Zune Takes the Day Off

If you have a Microsoft Zune player, it's taking the day off.

The brilliant programmers at Microsoft forgot about the extra day this year because of leap year. Because there was a February 29 that your Zune didn't know about, it doesn't think there's a December 31 this year.

According to the same brilliant minds at Microsoft, your player will be fine tomorrow.

That distant laughter you hear are the folks at Apple, unable to control themselves.

Update: Stay tuned for details on the class action lawsuit. Should be a slam dunk.

Thought for Today

Never bite when a growl will do.

2008 Year in Review

Was fucked.


Predictions for 2009:

More fucked.

Hume

Not all assholes are cops, but all cops are assholes!

Santa Gets $110 ticket while giving out toys.

I Kant Feel My Feet

By understanding the sources and limits of human knowledge we can ask fruitful metaphysical questions. If an object can be known to have certain properties prior to the experience of that object. All objects that the mind can think about must conform to its manner of thought. Therefore if the mind can think only in terms of causality (it does) then we can know prior to experiencing them that all objects we experience must either be a cause or an effect. However, it follows from this that it is possible that there are objects of such a nature that the mind cannot think of them, and so the principle of causality, for instance, cannot be applied outside of experience: hence we cannot know, for example, whether the world always existed or if it had a cause. And so the grand questions of speculative metaphysics are off limits, but the sciences are firmly grounded in laws of the mind.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In one of my earlier epistemology classes in college we were learning about Cartesian Doubt. Rene Descartes (famous for "Cogito Ergo Sum" or "I think therefore I am") postulated that because we cannot tell the difference between dreams or hallucinations versus real empirical experience, we cannot trust sensory experience. A student disagreed with the idea that we can't tell the difference between dreams and reality. The professor asked how she can tell if she's dreaming or not, and she replied with "I can feel my feet!"

And I distinctly remember thinking "Great, centuries of philosophy and critical thought down the drain because this chick can feel her fucking feet!"

Cool New Toy

Expect more photos on this blog. I know I've promised this before, but now I have this:

Poker Source Full Tilt Poker Freeroll

Poker Source Announcement:

We are extremely pleased to announce a $5,000 freeroll at Full Tilt Poker that is open to everybody who has ever signed up through PokerSource for FTP and has earned at least 300 Full Tilt Points over the lifetime of their account. Players have until midnight on December 20th to earn these points if they have not already done so.

When: Sunday, December 28th at 4:00pm ET
Where: Full Tilt Poker
Prize Pool: $5,000
How to qualify: Have a Full Tilt Poker account that was created through PokerSource and have earned at least 300 Full Tilt Points over the lifetime of their account by December 20th at midnight ET

Plax

I'm a big fan of firearm ownership. I'm a handgun owner myself. Everyone who wants to be should be a responsible gun owner.



There's only two reasons I can think of to carry a handgun into a public place. One is to protect yourself, the other is to protect your stuff.

Plaxico Burress decided to carry an unregistered handgun into a nightclub, so theoretically he wanted to protect himself or protect his stuff. Maybe he was wearing a lot of expensive jewelry, and wanted to protect that stuff.

But I doubt the jewelry or whatever he might be protecting was worth more than the $25 million he's likely to lose from getting caught carrying an unregistered handgun into a New York nightclub. So that reason is pretty illogical.

The second reason, to protect himself might be the reason, except for one thing. HE SHOT HIMSELF. So he didn't exactly keep himself SAFER by carrying the weapon. So that reason seems pretty illogical too.

Wait! I just thought of a third reason. To be perceived as "cool." Well, the entire sports following world is now calling him an idiot, so if that was his intention, it was pretty unsuccessful.

Getting Old Sucks

I re-watched the movie "Grosse Pointe Blank" the other day, for the first time in a long time. When it came out I loved it, because it hit me square in the forehead. I graduated high school the same year as the characters in the movie, and also had unrequited love stories and hitman tendencies. This movie was right in my wheelhouse.


The movie, in case you haven't seen it, is about a man who goes to his 10-year high school reunion in Grosse Pointe, which is just outside of Detroit. He tells everyone that he became a hitman, but nobody believes him. There are several people who followed him there to kill him for accidentally performing a hit on a dog.

Just from that, you can tell that the movie is fantastic. It is, but the story is layered with wonderful details and performances that really must be seen. I was hoping to relive all of that wonderfulness when I saw the movie the other morning before I needed to go to work on the night shift.

But the rewatching just depressed me. Twelve years later and all these people who were "just like me" back then are exactly the same. They look good and young, act stupid and charming and pull it off.

Me? I just got older, fatter and far less interesting.

One of the themes in the movie is the old "you can't go home again" (noted especially when the main character discovers that the house he grew up in is now a Ultra-mart convenience store.)

I discovered that not only can't you "go home" again, you can't relive a connection to a movie you once had. Time marches on, but the movies stay young and beautiful forever.

The Blue Pill

I tried one of the $1.25 Matrix tournaments on Full Tilt Poker. Interesting.

In case you don't know what they are, you pay one buy in and play 4 tournaments against the same set of players. You get points for finishing in the top 3 of each tournament, plus points for knocking out other players and lasting longer than other players. Each tournament has a payout for the top three finishers and the top three points leaders also get a prize.

I immediately noticed the convenience of four tables for a lot of players. If you get bad beaten on one table, BANG you have three more tournaments to GIVE THE GUY SHIT. Many players take advantage of this, but fortunately playing 4 tables at a time makes it tough to type.

Anyway, I finished fourth, third, second and second. Yeah, startlingly good heads up play. When all four tables were down to approx. 4 players, it was pretty maddening. When I lost the first table I had three going with three players at the same time. I can barely think when I'm playing one table, (okay, I can barely think when I'm playing zero tables) so this was quite a challenge. I busted heads up on another so I just had one table of two and another table of three. I lost a race to come in third and got to concentrate on heads up. I built up a 3-1 chip lead there and blew it vs. a guy playing a very straightforward game.

But 4th 3rd 2nd and 2nd plus knockouts was enough points to win first prize in the Matrix pool, which payed the same as taking first at a table.

I think the payout was about $2.30, so minus my $1.25 buy-in, I made a buck-oh-five.

If you do well in these you will always end up with a bunch of tables that are down to a few players, and I don't really like the hectic feeling I get when I'm in that situation. So I probably won't play them again, but it was fun to try out something different.

Weird Amazon Reccomendation

Greatest American Farce

A coworker brought in his DVD set of the show "Greatest American Hero." I hadn't seen the show since it originally aired in the 80s. Upon seeing it again we noticed something that made the show totally unbelievable. The guy received a super hero suit from aliens. No problem. But a guy who teaches learning disabled kids getting a chick who's THAT hot and also a lawyer? Not believable.

Gadget Junkie

I've developed a horrible gadget habit. One of my addictions is media players. I took a picture of the media players and storage devices I carry with me every day:



I carry hundreds of gigs of music and video with me, almost at all times. This doesn't even include the laptop computer and various paperback books that live in that bag.

It started with that little white MP3 player at the bottom left. Then I needed something with more storage, and that one played video. Then I needed something that played video that was more portable. Then I wanted something that played video that had a larger screen.

It's as though I live in constant fear of not being entertained.

If you add this to my LED Flashlight addiction, I might need some kind of 12-step program. I promise to go as soon as I get back from the store looking at those EeePCs. And that 120GB Ipod Touch looks pretty cool, if only Apple products weren't all evil.

GM Bailout

Yes, I'm a bad blogger. What can I say? A new expansion to World of Warcraft came out last Thursday. So if you wonder what I've been doing? You're correct! Playing SNGs on Full Tilt while I wait on the queues. It still amazes me how upset people get about poor play at a $2 SNG. TWO DOLLARS? Who is playing a $2 tournament and expecting to play vs Barry Greenstein? Jeezus.

Anyway, I've read many a blog about how bailing out the auto industry would be wrong and awful. They all read the same: the companies suck, the management is stupid and hasn't done a thing to improve themselves since the sixties.

Of course I am biased. I don't work for any of the US automotive industries, but I do depend on them for my IT job. If they go under, so do I.

Here's my admittedly biased perspective.

The management knows more about the auto industry than any blogger you read. They are not idiots, it's a tough job. The competition for the auto dollar is unimaginably intense. If you think you could do better within the constraints of the current market, well you're completely wrong.

The bailout isn't like the banking industry bailout, but it is needed for the exact same reason. The auto industry needs loans, not a handout. The banks got CASH. The reason they need it is because credit is FROZEN. There's no money to borrow out there. The auto industry needs working cash to survive until the market picks up and people start buying cars again. According to estimates that will be summer of 09 at the earliest and summer of 2010 at the latest. Since there is no credit to be had, the only thing automakers can do is borrow from the government.

This isn't unprecedented. The government gave the exact same style loans to Chrysler and the loans were paid back. The "bailout" was a big success. Yes Chrysler is in trouble again, but it is because the entire auto industry is in trouble.

Yes I said the ENTIRE INDUSTRY. The Japanese car makers are in trouble too, that's why they have ALREADY received bailouts from the Japanese government. Their auto industry is just as important to their economy as ours.

The comparisons to the US autoworker and foreign autoworkers are unfair. It's always a direct comparison, the UAW worker costs GM X dollars, the Japanese company worker gets much less. But Japan has national health care. GM pays for health care for its workers, so it's an apples and oranges comparison. Yes the US worker still makes a lot more, but the comparison needs to be leveled out a bit.

If you worked in the auto industry you would see that they have taken great leaps to try to become more competitive with automakers around the world. I see them EVERY DAY. Sure I don't agree with some of them, but you have to look at some, such as the turn over of health care to the union, saving GM over 4 billion dollars a year, as steps in the right direction. Even within the unions there are huge changes that make a ton of good sense. Maybe it's too late, but if you say they're not trying you're completely wrong.

Do I think the government should be in the business of bailing out the auto industry? No, not really. But since the government seems to be in the bailout business anyway, I definitely think that an industry that touches 4.5 million working people and over a million retirees should be included. Especially when all they need are loans. The US auto industry is NOT hopeless. There is a lot of money to be made in the industry, and abandoning these companies would be flushing that money down the toilet.

If the big three are forced to liquidate, estimates show that unemployment will be above 30%. With that many people out of work, I'd bet that those economic turn-around estimates would have to be changed from summer of 2010.

Finally, a Winner

The result we've all been waiting for....the DOUCHIEST WSOP WINNER PHOTO EVER CONTEST!



Thanks for capturing the moment Flipchip!

One Final FU

According to this, George W Bush and his right wing "we'll tell you what you can do with your own money in the privacy of your home" asshole administration want to give online poker players one final "FUCK YOU" before he leaves office.

The UIGEA is LAW people. It's not so easy to get a federal law overturned. It's not an executive order that can be banished with the wave of an Obama pen. Once the rules of enforcement are set, it will take a lot of money, effort and time to get them fixed. It's probably inevitable that they are eventually fixed, but I wouldn't hold my breath if I were you.

Pokersite.org

The following is a paid review for Pokersite.org.


Pokersite.org offers poker site rankings and reviews of poker rooms worldwide. They offer unbiased reviews based on a variety of factors. If you see a review you like you can click on the link to be taken directly to the site you're interested in.

Pokersite.org offers specialized rankings depending on where you live, as well as rankings based on the type of player you are. The site also offers content sections for poker strategy, games, tournaments and players, down to a section with rules and history for new players.

Poker Strategy Videos seem like the most poplular way to learn poker these days, and Pokersite.org offers them along with dozens of articles written by online poker pros with more advanced poker strategy.

The rankings and reviews section of the site lets you select poker rooms based on six different criteria, including Bonuses, Customer Service, Game Selection, Software Ratings, VIP Programs and Easiest to Beat.

I've never seen a site that evaluates the different poker sites based on how easy they are to beat. Since winning is the most important factor for most people it's a great idea for sorting poker rooms. If you play a lot of hands, I bet the comparisons of VIP programs is especially interesting to you.

If you're checking out some new or different poker rooms, Pokersite.org might be a place you can use to evaluate them how you like.

To My Coworker

"Fifty Bucks little man. Put that shit in my hand. Nong nong nonga-nonga nong nong."

Cool Google Map

Google MADNESS

Suddenly a hundred links to my blog, (many of them very old posts, some of them new posts with very old links elsewhere on the page) get hit in my automated Google Blog Search.

Something is going on with the Juggernaut, but I have no idea what it is.

My Problem With Palin

My problem with Governor Palin possibly becoming president is this: She's remarkably stupid.

In a conservative radio interview that aired in Washington, D.C. Friday morning, Republican vice presidential nominee Gov. Sarah Palin said she fears her First Amendment rights may be threatened by "attacks" from reporters who suggest she is engaging in a negative campaign against Barack Obama. Palin told WMAL-AM that her criticism of Obama's associations, like those with 1960s radical Bill Ayers and the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, should not be considered negative attacks. Rather, for reporters or columnists to suggest that it is going negative may constitute an attack that threatens a candidate's free speech rights under the Constitution, Palin said. "If [the media] convince enough voters that that is negative campaigning, for me to call Barack Obama out on his associations," Palin told host Chris Plante, "then I don't know what the future of our country would be in terms of First Amendment rights and our ability to ask questions without fear of attacks by the mainstream media."

The first amendment guarantees citizens protection from government restrictions on free speech. In her deluded mind that is accustomed to using her position in government to get whatever she wants, the first amendment is there to protect HER RIGHT TO KEEP FROM BEING CRITICIZED.

SHE SIMPLY IS NOT QUALIFIED TO UPHOLD THE CONSTITUTION. She is unable to comprehend the MEANING of it.

Fox Boy Scouts

Looks the Fox News Team are getting ready for the inevitable McCain election results by preparing their excuse in advance.



He was actually a Democrat all along!

Spree is a Subjective Term

Event 1. Texas girl claims a Barack Obama supporter has carved a "B" into her cheek because she has a McCain sticker on her car.

McCain campaign reaction? Alert the media! Make sure to imply that "all Obama supporters" are like this! Tell your friends! Start the robo-calls with the urban black accented caller telling terrified white middle class people to "be sure to vote Democratic next Tuesday."

Event 2. Tennessee skinheads are arrested in a plot to go on a killing spree and eventually shoot Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.

Obama campaign reaction? "No comment."

Stay classy, McCain campaign.

Criminal

Gordon Gekko [1987]:

[points at a bum and businessman] You gonna tell me the difference between this guy and that guy is luck?

The richest one percent of this country owns half our country's wealth, five trillion dollars. One third of that comes from hard work, two thirds comes from inheritance, interest on interest accumulating to widows and idiot sons and what I do, stock and real estate speculation. It's bullshit. You got ninety percent of the American public out there with little or no net worth. I create nothing. I own. We make the rules, pal. The news, war, peace, famine, upheaval, the price per paper clip. We pick that rabbit out of the hat while everybody sits out there wondering how the hell we did it. Now you're not naive enough to think we're living in a democracy, are you buddy? It's the free market. And you're a part of it. You've got that killer instinct. Stick around pal, I've still got a lot to teach you.

Bud Fox: How much is enough?
Gordon Gekko: It's not a question of enough, pal. It's a zero sum game, somebody wins, somebody loses. Money itself isn't lost or made, it's simply transferred from one perception to another.

Translation:

Fox News Columnist John Moody:

It had to happen.

Less than two weeks before we vote for a new president, a white woman says a black man attacked her, then scarred her face, and says there was a political motive for it.

Ashley Todd, a 20-year-old white volunteer for John McCain’s presidential campaign, says she was mugged at an ATM machine in Pittsburgh (my hometown) by a big black man. She further says he threw her down, then disfigured her by carving the letter “B” into her face with a sharp implement when he saw that she supported McCain, not Barack Obama.

"It had to happen?" Translation: "Let a nigger run for President, the niggers will get violent." Isn't that what "It had to happen" means?

John's column also said this:

If the incident turns out to be a hoax, Senator McCain’s quest for the presidency is over, forever linked to race-baiting.

He said this because the McCain campaign had been pushing this story to the press so fervently. Moody has been oddly silent since the story broke that this was a hoax.

I guess it didn't have to happen after all.


***************

One of the beautiful side effects of Barack Obama running for president is that if you weren't really clear on which of your friends are racists, it's trivially easy to smoke them out now.

Over a year ago I made a $50 wager with a co-worker that the next president of the US would be either a black person, a woman or a person of Mormon faith. I wanted Catholic too but he insisted that since there had been one Catholic president before it wouldn't be a first, so I couldn't have that one. Bye Bye Rudy.

Last week he came into the office and said with a smirk "If Obama wins, do I only have to pay you $25?"

I responded "Let me ask you this: If your daughter married him, would you only be half as angry?"

"I see your point," he replied.

Fuck Joe the Plumber

No, I'm not talking about the "real" Joe the Plumber. Fuck him too, but for different reasons.

I'm talking about this "imaginary" Joe the Plumber that McCain talked about in last week's debate. (24 times! If you like Joe the Plumber that much, why don't you marry him? Nyah nyah!) I've used a few plumbers and I grew up across from a guy who was a plumber, and I can tell you that a LARGE percentage of plumbers out there are fucking scam artists. They are flat-out crooks.

Even the "honest" plumbers overcharge for trivial work. God forbid you might need one on a weekend or holiday. You're better off just bending over and shoving your phone up your ass. Not one of these tiny cell phones either. The old-fashioned kind you had to crank on the side. And then crank it and talk to the operator. With your colon. That would be more comfortable than getting a plumber call on a weekend.

If a plumber can't find a way to make it on $250,000 a year, well fuck him. Fuck anyone who complains about a tax increase on people who make over $250,000 a year. I can understand anyone who will have to pay more taxes being upset about it, everyone gets upset when the price of anything goes up. But if you make $250,000 a year, SHUT THE FUCK UP ABOUT IT. Be upset SILENTLY. Because the rest of us DON'T WANT TO FUCKING HEAR YOU BITCH. Take your $250,000 and buy yourself something to make you feel better.

Some of us are one more stock market "correction" away from fighting over squirrels in the back yard.

Dear Blizzard

Your game is completely unplayable. Your ability to get people to pay for that shit you call a game is unbelievable. If you don't refund the month for all your customers you are reprehensible.

If I think of any more words that end in ble, I'm sure you're those too.

I'll Tell God, I Swear!

From a prayer held before a McCain rally last week:

I would also pray Lord that your reputation is involved in all that happens between now and November, because there are millions of people around this world praying to their God — whether it’s Hindu, Buddha, Allah — that his [McCain’s] opponent wins for a variety of reasons.

And Lord I pray that you would guard your own reputation, because they’re going to think that their god is bigger than you, if that happens. So I pray that you would step forward and honor your own name in all that happens between now and Election Day.

Not only do they think "MY God can beat up YOUR God," but they think THEIR God can be TRICKED into intervening! How funny is that? Our God is the most powerful, but he's easily manipulated. Oh and he needs your money. Pass the collection plate.

Whoda Thunk?

You are the Hanged Man

Self-sacrifice, Sacrifice, Devotion, Bound.

With the Hanged man there is often a sense of fatalism, waiting for something to happen. Or a fear of
loss from a situation, rather than gain.

The Hanged Man is perhaps the most fascinating card in the deck. It reflects the story of Odin who offered himself as a sacrifice in order to gain knowledge. Hanging from the world tree, wounded by a spear, given no bread or mead, he hung for nine days. On the last day, he saw on the ground runes that had fallen from the tree, understood their meaning, and, coming down, scooped them up for his own. All knowledge is to be found in these runes.

The Hanged Man, in similar fashion, is a card about suspension, not life or death. It signifies selflessness, sacrifice and prophecy. You make yourself vulnerable and in doing so, gain illumination. You see the world differently, with almost mystical insights.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

Poker Strategy

I'll be honest, I don't read poker strategy posts on blogs anymore. People will tell you I never understood them when I did, so now I'm just being more efficient.

At any rate, when this guy writes one, I read it. And This is one of the best ones I've ever read.

Excellent work.

Why Aren't You a Democrat

Someone recently asked me "If you hate Republicans so much, (and I truly do despise them) how come you don't vote Democratic? That's how you really hurt them."

Well, that's true. If the point was to simply hurt the Republicans, the only other viable option is to vote for a Democrat. But I just can't. For reasons such as this detail about the current crisis on Wall Street:

A majority of House Democrats did back the bill, in spite of their doubts about plans which appear to be rescuing irresponsible banks, rather than the customers they are throwing out of their re-possessed homes.

Look, everybody knows that some sort of compromise will be made on this thing. But to give the FIRST FUCKING DRAFT a yes vote is totally irresponsible.

The American public is vociferously against this thing. Isn't it even "politically" smart to do a few rounds on this subject? Make it get re-written a few times? If it's such an "essential" piece of legislation, isn't that an opportunity to get something you want in return?

But to favor such a piece of shit legislation lacking in oversight and accountability, well it's simply gutless. And I cannot support a party that is both gutless and stupid.

So I vote Libertarian. And Libertarians are picking up steam. Mostly from Republicans who fuck up and attempt to grab power for themselves, resulting in big government douchebaggery and right-wing lunacy. But this isn't a shock from the GOP, their fuck-ups are extremely predictable. They alienate more normal people every time they expose one of their extreme nutjobs. I can't really put it better than ScurvyDog does:

I could almost overlook all that bad crap ya'll don't like to talk about publicly much (you know, the rampant racism, sucking the blood of the poor and middle class, and all the weird Old Testament close-mindedness about abortion and gay marriage) and call myself a Republican. Almost.

It probably won't happen in my lifetime, and I don't really care. But someday people are going to wake up and notice that there is a small government, liberty first, fiscally responsible, America loving party out there. And when it happens, those people are going to say "where have you been all this time?."

We're here. Look harder.

1000 words about Henry Paulson and Ben Bernake

Dear twitterer

I don't give a fuck what you're eating or what you're listening to.

That is all.

Economists surveyed on election

Survey of Economists Democratic Economists Favor Obama. Republican Economists Favor McCain. Independents Lean Toward Obama.


Dublin, CA (September 10, 2008) – A wealthy independent voter commissioned a survey of over 500 economists to find out which candidate for President of the United States would be best for the economy long term.

The voter said, “I found myself wishing someone would give voters useful and unbiased information about which candidate has the best plans for the economy. Then I realized that I am someone, which is both inconvenient and expensive.”

At considerable personal expense, Adams commissioned a survey of over 500 economists, drawn from a subset of the members of the American Economic Association, a non-political group, some of whose members had agreed in advance to be surveyed on economic questions. The results do not represent the AEA’s position. The survey was managed by The OSR Group, a respected national public opinion and marketing research company.

Nationally, most economists are male and registered as either Democrats or Independents. The survey sample reflects that imbalance.


48% Democrats

17% Republicans

27% Independents

3% Libertarian
5% Other or not registered

86% of the economists surveyed are male, and 65% work in the field of academia or education. The rest are spread across various industries or not working.

When asked which candidate for President would be best for the economy in the long run, not surprisingly, 88% of Democratic economists think Obama would be best, while 80% of Republican economists pick McCain. Independent economists, who in this sample are largely from the academic world, lean toward Obama by 46% compared to 39% for McCain. Overall, 59% of the economists say Obama would be best for the economy long term, with 31% picking McCain, and 8% saying there would be no difference.

The economists were asked to rank the most important economic issues and pick which candidate they thought would do the best job on those issues.
Rank Issues Obama McCain No Diff.

1 Education 59% 14% 27%


2 Health care 65% 20% 15%


3 International trade 26% 51% 23%


4 Energy 61% 22% 17%


5 Encouraging Technology/innovation 43% 23% 34%


6 Wars and homeland security 58% 30% 11%


7 Mortgage/housing crisis 41% 18% 41%


8 Social Security 40% 24% 35%


9 Environmental policy 72% 9% 19%


10 Reducing the deficit 37% 29% 33%


11 Immigration 33% 29% 38%


12 Increasing taxes on wealthy 79% 14% 7%


13 Reducing waste in government 16% 38% 46%


The economists in the survey favor Obama on 11 of the top 13 issues. But keep in mind that 48% are Democrats and only 17% are Republicans. Among Independents, things are less clear, with 54% thinking that in the long run there would either be no difference between the candidates or McCain would do better.

Voter puts the survey results in perspective: “If an economist uses a complicated model to predict just about anything, you can ignore it. By analogy, a doctor can’t tell you the exact date of your death in 50 years. But if a doctor tells you to eat less and exercise more, that’s good advice even if you later get hit by a bus. Along those same lines, economists can give useful general advice on the economy, even if you know there will be surprises. Still, be skeptical.”


Update: Some of you will wonder how reliable a bunch of academics are when it comes to answering real life questions about the economy. You might prefer to know what CEOs think. But remember that CEOs are paid to be advocates for their stockholders, not advocates for voters. Asking CEOs what should be done about the economy is like asking criminals for legal advice.

Stewie on MySpace

Stewie: So I'm shaving last night at this make-out party. I took a bunch of pictures. You can see'em on my MySpace page. Along with my favorite songs and movies and things that other people have created but that I use to express my individualism.

Girl sitting at table: I have a MySpace page too.

Stewie: Yeah, I have mine ironically.

Sweet!

Virginia was the last state in America to legalize personalized license plates, but at least they were only ten bucks, so lots of people got them, and some of them are very creative...

Chris Rock is a Genius

And I steal from geniuses:

"You know the worst thing about conservatives? Conservatives always want credit for some shit they're supposed to do. A conservative will brag about some shit a regular person just does. A conservative will say some shit like, "I support our troops." You're supposed to, you dumb motherfucker! What kind of ignorant shit is that? "I'm proud to be an American!" What do you want, a cookie?! You ought to be making America proud of you, you low-expectation-having motherfucker!"

Slow and Steady

Maybe our pals at Google aren't running their purges anymore, maybe they've gotten to some of our applications to be re-instated into the google database, but I've been noticing that a lot of my friends' blogs are slowly creeping up to higher results in google searches.

A lot of people speculated that this was just a temporary bump in the road and I hope they're correct.

The fact is that a frequently updated website that publishes information about poker (which really is not mine anymore. I barely remember how to play poker. If I ever did. Make your own jokes!) SHOULD rank high on google searches. You know it. I know it. Google damn well ought to know it.

Hoyt Corkins Robbed

What kind of neighbor is Hoyt Corkins?

From LasVegasVegas:

Well known professional poker player Hoyt Corkins was the victim of a burglary at his Spanish Trails home in Las Vegas. The easy going Corkins had been away from his Vegas residence in the upscale gated Spanish Trails neighborhood for about a month when friends discovered the break-in and called him back to Las Vegas.

The crooks not only ransacked the residence but gathered up his trophies and poker memorabilia before leaving the scene. The poker goodies taken included a WPT bracelet and his two WSOP bracelets - 1992 $5K Pot Limit Omaha, 2007 $2.5K No-Limit Hold'em 6 Handed. The thief (s) also absconded with two cars, a motorcycle, electronics and more than $10K in cash. Corkins told Las Vegas Channel 8 News his losses were more than $100,000 and counting.

They also stole his identity by using his office phone to get a credit card in his name.

I know some of those gated communities are somewhat secluded, but come on! When I went to Florida for a week this summer I had a neighbor go by the house every couple of days and check the house and make sure everything is okay. You know, check to make sure nobody's turned on the hose, nobody's kicked in the door, broken any windows, whatever. It takes about two minutes, and my neighbors seem happy to do it. I do it for them when they're out of town. And I can guarantee you that you can't get $100,000 (and counting!) out of my house. Hell you'd be lucky to get five grand for everything in my house...I guess I'm not materialistic. Or I'm poor. Whatever.

Corkins is gone for a MONTH from a house that has a hundred grand worth of stuff in it and someone eventually discovers the place has been ransacked? I hope the details are wrong and all this happened the night before it was discovered or something. But right now the story makes it seem like the break-in was weeks ago and is just now discovered.

No alarm system is mentioned. Maybe it was circumvented? Who lives in a gated community then doesn't have an alarm system? Something really doesn't add up here. Is it just a case of someone who thinks something can never happen to them? Maybe it's just a worst case scenario. They forgot to set the alarm, unreliable neighbor didn't check very often, left the back door unlocked...something!

Anyway, I don't mean to kick poor Hoyt when he's down, but jeezus, it sounds like this could have been avoided multiples of ways that didn't happen.

Philosophy

Philosophy is questions that may never be answered. Religion is answers that may never be questioned. - Anonymous

TS Fay

Some of you might remember a picture I took of the dock at night in Jacksonville Florida.



Here's what it looks like after Tropical Storm Fay came through.



Luckily the water receded before it made it to the house. Lack of power was pretty inconvenient and there's a lot of clean up and landscaping to do, but nobody's hurt and there's no significant damage.

Coffee Worship

I remember a time in my youth when the coffee industry was suffering such hard times that they ran advertisements telling young people to "Be a part of the coffee generation!" I even remember they used an upbeat Electric Light Orchestra song called "Hold On Tight" that you hear on Honda commercials now.

Wow does marketing work! Coffee was dying. Young people saw coffee as that bitter tasting brown crap that their parents drank. It wasn't cool to drink coffee, that was for old people.

Then the mighty LATTE was born. Or at least it suddenly became popular. Chocolate milk with some coffee flavor to it to get the kids used to it. Shots of caffeine added to make it more addictive. Suddenly everyone you saw on television was carrying a cup with a plastic lid on it and a cardboard wrapper around it so they wouldn't burn their hands.

Especially targeted are young adults that are too young to drink. Go hang out in a coffee shop, you can be just like the cool kids from "Friends!" Maybe there will be some beatniks there! Woo! Get them started early. You can't have alcohol yet (in public, at least) but you can have this other drug. Help yourself!

I sit close to a community coffee pot, so I listen to coffee conversation all day at work. Those that drink the brown stuff that comes from those machines are the degenerates. They need the drug, and they don't care what form it comes in. More often the others bring in the cardboard sleeve variety from outside. You can hear them suck air through the tiny plastic hole in the top. Outside coffee is MUCH cooler than that brown muck from a 20-year-old disgusting pot.

And they love to talk about it. "Have you tried the hazelnut?" "I had to have an extra shot today, or I'd never make it!" "I can't believe you don't drink coffee, how do you make it through the day?" "I think I'd die if it weren't for my morning coffee."

No, in fact you won't. You just won't be a fucking addict. You'll have headaches for a few days. You'll feel like you have low energy. But it's not real. You have plenty of energy. Your body just wants its fix, and it's trying to fool you into giving in.

Everyone has vices, and I don't begrudge anyone for doing whatever they want to their bodies to make them feel however they want. Just stop trying to convince me that your fat filled, whipped cream topped, overpriced caffeine addiction is "cool." Coffee is not cool. No matter what the marketing says.

Death

I Read Ed Brayton, and You Should Too

Here's why.

Ed is guest blogging over at The Agitator while Radley is on vacation. Ed introduces himself as follows:

For those who do not know me, a brief introduction is perhaps in order. My name is Ed Brayton and I am the voice behind the blog Dispatches from the Culture Wars. I am also the co-founder and president of Michigan Citizens for Science and a Fellow with the Center for Independent Media.

Perhaps most germane to this blog, I am also the plaintiff in a FOIA lawsuit against the U.S. Trade Representative regarding the WTO settlement that the Bush administration signed with Canada, the EU and Japan over our online gambling laws. Radley has written about this issue a great deal. In fact, it was on this blog that I first read about the settlement, which may cost American consumers something on the order of tens of billions of dollars to preserve the government’s ability to prevent Americans from gambling online. I immediately filed a FOIA request for a copy of that settlement, arguing that we certainly have a right to know how much of our money the government is willing to spend to prop up their authoritarian anti-gambling scheme. The USTR denied the request, claiming that the settlement was classified for national security reasons. That being patently absurd, I appealed and was again denied. I filed a federal lawsuit, which is ongoing as we speak. My attorney filed our reply to the government’s response brief last week and we should have a ruling in the next few months. Perhaps I’ll post more about that over the next few days.

–Ed Brayton

Engineer Sex

Dude, based on the engineers I work with, you need to have sex whenever you can.

RIP Skip Caray

Father of Chip, son of Harry. Skip Caray always sounded like he was having more fun than anyone else at the Braves game, even if he sounded like a curmudgeon. Skip brought a level of intelligence and humanity to his job that Harry lacked and Chip hasn't mastered yet. Skip's real name was Harry Caray Jr., and his greatest feat was distinguishing himself from the reputation of his legendary father. In my opinion, he surpassed it.

Rest in peace, Skip.

Tough Economy Hits Vegas

Now THAT'S a bargain.

Seige

Apparently now our "friends" at Google have frozen Dr. Pauly's web sites and he is unable to update them until the investigation is over.

What is he being investigated for? Being a spam site.

That investigation should take about 3 seconds.

I suspect he'll be moving to his own URL in the near future.

UPDATE: See Pauly in Exile for the full story.

UPDATE2: Al Can't Hang is frozen too.

City of Boredom

Turns out I don't enjoy City of Heroes at all. I don't know if it just feels like the worst parts of grinding in World of Warcraft only more boring, or if I'm just burned out on MMORPGs completely.

CoH has definitely missed the mark though. One of the most fun things about WoW is that you find cool items, or earn enough to buy cool stuff at auction. A neat new sword or a cool ring that made your player unique. Nobody is unique in CoH. Everyone has one set of very few optional abilities, and the only thing that sets you apart is the color of your tights. WoW is the opposite. While everyone essentially looks the same as everyone else who shares their race, the items and abilities define each player much more than their costume.

The character generator in CoH is definitely awesome. There's just not that much to do, but you have to do a lot of it to gain experience and advance in levels. Unless you like interrupting muggings. There's a person getting mugged every 20 feet in CoH. Problem is, if the muggers are too low level, you are just wasting your time rescuing the poor victim. But what kind of hero walks by a person getting mugged just because they don't profit from the experience. It doesn't make you feel very heroic to run by a little old lady being pushed around by thugs just because the attackers are weaklings compared to you.

I also neglected the fact that I cannot cancel my WoW account because I'm not the only player in my household. I forgot that Mrs. Bogey also has some WoW characters and even though she hasn't logged on in months, she bristled when I told her I was considering putting the game aside for a while.

So it looks like I'm back to grinding honor points by doing battleground after battleground so I can save up for a week to buy a ring with 22 more resilience points.

Next up: Star Wars Galaxies?

R.I.P.

Rest in Peace, The Poker Comic.

I really ran out of steam when I quit playing poker obsessively. Maybe it's that there's nowhere to play live around here. I haven't played in a Casino since Vegas, and I haven't played in a home game since last year. No poker = no inspiration.

Besides, it would never be as funny or satirical as The Melted Felt. Go there for some seriously funny (get it? seriously funny? fuck you that's gold) poker comedy.

Too Lazy to Twit

Twitter wiped out all my following and followers because they had to restore from a backup or something. I'm really too lazy to go through all those people and add them again, so lets hope they finish their restore process and get all that back.

I'm sure I'll be bored at work again sometime in the near future when I will be able to set all that up again, but it ain't today.

CoH

The latest expansion for World of Warcraft is scheduled for November of this year, but if you know anything about Blizzard, they haven't made a deadline in a coon's....er some non-redneck expression that means "forever." I've played my Hunter for over a year, getting him up to level 70 and getting him all the best PVP gear by grinding the battlegrounds. I even created a Druid and leveled him up to 70 and started PVPing. It's rough, because without the gear you really get your ass kicked in by guys who basically have the stuff that my Hunter has.

It has gotten a bit repetitive and tiresome and the light at the end of the tunnel is 5 months away, even if you're optimistic about Blizzard's ability to meet a schedule.

A coworker of mine mentioned he had played City of Heroes and while it gets old pretty fast, it's fun for a limited period of time. We speculated for a while if it would get us through to the WoW upgrade and I finally bit the bullet and signed up for the game last night. He renewed his account and we were off like a dirty shirt.

Seems like the most interesting part of the game is creating your super hero/super villain, along with picking out his costume. There has to be a near infinite number of options. I laughed that the very first physical options are "male" "female" and "huge." I never thought of "huge" as a gender before. I guess you get to a certain size and you become asexual, or at least undesirable to anyone. Maybe I'd better put this pop-tart down.

I ground my way up through some missions and got my super hero to level 4. I created a bow-and-arrow type hero that's pretty similar to the Marvel character "Hawkeye" from the Avengers comics. My costume is fairly unique and I did manage to throw in some poker imagery as I have a big diamond on my chest. I'm pretty sure all the suits were available, but the diamond fit best with the style and color scheme I chose. There, now this qualifies as a poker post.

Twit

I joined in the fun at Twitter last week. It's like blogging, only even more pointless. You only have 140 characters, so you can really only get one idea across, and not very well.

But it's like methadone for bloggers. You don't get the same satisfaction from writing a blog post, but it gets your ideas out in the tubes.

Reading twitters is just like reading blogs, only a lot less interesting. At first it seems more involving because most of the people twittering are doing what they're talking about at that very moment. But the lack of detail and artistry makes it a very unsatisfying info dump.

99% of Conserative Talk Show Hosts are Fucking Douchebags

100% of what Michael Savage says is fucking stupid.

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Take advantage of these free money deals while they are still around.

LB3

Amazing Flying Dog!

Molli is enjoying her vacation.

Congrats Iggy!

You rule dude. Now take it down.

Poker Comic #192

Poker Comic presented by Free Poker Money. Some places offer $25 Free Money. Some offer $50 or $75 Free Money. Here you get $100, with No Deposit Required and No Credit Card Required. (New Players Only, Must be 21 or older.)

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It's 3:23AM

It's 3:23AM and I'm still up because I'm following Iggy's chipstack via Dr. Pauly. It's almost like a sickness.

I'm supposed to drive clear across Jacksonville tomorrow with the family. I wonder if they'll get upset if I let someone else drive and pass out in the car on the way?

It may not happen anyway as Mrs. Bogey has had some kind of violent allergic reaction to something. rash and hives all over her body. As we are on Vacation and nowhere near our preferred medical system, I took her to a Urgent Care. They turned us away because she didn't have her ID. She lost it somewhere. My ID and about 20 other non-picture IDs weren't good enough. No ID no health care. Good thing it wasn't serious. I suppose I could have been pretending someone else was my wife just to get them on my medical insurance fraudulently. Seems like they were being very cavalier about someone with a health crisis going on. Especially when we offered to pay cash - screw the insurance. Still no-go. They sent us down the road.

I found another Doc-in-the-Box inside a Wal-Mart and the girl at the counter was brand new and not bright enough to know that you had to have ID to get health care there. She accepted my ID and insurance information. The doc there was amazing. She prescribed a $4 generic steroid, gave us a $4 solution for the inevitable stomach upset caused by the steroid, and for the itching and rash? Windex. No shit! Amazingly, the Windex worked. Benadryl spray at $10 per ounce? No good. Windex at $10 a gallon? Totally effective. The father from "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" was right. I wonder if I'm the first husband to douse his wife with Windex in the parking lot of a Wal-Mart?

Mrs. Bogey just wandered through and reports that something must be working because the hives are all gone and she woke up itch free. Looks like we may be traveling tomorrow after all.

Well, it's past 2:30 now....should I stay up and click refresh on Tao of Poker a few more hundred times? Maybe another $3.50 Super Turbo SNG at Full Tilt. 300 starting stacks and 3 minute blinds. They're like crack cocaine you know...

One Wish...

If I could wish for any single person in the world other than myself to win the World Series of Poker Main Event, that one person would be Iggy.

Go you short bastard go!

Searching....Found!

So I was searching for some poker bloggers....and poof! They were gone from Google. Ugh. It sucked.

But then it occurred to me. Google isn't the only search engine on the intertubes. I searched the exact same names on Yahoo, and BAM! There they were. All of us, right where we belong.

And I think I'll do all my searching and finding on Yahoo from now on. Or MSN. Or AltaVista. Or HotBot. Or Lycos, the place the bought the company that hosted my first online email address. The place I used exclusively until I succumbed to the evil empire that is Nasdaq: GOOG.

Hell, I'll search anywhere but a search engine that doesn't let you find what YOU want, but wants you to find what THEY want you to find. Fuck them.

"Search" Engine

Google has so perverted itself and its indexing with this ridiculous penalty that if you search for "Poker Source Online" you don't get to Poker Source Online until somewhere down the second page.

You can't easily find what you are actually searching for anymore, because Google doesn't want you to find what you are looking for.

So don't search the internets with Google anymore, unless you want to search "the internets that Google finds acceptable."

Bleh.

Bye Bye Google, Bye Bye Advertisements

Yep, this here blog no longer exists in Google searches.

It seems like any blog that has banner advertising or affiliate advertising on their site gets automatically labeled by Google as being in violation of their indexing policy and is excluded from searches if such links don't use the "nofollow" guidelines.

I noticed this the other day when I went searching for a fellow authors blog and it didn't appear in my Google search. "That's odd," I thought to myself as this blogger has a very unique name, although his blog name is somewhat pedestrian. So I started searching for some other poker blogs, and NONE of them appear in the Google searches when I search for the name of the blog or the name of the blogger.

A bit of research into Google's new policy turned up that instead of checking all the blogs to see if they actually had original content and weren't just a bunch of affiliate advertisements, they just dropped the hammer on all of them. There is a method of getting Google to reconsider dropping your site from their index, but the process takes MONTHS. By then all poker blog advertising should have dried up completely.

I did take some small satisfaction in that a couple of the sites that once called me a "blogger whore" because I had a few sponsors (for example "Wired Pairs" which now sports 13 such advertisements) were also dropped.

It should be noted that NONE of these sites actually violate the terms of Google's requirements. If you provide original and unique content, you're in the clear. But it will take months for your site to be cleared, if it happens at all.

It will be interesting to see which bloggers quit now that the money train has come to a screeching halt.

Edit: Those that use the service "Text Link Ads" seem to have been targeted as Google feels that site and sites like it attempt to manipulate page ranks. I didn't have a problem with Google reducing page ranks, advertisers eventually figured out that page rank was just a phony baloney number that Google came up with and didn't really mean anything. Searches meant something. Now you literally CANNOT find a poker blog by searching the name of the site or the name of the blogger. Since that is specifically why a "search engine" is used, they have perverted their own reason for existing in order to punish us for abusing their phony baloney system.

Poker Comic #191

*for Drizz

Poker Comic presented by Free Poker Money. Some places offer $25 Free Money. Some offer $50 or $75 Free Money. Here you get $100, with No Deposit Required and No Credit Card Required. (New Players Only, Must be 21 or older.)

Click HERE to view the Comics Archive

LB2

Lazy Blog, Take Me Away!

Send Lawyers Guns and Money

I couldn't think of a title, so I just used the last song I heard. I miss Warren Zevon.

I was reading through some old blog posts of mine. Can you believe I posted 35 times in one month? That was years ago. That rate might kill me these days.

This is officially my 1015th post. My first post was four years ago tomorrow. That's about 250 posts a year for four years. I can't believe I had that much to say.

Most of my posts fall into two categories other than comics. Complaining/bragging about some Omaha hand, or being mean to someone for something stupid they did. The complaining and bragging probably didn't entertain anybody, and the being mean sure made me a lot of enemies.

I just tried starting a list of the enemies, but it would take too much time. Most of them are pretty smart guys, but there's something sad about them and their lives. You can feel it in their posts. Something is wrong, and it's not going to be fixed anytime soon.

I've been really lucky that this blog has introduced me to a lot of friends too. There are way too many of them to list also. And most of them have faded into the background of the poker blogging world. Some are still there, but most of them were never cut out for the high-flying freakshow that passes for online poker players these days. None of them ever tried winning ten grand with a month of twenty-five cent poker. The biggest thrills were meeting up in Vegas and playing some small stakes tournament, or going to a hotel suite in Cincinnatti for a birthday poker game. Not hitting the tables and using the proceeds for drugs and hookers. Their lives are quite a bit smaller than that.

I'm one of the ones who faded. Maybe it was the UIGEA, maybe my interest just started failing. I remember four tabling $50 O8 SNGs on Party Poker, occasionally taking a shot at a $100 game and feeling like a big shot. Those stakes are now laughably small time, and I can't even imagine playing that high now. I still play but very small and for very short sessions. When I get that pointless feeling, I quit. I don't chase bonuses and rakeback. I don't enter a big MTT to try and get that big score. I play some small cash. I jump into a turbo SNG.

I haven't phased poker out of my life or this blog. I still love it, and I still love reading about poker. God do I love poker blogs. I love reading about your home games. I love reading about your bad beats and your tournament wins. The struggles and the accomplishments all hit home with me. I used to be there with you, but now I just watch from the stands. But I'm still your fan. If you read me and you have a blog, I probably read you. Keep up the great work. Thanks for YEARS of entertainment, and the years to come.

Does UIGEA make Online Poker Illegal? Congress says "we won't say."

Interesting article from Ed Brayton's site:

The House Financial Services Committee refused to advance a bill that would require the government to define what is and is not illegal online gambling so that banks and credit card companies could have some guidance on which types of transactions it was required to block under the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006. They voted 32-32, which means the bill dies without going to a floor vote.

The problem is that the UIGEA requires banks, credit card companies and other financial services companies who facilitate cash transfers to block any and all transfers to websites that allow illegal online gambling, but they didn't actually define what was and wasn't illegal online gambling. The Bush administration claims that any form of gambling online not specifically authorized is illegal, but the courts have ruled that only online sports betting is illegal. This has created all sorts of problems implementing that legislation:

The Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department have been unable to finalize rules to implement the ban because Congress didn't clearly define online gambling when it passed legislation less than two years ago...

Banks and other financial institutions have complained that they are being forced into a law enforcement role because the Internet gambling ban prohibits them from accepting payments to settle online wagers without giving them a clear set of rules.

"The financial institutions are in the position of being told not process bets, but it's not clear what is legal and what is illegal," said Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., the committee's chairman. He said financial institutions had been given "a job that is undoable."

Naturally, the idiots who opposed the bill just talked about how horrible gambling is:

The committee's top Republican, Rep. Spencer Bachus of Alabama, argued that gambling is the fastest-growing addiction in the United States and having it online makes it accessible to children.

"The banks have decided that this is a financial burden," Bachus said. "We have decided, on the other hand, that our children are worth protecting."

That's not the issue, you moron. If you think it's important to block these transfers, then give the companies who have to do it some actual legal definitions so they can block them. The moral puritans don't want to do that because they know that legally they have no leg to stand on; under the Wire Act, only sports betting is illegal to do online. And they want it to remain unclear precisely so that the financial institutions will do what they're already doing and just block any transfer to any online gambling site.

If they made clear what the law actually says, then those companies would be legally in the clear to only block transfers to websites that feature online sports betting. That would make it possible for the online poker sites that pulled out of the American market to reopen to American customers. The moral puritans are deliberately refusing to define the law in order to force private companies to block as much as possible to avoid possible legal problems. This is a clear dereliction of their duty as legislators.

Type A

Last night I had a dream about being attacked by wild animals.

Not that I'm posting about my dream and what it meant. I hate people who describe their dreams to you and expect you to explain what it means. "You're very twisted," I always reply, even to the benign dreams.

What bothered me about my dream was that the entire time I felt it was a dream I'd had before, and I was upset about that. Not because it was a rerun but because I felt like I knew how the dream should go and it wasn't going exactly how it went before. My expectations were for a dream that I knew the results in advance, and I was more and more disappointed when things didn't work out the way I wanted.

Talk about control issues.

I woke up at 3:45 and wasn't able to get back to sleep before I had to get up at 4:45. I feel cheated out of an hour of sleep by my subconscious.

Uniquely Funny

Someone once said that all modern comedians are just doing an impersonation of Richard Pryor. With George Carlin, they didn't even try.

Rest in Peace, George.

Poker Comic #190

Poker Comic presented by Free Poker Money. Some places offer $25 Free Money. Some offer $50 or $75 Free Money. Here you get $100, with No Deposit Required and No Credit Card Required. (New Players Only, Must be 21 or older.)

Click HERE to view the Comics Archive

Rectum Crevasse

Douchebag said:

And to the players who won ME seats, allusions of grandeur are prevalent during these times. Drop the ego, stop thinking about selling shares and keep the $12K. You'll thank me for it later...I promise.

Buzzkill much? You forgot to tell them to be embarrassed about winning it in the first place. And I'm not going to touch "allusions."

Too Lazy to Post

New is Fun

There's a new version of Mozilla Firefox coming out today, Firefox 3.0. Should be interesting, I'm a big fan of them so far. I'll be one of the first to try it out, hopefully.


Bodog announced a new client. They claim they've addressed the most sought after feature among their customers. Re-sizable tables. Is that correct? People want to change the size of tables more than poker tracker support? Hmmmm.


A new fun site I've been reading lately is I am Neurotic. There are some serious freaks out there. I've always been interested in OCD and compulsive behaviors. Just when you think you've got some kind of small understanding of it, you find out about some that just defy all explanation and make you say "what the fuck?"

What I think...

Somebody asked me what I think so I'll post it.

Hoy's not a cheat. You can play under whatever name you want, as long as you only have one and nobody else has used it before to establish an image. What is he supposed to do, take out an ad in the paper and publish his VPiP? Grow up. Play your own game.

Why is everyone so upset? Because they are a bunch of cliquish assholes. Hoy blew up smokkee's bit. He peed in his Cheerios. He said bad shit about Bodog, even though they were adding virtual cash to the prize pools.

So the fuck what? Yeah, if he was making up bad shit about Bodog I'd agree he was wrong. But if he was just telling the truth, how can you fault him for that? I have never heard anyone rant and rave about how great Bodog is (other than the free cash.) In fact I think the honest opinion of Bodog from most people is pretty darn negative.

And somebody said some mean shit in a blog, and that someone may or may not have been Hoy. Grow up. If your feelings are really hurt that Hoy and his buddies started a blog to make fun of you, you need to spend some of that bankroll on a LIFE.

Jeez, get a sense of humor people. Poker Champ would crush the shit out of all of you.

Nothing Really...

This guy Who thought he could win $10,000 at $25NL in 30 days quit, after only winning around $3K halfway there. One of his conclusions is that people at NL25 adjusted to him. It's tempting to think that the other online players know who you are and keep track of you, but at that level it might be foolish. This is twenty-five cent poker. I know there are people out there who track and examine 25-cent poker to death, but eventually they realize that all that work is pointless at such a low level. If they're still doing it at such small stakes, they're fairly clueless, aren't they?

********

I saw something I've never seen before while driving home last week. I like to take the back roads because it's generally more pleasant and I get better mileage at the slower speeds. There are a lot of farms and ranches on that route and I passed a guy riding towards me on a horse while talking on his cell phone. Never saw that before.

********

The car I usually drive to work is getting some work done (old cars = more maintenance) so I'm without my beloved XM Radio for most of last week and this week. The ultra-right wing Tennessee talk radio is beating the Senate up over the global-warming bill that was debated last week. It got killed on Friday but they're still ranting and raving over it this morning. This bill never had a shot. Even if it passed the senate which was unlikely, it would go to the house which would be an impossibility. If that impossibity happened, then the President promised to Veto it.

So why cover it on talk radio for a week and a half? Because the nutjobs have such a small opportunity to be correct, they have to hold on to one like it's GOLD. The left uses "global warming" to keep people afraid just like the right uses the threat of terrorism. They're both just ways to make you give up money and more power to the government. Both sides use anecdotal evidence to back up their claims. Politicians LOVE anecdotal evidence.

********

Vote for Bob Barr folks. We need to build a third party that actually thinks the people have a say in how their country is run. The left wants the politicians to have all the power, the right wants the rich and the corporations to have it all. The Libertarians want you to have it. Actually, we need to build a third party of ANY KIND. We need more choice.

Yes, Bob Barr won't win. But a legitimate third party has to build gradually. This is how it happens. Stop voting for the lesser of evils, like you have for your whole life. Vote to build something for the future. There should be more disenfranchised people this year than ever before. The right hates McCain. The Hillary lovers hate Obama. Wouldn't it be great if they all voted somewhere else than the default?

I'll be voting for Barr, since I actually can. The Libertarians weren't even allowed on the ticket in Oklahoma. They won't be this year either, in all likelihood. If enough people vote for Barr this year, maybe places like Oklahoma will have to start putting a third choice on the ballot in the future. Eventually maybe someone will have a choice between something other than big government, big business or both.

********

This post is BRUTAL. I was always really interested in BG and CJ's handicapping skills, especially in their Pick-6 prognostications. I regretted not participating, even after I found out they lost, I wish I had been part of the fun. After this, maybe I'm not as interested in the future. His pick for first came in last, his pick for last came in first. If you can qualify wrongness, this was the wrongest.

Finally, A Camera for Stoners

Yes, this is a real camera, the latest from Olympus. I love how they call it the world's smallest DSLR...as in "DUDE!! My hands are HUGE!"

Sometimes the ignorance of major corporations about pop culture is astounding.

At least now I know what I'm getting Dr. Pauly for Xmas.

How to know you're doing well

When you get called this in Full Tilt chat:

bigvak77: with 56 really
DuggleBogey: it was the nuts
bigvak77: u fuc;king fa;ggot azz bit;ch
bigvak77: fuc;k this gay azz table of losers

Either that or you're playing with Waffles...

RIP Bo Diddley

A square guitar tuned to an open chord.

Rest In Peace Bo Diddley

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If you just want the best bonuses, no bullshit, check the place out. It's still in its infancy and will be redesigned shortly, but it's not too early to get a good bonus if that's what you're looking for.

It's like the start of the Christmas Season 2

It feels like the beginning of a holiday. With the Pot Limit Hold'em Championship beginning today, it's the official start of The 2008 World Series of Poker.

Terrorist Alert!

This scarf:



Looks like this headdress:



Enjoy Guantanamo Bay, Bitch.

Pokeremestari.com

One of the great things about playing poker is the international nature of the game. Playing in Vegas and online, you get to meet and sometimes get to know people from all over the world.

Blogs also have an international aspect, but I was still surprised to be asked to review a poker site from Finland. The site is in Finnish where they call online poker nettipokeri. Checking my stats, I do get a lot of traffic from Northern Europe in general, so maybe it's not totally crazy. Just partially.

At any rate, if you speak Finnish, check out Pokeremestari.com. Via Google Translation it looks like a fairly comprehensive Poker Forum with features like a site of the month, poker bonus sites list, poker discussion forums etc.

I've participated in a few poker forums and the time invested pays dividends in poker knowledge and entertainment value. If you are more comfortable with Finnish than English, this pokeri site might be the place for you.

Illinois Johnson

Going to the Drive-In tonight to catch a double feature of Indiana Jones and Iron Man. I saw Iron Man two weeks ago, but it's worth seeing again.

Harrison Ford is the same age as my father. Dad doesn't swing from bullwhips much anymore at his age. I've already read one review that said the most satisfying part of the movie is the Get Smart preview. The Drive-in rarely shows previews, so I might not get to see the best part of this hype-fest.

Mental Illness

This guy here, (with the really cool name) took over $17K in prop bets that he could win $10K in one month playing only $25NL.

He's set up a web cam so you can watch him. So far it seems like he's down about $35. A warning if you watch his webcam...it has sound and he sometimes sings along with his music.

EDIT. Amazing how he can play 24 tables at Pokerstars at the same time and still manage to look bored. He's up about $400 now.

Tard

Hey.

Douchebag.

Don't go to a foreign country, address a foreign parliament, and publicly take shots at another American.

You take care of that business at home. You don't talk shit on the road.

Fuckwit.

How Dumb?

How dumb are the players at the low level SNGs on Full Tilt Poker?

I haven't played SNGs in a while because I don't even want to commit to even a half hour at one time. But I got to sneak out of work early on time for once today, and I thought I'd try a lower level SNG to see if I had ANY patience left for poker.

I expected the poor plays. You know, the usual. Min raising pre-flop with big hands. Betting 80 chips into a 1000 chip pot. Calling two all ins with Q8 and hitting a Q8Q flop. Telling other players whether to call or fold. The classics. The standards.

What I didn't expect was a dude TELLING THE TABLE WHAT CARDS HE'S FOLDING. To give the game "an extra edge."

No shit.

The Revolution Will Be Delayed Until Fall

The final table of the World Series of Poker Main Event will be delayed for several months, so that it can be shown nearly live on ESPN.

Is this a good thing or a bad thing? Is it good for poker but bad for the fans? Is it good for Harrah's but bad for the players?

The answer is; I don't know. Nobody knows. It might be great! It might suck!

But someone might cheat! You know how long it takes to make a deal to cheat? I'm pretty sure it doesn't take months. If people want to cheat, you aren't going to stop them. Everyone is likely to get at least a million dollars. If they want to risk a sure million for a chance to win a few more by cheating, they're probably not bright enough to get away with cheating.

I do know the steam was always taken out of the WSOP for me because I knew the winners of all the events months before they were televised. Trying to avoid it was impossible given my reading habits. If the change helps me enjoy the ESPN broadcast a little more, I'm likely to consider this a good change.

I love the WSOP, and I believe it's more than just another big poker tournament. But it's not much more. It certainly has room for improvements. I don't blame anyone at all for experimenting with it. Sometimes that's how you discover improvements. There will be unintended side effects. Sometimes those are the best things.

I think a lot of people had a knee-jerk reaction that told them "if I have to wait longer, it's BAD!" But sometimes waiting can be tolerable, sometimes delaying gratification can even be pleasurable. Some people think a big build up makes the event even better.

If not, fuck em. We'll watch the US Poker Championship.

I got nuttin

I can't think of anything else to post, so some more pics from the old days.


This was a woman who's son mysteriously died in a jail cell in the county lockup. His picture is on her T-shirt. I can't remember what the final determination was.



The man on the right is Larry Langford. At the time he was the mayor of a small city called Fairfield Alabama. He is currently the mayor of Birmingham Alabama. Loony dude.


When Miss Alabama won the Miss America pageant, she had a parade through Bessemer, but unfortunately it rained. I took this shot of a little girl waiting in the rain to see her. You might remember that Miss America, she was the deaf one.


Youth football returned to the area after being gone for a long time. I did a story about the return and always really loved this shot of the kids at their first practice.


Every few weeks I would go to the animal shelter and take some photos of dogs to try to get people to go adopt them. This woman ran the shelter and she was awesome. They didn't euthanize healthy dogs there. If a dog was anti-social, they tried to train them by letting them run loose in the office.


Another dog shot. This one was at a Catholic School in the area on St. Francis of Assisi Day, where they would bless your animals if you brought them to the church. Always good to get lots of faces in the paper.

More Photos

After I left the paper in Virginia I got a job at a weekly newspaper in Alabama as a photographer and sportswriter. I covered local high schools for sports and took care of all the other photography responsibilities for editorial and advertising.

Here are some of the photos that I took for that small town paper. Most of them are scanned from halftones that were actually on the layout sheets. I used to peel them off after they came back from the printers and stick them to the wall of my office. I wasn't very responsible about maintaining copies for my portfolio, so I was lucky to be able to keep a few of these as memories of that time.