fun on a bun

pumping iron
I didn't know I could squat 230 lbs. more than once. Hell, I didn't even know I could do it once. It turns out I can do it several times. I will regret it tomorrow; I was having trouble walking down flights of stairs after my trip to the gym; I can only imagine what going up them will be like tomorrow. I hate legs day; I always skip a few days when it's legs day because I hate being a cripple the following day, and then I have to skip a couple days afterward because.... yep, I'm a cripple.

slacker
I'm way behind on my goals for this year; all the drinking and two jobs takes the fight out of me. (I am going to stop screwing around/being a pissy bitch and get to work.) I'm comfortably 6-tabling the 6.50 turbos on PokerStars; my bankroll would be high enough for me to tackle the PartyPoker $11s, or maybe even the Stars $16 turbos, but my brother has been playing a lot of poker on my account. He kept losing and giving me cash, which I would then turn around and use on beer and stuff. ("hey, there's money in this wallet!") So I continue to comfortably 6-table the 6.50s, leaving me far short of my goal of being on the Party $22s by March. I doubt I could 6-table those, but I feel confident in my ability to 4-table the 22s, if I have a roll that won't disappear after two losing sets (like last time).

east on 2, north on 59
I went to Seven Clans Casino in Thief River Falls with my brother last weekend for his 18th birthday. (no link; their website is an atrocity of misinformation and broken links) They're running $45 satellites to the Heartland Poker Tour, the biggest poker tournament (?) in the Midwest, to be held on April 20th. I'm seriously considering entering; the caliber of player at the cash game makes me fairly confident that I can win a 1-table (10 man) tournament to gain entry to the Tour.

Ah, the cash game. Seven Clans runs a 2-10 spread-limit game between 4 pm and 4 am, Thursday through Monday. The dealers are engaging, chatty, and funny (if you think rednecks are funny). The games are incredibly, edibly soft. I cashed in $150 and was a bit surprised to see myself sitting down with the big stack, and not just by 20 or 50 or so. I'd say 2/3 the people at the table were my age or younger, not counting me or my brother. They all cashed in with $75 or less. Our table opened, and I was treated to an hour of watching bets be raised and then capped, only to see showdowns between middle pair and bottom pair, bottom pair and high card, and (I swear I am not making this up) high card vs. high card on an all-overcard board. I was itching to engage the hideous play, but my cards were stink-nasty, and the couple of times I found myself with suited connectors, the boy in front of me (he looked like his 18th birthday was about five years away) raised to 10 pre-flop. Frustration settled in, and after about 45 minutes of folding, I found myself heads-up in middle position with a fellow in his 30s in the cutoff after we both limped in. The board came A-x-A, and I looked down at K high and fired off a bet. He called, and the turn card was a random rag, so I fired the second barrel, another bet about half the size of the pot. He called, and we went to the river--another rag. I checked, and he checked, and then he turned over the third A. Defeat feels a little like drowning in air.

Luckily, at this point, the other table broke up, and several new people sat down-- not enough to make a full table. I volunteered to switch, as I had not come all this way to lose a spread-limit game at the same table as my lil' bro. My chipstack was almost halved; I was down to $86, and I had entered the battle with the intention that if I ever blinded down to 50 or less, I was cashing out. The last 50 was to be used in dominating situations only, to pump the size of the pot. Lo and behold, such a situation happened on the first hand at the new table. I limped in from the small blind with 45 of hearts, with one limper before me and the big blind checking. Flop comes K45 rainbow. EP checks, I minbet, and the big blind raises to 6. EP folds, I frown a bit, study my cards intently, and raise to 12. BB calls, and the turn is a 7. I bet 6, and the BB raises to 16. I pretend to be worried for a moment and call. River comes -- 2. I bet 10, he raises to 20, I raise to 30, he raises to 60, I raise to 70, and he puts me all-in. I call my last few chips, and he turns over KT. (I expected KQ, or possibly KJ/KA, and had thought briefly about KK/AA/44/55, but decided that he wasn't being aggressive enough for a monster like that.) I show my two pair, and he is furious as I rake in the big pile of chips and tip the dealer $2 (one large chip) for his trouble. That set the stage for the remainder of the evening; despite seeing only the premium hands AK offsuit once, AJ offsuit once, and no pocket pair higher than 99, I left with $184 in profit. GG me. I bought 3am breakfast buffet for myself and my brother (who also finished up on the night), and we went back to our room, sleeping in and leaving around noon the next day.

that guy can't even spell poker
Here's the last hand of a $3.30 rebuy I played tonight..  this is almost 3 hours in; I had been hanging around 25k in chips for a while after burning up my table in the first hour (cashed in for $12.30, including the add-on), and then i lost a bunch of chips when my AQ made second pair on a K high board and I couldn't put it down (incidentally, i lost to KQ).  this was the next hand i played, two or three orbits later.

anyway, enough setup.  here goes.

PokerStars Game #4234455562: Tournament #20792986, Hold'em No Limit - Level X (400/800) - 2006/03/09 - 22:52:44 (ET)
Table '20792986 188' Seat #2 is the button
Seat 1: MAR108 (50906 in chips)
Seat 2: wsimmobr (10095 in chips)
Seat 3: #1 Big Cat (46703 in chips)
Seat 4: hakatak (9430 in chips)
Seat 5: trig358 (57472 in chips)
Seat 6: Rob Cunning (58622 in chips)
Seat 7: QUIGGY (14780 in chips)
Seat 8: grm69 (86428 in chips)
Seat 9: garyak (53070 in chips)
MAR108: posts the ante 50
wsimmobr: posts the ante 50
#1 Big Cat: posts the ante 50
hakatak: posts the ante 50
trig358: posts the ante 50
Rob Cunning: posts the ante 50
QUIGGY: posts the ante 50
grm69: posts the ante 50
garyak: posts the ante 50
#1 Big Cat: posts small blind 400
hakatak: posts big blind 800
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hakatak [Ks Kd] (hooray, kings in the big blind)
trig358: folds
Rob Cunning: calls 800
QUIGGY: calls 800
grm69: folds
garyak: raises 4000 to 4800 (hooray, he'll call)
MAR108: folds
wsimmobr: folds
#1 Big Cat: folds
hakatak: raises 4580 to 9380 and is all-in
Rob Cunning: folds
QUIGGY: folds
garyak: calls 4580
*** FLOP *** [Ts 2d 9h]
*** TURN *** [Ts 2d 9h] [Qs]
*** RIVER *** [Ts 2d 9h Qs] [6c]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
hakatak: shows [Ks Kd] (a pair of Kings)
garyak: shows [9d 9c] (three of a kind, Nines) (...doh.)
garyak collected 21210 from pot

I was so disgusted and so disappointed that I didn't even pound my desk or throw my hat.  I just wilted a little in my chair, and dutifully posted my final hand in the official rebuy results thread on 2+2.

lucked out is one letter away from fucked out
Normally I've got plenty of fire and brimstone for losing a hand where I'm a 4:1 favorite for all my chips. However, I had played an $11 multi-table freezeout tournament earlier in the evening/simultaneously, and I think you'll agree that the occurrences therein are breathtakingly extraordinary... or at least extraordinarily unpleasant.

(legal disclaimer: the following is property of myself and PokerStars, and is not to be used for any purpose other than training and review.)

(other disclaimer: this part is pretty long, and somewhat difficult to read. I apologize, and believe it or not, I cleaned it up quite a bit already. The number contained within the ==== is the hand # of the tournament. 1=first hand, and so on. Good luck.)

Transcript for tournament #20792998 requested by hakatak ( el.dusto@gmail.com)
*********** # 1 **************
Level I (10/20) - 2006/03/09 - 21:35:00 (ET)
Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: Scorpion11 (1500 in chips)
Seat 2: anticon (1500 in chips) is sitting out
Seat 3: martenmania (1500 in chips)
Seat 4: cook99 (1500 in chips)
Seat 5: loveulong (1500 in chips)
Seat 6: I Stay High (1500 in chips)
Seat 7: alde80 (1500 in chips)
Seat 8: jhr103 (1500 in chips)
Seat 9: hakatak (1500 in chips)
anticon: posts small blind 10
martenmania: posts big blind 20
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hakatak [Kd Kh]
cook99 has timed out while disconnected
cook99: folds
cook99 is sitting out
loveulong: calls 20
I Stay High: folds
alde80: calls 20
jhr103: folds
hakatak: raises 80 to 100
Scorpion11: folds
anticon: folds
martenmania: folds
loveulong: calls 80
alde80: calls 80
*** FLOP *** [6h Td Ts]
loveulong: checks
alde80: checks
hakatak: bets 100
loveulong: raises 100 to 200
alde80: folds
hakatak: raises 200 to 400
loveulong: calls 200
*** TURN *** [6h Td Ts] [9h]
loveulong: checks
hakatak: checks
*** RIVER *** [6h Td Ts 9h] [8c]
loveulong: bets 300
hakatak: calls 300
*** SHOW DOWN ***
loveulong: shows [6d 6s] (a full house, Sixes full of Tens)
hakatak: mucks hand
loveulong collected 1730 from pot
cook99 is connected
cook99 has returned
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 1730 | Rake 0
Board [6h Td Ts 9h 8c]
Seat 5: loveulong showed [6d 6s] and won (1730) with a full house, Sixes full of Tens
Seat 9: hakatak mucked [Kd Kh]

*********** # 2 **************
Level I (10/20) - 2006/03/09 - 21:36:44 (ET)
Seat #2 is the button
Seat 1: Scorpion11 (1500 in chips)
Seat 2: anticon (1490 in chips) is sitting out
Seat 3: martenmania (1480 in chips)
Seat 4: cook99 (1500 in chips)
Seat 5: loveulong (2430 in chips)
Seat 6: I Stay High (1500 in chips)
Seat 7: alde80 (1400 in chips)
Seat 8: jhr103 (1500 in chips)
Seat 9: hakatak (700 in chips)
martenmania: posts small blind 10
cook99: posts big blind 20
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hakatak [Kc Kh] (that's right, KK back-to-back.)
loveulong: calls 20
I Stay High: folds
alde80: folds
jhr103: calls 20
hakatak: raises 80 to 100
Scorpion11: folds
anticon: folds
martenmania: folds
cook99: calls 80
loveulong: calls 80
jhr103: folds
*** FLOP *** [8s 6h 5c]
cook99: bets 20
loveulong: calls 20
hakatak: raises 100 to 120
cook99: calls 100
loveulong: folds
*** TURN *** [8s 6h 5c] [5s]
cook99: checks
hakatak: bets 120
cook99: calls 120
*** RIVER *** [8s 6h 5c 5s] [Jh]
cook99: bets 180
hakatak: raises 180 to 360 and is all-in
cook99: calls 180
*** SHOW DOWN ***
hakatak: shows [Kc Kh] (two pair, Kings and Fives)
cook99: shows [As 7c] (a pair of Fives)
hakatak collected 1550 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 1550 | Rake 0
Board [8s 6h 5c 5s Jh]
Seat 4: cook99 (big blind) showed [As 7c] and lost with a pair of Fives
Seat 9: hakatak showed [Kc Kh] and won (1550) with two pair, Kings and Fives

I fold the next two hands preflop. Nothing to see there. Then...

*********** # 5 **************
Level I (10/20) - 2006/03/09 - 21:39:45 (ET)
Seat #5 is the button
Seat 1: Scorpion11 (710 in chips)
Seat 2: anticon (1490 in chips)
Seat 3: martenmania (1470 in chips)
Seat 4: cook99 (1610 in chips)
Seat 5: loveulong (2280 in chips)
Seat 6: I Stay High (1480 in chips)
Seat 7: alde80 (1400 in chips)
Seat 8: jhr103 (1510 in chips)
Seat 9: hakatak (1550 in chips)
I Stay High: posts small blind 10
alde80: posts big blind 20
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hakatak [Td Ts]
jhr103: folds
hakatak: raises 60 to 80
Scorpion11: folds
anticon: raises 260 to 340
martenmania: folds
cook99: folds
loveulong: folds
I Stay High: folds
alde80: folds
hakatak: calls 260 (I considered pushing, but was afraid of overcards)
*** FLOP *** [4c Ad Jh]
hakatak: checks
anticon: bets 400 (hmm, I think I'm behind)
hakatak: folds
anticon collected 710 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 710 | Rake 0
Board [4c Ad Jh]
Seat 2: anticon collected (710)
Seat 9: hakatak folded on the Flop

*********** # 6 **************
Level I (10/20) - 2006/03/09 - 21:40:49 (ET)
Seat #6 is the button
Seat 1: Scorpion11 (710 in chips)
Seat 2: anticon (1860 in chips)
Seat 3: martenmania (1470 in chips)
Seat 4: cook99 (1610 in chips)
Seat 5: loveulong (2280 in chips)
Seat 6: I Stay High (1470 in chips)
Seat 7: alde80 (1380 in chips)
Seat 8: jhr103 (1510 in chips)
Seat 9: hakatak (1210 in chips)
alde80: posts small blind 10
jhr103: posts big blind 20
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hakatak [Ah Kc]
hakatak: raises 60 to 80
Scorpion11: raises 630 to 710 and is all-in
anticon: folds
martenmania: folds
cook99: folds
loveulong: folds
I Stay High: folds
alde80: folds
jhr103: folds
hakatak: calls 630
*** FLOP *** [Qs Qh 9d]
*** TURN *** [Qs Qh 9d] [6h]
*** RIVER *** [Qs Qh 9d 6h] [Jh]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
hakatak: shows [Ah Kc] (a pair of Queens)
Scorpion11: shows [Qc Kd] (three of a kind, Queens)
Scorpion11 collected 1450 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 1450 | Rake 0
Board [Qs Qh 9d 6h Jh]
Seat 1: Scorpion11 showed [Qc Kd] and won (1450) with three of a kind, Queens
Seat 9: hakatak showed [Ah Kc] and lost with a pair of Queens

...I folded the next 7 hands.  So, seven hands later....

*********** # 14 **************
Level II (15/30) - 2006/03/09 - 21:48:51 (ET)
Seat #5 is the button
Seat 1: Scorpion11 (2500 in chips)
Seat 2: anticon (5380 in chips)
Seat 3: martenmania (160 in chips)
Seat 4: alleyezonme0 (2155 in chips)
Seat 5: loveulong (2040 in chips)
Seat 6: I Stay High (1605 in chips)
Seat 7: alde80 (1320 in chips)
Seat 9: hakatak (470 in chips)
I Stay High: posts small blind 15
alde80: posts big blind 30
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hakatak [Kd Ks]
hakatak: raises 440 to 470 and is all-in
Scorpion11: folds
anticon: folds
martenmania: folds
alleyezonme0: folds
loveulong: folds
snowman9 is connected
I Stay High: folds
alde80: folds
hakatak collected 75 from pot
hakatak: doesn't show hand
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 75 | Rake 0
Seat 9: hakatak collected (75)

I fold the next 19 hands preflop. Nothing worth hearing about; there was an A6 unsuited and a KJ unsuited in there. By this point, I realize that as far as the tournament goes, I am no more alive than Terri Schiavo. (before or after they pulled her feeding tube.) I was paying more attention to the $3 rebuy, and I was badly tilted, but my logic went like this: I wanted to get into a hand with the short stacks and not the big stacks because the shorties would have much wider ranges. This looked like one of the only situations that would ever turn out that way.

*********** # 33 **************
Level IV (50/100) - 2006/03/09 - 22:06:32 (ET)
Seat #7 is the button
Seat 1: morrent (2040 in chips)
Seat 2: anticon (3360 in chips)
Seat 3: martenmania (490 in chips)
Seat 4: alleyezonme0 (180 in chips)
Seat 5: loveulong (2135 in chips)
Seat 6: I Stay High (2070 in chips)
Seat 7: alde80 (4675 in chips)
Seat 8: snowman9 (1655 in chips)
Seat 9: hakatak (395 in chips)
snowman9: posts small blind 50
hakatak: posts big blind 100
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hakatak [Ts 4s]
morrent: calls 100
anticon: folds
martenmania: raises 390 to 490 and is all-in
alleyezonme0: calls 180 and is all-in
loveulong: folds
I Stay High: folds
alde80: folds
snowman9: folds
hakatak: calls 295 and is all-in
morrent: calls 390
*** FLOP *** [7d Jh 2c]
*** TURN *** [7d Jh 2c] [Kc]
*** RIVER *** [7d Jh 2c Kc] [4c]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
morrent: shows [Ad 5d] (high card Ace)
martenmania: shows [9d Ah] (high card Ace - Nine kicker)
martenmania collected 190 from side pot-2
hakatak: shows [Ts 4s] (a pair of Fours)
hakatak collected 645 from side pot-1
alleyezonme0: shows [Qc Qs] (a pair of Queens)
alleyezonme0 collected 770 from main pot

*********** # 34 **************
Level IV (50/100) - 2006/03/09 - 22:07:41 (ET)
Seat #8 is the button
Seat 1: morrent (1550 in chips)
Seat 2: anticon (3360 in chips)
Seat 3: martenmania (190 in chips)
Seat 4: alleyezonme0 (770 in chips)
Seat 5: loveulong (2135 in chips)
Seat 6: I Stay High (2070 in chips)
Seat 7: alde80 (4675 in chips)
Seat 8: snowman9 (1605 in chips)
Seat 9: hakatak (645 in chips)
hakatak: posts small blind 50
morrent: posts big blind 100
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hakatak [Ad 3s]
anticon: folds
martenmania: raises 90 to 190 and is all-in
alleyezonme0: raises 580 to 770 and is all-in
loveulong: folds
I Stay High: folds
alde80: folds
snowman9: folds
hakatak: folds (hmm, this will turn out to be a mistake)
morrent: folds
*** FLOP *** [7s 3d Ac]
*** TURN *** [7s 3d Ac] [8h]
*** RIVER *** [7s 3d Ac 8h] [7d]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
martenmania: shows [Jh 7h] (three of a kind, Sevens)
alleyezonme0: shows [Tc 7c] (three of a kind, Sevens - lower kicker)
martenmania collected 530 from pot

...or not. (^_^) Here's the next and final hand for me, as I lose a coinflip that would have tripled me up:

*********** # 35 **************
Level IV (50/100) - 2006/03/09 - 22:08:42 (ET)
Seat #9 is the button
Seat 1: morrent (1450 in chips)
Seat 2: anticon (3360 in chips)
Seat 3: martenmania (530 in chips)
Seat 4: alleyezonme0 (580 in chips)
Seat 5: loveulong (2135 in chips)
Seat 6: I Stay High (2070 in chips)
Seat 7: alde80 (4675 in chips)
Seat 8: snowman9 (1605 in chips)
Seat 9: hakatak (595 in chips)
morrent: posts small blind 50
anticon: posts big blind 100
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hakatak [8c Ah]
martenmania: folds
alleyezonme0: raises 480 to 580 and is all-in
loveulong: folds
I Stay High: folds
alde80: folds
snowman9: folds
hakatak: raises 15 to 595 and is all-in
morrent: folds
anticon: calls 495
*** FLOP *** [7h 3h Qd]
*** TURN *** [7h 3h Qd] [Kh]
*** RIVER *** [7h 3h Qd Kh] [Tc]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
anticon: shows [5c 5s] (a pair of Fives)
hakatak: shows [8c Ah] (high card Ace)
anticon collected 30 from side pot
alleyezonme0: shows [4h 4d] (a pair of Fours)
anticon collected 1790 from main pot


...and there you have it. I can safely say that I have never before played a game where I've had pocket kings 3 times in 14 hands, much less with an AK and TT to go along with them. I can also safely say that some days, you're just not meant to win.

i don't care what anyone says, i like fall out boy

Today's Sweet Link:
If this doesn't cheer up the emo kids... nothing will. (suddenly Google Video doesn't seem so stupid and pointless.)

This Week (last week?) in Poker:
I've been working all weekend and playing Magic all week, so I haven't had the opportunity to play as much poker as I would like, save for a set of 12 pokerstars 6.50s where I picked up one third place... in the 12th game. I am, however, much luckier than ZeeJustin; then again, I wasn't cheating.

Derek posts on 2+2. In other news, meteors strike and buttered toast now lands butter-side-up.

My goal is to play 72 1- and 2-table tournaments this week. I'll be playing the cash game at Seven Clans in Thief River Falls on Friday night, to celebrate the 18th anniversary of my brother's birth. I hear their poker room is nicer than Shooting Star, and also that they have a waterpark. First I splash my chips, and then I splash small children. Perhaps the other way round.

I Like Movies!:
March of the Penguins: B+ / Penguins are cute, and make cute noises. Their mating/cute-baby-penguin-rearing ritual is long, deeply involved, and remarkably unpleasant (reminiscent of me walking to campus in the wintertime, except ^10). I was skeptical, fearing a long episode of a Discovery Channel show, but it turned out to be the show I never knew I really liked.

Broken Flowers: C / Bill Murray was freakin' sweet in Lost in Translation. The same character (well, equally minimalist) doesn't play so well in Broken Flowers, a Jim Jarmusch joint *snicker* about a man's discovery that he may have a 19-year-old son, and his quest to determine who the boy is and where he may be. The writing is alternately boring and clever, and the cinematography is ... well, somnambulant. Jarmusch loves to give us reaction shots of Murray's character, whereupon Murray does his best to conjure up an image of a still, landlocked water hazard with just the slightest breeze blowing over it. The resulting effect is as easily digestible as the excessively saccharine and grandiose language used in this review, with about as much charm and entertainment value.

The Aristocrats: B-* / I haven't seen the special features yet, and I hear they are the highlight of the film, so I'll hold off final judgement until then. I was a little surprised at how seriously the film took itself; it's an actual documentary, and tries to give itself some credibility despite the depravity of the subject matter. Bob Saget is a highlight, as is Sarah Silverman, and I was extremely disturbed to find out that I actually sort of liked Dana Gould. (Gould, along with Ian Haxtone--- uh, Maxtone-Graham, was a writer for The Simpsons during their four- or five-year slump between seasons 9 and 13/14. The highlight of his tenure was an angry Gould telling angry fans that they didn't know what they wanted, and that their opinions mattered little because "none of them could ever write for The Simpsons." Maybe not, but they can sure watch the ads that provide for your paycheck, you ungrateful.... uh... never mind.)

That's all for this time, kids; I have to get re-medicated in the morning, and it's already ten past two.

100th post EXXXTRAVAGANZA!!!!

That's right, ladies and gentlemen... we have reached our 100th post.

ACT I: Hopes and Dreams

It's been about 9 months since this blog first appeared in the 'sphere (as we blognoscenti are wont to refer to the blogosphere), and it's undergone a few revisions and trivializations since then. My initial purpose was to write up a trip report for last spring's trip to San Francisco; that, however, was predicated on the belief that I would be attending the Electronic Entertainment Expo, otherwise known as E3. (you shouldn't lie to your friends like that... you know who you are)

Since then, I've masqueraded as a site offering pointless minutiae of my daily life, and by turns, a place to read some thoughtful analysis of political or technology news. Mostly, though, it's pointless minutiae, and it remains my goal over the next 100 posts to eliminate the boring and replace it with the thoughtful and/or creative. (I have a couple of good ideas in the works, both of which I think all four of my readers will enjoy.)

The appearance of the site has been changed a couple of times in pursuit of that perfect balance between elegance and readability; the latest change was today, in honor of our first milestone, and any comments on the latest redesign are welcome. My goal for next time is to invent my own stylesheet instead of using the pre-brewed templates here on blogger.

I believe that the measure of a blog is not its frequency, but its content. This is why I chose to make a big exxxtravaganza out of my 100th post, instead of a 1-year anniversary or something, because being around for a year isn't anything special. All it proves is that you managed to not die or get locked up, and post at least twice. On the flip side, 11 posts a month indicates true commitment to myself, my faithful readers, and those who would jeer the 'sphere. I will not make any "daily post" promises or anything like that, because posting a link with a snide sentence at the end isn't much of a post, and really just clogs up the internet. So keep checking back for random updates, and stop hassling me about not updating my blog (you still know who you are).

That's where I want to go in the next 100 posts or so. May they find us all in good health and good spirits, with the wind at our backs and the sun on our faces.

::: applause, cheers :::

ACT II: Lucky Day

(my PokerStars handle is 'hakatak,' just fyi)

PokerStars Game #3982295131: Tournament #19788312, Hold'em No Limit - Level V (75/150) - 2006/02/15 - 16:26:59 (ET)
Table '19788312 1' Seat #7 is the button
Seat 1: hakatak (2745 in chips)
Seat 2: Hayseed1979 (775 in chips)
Seat 3: wildkaz (1585 in chips)
Seat 4: slsdesign (1315 in chips)
Seat 5: Moonburn (345 in chips)
Seat 6: golbetkey (5500 in chips)
Seat 7: Nati-Natural (1235 in chips)
hakatak: posts small blind 75
Hayseed1979: posts big blind 150
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hakatak [Ah Js]
wildkaz: calls 150
slsdesign: folds
Moonburn: folds
golbetkey: raises 300 to 450
Nati-Natural: folds
hakatak: calls 375
Hayseed1979: folds
wildkaz: folds
*** FLOP *** [Th Jh Kh]
hakatak: checks
golbetkey: bets 900
hakatak: raises 1395 to 2295 and is all-in
golbetkey: calls 1395
*** TURN *** [Th Jh Kh] [6d]
*** RIVER *** [Th Jh Kh 6d] [Qh]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
hakatak: shows [Ah Js] (a Royal Flush)
golbetkey: shows [Kd Ks] (three of a kind, Kings)
hakatak said, "AWESOME"
hakatak collected 5790 from pot

::: more cheers, applause :::

ACT III: The Acceptance Speech

Nobody likes a glory hog, so I'll keep this short.

"When you're in a town like this all covered with smoke, you forget that there's a world outside. Nothing amazing happens here. And you get used to that, used to a world where everything is ordinary. Every day we spend here is like a whole lifetime of dying slowly. But now Haruko is here. That's how I know there really is a world outside." - Naota Nandaba

Thanks to modern communications, I am able to partially lift the veil of smoke on a daily basis. This space is (and shall remain) dedicated to everyone that keeps me from imploding under the crushing weight of the ordinary.

Here's to many 100s more....
(^_^) dusty

they just can't stop lying

come on, now.

it was a shotgun.

not a "pellet gun".

if only the media wasn't so liberal; maybe they could get their facts straight.

a better way, part 1

Jim Dobson, famous evangelical and head of Focus on the Family, seems to believe that global warming is less serious than abortion. We'll see what he thinks when the Florida coast is underwater.

Abortion is killing the Democratic party. It's a hugely resonant issue among Red State voters, and (I think, don't quote me on this) carries more single-issue voters to the Republican side than any other. Plus, it pits people of deep faith who have otherwise progressive values against progressives that just don't see what all the fuss is about. None of this is good for the country.

So, in lieu of the failed Democratic establishment having any ideas, I am going to come up with a better way. Here's my idea.

1) Compare outlawing abortion/overturning Roe to Prohibition. Making something illegal doesn't make it go away, it just makes it go underground and fills up our already overcrowded prisons even further. Of course, nobody should have an abortion if they can help it; abortion is gross and unpleasant (not to mention abhorrent, if you fear the wrath of God). So....

2) Just like government is uniquely capable of providing schools and roads and bank insurance, it is equally well-equipped to help stem the bloody tide of baby bits ending up in dumpsters all across America (but not in the Deep South). The federal government should oversee a national network of adoption agencies, providing funding, staffing, and responsible oversight so that babies have a safe place to stay between the time they are born and the time they are adopted. A simultaneous, sustained television/paper/school/church campaign touting the benefits of adoption to both the mother and child would begin, hopefully with the cooperation of the Ad Council (their stuff is always so snappy).

3) In case hearing it from the pastor, the teacher, and the tube wasn't enough, the government (probably on a state level, with some degree of federal reimbursement) can offer financial breaks to women who agree to carry their baby to term and put it up for adoption. Stopping short of paying a woman to have a kid, the government can offer, through Medicaid, to cover all expenses related to pre- and post-natal medical care, ensuring that Mom gives birth to a happy, healthy kid. (Exceptions for special cases; birth defects, situations where the mother refuses to quit smoking/drinking/doing drugs during pregnancy, AIDS babies, etc.)

4) And, to close the loop, the federal (and state) governments can offer refundable tax credits (the best kind) on children adopted through the federal government's program, starting out large enough to help defray the costs of raising a baby, and then slowly being reduced over the first 18 years of life so that the parents can rely on a little help from their fearless leaders in Washington as they care for a child that really just needed a loving mom/mom/dad/dads in the first place.

The progressives get to oversee an expansion of Medicaid to help the truly needy, women in fragile situations receive care worthy of the most advanced nation in the world, the evangelicals get to root for adoption and against abortion while handing out pamphlets printed by the government, and the conservatives get a tax credit. Everyone goes home happy.

jes kos i luv yew

To everyone that wants to get up and talk about how dailyKos is crap, I give you this:

The January Straw Poll of likely Democratic presidential candidates in 2008.

(I voted for Mark Warner, governor of Virginia... but only because Al Gore is not on the list. Sen. Feingold (D-WI) seems to be the frontrunner, but I gotta say that our last experience with a sitting senator running for president was, well... senatorial. Sartorial? Laughable? Yes.... laughable.)

Wes Clark interests me... there's a comment under the poll somewhere that talks about how Clark "united 19 famously uncooperative European nations and their militaries to fight a war," which I think would play well against Bush's "Coalition of the Mighty Filipinos and Poles." 'Cause we all know that you've gotta fear the Poles... they'll run away.

Seriously, though, check it out. Although there's a lot of "Feingold can't win because he's a ... you know... j-o-o...?" garbage, there are some clever retorts, and it's a generally interesting and stimulating discussion about who should be the one to lead America in saving itself.

the return

People talk about being addicted to alcohol, drugs, tobacco, food... etc.

I am addicted to the Internet.

Five days ago, I blew up my PC by trying to install some memory without unplugging the damn thing first. Four days ago, I acquired a new, faster motherboard, a new case, a video card, and a network card. The next four days are a frustrating struggle to figure out why my wireless card is fubar, and why my video card takes a big poop when my two network cards are in a certain slot, and why the wireless router doesn't work for anyone else in the house when it's on my PC desk, but if I move it four feet to my Mac desk, everything works fine (all the internet must have been going out the window).

An hour ago, I finally got my Internet working again.

Those four days were impossibly long. I didn't realize how much of my routine involved the 'net; in the morning, while I'm having coffee, I surf the blogs. While I'm waiting at the bus stop or riding the bus, I listen to podcasts or new music. I play a *lot* of online poker. At night, I chat up my friends on the IM, and watch friends of mine that make final tables in 20-table tournaments. (congrats, Kevin!!!)

I couldn't do any of that, and I felt SO LOST. I would listen to the radio when I could to get some news, and I've actually been reduced to reading the GF Herald to get snippets of what's been happening with Alito (confirmed) and the Prez'dint (bombed the SOTU). I got a book from the library (Neil Gaiman's "Anansi Boys") and read it in the garage while smoking a cigar yesterday because I had two hours to kill and no idea what to do with myself.

I did my taxes today... sort of. I still have to mail my signed form to the IRS, but other than that, everything is filed and complete. The Lifetime Learning credit is non-refundable, and that's bullshit. However, if I remain a destitute student, next year I will qualify for the EIC, which is most definitely refundable.

In other news, I found a pair of flannel pants at target for $4. I am so sick of Diggnation that I will strongly consider deleting it from my video-podcast directory. GOD those guys are (-1, Offtopic). I still can't get my iMac on the internet. I need another ethercable to put into the switch; you can't just plug an ethernet cable from one computer into another and expect it to work. (to which I say: WHY THE FUCK NOT???)

It's good to be back. If you'll excuse me, I have some surfing to do; there is much tv to be downloaded.

i hate my computer

Mozilla took six minutes to load a website on my PC today. I know this because I was able to listen to two songs back-to-back before i was able to navigate the 2+2 homepage.

i feel like crap. i don't have enough to do; no job (save for six hours on the weekends), no money, and no car. so i just sit in my house and drink.

here's a link.

go ahead and die.

a legend was born

True Story of one of the best online tournament poker players in the world.

I'm talking like top 5.

Darrell Dicken, aka Gigabet.

It's probably too late for you, but this is how you become the best.

ai-ai-poo!

More Super Monkey ball goodness on the way
This boring story in the GF Herald was on the slashdot main page today
Call your Representative and urge co-sponsorship, okay?

/rhyme

get a job

Get an Ivy League degree, get a wife that's smarter and more driven than you, get a trust fund, get rich quick, get lucky, but God forbid you get a job, because if you do that, you're not going to have any of the things that America should have to offer.

Everything makes me sick.

a little bit funky

DJ Sasha is -- BY FAR -- my favorite DJ. The live show he performed for Radio One's Essential Mix is probably my favorite trance mix of all time. No, you know what, scratch the probably... it's the best. If you're good, I might even link to it so you can download and listen to what was voted (in a landslide) the best Essential Mix of 2005.

Sasha performed a live show in Gypsyla---uh, ...Australia on January 13th, and you can listen to it on the Radio One website. Unfortunately, the BBC Radio Player is a fairly limited device, and before you can get to the good stuff, you have to listen to the show's DJ, Annie Nightingale, mix a brief show first (as well as promote some live shows across the pond that I would cut off two fingers to see). Her accent is 180 degrees from sexy, and her choice in music is.... well... boring.

So, if you can survive the first part of the show intact, you will be treated to the world's best DJ mixing a freakin' sweet set.

But only if you click this link. (This link will only lead to the Sasha show until January 20th, so get there quick and get your fix.)

Oh, and while I'm at it, I encourage you to listen to the Essential Mix on BBC Radio 1 every week. I have never not liked it. If you ever loved, liked, or didn't hate dance music, you will love this show. If you ever wanted to learn anything about dance music, or if you ever wanted to seem European without wearing a turtleneck and carrying a purse, you will love this show. In fact, why are you still reading this? Go there and tap your foot or wiggle your butt in your chair or whatever you like to do. Right now. Go on.... I dare you.

Why President Gore would have been an American hero, Part 1,623,471:

(note: Al Gore is still an American hero, despite having an election stolen from him, too.)

From Gore's speech on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day:

Fear drives out reason. Fear suppresses the politics of discourse and opens the door to the politics of destruction. Justice Brandeis once wrote: "Men feared witches and burnt women."

The founders of our country faced dire threats. If they failed in their endeavors, they would have been hung as traitors. The very existence of our country was at risk.

Yet, in the teeth of those dangers, they insisted on establishing the Bill of Rights.

Is our Congress today in more danger than were their predecessors when the British army was marching on the Capitol? Is the world more dangerous than when we faced an ideological enemy with tens of thousands of missiles poised to be launched against us and annihilate our country at a moment's notice? Is America in more danger now than when we faced worldwide fascism on the march-when our fathers fought and won two World Wars?

It is simply an insult to those who came before us and sacrificed so much on our behalf to imply that we have more to be fearful of than they. Yet they faithfully protected our freedoms and now it is up to us to do the same.

ich bin traurig

Those of you who listen to my angry ramblings are familiar with my belief that when the 2008 presidential election "happens," a couple of things are likely to occur:

1) The President will scare voters away by leaking "information" to the "media" that "the terrorists" are going to target voting places, encouraging the fearful and weak of spirit to stay home and not vote the criminal incumbent party out of office.

If that doesn't look like it's going to work,

2) The President will declare that national security is so tenuous that America cannot withstand a change of leadership during this "time of war," and refuse to give up the White House, period. The "media" hails Dear Leader as "visionary" and "courageous" as the now-lifetime-appointed Totalitarian Dictator lights a cigar on the burning corner of the Constitution.

Considering this little thought experiment, as I often do while walking to a bus stop/waiting for a bus/riding the bus, I decided that it is unlikely that the President would reject our system of elections. Europe, Latin America, Asia, and Canada (!) probably wouldn't stand for such a reversal of fortune in the world's richest country.

The enlightened wealthy leader class in America is one step ahead of me, though, like it always is. They don't need to revoke elections in order to remain in power in perpetuity.

Diebold can build machines to steal elections, call them "paperless voting machines," and then pay Representative #1, Bob Ney of Ohio, thousands of dollars to write and help pass a law that mandates the use of these election-stealing machines in every precinct in America.

Then they can continue to pay Election Stealer #1 thousands of dollars to ensure that a reform bill with over 100 bipartisan co-sponsors never leaves the committee of which E.S. #1 is the chair.

So now, despite exit polls to the contrary, Republicans can "win" every "election," and nobody can challenge the results because the only company with access to them is Diebold, whose chairman promised to "deliver the election" to President Bush in 2004. Wasn't Ohio the last battleground state? Was it ever really a battleground state? Will it be the last battleground state ever, as every election in America ends 51-49 in favor of the criminal incumbent party?

Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.

i can finally sleep safely tonight

last night:


dusty wrote:
sorry, i don't recognize your email address. who is this?


this morning:


On 1/16/06, Joe wrote:

tracy's bf dusty


...who? I continue to get confused. So:


dusty wrote:

oh.

sorry, i don't use bittorrent.


The game ends:

On 1/16/06, Joe wrote:

oops!!... i just found out i had gotten the email address wrong. the one i was supposed to use had a couple numbers after eldusto. sorry

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

This could just be a case of mistaken identity... but it could also be an attempt on the part of the media industry to ferret out bittorrent trackers. I certianly wouldn't put it past them. Curious.... curious indeed.

Oh, and check out Josh Christy's website. /plug

curiosity killed the cat

Now this is a curious email:

-----

On 1/15/06, Joe wrote:

Could you give me a list of the torrent sites you use? i forgot to get them b4 i left.

-----

Joe who?

Left where?

Huh?

Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not after you.

scotch? or bourbon?

is crown royal scotch or bourbon?

I can never tell.

I'm not happy with the way the Alito hearing has been happening. I listened to the whole deal while I got clowned at the poker tables yesterday, and I gathered three things:

1) Republicans are cheerleaders for anyone else who might be Republican.
2) Roe v. Wade is not "settled law," it is subject to a "super-precedent."
3) *most important* the executive branch of government is not responsible to the legislative, even in cases where the executive claims exception from the legislative. most important of all, there might be situations where the executive can make decisions regardless of legislative imperatives, and these decisions WOULD NOT BE SUBJECT TO JUDICIAL REVIEW.

no links; it's way late, and i'm tired. this guy is clearly a bushie. i pray to the god that doesn't exist that the democrats filibuster; otherwise, i wonder whether or not there will be presidential elections in 2008.

all hail king george.

don't look at the man behind the curtain

So if Samuel Alito is so freakin' awesome that he should be on the SCOTUS...

why is he telling the Senate, and by extension, the American public, to just ignore every organization he's been a part of, every job he's ever had, and everything he's ever said?

"Awww, relax, guy! I can change!"

my fingers feel like hot dogs

my landlord and roommate travis is not from grand forks. therefore, he would not know if he rented his other (OTHER!) house out to some well-known members of the GFK party circut.

Well, he did just that. I went by, shook hands with the 40% of partygoers I am on a first-name basis with (GOD I HATE GFK) and joined in the live entertainment (three guys on guitar, and two guys plus me on hand drums). Great times, but my right hand will be extremely swollen and my extra knuckle will hurt like a bitch come morning.

(update: i was right. i can hardly hold a glass of water, and my hand is black and blue. sweeeeet.)

changing history, part 3

This is taken from AmericaBlog; I know you're all too lazy to click links, and I wanted a long post without having to do actual work, so here's the goods. There are more links and details on AmericaBlog, and I strongly encourage you to link/visit.

(4:30pm update of news that happened yesterday. Note that NBC did not say "Andrea Mitchell was wrong and should not have said what she said," they instead said "we are continuing our inquiry." Sounds like someone who doesn't want to publish a story they're not finished writing. So has Christiane been talking to Al-Qaeda, or what?)

-----
Well this is getting interesting. NBC just delete two paragraphs from its Andrea Mitchell interview, the paragraphs that talked about whether Bush was wiretapping ace CNN correspondent Christiane Amanpour (kudos to Atrios for spotting this).

Here's what the NBC "official" transcript used to say (I copied this text from NBC's own page only 2 hours ago):

Mitchell: Do you have any information about reporters being swept up in this net?

Risen: No, I don't. It's not clear to me. That's one of the questions we'll have to look into the future. Were there abuses of this program or not? I don't know the answer to that

Mitchell: You don't have any information, for instance, that a very prominent journalist, Christiane Amanpour, might have been eavesdropped upon?

Risen: No, no I hadn't heard that.

Here's what it says now:

Mitchell: Do you have any information about reporters being swept up in this net?

Risen: No, I don't. It's not clear to me. That's one of the questions we'll have to look into the future. Were there abuses of this program or not? I don't know the answer to that

Mitchell: You are very, very tough on the CIA and the administration in general in both the war on terror and the run up to the war and the war itself Â? the post-war operation. Let's talk about the war on terror. Why do you think they missed so many signals and what do you think caused the CIA to have this sort of break down as you describe it?

Risen: I think that, you know, to me, the greater break down was really on Iraq. It's very difficult to have known ahead of time about these 19 hijackers. They were, you know, probably lucky that they got through and they did something that no one really assumed anybody would ever do. And I think that made 9/11 a lot like Pearl Harbor. That even when you see all the clues in front of you that it's very difficult to put it together.

Since when is NBC in the business of deleting entire paragraphs from their official transcripts? What's going on here?
----

What, indeed.

in other news

Swami Dusty had originally prognosticated that all the miners stuck in the mine shaft in West Virginia were dead. After all, the first man the rescuers found was dead, and it was public knowledge that the CO levels in the shaft were way too high for people to breathe.

I was off by one. (If you're counting, that's 11 less than the mining company was wrong by.)

close only counts in hand grenades and horseshoes

kevin was wrong.

(I said that during the only debate round that kevin and I ever had against each other, and I won. but that's not really why I won... I had supporting evidence, like this:)

it won't be the domestic spying thing that kills the republicans, and by proxy, president bush.

it will be this.

oh, and btw, this is Representative #1.

Number One, indeed.

the freedom of tyranny

If half the people you're supposedly accountable to don't care when you break the law, why not just do whatever you want?

my answer to Pascal's Wager

"If it turns out that I’ve been wrong all along, and there is in fact a god, and if it further turned out that this kind of legalistic, cross-your-fingers-behind-your-back hair-splitting impressed him, then I think I would choose not to worship him anyway."

-Douglas Adams

fresh meat

Every word of this story is true. I did my best to transcribe the conversations verbatim, but the nature of them made me stop listening about halfway through. The words contained herein are accurate, but not all-inclusive.

Friday night, 6 pm-ish.

Mild-mannered manager Jon is taking an order, but abruptly hangs up the phone, comes into the kitchen, and starts rolling dough with great, furious intensity, swearing to himself. Phone rings two minutes later, and I answer:

me: "Popolino's, can I help you?"
shrill voice: "I DEMAND TO SPEAK TO THE OWNER!! NOT THE MANAGER, BUT THE OWNER!!"
me: "Uh, he's not here-"
sv: "I KNOW THE OWNER, AND I DEMAND TO SPEAK TO HIM!! WHAT'S HIS PHONE NUMBER?"
me: "Well, if you know him--"
sv: "I WILL NOT BE TREATED THIS WAY!! I AM EXTREMELY MAD!!!"
me: (thinks to self) "No shit you are. You're also a raging bitch, and probably fat."

Jon comes up behind me and checks the caller id. "Hang up on her."

me: "We have already tried to take care of you. Have a good night." *click*

Five minutes later, a woman in her late 30s-early 40s walks into the restaurant with two small children and an older, shriveled-looking lady in tow. She stands at the counter with her arms folded, and Jon ignores her, instead retreating to the office. I immediately know what is up, and decide to bite the bullet.

me: "Can I help you?" *thinks to self* "Boy, you're a big one, aren't you?"
voice I recognize as shrill, but less so: "I want the name and phone number of your owner right now, please."
me: "He's probably in the phone book." I spell his name for her.
her: "Phone book."
me: "Excuse me?"
her: "PHONE BOOK." I give her the book, and she looks up the owner's number and calls him. Aside, to her child: "Oh, look, he lives close to Grandma." No answer. She turns to me again. "I want you to dial your owner's cellphone number. I want him to know how I've been treated."
me: *thinks to self* "Sorry, you spent all your cooperation allowance." To her, simply: "No."
her: "I KNOW THE OWNER. HE CAME OVER TO OUR HOUSE LAST WEEKEND, AND I THINK HE NEEDS TO KNOW HOW HIS EMPLOYEES TREAT LOYAL CUSTOMERS. I HAVE A STORE CREDIT, AND I WANT TO USE IT RIGHT NOW."
me: "You can't come in here shouting at us, demanding things, and expect us to just give them to you. If this is the way you're going to behave, we don't want your business at all. I think you should leave."
her: "OH, I THINK THE OWNER KNOWS THAT YOU DO WANT MY BUSINESS. I HAVE BEEN A LOYAL CUSTOMER FOR SEVEN YEARS..." blah blah blah, more shouting.

I refer her to Jon, who tells her that she does not, in fact, have a store credit, and that she needs to get her stories straight if she's going to lie in order to get free pizza. She starts shouting again, and Jon tells me to call the police. I eagerly comply.

her: "GO AHEAD AND CALL THE COPS!! I HOPE IT'S OFFICER (name)!!! OR MAYBE IT'LL BE OFFICER (name)!!! HE'LL BE VERY INTERESTED TO HEAR ABOUT THIS!!!"
me: *thinks to self* "Oh, you're already familiar with the police. Imagine that."

She goes outside and sits in her car, appearing a few minutes later to tell us that when the police come, she'll be in her car. This turns out to be a moot point, for when the police do show up, she runs up to them and tells her story, frantically gesticulating and pointing at me through the window. The police officer (a lady, maybe one or two years older than me, and kinda cute) comes in and asks us what's up, and we tell her that we don't want this crazy lady ever coming here or calling us again. They relay the message, and after the woman shouts at the police for a couple minutes, she eventually gets into her car and drives away.

The unmitigated gall of this woman, to come in and pretend we owe her something, and to pretend that she knows the owner (whose name, phone number, and address are a mystery to her), and then throw a fit when we call BS... you'd think she worked at the white house.

I can't believe how worked-up people get about paying for food. This woman is probably plotting how to browbeat an unsuspecting Deek's or Slap Shot employee into giving her some free pizza, and meanwhile, her poor little kids have to listen to her go totally ballistic whenever she doesn't get exactly what she wants. We called the cops on their mom, for chrissake. I feel kinda sorry for them; they will either make a psychologist very, very wealthy someday... or get all the free therapy they can handle in prison. I hope she comes back tomorrow so we can have her arrested for criminal trespass... no, actually, I hope the fat bitch (easily 350) dies of a heart attack tomorrow; it'll be better for everyone she knows. Oh, by the way, her name is Abby Coney. Fear and revile her, all who work in foodservice.

So that's my funny story from last night.

Sports are full of hilarious names.
This blog rules. A venture capitalist on the West Coast shares what he knows about IT, security, grapefruit juice, and game theory thought experiments. And that's just in the top 4 posts. Massively stimulating for the brain; if I were more alert, I would have devoured it like so much Chicken Fajita pizza. However, it's very early in the morning, and I haven't had coffee.

changing history, part 2

This makes me sad. Isn't satire supposed to be protected speech? Or does Comedy Central only care about what Catholics think is funny?

I thought this episode was hilarious, but mostly because of its great sendup of Alcoholics Anonymous. I've long held that AA is not appropriate as a court sentence, because it REQUIRES that you walk in of your own free will and admit that you have a problem with alcohol. If you want to quit drinking, AA will work if you're willing to do what they ask you to. However, if you get a minor or a DUI or break some windows, have never done it before, and will never do it again because what you did was stupid and uncharacteristic of you, the answer is not to be forced to listen to people tell you that you have an incurable disease and that you have to give yourself up to a higher power so that you never drink again.

I bet the Catholic League laughs their sanctimonious asses off when South Park makes fun of Rosie O'Donnell, Micheal Jackson, R. Kelly, gay people, and Scientologists. Too bad they can't laugh at themselves; they're missing out on an opportunity for some real personal growth. (the pope's knowing wink at the screen before the virgin mary farts blood all over him is classic slapstick comedy.)

hmm. that does seem rather inflammatory. you'd have to see it to appreciate it; try and steal it from the internet. apparently, that's the only place this episode exists any more.

changing history

I deleted the post from Dec. 28th.

I agonized for a little while over it; I'm not a big fan of altering history, but I think it's for the best. To condense a story down to its moral, one should not navel-gaze when they're in a bad mood, which is what I did, and the results were, uh... not pretty. (naver-gaze?! OH NO!!!!) I came off sounding like an ungrateful little bitch, and I'm really not. I apologize to anyone that had to read that nasty tripe.

I talked to Arshad for the first time in almost two years earlier this week. It didn't seem like it had been that long, but I am not one to have long phone conversations, and we ended up talking for more than three hours... I guess we had a lot to say. (We tried to disengage from one another, but really just ended up talking for another hour.) I'm glad to know that so many of my friends are happy and successful, doing things with their lives that have meaning for them.

In the grand tradition of a college student seeking to memorize information, I have made flashcards of the odds of making a particular hold'em hand when there are X outs to said hand. (Most interesting factoid: if you have 12 outs on the flop, say a winning flush draw, and an A that would win if you paired it, you are more than a 50% favorite to win - about 54%) I used to think that I hated math more than anything in the world, even fundamentalists; in reality, I just hate math classes. If only Mr. Janes could see me now.

During auditions for the cast of voice actors for Family Guy, most of the people who auditioned for teenage son Chris's part used a surfer-type voice to bring the character to life. Not surprising; what would a bunch of uncreative people in California try to do, if not be a surfer? (go to Hawaii...?) Seth Green got the part primarily for his bizarro interpretation of the boy, which was based on someone he had known in his previous, pre-acting life. As some that have known me for a very, very, very long time may remember, one of my earliest dreams was to be a voice actor, ever since I discovered that I had a knack for imitating Michaelangelo from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (you know, the surfer). From there, I progressed to the not-particularly-funny Dave Coulier's Jackalope, and then went on to annoy friends, family, and neighbors for years until I blossomed into a Mr. Garrison/Kim Jong Il/Tyrone the Crackhead doppelganger. The moral of this story is that if you are reading this, and you have a funny, imitatable voice, please call me and say something so that I can rehearse your ridiculous ululation and use it to become a member of the next ensemble cast of an animated show made for adults.

I got the Aqua Teen Hunger Force season 4 DVD for Christmas - although I do love the Mooninites, I wish they had found a way to strike a balance between Dr. Weird and Spacecataz. Dr. Weird made me pee a little from laughing more than twice, and although Spacecataz is funny, it's just not... random enough. But I digress. The special features include video of the voice actors recording an episode that is on the DVD; an interesting look behind the curtain. Meatwad and Carl are both voiced by the same skinny white guy, Dave Willis (hi-larious), and Master Shake is voiced by (I think, and I'm too lazy to look it up) Matt Maiellaro. Frylock is voiced by a guy whose name I don't know and cannot find that looks weirdly like Frylock. Oh, and the new winner of Worst DVD Feature Ever: these guys thought it would be funny if the "Play All" button on the menu played all the episodes - simultaneously, in Triscuit-sized windows. LAAAAAAAAAAAAAME!!!!

oh, and Kevin? You forgot about the time that you "showed 'em all," ... mostly just Paul, but you showed 'em something. I'm still not sure what. ^_^

ps - i got an ipod for christmas and you didn't. that makes my toys cooler than yours....again. my only complaint is that even casting an askance glance at the thing scratches the face. other than that, it is the coolest christmas present I've ever gotten. Thanks, Mom. *hugs* (i know, it's not the present, but the thought that counts... and what an awesome thought.)

so i'm not a moron after all!!!

warning: this post will be intensely boring to those of you not interested in poker theory.

This post on 2+2 interested and frustrated me. The poster presents a problem: KQ suited has a little more equity (win/tie likelihood) than A10 off-suit when you put it up against any two random hold 'em hands. (KQ: 47.1% / A10: 44.3%) However, the equity values reverse when the same two hands are calling a raise from someone holding any of the top 30 percent of possible hold 'em hands. (A10: 56.5% / KQ: 54%) His question was: Which would you rather be the raiser with, and which hand is more valuable?

I had two ideas about this situation.

1. I would rather have A10, because if the other guy called my raise with an A with a lower kicker, I would be killing him, whereas if he called my raise with the same cards and I had KQ, I would be in a pretty bad spot. Lots of tournament players at the $10 level would gleefully call all sorts of bets with A-anything, particularly at late stages of the game.

2. The difference in this case is SO MARGINAL that I would probably just raise with KQ anyways and not even think about it.

I wanted to post these thoughts, but they would not come out of my fingers in an intelligent way. Every time I rewrote my reply, I was afraid that I was missing some sort of deep expression of poker theory, and that the 1.5 to 3 percent gap in equity differences was the sort of thing that makes a big difference over the long term. Not wanting to sound as stupid as I was certain that I was, I went with the "say nothing" option.

Opting not to reply, the thread refreshed itself, this time with two replies from two of the most prolific posters on 2+2. The first post made my second point, and the second post made my first, both in ways that were much clearer than what I had come up with. My confidence restored, I threw in my $0.02, but mostly so I could make a little joke about slicing a tomato.

Moral of the story: My instincts aren't so bad after all, and 2+2 is freakin' sweet.

one flight down

The time is (bing!) 6:23 am.

I've been up since yesterday morning, and I still can't sleep. Yesterday, I had a job interview at Sears. They want to offer me the job, but I have to pass a background check first.

I think that sentence is going to haunt me for the rest of my life. Maybe that's why I feel like college is a waste of money and a futile exercise in how much better everyone else is at not catching felony charges than me.

It's quiet in the house this morning... the only sounds are the music and the dishwasher. I was suddenly overcome with the desire to clean at 5am, and I went so far overboard that I was hanging stuff on the walls and moving furniture around to make room for the incoming Christmas tree. Roommate Adam was drinking with me tonight, which is a very strange occurrence; he was even willing to let me teach him how to play Magic with several of my closest friends (and BP). Everyone, even Derek, has long since gone home or gone to bed, and I find myself enjoying the solitude.

The whiskey told me that I should listen to some Norah Jones, and all it's done so far is make me miss Arshad. I haven't talked to that boy since ... well, close to two years ago. He sent me some books to read while I was locked up, but because lockup is a crazy, backwards place, I didn't get to read them until I was free. I also never took the time to personally thank him... so, until it crosses my mind to call and do it voicewise, thank you, Arshad, for turning me on to Augusten Burroughs (no pun intended).

Five and a half hours remain until the foosball tournament. I am hoping to stay awake until the festivities are over; meanwhile, half of me hopes that keenan will randomly show up online with the promise of artificial stimulants.

Tonight seems auspicious... I feel like dumping out all the garbage that life has filled me with over the past couple of months, but I know that between the alcohol and the up-all-night, it will be much more maudlin and self-pitying than I really mean it to be.... so I think I will simply express my desire for a less-garbage-filled life.... and then leave it alone.

I don't remember why it was so important for me to blog tonight; maybe it's just because I have the opportunity to use my roommate's laptop and hang out in the living room, instead of holing up in my massively messy bedroom and eventually crawling into bed. Either way, I feel spent.

I shouldn't have said that John Lennon was the greatest voice for peace in two generations yesterday. To do so would be to discount and dismiss the contributions of people around the world, such as Bill Clinton, the Dalai Lama, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Mother Teresa. That is patently ridiculous, and I wish to modify the sentence as such: Mr. Lennon was one of the greatest peace activists the world will ever see, and it is supremely ironic that he met an entirely meaningless end.

Here comes the sun.

frohe geburtstag zum dir

Kevin's birthday is today; by the time you read this, he's 24, his hairline is receding, and the only thing he has left to look forward to is free coffee at Hardee's in 31 years. Wish him a happy birthday: vogeltanz@gmail.com.

I got my check today. Furthermore, the refund of all the garbage Enterprise Car Fuck You In The Ass tried to stick me with is coming tomorrow. Happy Kevin's Birthday to Dusty. Our long national nightmare is finally over.

The dough rolling machine at Pops made all kinds of horrible noise that made it impossible to understand anything anyone said unless they shouted. We have since replaced the guts of said machine, and now it is whisper-quiet, to the point where I occasionally insert dough and turn it off because I cannot tell that it is on.

There is a foosball tournament at Paul's on Saturday... I am too lazy/tired to look up a link for registration right now, but I will be sure to blog about the happenings afterward.

And, finally, today is the anniversary of John Lennon's unfortunate demise. It is very sad that a good and true soul can be extinguished by a darkened and sickened one, but alas, it is a fact of life. The good do not always triumph, and although evil does not often win the day, the damage that it does cannot be erased, nor can it be easily forgotten. May we all remember the vision and hope that Mr. Lennon embodied, and endeavor to carry out his wishes, despite the darkness that seeks to extinguish the light.

what a f***ing joke

From the November 8, 2005 White House Press Briefing:

HELEN THOMAS: I'm asking about exemptions.

MR. McCLELLAN: Let me respond. And he would never authorize the use of torture. We have an obligation to do all that we can to protect the American people. We are engaged --

HELEN THOMAS: That's not the answer I'm asking for --

MR. McCLELLAN: It is an answer -- because the American people want to know that we are doing all within our power to prevent terrorist attacks from happening. There are people in this world who want to spread a hateful ideology that is based on killing innocent men, women and children. We saw what they can do on September 11th --

HELEN THOMAS: He didn't ask for an exemption --

MR. McCLELLAN: -- and we are going to --

HELEN THOMAS: -- answer that one question. I'm asking, is the administration asking for an exemption?

MR. McCLELLAN: I am answering your question. The President has made it very clear that we are going to do --

HELEN THOMAS: You're not answering -- yes or no?

MR. McCLELLAN: No, you don't want the American people to hear what the facts are, Helen, and I'm going to tell them the facts.

HELEN THOMAS: -- the American people every day. I'm asking you, yes or no, did we ask for an exemption?

MR. McCLELLAN: And let me respond. You've had your opportunity to ask the question. Now I'm going to respond to it.

HELEN THOMAS: If you could answer in a straight way.

MR. McCLELLAN: And I'm going to answer it, just like the President -- I just did, and the President has answered it numerous times.

HELEN THOMAS: -- yes or no --

MR. McCLELLAN: Our most important responsibility is to protect the American people. We are engaged in a global war against Islamic radicals who are intent on spreading a hateful ideology, and intent on killing innocent men, women and children.

HELEN THOMAS: Did we ask for an exemption?

MR. McCLELLAN: We are going to do what is necessary to protect the American people.

HELEN THOMAS: Is that the answer?

MR. McCLELLAN: We are also going to do so in a way that adheres to our laws and to our values. We have made that very clear. The President directed everybody within this government that we do not engage in torture. We will not torture. He made that very clear.

HELEN THOMAS: Are you denying we asked for an exemption?

MR. McCLELLAN: Helen, we will continue to work with the Congress on the issue that you brought up. The way you characterize it, that we're asking for exemption from torture, is just flat-out false, because there are laws that are on the books that prohibit the use of torture. And we adhere to those laws.

HELEN THOMAS: We did ask for an exemption; is that right? I mean, be simple -- this is a very simple question.

MR. McCLELLAN: I just answered your question. The President answered it last week.

HELEN THOMAS: What are we asking for?

HELEN THOMAS: Would you characterize what we're asking for?

MR. McCLELLAN: We're asking to do what is necessary to protect the American people in a way that is consistent with our laws and our treaty obligations.

november 24th

Happy Thanksgiving!!

That phrase always looks so ridiculous to me... something about both words having capital letters. I don't know; I digress.

It's been almost eight months to the day since I walked away from the confines of the correctional system; in that time, I bought a car, went to SF, moved into my house, changed jobs, and went back to school. I'm playing good poker, I'm doing acceptably well in school, and I'm looking forward to when the Park District pours the ice rink behind our house so that I can go skating.

Particularly when you think about it against the background of Hurricane Katrina, the war in Iraq, the tsunami in Asia, or any one of innumerable disasters around the world (and close to home) in the last year or so, being able to take such clearly defined steps forward towards my own goals and destinations is .... t3h r0x0r. molodiets. ee desu.

Today I just wanted to use this space to reflect for a few minutes, and to share my gratitude and joy with the two people in the audience. So I did, the distilled results are viewable above, and there was lots of ensuing joy and gratitude. OMG U R 4LL T3H B35T!!!!!!!!11!!!!11eleven!!!!11! Best wishes to everyone, everywhere; no matter whether you're with family, friends, or 30 cats and a turtle.

i'm afraid it's not keeping any drinks anything any more

The insurance ordeal is nearly over. I sent them the title to Stan, and "the check is in the mail," .... literally.

In other news, my PC keyboard's space bar was not functioning properly due to unfortunate beer spillage. I pounded on it a few times after an unfortunate hand of poker was followed by an inability to type a pithy comment about my opponent's mother.

Now it works fine.

Also, I was at the mall yesterday, and picked up a turtleneck shirt to cover up the latest evidence that I really am some sort of man-whore. It appears that the evidence will be gone by tomorrow anyways, and I really only bought the shirt so that I wouldn't have to deal with my mom making fun of me when I go home for thanksgiving.... I guess it will have to wait until next time.

While I was there, I of course had to play a couple rounds of Dance Dance Revolution, just to see if I still had the chops... I more or less do; my sight-reading skill has declined, and I tire out faster, but I can still finish most 8- or 9-foot songs. The guy that played with me, though, is probably the second-best DDR player I've ever seen, right behind that crazy kid in SF that tried to beat MAX 300 on heavy mode. I was awestruck and humbled.

I am intensely cheerful about the holiday season this year. Anybody who bitches about having to see their family or put up with in-laws or travel or anything should have to spend the holiday season at the state hospital, with short weekly visits from family and closest friends the only link to what was once home, and crappy prison thanksgiving dinner.

a googol has 100 zeros

the last word.

wtf

So... the House passes $50 billion dollars in budget cuts, mostly in social programs like medicaid, school lunches, food stamps, and the like. This week, the House takes up a $60 billion tax cut proposal, mostly directed at (wait for it) wealthy individuals ($1m+/year).

Go figure.

this really twisted my dimple.

oh, and it was Jon WEAVER, not Jon LEVER.

A month later, the insurance company admits that it was the girl's fault that my car got wrecked. It's still at the gas station where I had it towed; it's possible that there is snow inside. Storage charges accrue.

I haven't walked to school in the cold since 9th grade, with rare exceptions. I didn't like it then, and I like it less now.

thank you, that is all.

long time gone

Phew. It's certainly been a while.

I apologize for the long delay between posts. Reading too much of dailyKos and the Huffington Post really makes me hate America, and the last thing both my readers need to see is another "The White House is full of crooks" post. We all know that already. That aside, there is much to discuss. I'll try to be brief and informative, as I know the two of you lead busy lives.

(sip of coffee)

First, a question: Which is preferable to you? A country where the press is monitored and censored by the government, or a country where the press is free from government sanction, but marginalized and propagandized by that same government? Through history, those options tend to be two sides of the same coin; just read an article about international politics from Pravda or Xinhua (not that China makes any claims about its media being free, at least that anyone believes). Or, for an example that hits a little closer to home, consider the New York Times. All of these are outstanding examples of government censorship and meddling in the "free" media.

Wait, what? The Gray Lady?

Sure. Take, for example, this piece about Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito. (NY Times, free registration may be required) How nice that the Times chose to do a human interest piece on a person whose human side must, by virtue of the job he is applying for, be put aside in favor of larger concerns. And, of course, there's the magical lie that Judy Miller heard from the administration and repeated as though it were fact. Meanwhile, Miller is the furthest thing from being fired for lying and conspiring with the White House to fleece the American people, and the Times continues to be clowned by its own reporters.

So, the question. Is it better when you know what you're getting, or when you think you're getting the real deal but you're not? Here's my suggestion - at the uppermost levels of the media, there's not much difference between the two, because the result on the part of the consumer is the same: for the most part, they think they're getting mostly, if not wholly, honest "reporting." The thing about repressive, totalitarian governments crushing opposition to the state-owned media is that it's hard to keep that sort of thing going in a democracy, particularly one with a large middle and/or upper class; one can always start their own broadcasting company (or blog ^_^). The other thing is that, like we saw in Yugoslavia, eventually the disconnect between what the media is reporting ("the resistance are terrorist, fascist dogs and should be beaten") and what is actually happening (police beating old women and teenagers in the streets) becomes so large that people simply cannot ignore the cognitive dissonance that results. Either the government is lying to you, or the pictures you saw and the stories you heard were false. Generally, people make the right choice and overthrow their totalitarian leaders (if they can).

So instead, semi-authoritarian regimes use constant, medium pressure on news agencies to keep them (dis)honest. Although in the rest of the world, it's not really a secret that Pravda takes every negative report about the Russian government to sling mud in return at whoever is denouncing their human rights violations, most people in Russia don't see it that way. They see it as Russia defending itself from the constant, unjustified onslaught of negative opinion from the West. In the rest of the world, it's not really a secret that China filters its news through the government. However, in China, anybody that knows about it doesn't talk about it, and most people don't even think about it. So business continues as usual, and the public is more or less convinced that they are getting as much of the story as they need/deserve.

Democracies use the media as a tool, too. Refer to that other paragraph up there, where I indicate at least two major instances of the New York Times, the "paper of record," blatantly propagandizing for the White House. Hundreds of thousands of people will read or have read those articles and believe every word of them. Not everybody, mind you, but many, many people. This gives a nasty advantage to the government; under the guise of a free press, the information leaked to the paper then becomes evidence for what the administration wants you to believe (exhibit A: Dick Cheney going on Meet the Press the first week of September, 2002 and asking, "Did you see the article in the Times (unspoken: that we planted) this week? It says Iraq is building nuclear weapons." So the end result is the same. People read fake news that is ostensibly less fake than the news in authoritarian regimes, but take it as though it were, you know, real.

The biggest difference is that in America, there are lots and lots of blogs dedicated to the truth, or at least opinion that is clearly demarcated as opinion. The HuffPo, although it is growing a new generation of young America-haters, will not be shut down any time soon. Neither will dailyKos, the most popular blog in the Ecosystem. And perhaps that is the greatest measure of the free press; after all, the Times has to worry about things like access to top levels of government, and its shamed, discredited reporters turning on it and writing tell-all books about the massive dysfunction at all editorial levels of the paper. I will never meet with Dick Cheney, and I have no staff (although most days, it's tough enough to keep myself in line). The unspoken rules are different for me, and that gives me a greater measure of freedom than the upper levels of the press. (Conversely, I have somewhat less responsibility to my readers, but that's a story for a different day) Hence the boldface.

So that's what I think; discuss freely.

On to my second point. President Clinton spoke at the University of Minnesota last night. I listened to most of his speech and the Q&A session on Minnesota Public Radio afterward. (link to article here, no audio, sorry) This speech made me long for a time when instead of sneaky crooks and relentless cronyism headed by a puppet with no marketable political skills whatsoever, we had a president who could, in the words of Walter Mondale, "think, who could write, who could connect with people, and who could SPEAK." President Bush could NEVER speak like this. He could never come close to writing a speech this eloquent, and he could never reaffirm anyone's belief in the greatness of America and the world, unless he ran around in a flight suit with an American flag in one hand, a bullhorn in the other, and shouted "STAY THE COURSE!!! FREEDOM!!! I WILL NOT COMMENT UNTIL THE INVESTIGATION IS COMPLETE!!!" in front of a giant banner that said Mission Accomplished. And even then, probably not.

I digress. At the end of Clinton's speech, he wanted to give the audience hope that the world was not dominated by a handful of corporations that had reached their long tendrils into the upper echelons of government, and this is how he did it. He said that these three reasons had hardly ever been mentioned in the press, and that the three had never been mentioned together (and they remained that way, even after the MPR.org news coverage), so I'm doing it here for you, paraphrasing and not quoting his words (please don't sue me):

1. Democracy is spreading. More than half of the people in the world live under democratic regimes. 60,000 mayors in China are either elected, or at least sensitive to public opinion. Democracy is not a safeguard against bad government (imagine that), but it at least gives people a chance to get the bad government they might have wanted, and at a local level, it can affect positive change. Clinton cites the example of the mayor of a major Chinese city fielding many, many complains from his citizens about the disrepair of the streets in his city. If the Chinese people feel free enough to complain about the streets... what's next?

2. The Internet is spreading, and its use as a political organizing tool is growing exponentially. Many thanks go to Howard Dean and Joe Trippi for organizing the largest grassroots presidential primary campaign, ever. Their organization has been mimicked by other, more successful candidates, and a similar system will no doubt be in place (with enhancements thanks to the power of hindsight) for the 2008 presidential contest. The Bush-Clinton Katrina fund has received the vast majority of its donations over the Internet, and the average amount of those donations has been $50 or less. Average people like you and me have come together to help people whose lives were devastated half a world away, and it is a testament to the power of the Internet that it has become the primary preferred medium for grassroots public action.

3. Non-governmental organizations are increasing in number. Bill Gates, though he is the founder of one of the most evil corporations in the world, is dedicated to spending his fortune before he dies, and he has given over a billion dollars to prevent disease in Africa. He has also given money to 250,000 high schools here in America. His foundation is the single largest philanthropic organization in the world. He is only the tip of the iceberg - there are thousands and thousands of organizations with specific purposes that you can give your money to, and they have pledged to do some good with it. (I recommend starting with my favorites, the ACLU, Democracy for America, and Minnesota Public Radio.) NGOs are even spreading throughout the world; even though Pravda can't be trusted to not hate the haters, there are over 60,000 NGOs in Russia.

The fundamental point is this: There are now more ways than ever for the individual citizen to do public good. This is a trend that is not shrinking or disappearing; it is expanding, and can only continue to do so. China let in the Internet, in a censored format; that is one Pandora's Box that they definitely cannot close. Dean and Trippi let politics onto the Internet in a meaningful way, and that will change the face of campaigning in the USA forever. There will be elections we are happy about and elections that take giant steps backwards, but the American federal government is not the barometer of progress for the world.

Lucky for us.

does he rofl? or lmao?

i like to laugh. a lot. it soothes the soul.

occasionally, i will laugh so hard that i cry. less frequently, i will laugh so hard that the pain in my belly demands that i think about something unpleasant so that the laughter ends, because it simply hurts too much to continue. Fits like this usually only happen between me and my brother, because he tends to laugh with great intensity, which makes me laugh, which makes him laugh harder, and so on until we both have little red lines over our abdominal muscles, tears streaming down our faces, and can no longer breathe.

this killed me. in fact, while i was posting this, i could not look at the link or the artlcle for fear that i would bust out laughing again.

however, now the pain has subsided, and i am ready and willing to venture back into the funniest (or possibly second-funniest) thing I have ever read. it's probably not as awesome if you've never owned a cat, but if you have, be prepared to have the rest of your day destroyed by the funniest thing you have ever read.

none of the above is hyperbole.

down the rabbit hole

Здравствуйте!!

(hello; "zdrasvytsente")

I can pronounce the words, but I don't know what they mean.

Furthermore, the Russian FARK does not correspond in any way to the American FARK.

Fascinating. If you can read Cyrillic, that is.

it's a trap 2.0

We were right. We were always right, and we were all right.

Liars and crooks, and now their closely-knit circle of friends is unraveling like that cheap scarf your cousin knitted for you that you wore once and got snagged on a door hinge.

Now if only the Democrats could get their hand-wringing heads out of their asses and govern...

it reminds me of an episode of the Simpsons I saw on DVD last week, from the 4th season. It aired in 1991. There's a chase scene that goes through both the Republican and Democratic national conventions. During the scene, you get to see banners hanging at each convention:

Republican: "We want the worst for everyone!" "We're just evil!"
Democrat: "We hate ourselves!" "We can't govern!"

ah, it saddens me how political satire remains the same, even though the years keep ticking by.

In other news, I got the first contact from the wreck-girl's insurance agency today. I will call them in the morning with a list of demands ten miles long. I am suffused with confidence befitting Napoleon as he invaded Malta.

i've created a monster

PokerStars Tournament #14267119, No Limit Hold'em
Buy-In: $20.00/$2.00
180 players
Total Prize Pool: $3600.00
Tournament started - 2005/10/25 - 22:02:35 (ET)

Dear hakatak,

You finished the tournament in 3rd place.
A $428.40 award has been credited to your Real Money account.

You earned 178.65 tournament leader points in this tournament.
For information about our tournament leader board, see our web site at
http://www.pokerstars.com/tlb_tournament_rankings.html


Congratulations!
Thank you for participating.

RIP

Stan the Civic
March 20, 2005 - October 21, 2005

my car got wrecked today.

i was driving up the exit from columbia rd. to demers ave., while working at pops tonight. stopped at the north-south light, where demers ave. crosses right in front of pops, team electronics, etc.

light turns green, so i go. since my light was green, the cross-traffic light was red, a fact which escaped the notice of the 18-year-old female driver of a 1994 ford explorer. a perfect t-bone, right in the front passenger door.

what amazed me was how long the whole ordeal seemed to take, and yet how quickly it was over. the headlights, noise and shower of glass took like four hours, but i didn't even notice the flying plastic or crushing of the passenger door/dashboard. she was profusely sorry, and i wanted to lay into her, asking her how sorry would help me get another job, but that would have just made her cry.

so far as i know, i'm okay. my right hand instinctively went up to protect my face, and that was pretty much the only exposed area of skin on my body at the moment, so it caught quite a bit of glass. i went to the hospital to have them take it out and swab me down with some antibiotics, and they took a couple x-rays. i wanted to keep the glass, but all the fragments were miniscule. my fingers are a teeny bit broken, too, but not to the point where they need a cast or splints or anything. ("1% fracture.") during the great deal of down-time at the hospital, i had horrific visions of waking up tomorrow a quadraplegic, but the doc tells me that is highly unlikely.

the anaesthetic has mostly worn off, and now my fingers hurt like hell.

my first real taste of freedom when they let me out of work-release was getting into Stan and driving away.

unpleasant things

three more kinds of people that annoy me:

1) people who have pictures of themselves as their pokerstars avatars
2) people who have pictures of babies as their pokerstars avatars
3) people who see the funniest picture ever as someone else's pokerstars avatar and then use it as their own

that is all.

spoiler alert

yeah. and it really sucked when data died.

lolz #4

lost in translation.
i hope.

untitled 16

The chalk wars have begun, and the first clear losers are the kids that always look at the sidewalks in front of them as they walk around campus. The new campaign appears to be sponsored by the 10% Society, the GBLT support group on campus. Walking into the Union yesterday, I was met by a big pink "Gay is OK!" sign scrawled on the ground beneath me.

It sure is.

today's science lesson

Ah, magnets.

and another thing!!!

so, a short list of things going very badly for the bush administration:

1) Iraq is a clusterfuck, still.
2) FEMA actively prevented good things from happening in New Orleans. New Orleans may be so digustingly dirty that it is actually toxic. President Bush outlines massive money to immediately be given to Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg, Brown, and Root, in a no-bid contract to take care of the "number one priority" in the hurricane aftermath: restoring military bases.
3) NY Times reporter Judy Miller's newly-acquired (to use the Times's own parlance) notes indicate that Lewis Libby and Karl Rove spoke about Valerie Plame and Joe Wilson a couple of weeks before Robert Novak's story came out. Likelihood of presidential/vice presidential involvement in the whole situation seems *extremely* high, along with possibility of everyone being indicted or at least associated with a conspiracy.
4) Senate majority leader (a republican) under investigation by the SEC.
5) House majority leader indicted.
6) Karl Rove agrees to testify for the Plamegate grand jury without a guarantee of immunity.
7) President disagrees with 9/10 of the Senate, who all say torture should be expressly forbidden.
8) Conservatives are angry because President Bush nominated his own lawyer to be SCOTUS justice.

And what is the lead story in all the papers today?

New York subways shut down AMID FEARS of a terrorist attack.
Rumors spreading that the plan was initiated in Iraq.

It never fails... just when things can't get any worse for Bush Inc., they stoke the fears of the populace with the possibility of another terrorist attack. No attack, mind you, just "credible evidence" that nobody can talk about. Oh, and the Iraq thing thrown in there for good measure, you know, since the Prezdint just gave a speech about how if we get out of Iraq, we're giving it to the terrorists.

This time, I don't think it's going to work.

past-blast-ification

"You're listening to Minnesota Public Radio on 102.7, KNTN... My name is Jon Lever, and..."

at this point, I was struck dumb. Not THAT Jon Lever.

Not screaming-freakout, Central debate coach, Ex-Lax-in-your-morning-coffee, barking spiders, Lever 2000 Jon Lever.

No way.

... is it?

and, on a sadder note, we put one of the family cats to sleep a couple days ago. Boots had been having problems with arthritis for a long time, and she'd gotten to the point where she could only take one or two steps before stopping to rest, and she spent most of her time retreating into corners of the house, so we figured her time had come. She was cute and cuddly and would always lick you right after she bit you. We had a little ritual that we'd always do, even after I moved out of the house - whenever I'd see her, we'd sniff each other up close until we bumped noses. I'm a little sad that she's gone, but I really think that she was in a great deal of pain pretty much all the time. Beyond that, there isn't much an atheist can say; the only things that come to mind are silly platitudes about kitty heaven, and we all know better than that.

since i was the first i guess i'll be the last to leave

mental health day.

first day in a while i haven't had to take a quiz or a test, write a story for the student, do work-study stuff in the studio, or deliver pizza. sweet freedom. i slept til noon.

More proof that the Supreme Court picked the wrong president.

Harriet Miers scares the shit out of me. If you do a little research, you'll see that she's a wacky, Bible-literalist evangelical. Not only that, but SHE'S THE PRESIDENT'S LAWYER. When the Supreme Court has to hear arguments about the crimes that Karl Rove, Scooter Libby, Dick Cheney, Bill Frist, Tom DeLay, President Bush, Don Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, and all the other career criminal scum that has somehow worked its way to the highest levels of government have committed.... who do you think is going to vote to send them to prison?

Not Harriet Miers.

do you agree with dusty?

the leaves are turning.

I won't enjoy it much today, due to cold wind and whipping rain, but walking home from school yesterday gave me a chance to crane my neck at the trees lining University Ave., all in varying degrees of yellow and green. It doesn't smell like fall, though. Not just yet.

For the last two weeks, there has been a veritable plethora, an encyclopedia's worth of chalk drawing on every walkable sidewalk on campus. Until Friday, they were all the same: the cryptic message, "Do You Agree With Travis?" Although the buzz on campus was so thick you could swim in it, I knew immediately what was up: the Campus Crusade for Christ had engaged in yet another viral marketing scheme.

They do this every year. Tossing around someone's name, all over campus, on every sidewalk, in every newspaper, for a month leading up to a sermon or speaker sponsored by the Crusade and a few other virulently Christian organizations. They don't say anything about their purpose, or who their sponsor is... all they want to know is the answer to a simple question (that is unanswerable, of course): Do you agree with Travis?

Swami Dusty prognosticates once again: When an auditorium full of people show up to meet this Travis person and figure out if they agree with him or not, the lights will dim. A young, white man will strut on stage, emanating pure confidence and charisma the likes of which have not been seen since Dane Cook was here last spring. Applause and cheering from the crowd will be hushed by Travis's dazzling white smile. "Hello, friends!" he will say. "I have a few questions for you."

"Wouldn't you agree that dorm life is cramped and stinky?" cheers and applause.

"Wouldn't you agree that college is too much work, all at once?" cheers and applause.

"Wouldn't you agree that PeopleSoft is the Devil incarnate?" cheers and applause.

"Wouldn't you agree that murdering babies is a crime, and any mother that murders her unborn baby should get the death penalty?" scattered cheers, some confusion.

"Wouldn't you agree that evolution is just a weak theory invented by weak minds, and we should teach intelligent design in biology classes?" cheers-- wait, what? ...yeah, cheers. more scattered cheers.

"Wouldn't you agree that Christ is our savior, and all those Arabs and Jews and Hindus and whatevers need to SEE THE LIGHT??" MASSIVE cheers and applause.

I want to go to this stupid sermon so that during the Q and A, I can drop some real science on him. Ask him about the constant failure of the Catholic church to own up to the disgusting behavior of a few of its priests, and the even more disgusting coverups perpetrated even now by the bishops and the Vatican to keep pedophiles in the fold. I'd really like to ask him why Kate Moss was castigated by the entire modeling industry when tabloid pictures of her using cocaine appeared all over the world, while Brad Pitt was wrecking his marriage to Jennifer Aniston on the set of his new movie, with his co-star, and the Christians of the world remained silent. I want to ask him about Rev. Pat Robertson's decree that we should start assassinating foreign heads of state. I'd particularly like to ask him what Jesus would say about Rev. Fred Phelps and his congregation's deplorable practice of turning funerals of gay and lesbian people (as well as FALLEN AMERICAN SOLDIERS) into anti-gay protest rallies. I'm not going to do any of that, though. I learned my lesson when Dr. Budziziweski came to town to give a speech about tolerance (that was actually about not tolerating the murder of babies). Travis will be ready for any question I throw at him; maybe he'll be crass and cut me off, maybe he'll be glib and throw me a non-answer. Either way, I will be the spoiler of everyone else's fun, and it won't make enough of an impact for me to want to sit through whatever boiled tripe he wants to feed me.

I want to be offended, and I want to be outraged. The sneaky, underhanded way that Travis has been marketed to us is an affront to my somewhat-educated sensibilities. Unfortunately, I must choose to be tolerant - the real kind of tolerant, not the Budziziewski-Campus Crusade kind. Once this post is completed, I will bite my tongue and smile at the girls in the quad with a giant I Agree With Travis poster, complete with a hundred or so signatures of Travis-dittoheads, when they ask me if I agree with Travis.

The truth is... I don't. Not one bit. Thanks for asking.

let her infer what i imply

a handy mnemonic so that you don't go around accidentally inferring things that you meant to imply.

lol.

(/grammarpolice)

"we tight, right?" - in reference to parliamentary party structure, courtesy of dr. paul sum. (yeah, we tight.)

ahem.

I didn't get much done this weekend. Spent all of saturday sick as hell. Got so tired of the vikings getting their arses kicked that i actually fell asleep on the couch. There's a big pile of laundry on my bedroom floor stinking up my room, and all kinds of plastic bottles and paper garbage in my car. Furthermore, my backpack is disorganized, I don't have half the contact information I need to investigate my DS story, and I lost my list of passwords to the computers in the studio -- again. Meanwhile, I have a test in interpersonal communications tomorrow and another in comparative politics on wednesday. about two hundred phone calls to make, and I also need to pick up a couple of shifts this week at pops to alleviate mounting financial tension. I'd be ok, except I am nearly out of coffee.

The reason for the topic line is this article from DrunkenBlog. I'll let you read it yourself, but the gist is that the Next Big Thing will be relative to the human capacity for mindless inference. One does not consider that the law of gravity will pull the water down on top of you when you turn on the shower in the morning; you just turn the knob and get wet. Having to think about what would likely happen whenever you did anything would make life impossible; maybe that's why we get so frustrated and feel like our lives have been irrevocably changed when our cars don't start because it's -300 degrees outside and we still have to go to class. We expect that certain things around us will just work, and work in an intuitive way.

Imagine if your computer could make as many inferences about you as you make about the world. Computers are minimally capable of this - URL autocompletion comes to mind, as does T9 text input. But they are fundamentally weak, reliant on recent inputs/relatively simple mathematical algorithms, and not very intuitive; computers themselves are not intuitive. What, sayeth drunkenbatman, if this were not the case? It presents some very difficult and expensive technical problems, some of which are addressed in the article. I won't go into much detail here, just because I'm pressed for time and I don't want to try and say something that DB says much better.

Swami Dusty will prognosticate, though: how awesome would it be if you could travel from one terminal to another, from home to car to school to work and back, and have all your data follow you securely? What if computers were able to tell who you were without you having to type a million usernames and passwords? Better yet, what if computers could tell what you were doing (writing a paper, blogging, etc.) and could offer tailored services without your having to ask for them?

I think it's possible. I think that data must become much more portable and accessible before anything revolutionary happens in the way we process it; some of the biggest barriers to such a scenario are the hardware and software incompatibility that plagues the desktop PC/mobile/wireless world. If by some freak occurrence (or more likely, series of freak occurrences), interfaces, data formats, storage, and transmission protocols become standardized, there would be a market for some of the pure research needed to develop truly adaptive devices.

Then again, maybe not.