Visitors and More

On Wednesday night, Duke and Crestfallen flew in to visit. They'll be here until Monday. So far, we haven't done too much, because we're all pretty much working. Both Duke and CF have been working remotely from my place, and I've had to go in to the office as usual. But, we did get to play some Carcassonne. I don't think Duke's a fan of the game right now, but I suspect that will change after he gets the hang of it and begins to appreciate the subtleties in strategy.

Tonight, QB will be joining us for dinner over at The Grill on the Alley. I've never been there, but Duke says it's great. I'm definitely looking forward to some good steak. Recently, as you may recall, I've been a fan of Alexander's Steakhouse. So, we'll see how The Grill stacks up.

And, I'll leave you all with this interesting software license agreement. I stole this from the Worse Than Failure (previously the Daily WTF?). Here's more info on their eco-friendly license agreement. I'm no eco-warrior, but I still think that this is an interesting way to push your world view onto others.


Hope everyone has a fun Labor Day weekend. Check you all later!

Comeuppance

A serious down session was overdue for me... and tonight was the night. I started off the night amazingly well in the 8/16 game. In under an hour I was up 2 racks after 89s rivered the nut straight, and KK held up in an 8-way pre-flop capped pot. After these two hands, I did not win another pot in 3 hours.

It was not really a card-dead situation. It was basically being up against a better hand from the get-go, getting outflopped, getting turned, or getting rivered. It was really quite brutal. I don't think I played all that badly... there were definitely a few hands that I probably misplayed somewhat, but nothing egregious.

All three of the flushes I hit lost to bigger flushes. Twice I was up against a bigger flush, and once I made a flush on the turn only to have the 4th flush card hit the board. I never managed much of a comeback, and after being stuck 3 racks (~35 bets), I called it a night. It was one of those sessions where it almost didn't matter how the hands were played. Almost every hand was really straightforward, and I'm not sure I could have really saved myself that many bets.

I guess my luckbox card expired.

*** Edit #1 ***

Just wanted to say that while I didn't win another pot in the next 3 hours following the strong start, I did end up winning a few later, but none that really could save me from my eventual loss. It was a pretty consistent string of beat after beat.

What Am I?

Ok, so I picked up this weird looking seed from some tree. At first I thought it was an egg... it's the size of a large nectarine, and from its incredibly light weight, I assumed it was hollow. I took it home and decided to crack it open with a hammer. After a few solid pounds, the egg seed remained complete.

Eventually, I had to use a chisel along with the hammer to break it open to see that the inside was some really un-dense wood. I was wondering if anyone knows what this tree is that produces these super lightweight egg seeds. I didn't have my camera on me so I couldn't take a pic of the tree or its leaves. I'll have to do that next time.

Anyway, here are shots of the egg seeds... I know it looks like some sort of mushroom, but believe me, it's not a mushroom.

Lights, Camera, Avian!

Lights

Here's some random, useless information for all of you.

So, I watched some show that talked a bit about slot machines, and I was surprised to learn something new about them. Turns out that the lights (called candles) on top of slot machines are color coded by denomination. I just never noticed that, but it makes a lot of sense.

According to the show, Nickel machines have Red candle, Yellow is for quarters, Blue for dollars, and Purple mark the $5 machines. I wonder what the color codes are for the $100 and $500 machines. I'll have to remember to check that out next time I'm in Vegas.

Camera

On Friday, QB and I went to San Francisco to meet up with one of her old college friends. Before meeting up with them, we randomly dropped by Taqueria Cancun for something quick to eat. We were really pleased with the food. It was cheap and delicious. And, all the fresh avocado chunks shoved into our burritos and quesadillas really added to the yum factor. If it weren't so far away I'd be a regular.

After our quick meal, we met up with everyone at The Cellar. There was a reasonable $5 cover, and while the music was decent, we weren't too fond of the crowd and the dance floor was really packed. Within an hour, we're off to a different spot.

QB and I drove off towards some bars over near Valencia when suddenly I see a lot of cameras flashing. Oh Shit! I got snapped by those red-light cameras. I should be expecting a ~$400 ticket in the mail soon. What's done was done, and there wasn't much use pouting over it. But, I was pretty pissed for a good 20 minutes.

We finished the night off at several spots... the Casanova Lounge, Skylark, and Blondie's Bar and No Grill. All of these bars gave us a good time... nothing extraordinary, but fun, nonetheless. Main thing that would make it a better would be to clean up crowd a little... the 'gangbanger' element there.

Avian

The next day, we took a walk on a trail nearby the new place. We saw a bunch of different lizards, and also scat from various animals. I really found that being near some wildlife was nice. I definitely didn't get any of that at my old place... this new area reminds me a lot of the Riverside boonies, where I grew up. The highlight of our walk was spotting a large group of wild turkeys.

At first I didn't really believe that there were wild turkeys in the area, but I found a check list of Santa Clara County birds for bird watchers. And, sure enough, there are wild turkeys year-round in the area. I'm going to bring my camera next time so that next time I see any neat birds or creatures, I can get a few good shots.

Poker Update and a Comeback Tale

Edited to correct the flopped straight hand.

Played two sessions this week with CK. Though the first session was highly profitable (+$517), it was a bit tense due to a two separate incidences of trash talk directed at me.

The first incident, I made a T-high flush on the river which also put a 4 straight on the board. I get raised and I 3-bet. My opponent calls, and he pretty much stares at the board as if he lost. Then he turns over his winner... an obvious slowroll. When another player asked him about his slowroll, he looks me in the eye and then says something to the effect of wanting me to feel really happy and good before crushing me. I proceeded to make it my duty to destroy him, and eventually he lost all his chips, rebought for another $120, and then lost it all before leaving.

At some point I get moved to another table, and there's this guy that is up a lot... he's got about $800 in front of him, and he's in great spirits. I am pretty sure I've played with him before, and he thinks he is much better than he really is, and loves to play way too aggressively. Anyway, one of my early hands at this new table, I open raise AJo in MP. I proceed to win the hand, and this guy tells the table how I'm a clown that raises trash like Ace-Jack.

I ignore him... and, later on I raise QQ and the flop comes Jack high with a 3. I bet the whole way and get popped on a 3 river. I am shown a ragged 3, and the guy laughs and tells me that's what happens when I play like a clown and raise with AJ. He tells me that since now that he knows I raise garbage like AJ, I'm going to get called down. I'm thinking to myself, wow... that makes absolutely no sense, but that's cool. I just have to wait for the cards even themselves out. If it happens, then this guy's going to give it all back. It didn't take too long, mostly because he way overplayed his hands. A few hours later, he has lost everything and heads home... a sad, sad loser.

Anyway, tonight's session started off horribly. I won a single pot in the first 2 1/2 hours, and it wasn't long before I was stuck a nice $380. I had bought my 3rd rack at this point. There weren't any really sick beats... it was just steady losing with solid hands that flopped decently. Often, I was simply behind to bigger hands... AQ vs AK twice, for example. After the dry spell, a few hands held up and I was only stuck about a rack. I was feeling pretty confident. The game was really quite good still.

The turning point for my night was a family pot where I limped in with K6h on the button. The big blind raises, and then some guy in EP 3-bets it all in. Everyone calls, so I go ahead and call two more bets... I mean, really, it's a family pot. I either hit this flop or I don't. The big blind caps it, and we see the flop 9 ways for 4 bets each, save for the one all-in guy who only put in 3 bets.

As most of you know, I'm a luckbox supreme. The flop comes K96 with 2 diamonds, and we get to the turn with 3 players for 4 bets apiece plus the all-in guy. The turn is a beautiful Kd, and the pre-flop capper bets into me. I raise, and he calls me down. I cracked his red AA, and scoop a monster. That hand put me ahead slightly, and I never really looked back after that.

There was another monster pot where I had JTo in the big blind. I see the 789 rainbow flop for free, and I get a ton of action from a guy that is drawing to a runner-runner chop with 56 for the other end of the straight. My nuts remain the nuts, and we go for a total of 4 bets (3-ways) on the flop, 1 bet (only the 56 caller) on the turn, and 3 bets on the river. Ka-ching!

The table eventually got short (4 - 6 handed), and I pretty much switched up my game to adjust to the new situation. The others mostly did not, and so I was able to run up a good bit more before the table broke. After being 3 racks deep, I cash out for a total of $911... a.k.a. a $311 profit. WOOT!

11 wins in 12 sessions... maybe I'll be able to furnish the house quicker than I expected. Heh.

Hot Water!

After having to shower with cold water for 4 days, the water heater has been fixed. It turns out that it was improperly installed. The water heater in my garage, as I learned last night, is slightly different than most. It's a direct-vent model.

I don't know much about these things, but basically, there's an intake tube and an exhaust pipe that sits inside it. And, for whatever reason, the main outer tube was sealed tight as it should be, but the inner tube was not sealed at all. The end result was the burner would not have enough oxygen to consume, which in turn would lead to the flame going out completely.

The water heater guy was here for over two hours diagnosing the problem and re-installing the venting part of the system, and not long after I had hot water again. One annoying thing though... I'm going to have to get reimbursed for the $239 repair. The builder and its contractors thought it was a defective unit, and they contacted the manufacturer, who sent out the guy that came yesterday. But, since it was not a warranty issue, I had to cough up some cash to pay for the repair, since it was already late when the guy showed.

Cold Showers Are Efficient

The big move is done, and I'm still really quite sore from all the heavy lifting. The move was pretty much completed by just 3 of us, CK, QB, and me. All in all, the actual moving time was around 5 hours or so, so it wasn't too bad. In addition to all that was in my smallish medium-sized single bedroom apartment, we got a few more pieces of furniture from QB's place.

Both QB and CK were pretty good at visualizing how to manuever the different pieces of furniture. I pretty much sucked at it. At one point I had almost convinced myself that one of the pieces could never make it up the stairs, but I was proven wrong. Hah.

Anyway, the move was completed smoothly, but even so, we were all pretty exhausted. And, so what do most people want to do after sweaty labor? Probably take a nice hot shower to relieve the stress in the muscles and then relax. What did I do? I took a frigid shower, because the water heater is apparently malfunctioning.

The builder sent one of the construction/maintenance guys to take a look at it today, and sure enough it's busted. So, they contacted the water heater company on my behalf. A dispatcher then called me to confirm that they had dispatched the service call and that I'd be getting a call about it. I received no further call, and by the time I called back about an hour later, they were already out for the day. Pretty annoying.

Anyway, I'm not going to die without hot water. And, after taking a couple cold ones, I'm getting pretty efficient at washing up. Other than being deprived the luxury of hot water, the 'living in the new place' experience has been good. I no longer have to hear random people talking loudly all night, listen to the deep bass beats emanating from the living room wall, or have to put up with the loud bathroom vent that comes on each time my apartment neighbor decides to drop the kids off at two in the morning.

The other day, we saw a pack of wild hogs cross the street. Anyone up for a lechón party? Ha ha.

Minesweeper: The Movie

I saw this being posted up in a few places, so there's a fair chance you've already seen it. But, I'm putting it up for those who haven't, because I thought it was pretty good.

Continue to Run Well

Played twice this week... one session of 6/12 with Captain Kings, and one session of the 8/16 with half-kill since I went solo. The games are still ridiculously good, but after playing two 8/16 sessions so far, it does seem like the competition is a bit stiffer. This isn't so much the case over at Bay101, where there's almost no difference in skill level between the 6/12 and 8/16, except that the game is a bit wilder.

At the table tonight, there were at least 2 other players that were solid, as opposed to the usual none at the 6/12. Luckily, there were also a few horrible players that made the game great. No really exciting hands to report, but I will say that I witnessed the craziest dealer-related accomplishment.

So, we're a full 9-handed game, and this one dealer sits and tells us that he's been trying to get better at dealing faster and moving games along quicker to increase his pay. And, let me tell you how sick it was. He did not make any mistakes at all in dealing 30 hands in his 28 minute down. Yes, that's right... 30 hands.

Sure, he was helped by maybe 3 hands that were chops. But, overall he was awesome. If only all dealers could aspire to be like him. Card rooms ought to give a daily bonus of say $200 to the best dealer each day as incentive to deal correctly and quickly. I would have to think that such an incentive would pay for itself, since hands are raked at a $4 rate. Hard to make it fair, but who cares how fair it really is... it's a bonus after all.

Anyway, the two sessions were profitable putting me at 3 in a row. The 6/12 session was + (Area Code of Rochester, Minnesota), and the 8/16 session was + (Area Code for most of San Diego). Haha, I'm so lame.

Fear in the Markets

Wow, what a crazy day for the market. It's been a really wild and volatile ride recently. The fear is really becoming apparent... check out the Volatility Index (^VIX). The last time we saw readings as high as we saw today was back in February/March of 2003. I think it's safe to say that, it really is fear in the markets we're seeing.

Here's a 1-year chart of the VIX.


I might be crazy, but I think that there will be some really good buying opportunities in the beaten-down (for good reason) financials. I would like to get some Goldman Sachs (GS) yielding 1% at $140. Bank of America (BAC) looks worthwhile, and it doesn't hurt that Buffet has been adding to his position there. You could probably even speculate on Countrywide Financial (CFC) at some point. If we see this financial sector meltdown continue, I will probably begin building a position in this sector via the S&P Financial Select Spider ETF (XLF).

If I had more funds today, I think I'd start buying some of the more conservative blue chip names that have been taken down with the rest of the market. I guess that I'm hoping that the overall market stays low and that the Financials take a bigger hit as I raise cash to make a few moves.

The Portfolio Today and a Few House Pics

As most of you know, I had to do a large amount of selling in order to close on the house I recently purchased. Here is what the Long-Term Portfolio's allocation looks like at the moment. I hope to be adding more funds and spreading out a few purchases soon to help reduce the high concentration.

Altria Group	MO	30.1%
Student Loan	STU	13.2%
General Electric	GE	12.4%
First Marblehead	FMD	9.8%
Glatfelter	GLT	8.3%
Eastman Kodak	EK	8.1%
International Game Tech.	IGT	6.9%
Fortune Brands	FO	6.6%
Yahoo!	YHOO	4.7%

So, there you have it. That's what the portfolio looks like after today's market sell-off. I still hold Compucredit (CCRT), eBay (EBAY), and Wet Seal (WTSLA) in the Trading Portfolio. Only EBAY is a currently up for me, the other two are solidly underwater.

Anyway, I'm going to put up a few random pics of the house. If you are on Facebook, I have put up a much larger collection there. So, find me and friend me if you care to see more.

Some background... the house has 4 bedrooms and a completely built-out loft, which will most likely act as a game room, and it has 2 1/2 bathrooms. It is also fully upgraded and is already professionally landscaped. This really helps, since I'm not so handy. Though, I did spend a good chunk of time sealing the granite counter tops over the weekend.

Aside from the house itself, the lot is small, and nearby houses are packed pretty tightly... I'm lucky not to have my backyard butting up against a neighbor. Well, that's the Bay Area for you. We pay such a disgusting premium up here compared to most of the country.

Enjoy the pictures!

View from Upstairs Window

Master Bathroom

Kitchen

Game Room / Loft

Bedroom / Office

Half of the Backyard

The Margarets

Each year our company hosts a couple of interns from Norway who are here studying as part of an entrepreneurship program. Anyway, their last day at our company was last week, and as a going away gift, one of them gave me a CD with tracks from a soon-to-be released album by her fiancé's band, The Margarets. Yay, for getting gifts, because I'm the most awesome lunch time partner.

I did get to meet her fiancé when he was out here visiting. He was really a laid back and chill guy. But, other than small talk over a few beers at a company event, I didn't know much about him or his music. I have to admit I didn't know what to expect from the CD, as all I knew was that the band considers their music to be in the Brit Pop genre.

So, I listened to the album through once, and I thought it was alright; it certainly wasn't bad. Usually, I have to give music a second or third try before it really grows on me (or I end up not so into it). And, that's exactly what I did. I gave it a few more listens, and well, I have to say that the band's music has definitely grown on me a bit.

The band has a nice, sweet sound. In some of the tracks, I definitely get a Simon and Garfunkel feel. In others, I sense some Beatles, and maybe even hints of some U2. I really don't know, but I am totally digging most of the tracks. There are a few that don't really do it for me, but overall, the album's quite good.

Check out their MySpace page to listen to a few tracks. I think their song, The Woods, is fairly catchy. I also like Twenty Years Erased quite a bit. There are other songs on my 'pre-release' bootleg that are also excellent, but I have no idea what their names are, since all I've got is basically a CDR with untitled tracks.

Anyway, that's it... keep your eye out for them if they do make it out to your neck of the woods. You (probably) heard about The Margarets here first!

The Mind and Interpretation

I read this not long ago on another forum, but I thought it was interesting, so I'm going to share it here.

Take the following sentence: No head injury is too small to ignore.

Now, think about what the literal interpretation of that sentence implies... does it imply that we should treat all head injuries, or that we should be ignoring all head injuries?

Most people, including myself, think the above statement says that we should treat all head injuries. But, that is actually not what that statement is telling us to do at all. Re-read it carefully to see if you can see why. I think it is neat how our mind is quick to correct syntactical errors if we have some formulated opinion as to what is the most reasonable interpretation.

Had the sentence been: No head injury is X to Y.

We would interpret it as it is written, since we have no bias. Anyway, I find all of this interesting.

If you still aren't quite seeing the error in the first sentence, take a look at the following sentence.

The man is too tall to drive a Lotus. This says that the man can't drive a Lotus, because he's too tall. This sentence makes sense... a Lotus is a small car, so if you're too tall you probably would have difficulty driving it.

Now, let's replace the with no.

No man is too tall to drive a Lotus. This clearly means that all men are short enough to drive a Lotus, since there does not exist a man that is too tall to drive one.

Finally, let's go back to the original sentence.

No head injury is too small to ignore. This must mean that all head injuries are big enough to ignore, since no head injury is too small to be ignored. It is clear that this sentence is nonsensical; it implies that we prefer to ignore large head injuries over small ones. Additionally, it tells us that all head injuries are of a size that grants them admission into the 'large' category.

Apparently, this nonsensical sentence comes from Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. I assume that Carrol did this on purpose, after all, he is known for literary nonsense.

Global Warming Debate Continues

I have not followed all of the controversy on Global Warming really closely. But, from time to time I do read a bit about what others have been saying about it. Not long ago a top NASA official came out and gave his opinion on the subject... that global warming is probably not an issue, and that it'd be arrogant for those who claim the opposite to say that today's environment is optimal. About a year ago, I put up a quick post after reading an older speech given by Michael Crichton that I found thought-provoking.

Anyway, fast forward to today. The Science and Public Policy Institute came out with a press release providing some historical evidence to counter claims made in this recent Newsweek article about Global Warming.

Who knows which side is really right, but I do believe that for the most part, the opinions held by the general population are heavily influenced by how and by whom the data is presented. Most of us really have no idea about the actual science behind much of it. I'm certainly not so arrogant to claim that one side is right or wrong, but as usual, I'm eager to hear cases presented by both sides.

Let's just hope that the 'winning' side, if there ever is one, wins through real science and not for any other reason.

On Record

Well, I guess it's done now... I just got confirmation that the lender funded yesterday and I'm now officially on record as the new homeowner. Now, I'll just cross my fingers and hope (really, really hope) that I'm not completing this purchase at the edge of a cliff.

Assuming there's not a sick drop in house prices, which is definitely possible given the mortgage industry turmoil, I got a bit lucky in timing. I did a lot of the stock liquidation in the first half of July. And, now I'm hearing that Jumbo mortgage rates have spiked recently. I was able to lock in a 30-yr fixed at a 6.625% with no points and none of those b.s. loan origination fees. At the time, I was a bit bummed, since that was a bit higher than it was just a month before I locked. Today, I doubt I could get anywhere near that rate.

So, I'll be picking up keys later, and I'll probably take a few pictures of the empty house.

Hits from Get Rich Slowly and Quick Poker Update

So, I just got back not too long ago from a nice session at Garden City. Anyway, I was surprised to see that I had hundreds of hits on my blog. This is highly unusual... I probably average around 25 hits a day. This blog is kind of like a life journal for me. I never really expect anybody to read it, although I'm really glad that I do have some regular readers, and a few randoms that pop in every now and then.

The reason for the hits was a link on Get Rich Slowly to an older post I had written about compounding. GRS is a really popular blog (my RSS manager says that there are over 1400 subscribers). I personally like the site, as it's got advice that is helpful for a lot of different types of people, ranging from the financially challenged to the sophisticated financial whiz. Check it out if you've never seen it.

In any case, one guy did post a comment on GRS regarding the naiveté of the calculations I did in that piece, and ya, he's right about the oversimplification, but it doesn't take away from the fact that how compounding works isn't obvious to the layperson.

If any of you coming from GRS are reading this... Welcome! You should expect mostly just random life experiences, stock market investing talk, and poker-related gibberish. If that's not your cup of tea, then I guess here's my chance to say good-bye. Hehe.

On to the quick poker update...

I sat in the 8/16, which has a half-kill. For those not in the know, this basically means that if someone wins a pot twice in a row, the next hand becomes a half-kill hand, meaning that the stakes are raised to 12/24. If a full kill had been invoked, the stakes would be at 16/32.

Anyway, to make a long story short, I ran good in the first hour or so, and won about $500. Flopping quads with 77 (J77 flop), and having 99 river his 9 definitely falls into this category. Not long after that hand, the table broke. I was reseated almost immediately, I managed to pick up another $300 or so. After that, I ran pretty badly. Mostly had a bunch of amazingly good draws that didn't come in, and a few rough rivers. So, I gave most of that back, and finished at a solid +$551.

The Pain In Planning For Italy

Some of you know about the upcoming Italy trip that QB and I have been planning for some time. We booked the flights a while back, and we also booked a few of the hotel nights then as well. And, recently we've been working on trying to book the rest of the nights of our 2-week trip. We decided not to do a packaged tour, because we really enjoy having a more flexible schedule where we can do as we please. It looks like that luxury will cost not only additional money, but some extra headaches in planning for the trip.

It's been a serious pain just doing something simple, like booking hotels. First off, a ton of these Italian hotels are tiny. By tiny, I mean 15 rooms or fewer. This makes it relatively easy for the better ones to sell out quickly. Also, to add to the difficulty, it is not wise to judge a hotel by its star-class. Based on reading a ton of reviews, a 3-star hotel can mean anything from an absolute crap hole up to a decent, clean place with no frills.

Additionally, you really have to pay attention to hotel location. Best bet is to go by the reviews on TripAdvisor. They seem to have a ton of reviews on most hotels, so I'm hoping that relying on what's said is as effective as the Ask the Audience lifeline in the Millionaire game show. Hotels listed as being a part of one city might actually end up quite far from where you want to be.

One other thing that is a bit annoying is that hotels aren't on all the travel sites. I've had decent luck finding hotels on Venere, Expedia, and Travelocity, but honestly, it's sort of hit or miss whether a specific hotel is on a particular site. Oh, and since I'm pretty much ranting now, a lot of these hotels don't have any sort of online booking system. So, if you can't find it on a travel site, you have to e-mail them and request pricing and availability. They then send you e-mail back and you go back and forth with them to reserve your room.

Anyway, I hope the trip is worth it. We'll be gone for a couple of weeks at the end of September. We've got a basic itinerary planned, and I think it'll work out well. We will be starting out in Rome, then hit Naples, Siena, Florence, Bologna, and Venice before we get to Milan and head back home. Hopefully, we'll find the time to stop by Verona and also do a day trip or two to check out other attractions like the Leaning Tower in Pisa. I hope the Euro takes a hit in the next few weeks, but I know that's seriously wishful thinking.

CT Weirdness

Only a quick thought about another word related curiosity that I popped in my head earlier.

What is the deal with the suffixes -er and -or for verbs ending in -ct to describe an object performing the specified action?

Here are some -ct verbs that use the -or suffix.

act -- actor
react -- reactor
extract -- extractor
elect -- elector
collect -- collector
eject -- ejector
inspect -- inspector
abduct -- abductor

But, what puzzles me is how come some other -ct verbs are blessed with the flexibility of both -er and -or suffixes?

neglect -- neglecter; neglector
reject -- rejecter; rejector
detect -- detecter; detector
concoct -- concocter; concoctor

And, what is with the only -ct verb that I could find that only allows the -er suffix. Seriously, what gives? Maybe there are other words that fit in this category, but I can't think of any.

subtract -- subtracter

That's all I really wanted to say.

That Which Gives Also Takes Away

CK and I went to Garden again tonight. I was hoping to extend the streak, but alas, I failed. I started off the session pretty typically... playing well and up about $100. That was rather short-lived, and soon I got a taste of running cold, as I get rivered mercilessly. One of the many times that I got jacked on the river was CK's QT that took out my AA. He opened with QT, and I 3-bet him. The flop came J -T-rag, a K came on the turn which pretty much committed him. The river gave him trip T's, and that was that.

What followed was hours of being card dead and slowly bleeding chips. I had to buy in for another rack, but it wasn't too long after that when I started getting cards again. I worked my way back up and once again I peaked at around $100 in profit. And, then I received a ton of great starting hands, which pretty much never held up. Basically, I was outflopped way more than I should have been, and when I did flop good, runner-runner beats finished me off.

Even when I was hit with what I thought was a big blind special, I was crushed. I had 84s in the big blind, and I get a free look at the flop. It comes 44J, and I check-raise the flop, getting a few callers, led on the turn when a 5 hit, and got check-raised by the SB on an A river. Apparently, I was drawing to 1 out. I guess his JJ wasn't worth a raise pre-flop. Sometimes you just gotta laugh it off.

Anyway, I can't complain about the cards I got near the end of the session. I'd love to get all those big starters again. Too bad it just didn't work out for me tonight. AA held up 1 time out of 4, KK held up 0 out of 4, QQ held up both times I got it, and JJ never held up, and once it cost me quite a bit of money when the final board showed T948Q and KJ was in the other guy's possession.

In summary, I was up then down then up then down for the count. The session was a disappointing -$394 (just under 33 bets). The table was still incredibly fishy, and I'd have loved to play more, but sometimes you've just gotta call it a night when things aren't going your way.

The Garden Keeps On Giving

I know that I'm starting to sound like a broken record, but that's just how good I've been running. Tonight, Captain K's and I hit up Garden City again for some more 6/12. A good 6 hours later, I cash out just over 4 racks for a nice 51 big bet win.

Captain K's ran pretty bad and still managed a small win. That says a lot about the juiciness of these games. While I did have few big hands, the bulk of the money came from the basic top pair strong kicker type of hands that got paid off by donators. I definitely had my share of beats.

I lost with KK the one time I got it, and QQ won one time out of three. I never did get Aces, and the one flush I did make ended up costing me a lot when a lady filled up on the river. Unfortunately, I put her on the wrong hand and it cost me extra money.

All in all, it was a pretty typical session. That is until about 1am when a crazy drunk guy would basically straddle and blind 3-bet 100% of the time he was under the gun. Then, he told the table he would continue to bet blind until raised, at which point he would be 'allowed' to look at his hole cards. That made for a fun and profitable hour. Too bad he didn't last longer.

Anyway, that's the quick poker update. The streak stands at 6. Yay!