Day 1 - Adventure to Pune, India

I promised to blog more, but I am failing to do so.  Today I am going to chronicle my journey from Austin Texas to Pune India.

Yesterday (or two days ago) I headed for the Austin Airport at 4:30 AM.  It was more crowded than I expected.  I guess due to spring break.  I got through security and got to my gate just in time.  The flight from Austin to Newark was fun.  When I arrived in Newark it was snowing.  Things did not look good.

I owe a big thank you to my boss.  He suggested since I had a 9 hour wait until my flight to Pune, that I should pay to join the United Club for the day.  It was supposed to be $50.  For some reason the lady processing my request had trouble, so for me being so polite and patient she let me into the club for free.  Not only did she let me in for free she gave me a pass for another day at the club.  I enjoyed the day drinking Sam Adams and munching on free snacks.  I met some nice people.  CIO of Starpoint Solutions, a lady who works for Rolls Royce, and two brothers heading to Breckenridge for some skiing fun!  Who knows how many beers I had and I added a couple of shots of Jameson.  It was a pleasant day working from the lounge of the United Club at Newark.  Thanks Jack!

The weather miraculously cleared and my flight left close to on time.  The flight to Mumbai was relatively uneventful, but the plane was FREEZING.  I was so glad I had on my Snake Eyes wind breaker.  I watched 4 movies:  Argo, The Dark Truth, Chasing Mavericks, and Trouble with the Curve.  I really enjoyed all 4 movies.  I also played a game on the iPad called Trenches II.  I suck at it, but it was entertaining.  The food on the plane was marginal at best.  I did not like the breakfast much at all.  Fortunately I happened to pack some pretty tasty snacks.

I arrived and needed to go to the men's room due to the wonderful plane food.  Let's just say the bathroom experience at the airport was exactly that an experience.  Trust me, TMI!

I made my way through customs although I declared I was bringing meat into the country, beef jerky.  Nothing happened, whew!  Interesting in that the scan your luggage upon departure from the airport.  I had no phone service so I could not text my family.

I found my driver readily.  Hard to miss the large placard that had my name, but it took a minute or two to scan the large crowd.  My drivers name was Kalyan.  Fortunately for me he was an excellent driver.  He did not know much English, but I felt safe.  I will describe the traffic like this.  A NASCAR track where speeding cars had to dodge large slow trucks of all flavors, motorcycles and throw in pedestrians playing "Frogger".  I cannot do the experience justice in words.  I now love Austin traffic!  There is no way in hell I could have driven in this madness.  Half way to Pune we stopped at highway facility.  Honestly I was not about to use the mens room until I got to the hotel.

Finally arrived at the hotel at 2:00 AM.  The hotel is very nice.  It took me a few minutes to figure out how to turn on the lights in the room.  I felt pretty stupid, but I chalked it up to my sporadic unrestful sleep on the plane.  I was easily able to access internet and let my family know I had arrived.  I took a hot shower and a sleeping pill.  The bed was so comfortable.  I slept like a baby until the barking dogs woke me up around 8:00 AM.  I did feel well rested.

I went downstairs for the complimentary breakfast.  Wow there were so many choices.  I had some scrambled eggs with onions, spicy peppers, and mushrooms.  The staff were amazingly polite.  Here is what the kitchen looked like.  And just a note to my family - I did resist the donuts in the photo at least for today.

The breakfast buffet was amazing.  The service was exceptional and the people warm and kind.  The music was also very peaceful.  I wish I could find out who the artist was.  During breakfast you could hear the occasional crack of a fly meeting what looked like a mini tennis racket.  The coffee was deliciously strong.  I took some photos of some great sculptures.

After another warm shower I am about to head out with my colleagues to tour Pune.  I have no idea what is in store for me, but it should be a fun adventure.

What the hell?

I have not posted a poker blog since 2010.  I did not have many followers, but I did enjoy the poker bloggers I connected with.  I miss the online poker community.  I have some found memories of meeting local poker bloggers for a tournament or two.  It was an inexpensive way to sharpen skills and meet new people.

Since I cannot legally gamble online in the great USA, I am stuck playing sites like Pure Play Poker and Zynga Poker.

I sure wish Congress had not shelved the federal bill, "The Gambling Prohibition, Poker Consumer Protection Act".

I am going to resurrect this old blog and start posting poker experiences again.

Two Friday nights ago I was playing in the neighborhood game.  I held pocket 7's.  The flop came 7d5d3d.  I made a modest bet with my set and got called.  The turn comes 3c giving me the nut full house.  I made a good bet thinking I can lure someone in.  I got called again.  I am getting pretty excited when on the river comes a blank.  I bet an amount to milk the pot.  I got raised by $8.  I immediately went all in for my $23 bank roll just to get an instant call.  Yes my opponent had flopped a straight flush.  The funny thing is if I had been paying attention to the player and not the cards, I would have realized I was beat.  I should have listening to the pointers in Daniel Negreanu's book "More Hold'em Wisdom for All Players".  I should have called the $8 bet and still ended the night with a profit.  Instead I gave away my entire bank roll.   Another player tried to point out that my opponent was shaking.  If I had simple taking the time to look and consider the possibilities on the board.  We usually play until 3:00 AM and it was 2:50 AM.  No time for a come back.

I learned some good poker lessons with this mistake.

Rant #2 - I went to the DMV this morning with every intention of renewing my drivers license.  I wait in line for a couple of minutes, when I realize that they might not take credit cards.  Sure enough on a big paper sign at the desk is we take cash or checks only.

We live in a world of completely fake money so why not take credit cards.  I could see that a prudent use of tax dollars would be not to pay the costs of credit card transactions. 

Back to the drawing board tomorrow!  I am sure after I go through the entire process I will have rant #3.

I have no followers on this blog, but I need a place to rant so I am starting it again.

The thing that has me a bit ticked is the government's idea of replacing the gas tax with expensive equipment to track our miles.  I find this flawed for many reasons.

First the expense of the equipment.  Who is going to pay for  it?  Oh wait tax dollars!

The gas tax is a TAX.  The government takes enough of my money for worthless purposes, so why not just add on equivalent which would be close to the average current gas tax.  Then allocate that portion to the causes that the gas taxes support.  I am sure they are great causes!

We the people are smarter than that.  We will begin using public transportation or Cars2Go.

We the people already pay in way to much to support bull shit initiatives.

Wake up people!  We should institute the flat tax ASAP!

I am sure I have more to say, but I got that tiny bit of angst off my chest.

Youth Sports

Here I sit in a hotel room in Houston.  I did not sleep well, but the bottom line is our daughters team will be competing for the Texas Director's Cup title in soccer.  The schedule has been turned upside down due to the nasty rain yesterday so we play this afternoon.  This gives me some time to reflect and comment on youth sports.

Topics covered:

Select soccer
Coaching baseball
Choosing a sport

First lets rant about select soccer.   Although our kids get excellent training, select soccer is extremely expensive.  Added to the thousands of dollars for fees are travel costs.  These go up tremendously when team advance into the playoffs.  I guess right now we are blessed that this is something we can afford for the kids to do.  After the expense comes the politics.  Good or bad select soccer is a BUSINESS.  Recently our son's coach was let go.   I will not go into the details but the result of this business decision is that the club lost a good coach, some families behaved in totally unacceptable ways, and one or both sides are lying threw there teeth.  On the positive side I love watching our kids play and try their personal best.  I am trying to calm down as a parent fan and just enjoy the experience.  Occasionally I do have to be vocal regarding a bad call or to motivate our children.  Truth silent parents are better parents.

Speaking of being silent I wish I had not over heard a couple of the Dad's from the baseball team mumbling how they would be better coaches.  In youth sports the coaches are volunteers.  We volunteer because we love the game of baseball and we love to watch kids advance their skills.  This season has not been a strong season for our team.  That being said we are playing at the top level.  I know the boys have the skills, but unfortunately we cannot play the game for them.

This leads me to the last topic, choosing a sport.  Our son is 10 years old.  He is about to tryout for a select soccer team.  I definitely encourage this because soccer is a well rounded sport and the select coaches definitely know what they are doing.  But my son is also pretty darn good at baseball.  He struggles at the plate, but he is a thinker and understands the idiosyncrasies of the game.  Does he really have to choose a sport at the age of 10?  The other sad part is that baseball and soccer are played during the same season in Texas, so he will not be able to play both in high school.  He is also pretty good at golf, but I am thinking that is also a spring sport in Texas.  When I grew up I had the opportunity to play every sport - baseball, basketball, golf, tennis, football, and bowling.  Select soccer is going to be extremely expensive, so we will need to see how passionate he is for the game.  My wife argues if he chooses baseball then we need to get him the same level of coaching they are getting for soccer.  I honestly do agree.

All that said I will conclude by saying youth sports are killing us parents.  We have to leave work early to get the kids to practice and to games.  We have to work late at night to make up for the missed time from the office.  Definitely blessed that we work for great companies that permit this flexibility.  Finally we had to split up the family this weekend in order to cover the two sports.  That is not always an easy decision nor fun.

Kids go kick some butt today.  Good luck to the Dallas Texans Austin Division 97 Girls White team.  Compete and do your personal best at the state finals.  As for the Mustang Diamondbacks please play well and win today so I have the opportunity to coach one more game next Thursday.

Play ball!

I love youth Baseball!

Last night I had so much fun coaching our team in the baseball tournament.  We were playing probably the toughest team in our league as our first game of the tournament.  The conclusion was not ideal, but boy they boys sure fought hard.  In Little League baseball rarely do you get a complete game.  Well last night we went the full 6 innings.  We lost 10-8, but with two outs the boys were attacking. The final out came on a bang bang play to first base.  Although our fans were not happy it was the correct call from my angle as third base coach.  The umpires were the best two umpires we have had all season.  They were on top of the game and enthusiastic.

I saw such great effort from these players I was pumped up.  We may have won the game if one ball bounces cleaner or I did not make a coaching error.

I made some errors in the pitching department, but we stayed in the game.  My big error came during our final at bat.  Bases were loaded.  A better rips a single.  Runners from second and third score.  I did not pay attention to our runner coming from first because I was focused on getting the runner from second home.  He got caught to far off second base in a pickle between second and third.  The result was not good, ending in our second out.

We did have a very scary moment when a batter swung the bat around hitting our catcher in the middle of the back.  He was down for awhile.  What a tough kiddo because he stayed in the game.

DBacks! I am very proud of you!  Now if we can just teach a few of you to not cry when things do not quite go your way the season will be a total success.

Apparently Unsportsmanlike

I can certainly see how someone would perceive my actions on the baseball field today as unsportsmanlike, but that absolutely was not my intention.

I am coaching third base in a U10 baseball game and we are leading 9-4 with one out.  One of our fastest players on the team (our son) is on third.  I am collaborating with him on how we are going to score.

The batter hits a high pop fly down the third base line.  The catcher hustles down the baseline to make a spectacular catch.  The hustle and catch was definitely a web gem.  It is a live ball and no one is covering the plate so I send the runner home to score.  The opposing team was furious with me.  Honestly I did not think I did anything wrong.  One of the coaches is a friend and he was pissed at me.  I asked him if they really thought it was unsportslike and he said absolutely.  I assured him that was not my intention.  I apologized to all of the coaches.

Then the moms were bad mouthing along the fence.  I turned to them and also apologized.

I viewed this move as aggressive baseball.  We have not had many opportunities this season to teach the boys aggressive base running. 

Would I do this again?  Absolutely!  Would I do it with a five run lead?  Probably not!

It was not my intention to cause the other team to get upset.

My friend asked me if they would do this in high school baseball.  My initial answer was probably not.  The more I think about it I have seen this play done during my umpiring days by high school teams.  It would be a rare occurrence.

I will agree that by taking this course of action the timing was not appropriate.  I could have exercised a bit more respect for the fantastic play.

I would also say that some of the things that were said about me on the side lines were not appropriate.  These people have no clue about me.  I try to do the right thing and live life with a great deal of integrity.  I do make mistakes, but I always try to teach the boys good sportsmanship and to play an aggressive brand of baseball.

I will learn from this experience!

Bottom line is that both teams played a great game today.  There were some outstanding plays!

New Things Happening

I was not sure what I was inspired to post about this week.  I think I will summarize a couple of key new things that have been happening in our lives the past 3 - 4 weeks.

• Moving completely away from processed foods
• Buying local produce every Saturday at the Farmers market
• Making our own bread every week
• We even made our own wheat thin crackers
• We also made strawberry jam from local strawberries
• We are growing our own veggies in the yard
• We are collecting rain water
• We are dehydrating tomatoes from the farmer's market
• Eating all organic items
• Eating more fresh fruit

Kids are a bit frustrated, but I am feeling good!

Happy & Healthy eating!

Fantasy Baseball

Well it is time again for fantasy baseball.  I got my team yesterday.  I think I have a great pitching staff, but the rest of my team sucks.  Once again I failed to appreciate Yahoo's approach to automated drafts.  I do not spend a ton of time pre-Ranking my players, but I usually move all the injured players out so they do not get drafted and I make sure I have a shot at getting as many of the top 100 players as possible.

I guess my big flaw is that I was to worried about getting a couple of good pitchers I stuck to many pitchers in my top 100.  I also drafted dead last so I got back to back picks, but two picks after 13 other teams picked twice.

My second big flaw is that I completely fail to account for the fact that there are 14 teams in our league.

My third flaw this season was that there are a couple of very hot prospects so I wanted a shot at a couple.  I got a few to many.  I think having Stephen Strasburg and Jason Heyward on my team will be a benefit.  It sucks that Strasburg has to sit out a month in a financial move by Washington, but I understand the fact that he may be worth keeping around.

Regardless of how well my team does this season I need to definitely increase the amount of SMACK talk on the fantasy baseball site.  Last year everyone was way to quiet.  Right now everyone is bashing my draft, but soon I may have ammunition for smack talk.  If not I will certainly make something up.

Go Team!

Food Revolution

This is a short post, but I absolutely have to add this to my list.  Please watch Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution.

OMG!

I will start this post by recommending everyone watch the documentary "Food Inc".  Next pick up and read this book, "In the Defense of Food" by Michael Pollan.  And you should do all of your shopping at Whole Foods and local farmers markets.
So after watching Food Inc.  I sent a form letter to Senator Cornyn.  Below is his response and below that are my thoughts.

Dear Mr. Shaulis:

Thank you for contacting me about the production and distribution of
genetically modified (GM) foods. I appreciate having the benefit of
your comments.

The United States enjoys the safest and most plentiful food supply in
the world. Key to our successes are production and safety practices
rooted in sound scientific practices. Among these practices,
biotechnology, though still in its infancy, has the potential to help
keep U.S. agriculture at the world's forefront while ensuring a safe,
abundant, and affordable food supply.

Underscoring the immense size and slow response time of the federal
government, biotechnology development, and the development of GM
foods, continually outpaces the standards of federal agencies that
regulate and monitor food products. Several federal agencies,
including the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the United States
Department of Agriculture (USDA), have a role in the development,
production, and marketing stages of the entire U.S. food
supply—whether traditional or GM. Any plant or animal product intended
for human consumption must undergo strict scrutiny by the FDA and
USDA. Additionally, the USDA must review and approve all GM crop
varieties—subject to further examination by the Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA)—before planting.

As you know, food containing GM plant varieties is now commonplace.
The Congressional Research Service estimates that nearly 70 percent of
the U.S. food supply contains some form of GM crop variety—most
notably corn and soy-based ingredients used in many processed foods.
However, a narrow category of dairy products is currently the only GM
food product derived from animals to be approved. Although questions
were raised about the safety of meat and dairy products derived from
cloned animals, the FDA has concluded that these products are as safe
as meat and dairy products derived from naturally born animals.
Cloning technology does not alter the genetic makeup of animal, but
rather generates an exact copy. The FDA is currently developing
guidelines for monitoring the marketing of cloned and other
animal-based food products with the help of USDA and the biotechnology
industry.

Additionally, questions have been raised regarding labeling
requirements for GM foods. No government regulation exists to compel
food manufacturers to label a product that contains a GM variety,
however GM food products are subject to all existing USDA and FDA
safety and labeling requirements. Moreover, USDA has determined that
cloned animals will not qualify for the USDA Organic marketing label.

I appreciate having the opportunity to represent Texans in the United
States Senate, and you may be certain that I will work to ensure that
decisions concerning the development, production, and marketing of our
food supply continue to be rooted in sound and safe scientific
practice. Thank you for taking the time to contact me.
Sincerely,

JOHN CORNYN
United States Senator

My thoughts:

1.  At least his office replied, but the form letter is full of Bull Shit.
2.  Sound scientific practices my eye.  Hmm, lets make sure the results allow Monsanto to monopolize crops.
3.  I trust the EPA, USDA & FDA almost as much as I trust Capitol Hill.  Wink!  Wink!
4.  Thank goodness cloned animals do not yet qualify as Organic.  Hell up until a month an organic cow was a cow who had access to a pasture.
5.  Final note genetically modifying crops to be resistant to Round Up.  WTF!!!


I bet this sounds yummy with all of your foods - Glyphosate (N-(phosphonomethyl) glycine)!!

I am moving toward this diet - "If God created it and man has not mucked with it, then I can eat it"

Not quite there, but working on it!

Next month they vote on Genetically modified alfalfa and wheat please send your Congressmen & women a note and visit http://www.saynotogmos.org/.

Eat Healthy!

Well I just had to toss out another post.  I have become extremely disillusioned with our political process.  Two things specifically get under my skin.

1.  Adding items to a bill that are completely out of context such as this added to the health care bill:

"By the way, buried in the new House health care bill is an unrelated but also sweeping measure that rewrites the rules dealing with college loans for needy students"

2.  All of the deal making it takes to obtain a vote.  I heard the Nebraska deal was removed, but there was still advantages to Louisiana and a couple of other states left in the Health Reform Bill.

Collaboration and Common Sense should rule the day.  Special interest and unrelated topics do not belong.  Both parties are guilty as hell and should be ashamed as to how they represent us.

Bills should be broken down into reliable and efficient legislation.  I think a 2000 + page document that takes a law degree to understand makes little sense.  Every member of the house and senate should be able to efficiently discuss the bill and damn it work together to craft what makes sense for the people.

I had some politicians I was planning to support come November, but now I am leaning toward voting out every incumbent.

I have this simple message for the Government of the United States.  Get your act together!

Stay tuned for my next post when I reveal the canned response I got from Senator Cornyn regarding the up coming decisions on genetically modified alfalfa and wheat.  An entire rant is forthcoming!

Peace!

This blog was about to die off since there is not much happening in the world of on-line poker.  I recognized that there is so much more to post about.  So I will try once again to post at least weekly.

So this week is SXSW in Austin Texas.  I got to see a set by Surfer Blood at Waterloo Records.  Last night I got to see Cracker and the BoDeans at Auditorium Shores.  The family was hungry so unfortunately we did not stick around for Cheap Trick.  We stopped at Whole Foods for some food and heard a tiny sampling of the Octopus Project.  I wish today I was at the Continental Club for Mojo Nixon's party, which includes The Mother Truckers and Mojo himself.

Today we are off to visit a new farmer's market.  Despite the rain, we hope to get some local foods.  The only way to go.

Peace!

August 16 – Off to take our daughter to the Emergency room. We happened to select SunRise Children’s Hospital. I will spare everyone the details of our daughter’s symptoms, but it was not quite how we planned to start the vacation. The hospital was great. At least we could watch the Olympics while waiting. The wait was long so my son and I headed back to the resort to swim and goof off. We played air hockey, pool, and showed other guests the finer art of Wii bowling. Around 6:00 PM we headed back to the hospital. The drive to and from the Hospital allowed us to learn some back roads in Vegas. We arrived just about the time our daughter was being dismissed.

Sticking to the game plan I tucked the family in and headed to Downtown Las Vegas around 10:00 PM. My best experiences gambling in Las Vegas has always been downtown, so I drove to my old venue, Binion’s Horseshoe. I must say the parking garage was a tight fit, but at least there was parking. I had heard that $1-2 black jack was back at Binion’s. Well that turned out to be false, so I headed to the poker.room. I bought in to a $1-2 NL game for $50. I know. I am cheap. I do like the challenge of spinning gold out of straw. I won a few hands. My biggest win came as a small blind special with 74s. Two fours came on the flop and I had one caller all the way. I believe I was up to around $75. A new player came to the table. Oh before I forget the Olympics were on and when the US men won the swimming relay the place erupted in applause. It was really cool. The very first hand with the new player I flopped top two pair, Kings and nines. I bet out $15. He went over the top of me $40, essentially putting me all-in. My gut told me that he flopped a set. I ended up mucking my hand. Two hands later I limped in with KQ. The flop came KQ7. I bet $15. Again this guy goes over the top of me. I put him on AQ, so I pushed in my stack. He immediately called. He turned over AQ. For a second I felt like Daniel Negreanu. Everyone reading this can guess the outcome. An Ace hit on the turn and I lose site of a $200 + pot. I went on tilt. I quickly congratulated the player and stormed out of the casino. I acted like a total idiot. That is the way my play has been online, always getting out drawn on the turn or river. Oh I was frustrated because I thought I played excellent poker. I finished my beer watching the Freemont Experience.

I got in the car and got turned down a street with construction that ran by the Golden Nugget. It was quite serendipitous because the street headed me straight for the Stratosphere and I made it back to the resort in record time with little to know traffic. Thank goodness I noticed the police offer patrolling and I was not speeding.

Play on!

Las Vegas Trip Report August 15-22, 2008

August 15 – Driving from Phoenix area to Las Vegas. We arrived at Hoover Dam approaching dusk. The cost to park was ridiculous ($7) but well worth it to view the Damn up close. Our daughter did not care for it much. Apparently she is terrified of heights.

I believe we arrived in Las Vegas around 7:00 PM. I had not been to Las Vegas since 1991, so I was not sure what to expect. The skyline definitely changed significantly. Our trusted Google map brought us right to our resort, Wyndham Grand Desert Resort.

I made several trips to the car to unpack. I was too cheap to pay the bell hops. Our accommodations were nice. We made a grocery list and I headed to a store called Von’s and to Jack in the Box for dinner. I found the store and picked up supplies for the week. There were only two checkout lines open. I was about eighth in line and there were at least 20 people behind me. It was ridiculous. Definitely all walks of life were out shopping on a Friday night.

Next stop Jack in the Box. I got my order and against my normal practices I checked the content. I was a sandwich short. I parked and walked inside where the quickly corrected the order. After dinner my son and I decided to go for a swim. Man that pool water was cold. We ended up chilling in the hot tub!

Although I was anxious to hit the tables I decided it would be best to stay put for the night. I thought I could kill time playing online. NOT! The internet at the resort sucked.

Rather than an uber post I will post one day at a time!

Play on!

Thought I would share this brief adventure and even include a bit of poker.



Last night I decided to do some yard work to please the boss. I pruned and weeded the bed along the side of our house. It was not a problem and I had energy to burn. I have been inspired to create another water feature so I decided to start digging the hole. I used a shovel and a pick axe, having a grand old time. I hit something hard so I got my 30 pound rock spike. Wham! Wham! Sphhhhshhhhhh! I hit the #@%&*( main sprinkler line. I was pissed! I turned off the water to the house. How the F... was I going to cut this line. I could not get a hack saw in there. Hmmmm! My wife bought me a all-in-One tool a few years back. It took n act of Congress to figure out how to install the saw blade, but I finally managed. In the pool of water I was only able to cut 3/4 through the pipe. I had to dig deeper into the swamp I created then finsih the job with a mud splattering hack saw. I got the piece of pipe out and boogied to Lowes to buy parts. I returned with a compression fitting two couplers and a end cap.



Note to readers - PVC compression fittings suck! Oh I forgot to add since the water was turned off my wife was let's say "Less than Happy"! I tried four times to get the damn compression fitting to stop leaking. I finally gave up and debated a trip back to Lowes. Hmmm! I bought the end cap for a reason, so I just capped the pipe and turned the water back on. No leak!



Saga continues - Oh I forgot to mention that I did buy two couplers, but I did not have a piece of pipe to connect the two. I stopped at Lowes on the way home from work and got the PVC pipe. I did learn from my boss that there should be a cut-off valve specific to the sprinkler system. I found and opened the box. I was staring at the valving with my sun glasses on trying to study the configuration and figure out how to turn off the water. Then I saw it it laying on top of the pipe. A SNAKE! I was thankful I did not just reach in and attempt to turn a valve. I am not sure what type it was. I poked it with the screw driver. The snake did not put up much of a fight then slithered into the hole next to the pipe. I was thinking to myself -"Man life is full of surprises!"



After several cuts of PVC I got the leak repaired and the water back on.

Poker story will have to be later!

Hello Internet!

I have not posted in a long time. Poker is not the hot topic these days. My only poker comment is that I lose more often than I win when I have pocket aces. Enough said!

I am going to start writing on this blog anything that happens to get under my skin. Here is today's WTF moment.

We are at the farmer's market downtown Austin. There is a line about 8 persons deep to get a pint of freshly picked blueberries. This non-english speaking lady walks by the entire line and right up to the vendor. "How much?" The farmer explains 3 or 4 times the prices. Lady knods her head. "I take two." The young lady starts to package two pints. "No! No! No! One this size."

Vendor prepares a half pint. The the lady tries paying with WIC. The vendor is like sorry we do not take WIC. "You You take! Just like money."

The lady walks away.

I am primarily kicking myself in the buttocks, because I did not ask this lady to get to the back of the line. It was not worth any hassle, but she should follow the rules.

I have experienced several other WTF moments and hopefully I will post those soon.

Howdy Bloggers! I have not been inspired to write in a very long time. However, for some strange reason I decided to read some of the old blogs. Scotts' post of the song by DropKick Murphy for some reason inspired me. Perhaps I will see you at that show. Never heard of them, but I liked it!

My state in the poker world is simple. I have no cash at any sites, so I am back to chasing the freerolls. I am not finding very many good freerolls. At poker time I can no longer consider their site a freeroll. They require one raked hand per day to play in their freerolls. That is a crock. Others freerolls have 5000 players so it is a crap shoot. If anyone knows of good sites were I have a shot to win cash please send me a comment or e-mail. I did finally get my last little bit of stash back from Neteller. I still enjoy playing SNGs for FPPs at PokerStars.

Locally I play in a couple tournaments a month. I thought I would share my experience on Monday night. There were 22 persons in the tournament. Essentially I played AJ suited, pocket kinds, then AJ suited again. Both times with AJ I lost to AKo. I was out with the second AJs. I felt I played the hands correctly, so I was not upset. I then moved to the cash game.

The first couple of hours it was a normal NL Holdem cash game. Soon we had 11 players so we split to two tables. I landed at the crazy table. We ended up playing pineapple, crazy pineapple, Omaha, and Holdem. They would do straddles and double straddles. I thought it was totally insane, but I sat there drinking whiskey and water and more importantly extremely patient. I was down to my final 6 bucks when my luck changed. I built up a stack of something around $30 when they decided to play Omaha H/L. The river brought me the nut flush and the nut low. I raked in an $80 pot. It was a nice feeling. So for the first outing ot 2008 I am plus $42. Perhaps I should quit! :o)

To end 2007 I lost with pocket Aces to 57o to finish on the bubble. I was totally on tilt! I still have no clue how he could call a 4X raise. The flop came 553.

What else can I complain about. My back is mucked up, so I can not play golf. It has been a long time since my back was this whacky. Hell to get older.

I doubt anyone reads this silly blog, but once again I am going to attempt to post more often.

Play on!

"Nice to have a huge Stack"

I am not sure why but it is really hard to be motivated to post. I continue to grind at the low limits on Poker Stars, but I am definitely lacking inspiration to blog. Just now in a micro SNG I lost with jacks full of aces to queens full of aces. I had top pair all-in and my only caller hit a king on the turn to topple my queens. Maybe I should not be playing tonight.

Any way I wanted to share what happened a couple of Monday nights ago. There is a live tournament in Cedar Park. This time I believe there were 24 players. I was sitting at a table of very tough players, so my MO was to be aggressive early and hopefully build up a stack.

The third hand of the night I had pocket Kings. I made it 3x and got two callers. The flop came 67Q rainbow. I think I made it about 6x and same two callers. The turn and river were small cards and not chance of a straight or flush. My only fear was two pair. I made it 8X which would have left me short stacked. Both players called instantly. I went "oh shit"! On had AQ and the other had QJ. I almost tripled up.

The remainder of the night I could raise in position and force action. I called one all-in and lost, but other than that things went my way.

Two interesting hands came later in the evening. I was under the gun with QJ of clubs. The flop came AAK with 2 clubs. There was a reasonable bet of 2X the BB. I called. The turn came the ten of clubs, giving me a royal flush. Here is where I think I made a mistake. The raiser after the flop checked. I immediately went all-in hoping he would think I was stealing the pot and I assumed he had an ace. He thought about calling me for a long while then mucked stating "I bet you have JQ of clubs". I definitely had to show the cards to the table! If I had this situation again I would have checked and hoped that he caught something on the river. Oh well!

Another hand that was interesting was a player went all-in from early position. Everyone folded and it was up to me. I felt obligated to call even though I had 96o. I commented nines have been hitting the flop all night. A nine hit on the flop and my pair of nines held up to the two over cards.

Nothing two eventful until I was heads up. The player I was heads up against had played extremely smart all night. Twice he slowed played pocket aces perfectly and took down enormous pots. I think heads up I only had him by $500 in chips. I alternated between agressive and conservative. I was waiting for a moment to win this tournament. WE exchanged chips for about 30 minutes. I was in the SB and limped in with A5. The flop came 529 or something like that. I made a small bet and the other player went all-in. I felt he was trying to steal so I insta-called. He turned over 54o and my kicker won me the tournament. It was nice to win $187 in profit.

The good news is that I shared the spoils with the family and my better half will let me play again. These games are on a Monday night so it does impact our weekly flow of life. Now I am working my bachelor points so that I can play twice a month.

Play on!

Well I obviously have not blogged in a long time. I have been meaning to, but for some reason never make it a priority. Here goes a quick shot at catching up.

Two weekends ago I went to Plano, TX for some baseball, golf, and gambling. It only took 2 hours to get through Waco, but we did make it to the Rangers Indians game. Here is a great game if you go to a baseball game, Pass the Cup! In our case it was cap night so we played pass the cap. Rules to the game are:

1. Everyone in your party puts $1 into the cup
2. One person starts with the cup
3. The person with the cup is now attached to the batter at the plate.
4. If the batter gets out you put in another $1, if he gets a hit you take out $1, double $2, and a triple $3, if he hits into a double play you put in $2, if he hits a homerun you get all the money in the cup (everyone then re-antes)
5. Pass the cup and the next person has the next batter.
6. Odd rules - Fielders Choice put in a buck. An error put in a buck, a walk or hit by a pitch is a push and you pass the cup. End of the game all money in the cup is divided back out equally.

It is really a fun game.

We also played a dice game called ships, captain, and crew. Everyone put $1 in the pot. You roll five dice. You must roll a 6,5, and a 4. One you do that then the remaining two dice make up your score. Every player gets three rolls. The person with the highest score drags the pot. So I roll and I get 654 on my first roll and two 4's my score is 8. Since I have two more rolls I can stay put or try to improve my eight. The person who drags the spot and starts the next round. A round is complete when everyone has had a turn.

Saturday night we did manage to play some dealer's choice. I was down most of the night until we played 5 card draw 6's are wild. I hooked up with a straight flush.

I did play in one big tournament here in town with 38 players. I had a full house only to get beat by a bigger full house. I knew it, but could not let my boat go!

Monday night I am going to give it another shot. Hopefully I will have better luck and make it into the money.

Soccer boot camp has been going on all week, so I spend 3 hours per day at the soccer fields. It has been fun for me, but I can not say the same thing for our daughter. The run their asses off in the morning, then work on skills at night.

Hopefully I will be able to get back to doing one post per week. My fingers are tired, so I am not in typing shape.

Peace!