Happy Holidays!

Check out the lil guy who came with my gingerbread latte! Isn't he cute? I was almost sad to eat him, but then I bit off one of his delicious legs and it was sayonara mr. gingerbread man.

How About a Nice Hawaiian Punch?

I get miserably hung over about twice a year. Today was one of those days.

When I am hung over, I do not want food, I do not want water, I do not want coffee. I only want one thing: Hawaiian Punch. You can ask many of the people who have gone on quests for Hawaiian Punch with me during my times of need that I do not settle for much else unless I have to. If my punch cannot be found Powerade will do, but Gatorade will not. I'll take an Orange Hi-C but not orange juice. In other words, I am picky.

Needless to say, when I made my pilgrimage to CVS today to pick up a prescription and aforementioned beverage I was devastated to find neither Hawaiian Punch nor any of my standard alternatives. I was forced to settle for....Grape Vitamin Water.

For those who are curious, Grape Vitamin Water will not be repeated as an alternative hangover remedy again, but that is neither here nor there. What I really want to talk about is this....

As I am sitting in the little waiting area by the pharmacy, a man walks up to the counter. He is in his mid-30s and is wearing a pair of pajama pants with bottles of Corona surfing on them. He has a basket with an array of cold medicines in it. He asks to speak with the pharmacist (this is one of those places that you can ask the pharmacist medical questions).

The pharmacist emerges and he explains that he has a cold and he was hoping she could recommend an over the counter medicine for him. She goes through his options and explains which one relieve which symptoms and such and the man is summarily disatisfied.

"So none of these really make the cold go away faster?"

"No, they just relieve some of the symptoms typically associated with colds."

"But none of these will, you know, cure it and make it go away?"

The pharmacist is a) clearly not amused and b) clearly has to explain this to 10 people a day. And at this point, I am completely blown away because I know I tend to overestimate the general intelligence of people, but who on Earth manages to go 35 years without ever hearing that there is no cure for the common cold??

Worst Forum Member Ever

I have to be perfectly honest that I have just not been in a blogging mood as of late. Moreover, I don't really feel like I have much to blog about that isn't going to come across as overt and outright bitching about ivory tower politics.

However, what bertminatti wants, bertminatti gets when it comes to birthday requests and his birthday request (sad, but true) is that I update my damned blog.

So.

A blog, huh?

Well, let me talk about this: I have been mildly obsessed with Pokerroad ever since its inception. I listen to all the shows (yes, even Cash Plays) read all of the blogs, and I should have been jumping for joy when they finally started a forum for their legion of followers and fans. However, there is a tiny problem: I never have anything to post about.

I have the same problem at PocketFives. The joke amongst the reporters is just how bad and mindless my posts are. "The Rio is indeed cold, you should consider bringing a sweater". "Mike Watson won $1.6 million! Yay!". "There are 4 parking levels at the Horseshoe Southern Indiana parking garage".

In other words, they are the epitome of ascinine. However, I was intimidated to ever volunteer my poker opinion in PD because I am not particularly skilled at poker. While I play my fair share of $3 KO 90 man SNGs (my new obsession---brag coming....186% ROI kids! Granted, small sample size, but shhhhh), I don't think I am qualified to answer strategy and I just think to myself "oh no one really cares what I have to say about that".

With the PR Forums I had high hopes things would be different. After all, while I may not know poker, I do know Pokerroad. But now that the forums are up and running I keep encountering the same problem---what can I add of value to this conversation? "QFT", "+1", "Oh Ali, you so funny"? These seem equally bad in terms of post quality. But I find myself not really having anything enlightening to say about "Know Your Casino" or feel compelled to add to the "What's your favorite episode?" thread. Does anyone actually give a shit what some random stranger has proclaimed to be the best PRR episode ever? Because I don't. I truly don't. And I just have a hard time believing that others eagerly sift through 6 pages of responses to learn what random peoples' favorite moment is.

What I do believe is that the posters that help these forums thrive and keep them going are those who have no filter stopping them from saying "well, who would genuinely care what I have to say about this?" And God bless them for it. There are people on Pokerroad's forums that have found 500 things to say about various posts in a matter of around a month while my piddly post count sits at 7. So, with that in mind, I salute you bertminatti for your endless knowledge about fantasy sports, your quippy and sasstastic comments in response to stupid threads, and your fountain of knowledge about various abbreviations and internet lingo. Most importantly, I salute you never being "internet mean" and managing to evade the plague of early-20s assholeishness that tends to plague that place from time to time (I'm looking in your direction OT)

Happy Birthday (one day late) Brett!

1 Week Down, 14 to Go....

I have survived the first week of the semester and it went a little faster than I expected, which is always nice. My schedule is such that the first half of the week is really slow but my Thursday and Friday are a bit crammed. Obviously I am not complaining about the perpetual three day weekends and the minimal amount of obligations on Tuesday and Wednesday, but this early in the semester there is just not a lot of work to fill the time with. Now that my syllabi are in my possession all that will quickly change.

In typical grad school form, there was a fair share of Republican bashing in the classroom. Most everyone in my cohort knows that this is my grad school pet peeve to end all pet peeves and this particular incident sparked a reaction from everyone, not just me:

In my Media Ethnography class we watched a brief clip from a 1950s propaganda video entitled "The House In The Middle". The basic gist of the film is that your house is less likely to burst into flames in the wake of an atomic blast if you keep it tidy and uncluttered. They would blow up a "messy" house and watch it burst into flames that engulfed the home in a matter of minutes. Then we saw how the "tidy" house also had the roof blown off as a result of the blast and still caught fire, but this fire was much more easily "extinguishable". I don't know about you, but I would hazard to guess that I don't have a fire extinguisher handy when/if an atomic bomb goes off. And, considering my house is so tidy, I doubt there would be a blanket or some other tool to smother the blaze sitting around either.

I digress. One of the comical aspects of said film strip was the tinge of excitement in the narrator's voice when he got to say "bomb", "fire", "blaze", or any other word related to nuclear explosions. As we were discussing this a man in class raised his hand to add his own thoughts on the matter. His comment began discussing the 1950s atomic bomb film and then, apropos of nothing, the subject changed to...Sarah Palin.

Yes, that is right, Sarah Palin. I don't know about you, but apparently this fellow made the logical jump from 1950s nuclear film strip narration to the rhetoric of the hockey mom VP candidate with the greatest of ease. He explained how Palin would seem sweet and nice, but then she would inject something "venomous" or even "mean" into her speech. I must admit I did not watch the RNC despite being a registered member of the party--I do not like John McCain and I am in a bit of a quandry about where my vote is headed. What I do know is that I will not be voting for him, ergo I found the task of watching the RNC to be unecessary.

Based on this man's remarks and what I have read in the news, it sounds like he was hating on her in part because she was sarcastic. This is really beside the point though. The man said point blank that Palin is mean, evil, and venemous and no one in the classroom said anything to challenge 1) the way this information was presented as a fact everyone had to agree with rather than an opinion or 2) the pertinence of this information to the discussion at large. Even I kept my mouth shut because I am just tired of having this discussion week in and week out, but I rolled my eyes rather overtly and began to watch the clock, hoping class would just end.

One week down, 14 to go. I got through the week with 3 anti-Repub references in class, so I am going to set the over/under at 70. Any takers?

Rainy Days, Chinese Takeout, and the Biz

After class today it began to drizzle outside. As I talked to Dani in the lobby I began to notice the rain falling harder and harder and I realized I needed to book it home--and fast. However, I also needed sustinance--and fast. I popped into Dragon Express on the way home and enjoyed a leisurely early dinner of Chinese takeout eaten at my bedroom window.

It is kind of hard to explain the layout of the rooms here, but I will do my best. The wall opposite the door consists of mostly window. The window extends across all but a foot or so of the wall and is probably five feet in height, stopping just below the ceiling. There are several features of said window that I am quickly growing to enjoy:

1) My bed being located right next to the window allowing for ample natural light. I think that copious amounts of natural light is quickly becoming a dealbreaker on whether or not I am willing to reside somewhere. Nothing compares to the feeling of sunshine on you when you wake up in the morning.

2) The view. My window looks out away from campus and, since the building is located on the edge of campus, there is a vague illusion of nature. Most of what I see is tree tops and I can pretend I live in seclusion rather than on a hall with several dozen other students who are 5 and 6 years younger than me.

3) The ledge! The window ledge juts out a good eight inches or so from the wall allowing for objects, such as Chinese food to be perched upon and consumed from the comforts of my bed. If you have never tried eating Chinese food in bed on a rainy day, let me assure you that you are really, really missing out.

Duncan is trying to persuade me to drive up to the Horseshoe this weekend, but I have numerous social obligations of the utmost importance here in Btown, the first of which is the 80s themed party at Casa del Pyramids tomorrow night. I have my Little Mermaid t-shirt clean and ready to go, but other than that I am lacking in the costume department. Maybe I will go and buy a scrunchie tomorrow.

The second fiesta is James' birthday shenanigans Saturday night with our traditional trip to Nicks and rousing games of Sink the Biz. I cannot explain the game to you nearly as well as the blogger in the link has, but let me assure you that game is a beast. Here is a horrifyingly unflattering photo taken from James' previous birthday extravaganza:

If the expression on my face does not convey it on its own, let me explain how over this evil metal bucket filled with beer I truly was. First of all, I loathe beer--carbonation really messes with my tongue and the taste of it can only be described as putrid. Secondly, James is a Sink The Biz Nazi and if he thinks you are not drinking enough, he will purposefully attempt to get the Biz to sink on your turn, thereby forcing you to drink. He will massively overpour on the turn prior to yours, he will pound the table during your turn, and he will blow on and shake the bucket before the next person goes. James, you know I love you dearly, but I am putting my foot down this year. There will by no Biz sinking for Ms. Welman! There will be alcohol consumption, oh trust me, there will be that. But it will not be beer and it will most certainly not come out of a bucket!

Poor Form All Around

Now I know everyone has been talking about Scotty Nguyen's poor sportsmanship in the $50K HORSE event and I wholeheartedly agree. However, what really, really surprises me is that more people are not annoyed with the antics of Michael Dimechele. Within five minutes of watching this episode I had decided this guy was acting like a complete douchebag. The excessive celebration, the hollywooding in a stud game (SUCH poor form), I was not a fan of any of it and I was actively rooting for this kid to lose. As we established last time, I am no HORSE genius but I play enough to understand how the games work and I was less than impressed with his play--I mean, the kid couldn't even read what cards he had at one point.

I am sure he is a nice guy away from the table and I actually found his interview on Cash Plays on PokerRoad rather interesting, but I find this to be an aspect of tournament poker that I am growing increasingly annoyed with. I guess you don't notice it on TV as much, but being around the final tables this year I began to realize just how often the cheering sections of the various players were acting like total tools. Don't ham it up for your drunk and disorderly friends. You are adults, behave like adults. If your friend gets it in bad, don't chant crap like "suck out suck out", just wait politely and see how the hand plays out. Even if Scotty Nguyen did behave in an equally unbecoming manner, don't scream out "brick" when 7th street gets dealt. It is tacky, it is in poor form, and it makes it increasingly more difficult to present poker as a competitive game for intelligent people rather than a vice.

I have to be perfectly frank that, before I worked at the WSOP this summer, I was generally skeptical of internet players. I don't particularly enjoy internet poker nearly as much as I enjoy playing live so I am biased to begin with. Moreover, I watched enough poker on TV to see several young online pros who were presented in less than flattering light. However, within a week of working the WSOP, I realized I had judged too quickly and these were genuinely nice guys (and girls) who, for the most part, behave just as respectfully as everyone else.

However, every once in a while, when they get in big groups and, perhaps, too many substances are consumed, they cement the reputation that they are cocky, ungrateful, disrespectful players. I think the antics of Demichele and his cheering section, at least for me, fell into that category. I have gotten a chance to speak with and get to know some of the guys I spotted in his cheering section and I know categorically that they are really, really nice people and I don't doubt for a minute that they didn't mean anything by it. I just think it is odd that no one is bringing up in the forums that this doesn't reflect well on poker players under 25. Just because Scotty Nguyen's douchebaggery far outshined that of everyone else doesn't mean that everyone else doesn't need to take some time to think about how their behavior comes across to other people.

At the end of the day all I can say is I love Erick Lindgren and I think everyone else does too. Man, that guy is a class act all around and I continue to marvel at his stellar play throughout the WSOP this summer.

So bored I'm playing $1 MTTS

For no particular reason I elected to play in a bunch of stud game MTTs on Stars tonight. In part, it was spurred on by my victory at the shed in our HORSE tournament on Saturday. Let me explain how ignorant this reasoning is on my part. 12 people played in this thing and two had to leave early and were blinded out. The rest just plug did not know how to play HORSE, especially shorthanded HORSE. I am not going to shun $200 in profit, but I am not stupid either. Let's be realistic, I am no HORSE genius.

However, I do really enjoy the rotation of games and I would really like to get better at it. Rather than playing in the Ladies Event at the WSOP next year, I would love to play in one of the $1500 HORSE or Stud Hi/Lo events. Devo blogged about how soft the stud fields were this year and, while I am no Stud 8 genius, I definitely know more about the game than the average person and it seems like a worthwhile investment of my time. I am sure that stud odds software exists, I just need to make an effort to track it down.

My weakness in HORSE has and always will be Omaha. Every hand, save for obvious ones like A267, always look awful to me so I fold everything. I tend to fold big flush draws on paired boards, anything but the nut flush draws otherwise, and draws to the low end of the straight. However, as much as I think this discipline has its benefits, I am almost certain I am folding WAYYYYY too much. But the hands are all just so ugly. So ugly. Not to mention that it feels like every flop is just brick, brick, brick. If only I had a lucky cat to help me out...

In other news, I am morbidally depressed to find this great $1/$2 game in Lexington only to have to go back to Bloomington and abandon it. I had another profitable night last night (though $80 is nto $350, I will gladly take it). Money can also not buy my two favorite quotes of the night.

1) We were playing Omaha 8 and on a rainbow AK6 board it went bet, call, raise, call, call. There was another bet when a 6 came on the turn and, after a 7 came on the river, the guy who had been passively calling the whole way suddenly started raising. Then the initial reraiser, Guy, looks at him and says, "you didn't do what I think you did? If you called all those bets and raises with only a draw to the low you are immeasurably retarted." Well, apparently, he was, because he had 2-4. Whoops.

2) On a Ac Jd 5c board in a multi-way limped pot of NL Hold Em I checked in the SB, immeasurable tard bets $7, Chris flats behind him, and I reraise to $30 total. Josh The Immeasurable Tard folds, and Chris looks at me and asks, "how big is your kicker?"
Josh taps him on the shoulder and says, "you don't really need a kicker when you flop two pair" and Chris folds. GG me.