Ken’s small aside about the language of poker got me to thinking about the jargon that is used to describe poker action. Like any jargon, it makes for a nice shorthand when discussing a fairly complex situation. I know I sound like a 1940s hepcat sometimes when I talk about it. Feel free to ask if I lose you at any point.
You may have noticed that I added a new link into my blogroll. It’s Cardschat.com. If you are interested in poker, or are just trying to figure out what I’m talking about in my poker posts, you should check it out.
My 2nd shot at a $1500 buy in WSOP event was not as successful as the first. The field was roughly 2700 players again and I made it to about 400th place, but that was it. The field paid to 270, so no cash for me. It ended much the same as last year with me getting knocked out with AA. A player in mid-position raised, I was getting short stacked and the blinds were about to go up. I looked down at AA and pushed all my chips in the middle. Everyone else folded, the original raiser went into the tank for awhile and then called saying that we were probably racing. He turned over a 55. The flop came KK5 and the turn and river were no help.
I got my money in good when I needed to do it. I made exactly the right play, it just didn’t turn out for me. I can’t shake the feeling that I let a bunch of people down, though. It’s aggravating that I have to wait another year to try again, but by then I should be even better.
Alright, I’m letting it go. I’m gonna try some $100 buy in tourneys at the local casinos and see what happens.
Lots of critters. The house we recently bought is pretty much in the heart of this city, but because of it’s environs it is alot like living in the country. There is a pond at the back of my property that is still owned by the church that we bought the house from, but I consider it my pond. Rick, the man in charge of the physical plant of the church (and thus the pond), encourages me to do whatever I like as long as it doesn’t involve chemicals. If it does, I have to ask first, because he might have put some in and we don’t want a big fish kill or the water turning purple or whatever.
The pond has hundreds of small catfish which a member of the church put in there the year before last. I’ve caught a few bream. It also has dozens of turtles. A few wild geese stop by regularly. This morning I caught a glimpse of a heron or stork taking off as I was coming out of the back door. If you add in the frogs, squirrels, rabbits, snakes, birds, lizards and things I have yet to see, it is a veritable menagerie on 2 acres.
You would think that with all this life thriving, the catfish would be getting huge. Not so. They have an inordinate amount of competition for the relatively scarce food resources. So in the self-interest of wanting bigger catfish to eat, i have undertaken a feeding program.
I went to Brown Feed and Seed which is a store that looks like it is pretty much unchanged since the 60s. I purchased two 50 lb bags of floating fish food for $16 each. I figured I would throw a pound or two into the pond every day and fatten the little suckers up.
Turns out I’m feeding about 50% of all the critteers I have mentioned. Even the normally shy turtles have taken to swimming in at the sight of me. The wild geese change course and land on the pond if I’m outside. If you count the number of organisms that are happy to see me as a measure of popularity, I may well be the most popular person in Martinez.
Don’t think that the joy the fish feel at the sight of me is going to make me soft on them. Let them get big enough. I’m gonna eat them jokers.
My high school buddy Mike got me started on this whole facebook thing. Not only have I become a complete TWAC, I have found out that I have at least 20 friends that are TWACs too. So not only is there a bunch of junk to waste time on, there is peer pressure to keep wasting more time.
Evil in it’s simplicity. Give them shinys, then make sure their friends remind them of the shinys.
We have moved into the new house, but do not have our internet connectivity yet, so I will continue to be basically disconnected for the next couple of weeks.
Bruce Schneier is, as always, right. People really are fairly predictable. They will almost always act to maximize their incentives. We have a word for the ones that don’t– crazy.
Governor Jindall (R-LA) gave last night’s Republican rebuttal to President Obama’s speech.
Wow. I kept getting the feeling he was offering me candy and wanted me to get in his car to help him find his lost dog.
For the guy’s who sided with the RIAA and champion free markets, Republicans sure don’t like to pay for music. Maybe they think free market means they can take what they want for free. I’m not sure.
And in case you think this is an anomaly or isolated case, it’s not.