it, it's you, Huck."

Remember that scene in Lucky You?

Last night Nelly was going to register for a small buy-in tourney at Venetian and I was gong to play cash.  Leenan on the other hand had no money.  Until he found $4 in his shirt pocket.  Sweet!  Let's hit up the penny slots.  An hour later, Keenan had turned his $4 into $70, $51, $21, and then back into $50 thanks to the penny slots.

Then he went to blackjack and turned $50 into $180.

Sweet - $180 is a buy in.

8 hours after we originally started this nonsense, Keenan and I are ready to cash out and join the others who have gone to bed long ago.  We were at the same table (Keenan flashed me the degenerate bat signal after my HORSE game broke - he was at a good table and we successfully stayed out of each others' way). I told him I was done when it got to my BB.  Then I look at his stack of $700 less a very lengthy massage and say - that's $4, right?

The guy next to me looks at me like I am that Barbie doll that says: "Math is hard."

Nice hit, sir.  Way to turn nothing into something.  Nice alchemy.

Nelly (aka my horse) is playing event #49 today.  As we speak, she and the others are out foraging for breakfast.  I think I'm headed back to bed and then over to the Rio in the afternoon.

I registered for my tournament (#51) yesterday.  Table Orange 25, seat 1 to start for those that are curious.  I've been playing a lot of HORSE cash games here the past few days and I've met quite a few people playing #51.  Should be interesting.  Oh yeah, and a thank you to my backers.  I have been able to sell a full 2/3rds of myself. 

Pink on 'roids. Cause that's how they roll on the West Coast.

In Vegas.  Yesterday I
didn’t play any poker.  Monday’s session
I was running bad and I just wasn’t in the mood to get in the saddle again.  Didn’t see the point in forcing myself to play
since that usually ends badly.  Played
blackjack and made $10. 

In the late afternoon/early evening I played some 1/2 NL at South Point briefly
and broke even (actually +$1).  It helped
to get my feet wet again.  On the other
hand, I’ve been kind of frustrated with breaking even recently because it seems
overall the past few weeks I’ve been a break even player.  I think this is a sign of some of the holes in
my game right now (primarily calling to much pf), but I keep telling myself
that being a break even player is better than being a losing player.  Still frustrating to sit and play for hours to break even...but that is another story for another blog post.

After watching The Love Guru (can I have that 2 hours of my life back, please?) I cabbed over to MGM, grabbed a bite to eat, and sat down at a 1/2 NL table there.  And then I proceeded to play like a fish...basically calling or betting when I knew I was way behind.  After shipping $200 with a quickness, I decided it would be a good idea to play blackjack.  The dealer was running so hot she had blackjack literally 5 times in the 20 minutes I was sitting there and the previously full table completely cleared.  I also left behind $100.  Then on my way out I had to pass a HE Bonus table.  Donated another $100 at that table after playing only 4 hands.  I wonder how many times I will have to learn the "table games are -EV" lesson?  To quote Hooker from one of my all-time favorite movies, The Sting: "Sorry Leroy - you can't beat the house."

I did the "Katie walk" out of MGM and cabbed it back to the Rio where I am staying.  Perhaps tilty is not the best mood to march into the Amazon ballroom with, but I decided that I was gonna play the 10/20 HORSE game they had going the day before.  Plus the $50K HORSE event was going on and I always like sweating that.

Showed up and put my name on the very LONG 10/20 HORSE list as well as the considerably shorter 10/20 O8 list.  Sweated HORSE while I waited for a seat and got to say hi and gush all over Jennifer Harman (my all-time favorite player).  I was too embarrassed to ask for an autograph. I also made eye contact with Pauly of Tao of Poker fame and briefly considered yelling how much I love his blog across the room. 

Finally got a seat at 10/20 w/half kill O8.  I had heard from multiple people (notably Anne and Travis) that this and the 20/40 O8 were very good games, but I was unprepared for what I had just gotten myself into.

For a moment here, I'm gonna assume that most readers of my blog who care about poker are familiar with Mr. E Honda's 5/10 half kill TOE pink chip game.  Imagine the worst of pink: the anger, the donkalicious play, the berating of the dealers.  Now imagine that game with everything amped about 150%...for twice the amount of money.  (Seriously, I didn't think people could play worse than at pink, but apparently they can) That, my friends, is what I decided to have as my first experience playing in the Amazon ballroom. 

Seriously, these people make Roy look like a sweet old man, and even the dumbest of pink players look like a 75 year old NJ rock.  Oh, and Kenny - you think you get shit as a dealer?  You should have heard the crazy business going on at this table.  We also had people straddling (either UTG or on the button) every hand that was not a kill (which many were).

Less than 2 hours later, I had more than tripled my short buy of $300...sitting on $1050.  The game is strong, so I go to take a short break.  When I get back, the table has broken.  :(  From what I gather, something got out of hand and someone's feelings got hurt (PSA: PEOPLE - DO NOT TAP THE TANK - ESPECIALLY FROM THE INSIDE).

I was offered a seat at 20/40, but I took the opportunity to cash out.  Pocketed the benjis I had sitting on the table, racked up, and went to the cage.

Vegas running tally:
NLHE and table games: -$400
LO8: +750

Total: +350 (too bad I had to ship $400 at MGM otherwise this would have been a REALLY good night).

Like to gamble?

I still have 19% of my action in WSOP event #51 ($1500 HORSE) for sale.  If you want to get in on it, let me know.

Pics from my parents' boat trip

So jealous.  It's the worst when you are invited to go somewhere for free and you can't swing it.

Dad with some crazy huge fish.  I'm excited to go fishing when I go home in July.

Mom at the helm.

The captain looks like he's in the process of giving an order.

Salmon that my dad caught.  This is what makes me super jealous.  You don't know good until you've eaten fresh salmon.

Grilling giant oysters.  Again, jealousy.

Currently chip leader in FT HORSE tourney

27 players to start.  Top 4 get paid.  8 of us left at the final table.  I have just over $12k in chips...should be losing a few more players very shortly.

10:01am: In the money now, but just had an unfortunate razz hand...now I'm 3rd in chips.

10:21am: Clawed my way to second.  3 handed now.

10:31am: First in chips, heads up.

10:37am: Ick.  Had a very unfortunate round of heads up o8.  Ended up taking second.

An ego boost

I briefly mentioned wanting to play the $1500K HORSE event and I've already had offers to buy 2/3 of my action.  Pretty neat.

So yeah, looks like I will be playing WSOP event 51 after all.  Anyone interested in getting in on the action, let me know.

Cynicism

"When you look for the bad in mankind expecting to find it, you surely will." - Abraham Lincoln

"That's because there is a lot of bad there." - Katie Baxter

When asked to describe myself, I frequently tell people I am a cynical optimist.  It is, I think, the best descriptor of me.

At school I am definitely known as the cynic.  When we have the political sophistication discussion, or the democratic theory discussion, I generally stake out the position of people are stupid, and is it really such a bad thing we have low voter turnout?  While my true position is slightly more nuanced than that, I am certainly no Pollyanna.

Sometimes this bothers me.  On the other hand, I got this way through experience, and being cynical has also served me well, probably more than it has caused me any harm.

My cynicism is certainly tempered by my overall optimistic nature, however.  I am certainly no pessimist, or I would have run into oncoming traffic long ago.  ;-)

A change will do you good

Yesterday I went to see the SATC Movie (it was pretty good) and get my hair done with Nelly.  I showed up to the salon and told the hairdresser that I had had a rough 6 months, variations on a theme of the same haircut for years, and I didn't even care if I hated it as long as she just did something new.

I have naturally very wavy hair.  Especially in the summer time, it is a battle to keep it reasonably straight.

Once my hair was wet she was surprised to find my natural wave and talked me into going with wearing my hair wavy.  She cut it with some choppy layers and gave me long bangs for the first time since I had been in 8th grade.

The bangs kept annoying me all night as I am used to being able to put my hair behind my ears.  And wavy my hair was bigger than I was used to.

Today when I woke up I styled it curly and then re-styled it straight.  They both look good, but I'm not sure how I feel about letting my curls shine through.  More experimentation is required.

At any rate, a change it definitely is.

Gonna be one heckuva crazy trip to Vegas

Going to Vegas in a week!!!  And can hardly wait.  Regardless of the fact that we could all be theoretically busto a few days into the trip.

However, I did hit up the Monday game for a nice amount of money (which I spent half of on a new haircut).  And, I have managed to have the same amount of $ in my bank account the past 2 months.  So I must be doing something right, poker-wise...at least not shipping it.

Gonna be an interesting trip for sure.  I'm not bringing all that much cash with me, but I have a horse in one of the $1500NL events (#49), and depending on how I do myself, I'm contemplating throwing $1500 out the window at the HORSE tourney (#51) that starts towards the end of my trip.  I'm under no delusions of my skill level, but I've won more HORSE tourneys than NL ones, plus I just want to play a WSOP event. 

At any rate, win, lose, or draw, I'm going to Vegas in a week, and that makes me happy!!!

The disadvantages of an elite education

My parents (and their parents) are (were) educators.  It probably comes as no surprise that I was raised to value education as a means to an end, yes, but also as something intrinsically valuable in and of itself.  I also ended up at what Princeton Review called the university "where those smart enough to go Ivy, but don't want to work that hard" end up.  I might not have gone to an Ivy league school, but there was a time in my life where I was pretty insufferable about "being smart."  Until I had my peers who actually did go Ivy talk down to me.  Then I realized how freaking annoying and idiotic such attitudes are.  Some of the smartest people I know don't have a lot of formal education.  And I know some pretty common sense dumb people who have a lot of formal education.

One of the great errors of an elite education, then, is that it teaches
you to think that measures of intelligence and academic achievement are
measures of value in some moral or metaphysical sense. But they’re not.
Graduates of elite schools are not more valuable than stupid people, or
talentless people, or even lazy people. Their pain does not hurt more.
Their souls do not weigh more. If I were religious, I would say, God
does not love them more. The political implications should be clear. As
John Ruskin told an older elite, grabbing what you can get isn’t any
less wicked when you grab it with the power of your brains than with
the power of your fists. “Work must always be,” Ruskin says, “and
captains of work must always be....[But] there is a wide difference
between being captains...of work, and taking the profits of it.”

Training people to feel so entitled is setting them up for failure.  The one Scarlett O'Hara moment I've had in my life (you know, "As God as my witness I will never xxx again?"  The kind when you not only say it, but really mean it, and stick to it?) came as a result of hitting bottom and not having anyone pick me up.  If we continually enable our students, what are we teaching them?  Fuck up and it will be fine, no matter what?  Training the next group of Enron execs?

A very well-written article.  Please read.

Simple pleasures

Three small things that made me smile today:

1) Coming home in the wee hours of morning and finding that the yellow lilies on my front stoop bloomed.
2) Watching a movie that makes good use of the surround sound system I have in the basement.
3) Being awake for dawn - my absolute favorite time of day - you know that time before sunrise, but it is starting to get light outside?

Two good surprises

1) I thought my last paycheck was 2 weeks ago, but I got my last paycheck on Friday.  Granted it was only about $200, because they take out all the health insurance premiums for the summer out of the last paycheck, but hey a paycheck is a paycheck.

2) My xbox 360 arrived and I've been playing it today while I work on my paper (I have GTA IV and Marvel Ultimate Alliance).  I forgot how much I heart video games.  And no, Honda, I  don't want to play COD4 with you and get bodied.  LOL

I get my sense of adventure from this man:

He's crazy.  Of course, so am I.  Happy father's day, dad.  Love you (and would not be the person I am without you...that might be a good thing or a bad thing, depending).  :-)

A perfect day

I have over 100k lifetime miles on United Airlines and I as a result I used to be a big fan of their 3 perfect days series in their seat back magazine, Hemispheres.  If I had to design the perfect everyday day it would definitely be something like the day I had today:

Play Pink in the morning and end up ahead (even if only $10).
Sleep.
Clean/do some laundry (OK, not perfect, but it does make me feel like I am being productive).
Go and play with Nelly and Keenan's doggies.
Eat a really good Vietnamese dinner.
Hang out at Orange Ball playing trivia.
Go to Stained Glass and play tonk (the only bar where we can stay til 2:30am in MD).
Come home, put on my pj's.
Go over to Anne's (at 4am) and watch one of my all-time favorite movies (The Sting) and have a great conversation about everything under the sun (including my dissertation - who else is gonna listen to me talk about that?  LOL).

Definitely a good day. 

Nerd term of the day: selection bias

What happens when we get unexpected results from the data we have?  If we are just relying on memory, or if our sampling procedure was bad, perhaps it is faulty data.  Garbage in, garbage out.

From Wikipedia:

Selection bias is a distortion of evidence or data that arises from the way that the data are collected. It is sometimes referred to as the selection effect. The term selection bias most often refers to the distortion of a statistical analysis, due to the method of collecting samples. If the selection
bias is not taken into account then any conclusions drawn may be wrong.

See also: cognitive dissonance.

Black is the new black

Well hallelujah, I actually made some money this past trip to AC...a couple hundred after expenses.  This money was immediately handed over to Bank of America to pay off my credit card.  Not having a job (or any guaranteed positive cash inflow) sucks, but I will admit that it has inspired me to play better, and manage my bankroll better (the latter is probably most significant change and I'm actually kinda surprised what a difference a few changes here and there have actually made).  This might not be saying much, but I've also been playing some of the best poker I've ever played over the past month (yes I still do the dumb shit from time to time more than I'd like to, but I've been happy with the changes I've made to a couple of aspects of my game).  It's really nice to put consistent wins (even if they are not huge hits) and/or minor losses in my spreadsheet, as opposed to some of the bigger losses I have had to type in over the past 6 months.  This is gonna sound dumb, but I'm surprised at how effective actually getting up from the table when I'm a certain percentage ahead...or taking a break when I'm swinging down has really made in my bottom line. 

I have also decided that I can't ever claim to run bad after seeing how good (and by that I mean not good) this one guy was running up at the Borgata a few days ago.  When I first sat down at the table, he ran his nut flush into another guy's 2 card straight flush.  It was pretty obvious that the one guy (table rock) had the sf, but it's hard to fault the nut flush guy for not folding.  Not 5 hands later (after rebuying for table max), he woke up with KK against my 55 in a multiway pot.  Flop was 5K5.  Case K did not show up, all the money got in on the turn when the flush got there, and the guy was seriously confused when the dealer did not push him the pot after he insta-tabled his hand, slamming it on the felt and yelling: "I flopped it!"  I quietly turned over my hand and said: "I did too."  I'm a very empathetic person away from the felt, but usually I don't feel bad for people I'm in hands with at the table.  However, I felt horrible for this guy.  Talk about running bad.  Stack off with the second nuts twice in the space of 20 minutes when both times you think you have the nuts.

Sadly, I was unable to avoid table games.  Happily, I didn't ship it at them.  Plus I got to spend some time with Jon and Sarah, which is always fun.  We had a rather entertaining dinner at Harrah's.

I also continued my winning streak at pink, except for the fact that this week I only cashed out $10 profit.  However, a win is a win...I'll take it.  My new philosophy: +$10 is a lot better than -$300.  Small wins and/or breaking even allow my big hits to put me further in the black rather than less in the red.  And black is a good place to be.

Funny dealer

Overheard at a Borgata Texas Holdem Bonus table when playing with Sarah, Jon, Ricky, and Eric:

Dealer: "That hand isn't winner winner chicken dinner.  It's more like winner winner chicken soup."

Grinding sucks but I guess it's better than the alternative

I've only had two losing sessions over the past 30 days.  I'm also in the black over the same time period (huzzah!).

However, my wins in the past month haven't been greater than $200 in a session.  The average is around $100.  Considering all I've played the past month is pink (5/10 Limit TOE), 1/2 and 2/5 NL, I guess this is OK, but I was really hoping to make more at the 2/5NL up in AC. 

I was bitching to Keenan the other day that I haven't been able to make any big scores recently and he pointed out that it is better than the alternative (aka shipping it).  I suppose this is true.  I could really use any positive income right now and every little bit helps, but it is pretty frustrating to profit such a little amount.  I've been really proud of my ability to just get up and cash out when I'm ahead and I realize that I'm starting to play bad...which is probably a reflection of my improved mood of late more than anything.  I don't mind just being at home these days.  I've also been playing a lot more solid poker and it's been showing in the fact that (other than at pink) my stack hasn't been fluctuating nearly as much as it normally does (yeah I'm a nerd and try to keep track of this kind of thing).

And speaking of poker, all the degens (and their mothers ha ha) are up in AC this week and I'm headed up myself later tonight.  Ricky and Pops are up there now, Anne's going up this afternoon and I'm leaving tonight after my comp study group meets.  E's talking about heading up too.  I got a free room tonight and Wednesday, gonna play through Thursday afternoon and then head home Thursday evening some time.  Wish me luck.  Sure would be nice to do something this trip other than just pay for gas/tolls (like the last two trips). 

I've been very strict with the no table games policy...ask Anne, I was looking longingly at the pit last week at the Borgata.  Fortunately I was able to ignore their siren song.  Hopefully I can keep up my willpower on that front on this trip too.  Need to save some money so I can gambool in Vegas (2 weeks and counting!!!).

WSOP freerolls continued...

Awhile back I won a WSOP freeroll and got a ticket to play in a satellite to the WSOP main event.  I haven't used that ticket yet because the satellites are on Saturday and I tend to be asleep or busy.  Gotta hurry up and do that soon.

Anyways, I've been trying to win another ticket.  A few weeks ago I came in 58th out of ~4000; the top 50 get tickets.  I just couldn't hang on with the blinds and antes going up so fast.  Another week I busted out 300-something out of 4000.  My tournament play has really improved in the past year and I know I can win another ticket if I play good and win a few races along the way.

I'm on break in yet another of these freerolls right now.  I've had an above average stack pretty much the whole tourney after an early triple up.  306 people left.  Sitting on 28k, average is 23k.  Started with 4714 people. 

Wish me luck.  I'm not gonna be able to fold my way into the win on this one since it's a turbo and the 50th person right now has a stack size of over 38k.

Update:  Boo- went out with AK in 98th.

Folding the nut one pair in a cash game

Last night at Pops', I had an unfortunate hand and I folded on the turn and never found out what the other guy had.  I absolutely HATE it when people pester me to tell them what I had, especially after I've already politely declined to say, so I never ask anyone else what they have either.  But this hand is killing me.

A couple hands after I took a beat, I wake up to AA in the cutoff.  I'm sitting on just over $300.  The rock is in play and there are lots of limpers, so I make it $20 to go.

Ross, immediately to my left on the button calls.  Everyone else folds til it gets around to Vince who is two to my right.  He calls.

Flop is 456 rainbow.  Vince checks to me and I c-bet just under pot.  Ross instamucks.  Vince instacold calls.  Arrooooo?

A black K comes on the turn and I smile internally, thinking this could be a great scare card for me.  Vince checks to me again.  I instabet around 1/2 pot, thinking if he flopped a set, he could lay it down to me now.  He has definitely made some big folds against me in the past.

Now Vince goes into the tank.  Forever.  So I guess it was a good bet.  Except that after tanking for like 3 minutes, he comes over the top.  At which point I instamuck.  After all, as I tell Pops later, I only had one shit dog pair.

I don't know why this hand stuck in my head.  Maybe because I lost a good part of my stack.  But I am fairly certain he flopped a set (or somehow flopped a straight, but I don't think he would have tanked so long if he had).  If there was a flush draw out there too, maybe I could have convinced myself that he had a straight draw/flush draw combo, but no flush draw was out there.

Thoughts about how this hand played out are appreciated.

I've got a mule, her name is Sal

If you go to college far away from where you grew up, you quickly realize that some things you thought were universal are clearly not.

For example, I thought everyone knew the Erie Canal song.  Shockingly, people who did not grow up in central NY were not privy to this lyrical masterpiece.

Growing up in upstate NY, especially in Syracuse, where the main drag is Erie Boulevard, site of the old Erie Canal paved over, you learn that the Erie Canal was hugely important in connecting the then frontier with the coast and its ports (along with several class field trips to the Erie Canal museum and on boat trips on the parts of the existing Erie Canal so you can see how locks work).

I recently read Wedding of the Waters: The Erie Canal and the Making of a Great Nation by Peter Bernstein which is all about the history and impact of the Erie Canal.  It's a pretty quick read (I was able to read it in a day during which my power was off), well-written, and interesting.  Bernstein is an economist so he pays particular attention to the economic impact of the canal, which is not the kind of thing we ever learned in elementary school.  It also inspired me to mosey on over to Amazon and order his other book: Against the Odds: the Remarkable Story of Risk.  Can hardly wait.

Anyways, I would recommend this book to anyone who likes historical or economic non-fiction.  I don't think most people outside of CNY-ers know much about the Erie Canal and it's a really interesting story, from an engineering perspective as well as an economic/political one. 

We're supposed to hit over 100 again today

Yesterday was brutally hot and humid, but the accompanying lightning show was pretty damn cool (shout out to John - watching storms like this always make me think of that time you ran out to the hill behind Jeremy's house - you would have liked this one - lots of arcs).

To help people stay cool, focus on this picture of the house I lived in in high school buried in a normal Syracuse snowfall.  The dark thing in the front left is the mailbox to give you some perspective.

Can't make fun of Keenan anymore

Well actually, yes I can (and will), but I used to joke around how one night a little more than a year ago, Billy and I broke Keenan's casino playing blackjack.  We were playing blackjack for play money while we waited to go out and took him for every last chip he had.  Twice.  Yes, we made the house rebuy.

Well tonight I'm at Pops' when I get a text.  Drinking at Keenan's.  I had just made it back to even after telling myself I wasn't even gonna go to Pops', and the table was short, so I took the opportunity to get the hell out of there.

Show up to Keenan's and not only is there drinking, movies, and taco pie, but there is also Keenan's casino.  Hooray. 

Billy, Nelly and I each buy in for 10k.  Mine lasted a long time but then the dealer went on a good run and I was forced to rebuy.  We had convinced the floor person to let us up the table stakes (twice) so I rebought for 35k.  Then we started playing three card poker.  Keenan pointed out to me that if any of us got trips we would break the casino.  But lucky him, it didn't work out that way...  I ended up in the hole 100k.  Bwahahahaha.  At one point after a few hands of three card I was ahead, even including my blackjack losses.  That hopefully would have been the point where I got up had I been at a real casino, rather than continue to drink my chardonnay, eat my taco pie, and proceed to ship >100k in play money.

Nice hit Keenan's casino.

Grandpa table flop?

Been playing around with some tracking stuff on my blog.  I know I've been getting a lot of traffic from some random places and I wanted to get a better handle on where it was coming from. 

Although I have had the equivalent of a blog on my website since before anyone knew what a blog was (seriously, I had a journal back on my website in the Spring of 1997), I wasn't really tuned into the blogosphere until one of my projects at work between 2004-2005 was to be the primary contributor to a blog about re-entry to society from prison for one of our clients.  Yes, I used to get paid to blog.  Rock.

Ever since then I have hearted typepad, but due in part to the fact that it lets you specialize so much it can be confusing.  Anyways, I just figured out how to get Google and typepad to talk to each other in a way that enables me to track a lot more than using just typepad alone.  One of the things I can now see a hell of a lot more clearly is searches that brought people to my site.  And the most common search bringing people to my blog right now is:

"Grandpa table flop"

What the heck?

What not to say to women #4:

I have carried around cards with me since high school.  When I go out to a bar that is usually what I and the people I am out with do...

So we're out Wednesday and within a minute of sitting down and whipping out the deck, two guys come up and ask if we can play spades.  I love spades and don't get to play it that often, so I'm down... except we end up playing the drinking version of high-low (aka acey-deucey) and then we can't get rid of the guys...

Hours later one of the guy starts being an asshole.  I don't know if it was the alcohol, or the fact that he realized that neither of us were going home with him, or what, but he started insulting us.

"You girls can't hang at *insert name of overrated Rockville restaurant here*.  Neither of you are blonde enough.  I bet you can't get free drinks."  blah blah blah.

The funny part of this was, at that very moment in time, we were both drinking free Jaeger bombs that some guy had just bought us.  Bwahahahahahaha. 

I finally did it

I sent in my registration renewal and ordered my new vanity plates.  And I didn't go with 28IF.  I went with an old nickname my dad used to call me.  Feel free to make fun of my car/me in a month when my plates arrive and they are cheesy.  At least I didn't get poker plates...now THAT would be cheesy.

Trying a new strategy

I have always generally been pretty good in terms of stoploss.  I think I can count on one hand the number of times I've really thrown a party.  However, recently I've started also getting up from the table when I'm up a certain amount (based on what game/limits I am playing and my buy in).  Yet another tweak in my game as I attempt to make some money on poker during this summer while I am unemployed.  It's been an effective strategy so far.  As a matter of fact, I've made money 3 out of 4 past weeks at pink as a result.  Way better than shipping it. 

Tonight I got accused of hitting and running (jokingly), but as I pointed out, I have more hours at pink over the past two years than most of the players sitting there combined.  It's nice to be able to book a win recently at this silly, silly game.

What not to say to women #3:

In AC around 4am Tuesday morning.  Near the pit right outside the poker room.  Guy comes up to me, gives me "the look", and proceeds to say:

"Are you done for the night?  Do you need a room?  Cause I'm headed back to mine right now and you could come with."

Actually, I did need a room, as I was waiting for Harrah's ressies dept to open up.  And the guy was actually good looking.  However, the day I go up to some stranger's room when I'm by myself in AC is the day you should take my common sense card away.

I was going to come up with some kind of snarky response along those lines, but then I remembered my resolution to be less of a flippant bitch in '08 and simply said: "I'm just taking a break from trying to make some money here, thanks."

Do I live in Laurel or New Orleans?

Back when I lived in Rockville, our power went out in the summer constantly, like maybe once a week.  But it was always back on in a few hours.  Since moving to Laurel in the Summer of 2006, the power there has yet to go out, so I guess I'm lucky, but I would definitely rather have the power our repetitively for a few hours than once every two years for > two days.  I kind find something to do for a few hours.  Trying to live without power for days on end on the other hand...that is another story.

Wednesday afternoon a huge storm rolled through the neighborhood.  Lightning hit a tree in my neighborhood (and caused it to topple over, narrowly missing a house).  The power went out Wednesday afternoon, but I have the internet on a UPS so I was at least able to be on the internet the first few hours of the outage.

That evening I had the kickoff study group meeting for my comprehensive exam and plans after that too, so I figured it would be back on when I got home.  3am Thursday I get home and my power is still not on.

That's OK, it will be on when I get up.  I crash for several hours, but of course manage to wake up significantly earlier than I have in the past month.  But I had no clue what time it was because my power was still not on.  Great.  Now all the food in my freezer/fridge will have to be tossed.  Plus this week summer finally arrived to DC so it's like 80 degrees in my house.  Not to mention, no internet, tv, cooking, clothes washing, dishwashing, etc.  I read two books yesterday until one of my flashlights' batteries ran out.  I needed a flashlight because I'm camped out in the basement trying to avoid the heat of the rest of the house.

So I gave up and went over to Keenan's to check email and play some cards, etc.  End up going home around 2:30 am thinking: "Surely my power will be on by now!"  Uh, no.  And no, it was not on when I woke up just before noon this morning either.

I'm on campus now checking email, catching up on work that, you know, requires power, and picking stuff up from my school mailbox.  If I'm lucky, maybe power will be on when I get home...but I've been saying that to myself for the last 50 hours, so I guess I'm not gonna get my hopes up.

Keep your fingers crossed for me.  Life without power sucks!

PT wages flat after 8 years

I've been looking for a part-time job a few days/week less for the money and more to just help keep me on track.  I always do better when I have some set schedule.

But I've noticed that the standard hourly rate for these kinds of jobs is the exact same it was 8 years ago when I first graduated college.  Meanwhile, cost of living is definitely more expensive (gas alone has tripled in price), and it wasn't enough to live on even back then (My first job out of college was doing tech support...offered little $, no benefits, and dealing with angry people all day.  I was looking for a new job literally from day 1).  You'd think it would at least be a dollar or two more.

Crazy. 

Confessions in Nerddom

Back in the day I used to be a gaming geek.  Consoles, computers, first person shooters, strategy, it did not matter.  When the new hot game came out, I bought it and would stay up hours and hours (days) at a time playing it til I beat it.  (To my poker friends, wow does this sound familiar?)

Since I've been at Maryland I haven't been playing video games as much.  I'm afraid to buy a new game because I'm afraid I won't be able to stop playing it and then I won't get my work done.  On the other hand, it's good to have some kind of distraction.  For Christmas I got a new game and was able to pull myself away from it.  I must have developed some discipline somewhere.

Anyways, one of the games I used to play for hours on end is Civilization.  I am a sucker for any Sid Meier game, just like I'm a sucker for the GTA games and all of the Sim games.  Tonight it's like 3:30am, I'm online after being out playing at a poker game and then at the bar...  Blevins and I are chatting about his tourney win tonight when all of a sudden he says "Hey this might sound gay, but...

do you want to play Civ sometime?"

Are you kidding me?!?  I LOVE THAT GAME!  Hellz yeah.

2/5 NL in Odenton

Went to a good game over in Odenton tonight and managed to double.  I really liked the game (not just because I won either) and plan to be back.  The guy who runs it is a really good guy, a friend of mine deals it, and the other guys who were there (none of whom I had met before) were also a really friendly group of guys.

Since I've been trying to actually pay some bills with my winnings recently I've been trying to play 2/5 (though that is harder around here since I refuse to play games with crazy rakes) and also been trying to play some different games than the ones where everyone knows me.  It seems to be working.  Plus, got a text from a guy I met up on the last AC trip who lives in DC who is hooking me up with a 2/5 in the city.  Can hardly wait to play that game from what I have heard.

At any rate, it was a good night.