Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Spike Me?

OK, first off, I'm a huge Buffy fan. Huge. I own all the DVDs and even have almost all the seasons of Angel on DVD as well. I even wanted to buy two dogs and name one Spike and one Buffy. Riley was really really really hawt, but I must admit I'm a Spike lover in the end. Imagine my shock when I took the test I found on Butch Howard's Blog and found out that:

Monday, January 28, 2008

The Cheetah

Cheetah

Length: 35 feet

A cheetah may look harmless, but this speedster has a dangerous side. So does this pattern - with a fast scoring pace and play near the gutter, there's no room for error.



Description: Cheetah measures 35 feet in length and is the shortest of the five patterns. Sometimes used on lane surfaces that are well worn, it tries to maximize the area on the lane with less wear, which is usually extemely close to the gutter. Because of this, players tend to migrate toward those spots to take advantage of the more pristine surface areas. The cheetah is exciting for its ability to allow players to make "risk-reward" decisions based on playing near the gutter. The scoring pace is normally medium to high for this pattern.

I started bowling in a PBA Experience league designed to give house bowlers a chance to bowl on PBA lane conditions. The Cheetah is the first pattern we tried this last Sunday and we will bowl it again this Sunday but I am *cough* unable to bowl *cough* because of a prior engagement *cough* poker tournament *cough*.

I read the information sheet on the pattern and they recommended that you play as far outside as you could get as the middle was heavy with oil. Yeah. Right. I couldn't get my ball far enough out there. I kept coming in light and leaving headpin splits. Eff that.

I bowled a stellar 156 the first game and was not the low man on my team. D'oh. Somehow we managed to win that game. Towards the end of the first game I decided a straighter shot was my weapon of choice.

The second game I was able to pick up my spares and run some strikes together for a 200+ game but I proceeded to fall apart again the last game. I couldn't pick up a spare for anything. I finished with a lovely 145.

The miracle is that we managed to win all our games. Luckily the other team struggled as much as we did. Unfortunately, this is supposed to the be easiest of the patterns. Oh joy.

Tonight we bowled on the regular house pattern. I decided to go back to my Blade for a while. I seem to be able to do more with it than I can with my NV. I just had both balls de-oiled and resurfaced. They both look amazing and are performing well but the Blade really gets going for me more than the NV right now.

I've switched to using the NV for my spare ball and the Blade for my strike ball when I had been doing the reverse. I bowled 235, 194 and 215 tonight for a 644 series. That's the best night I have had in a long time. I think I'll stick with that for a while.



Poker Railing

We all do it. Most days it's like watching paint dry unless the player tells you his hole cards.

Virge once let me watch his desktop with some video conferencing software that his employer used but it wasn't the greatest clarity and there was a horrible lag.

Today he turned me on to Mikogo. This is really slick. It's free and easy to set up. Register for your account and install the software. Once the software is installed you start a conference and it gives you the number. Give the number out to whoever wants to watch your desktop. They don't have to have an account just the conference number.

The best part is that you can select how much or little of your desktop you want them to see. You can also let them take control if you want. It's much more exciting to watch/rail/sweat poker when you can see all the action.

I have been walking my mother through a lot of computer related stuff lately and, frankly, I've come close to killing her. It's a good thing she's a continent away. I'm having her install this on her computer so that I can control her desktop and show her how to use her computer and the software on it. There's nothing like the visual of seeing someone else do it for you. Hopefully she'll be able to function on her own real soon.

Give it a whirl. Indulge your inner voyeur. It's fun to see other people's desktops. Where are you hiding the pron?

Sunday, January 27, 2008

Rock Star

Wait a second, he IS A ROCK STAR!
I'd hit it. Just sayin.

Saturday, January 26, 2008

Roccopalooza Day 2

Despite waking up at 1:30 to let T stumble into the room I was unable to snooze in late as planned. I guess that's what happens when you hit that certain age where your body just refuses to NOT wake up.

I strolled over to the registration/breakfast area and grabbed some eats and headed back to the room. OMGWTF my ears are FROZEN. Turns out the temperature was -1° with a windchill of -14°. D'oh. I made a pot of coffee and fired up the laptop.

T slowly gained consciousness. I called the Poker Party Room to see what the status of the mystery guest was only to be informed that we would hear from him when he arrived.

After slurping down a pot of decaf while T made her high octane we get the call. The mystery guest was on his way to our room with Rocco! We were stumped. He wasn't anybody we'd seen before. I made a stab with a guess of Entegee and he was impressed when I nailed it! Wooooooot! Not bad for somebody I'd hardly heard of.


You think Huck and Entegee have some history?

We decided it was time to get some poker going and headed to the Poker room where there was some sign of life. Knighty showed up just in time for "Shuffle up and Deal!". Rocco drew the "Jesus Seat" left of Huck. If Huck raised you knew Rocco was calling. And he did. And he did... and he did. Only once did a hand of Rocco's hold up though. He managed to get it all in with an OESD that hit on the river. NH Rocco!



Huck was getting his game on again when he called REV's allin with 45o. I'm sure REV was not happy when he saw this flop and the turn sealed his fate.



I was definitely not PERKY this morning, nobody was. Maybe this will explain why:


Reload?

We all start getting hungry for lunch and WTF?! Pizza!?!?!? You must be kidding me! But no, we ordered pizza knowing we were going out to a famous Chicago pizzaria for dinner. WTF were we thinking?

Pizza: the official meal of Roccopalooza.

D'oh.



After a brief nap and shower we meet before dinner to show off our new "EFF ROCCO" tshirts. They were a hit.


Eff Rocco!



We even wore them out to dinner!

It was back to the Poker Party Room for more, yeah, you guessed it, poker. This time we had a table of LO8 and one of S8. I played a little O8 - not my favorite game - then cashed out to join Rocco on the couch. We had the tv going but not much of interest was on until we stumbled on to an episode of the WSOP Tunica Circuit Event that Daniel Negreanu won.


No, I wasn't sleeping just resting.

I called it a night as soon as that was over. I have no knowledge of what went on after I went to bed. None. Don't even ask. I know nothing. Nothing, I say.

Friday, January 25, 2008

Politics



I took this test I saw on SirWALGman's blog. What it doesn't show is that I got the same score for Obama but disagreed on one more topic.

I haven't really thought that much about the presidential race so far but I was already sure I was voting for the Democratic candidate.

Regardless of who we end up with, I really want a leader with a strong moral foundation who hires only the best and brightest AND MOST HONEST & REPUTABLE people he/she can find. I'm tired of all these corrupt government officials. I'll just leave it at that.

Brrrrrrrrrr!

WTF!?!?!? Srsly?

I gotta go bowling in this weather?

Eff Me.

Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Roccopalooza Day 1

The drive up to Chicago was far more pleasant than I thought it would be. Props to T for the TomTom she gave me for Xmas. I definitely heart my TomTom!

I picked DTM up on the way and he proceeded to lob me softballs that I hit outta the park of course. He asked why I was so mean and I replied, "You make it too easy, duh!"

Thankfully, Huck had already checked into the Poker Party Palace and told the nice lady at the desk to let us have a key since my room wasn't ready yet. Dan and I hauled the two tables and 16 chairs, chips, cards and Poker Party Paraphernalia up two flights of stairs tyvm.



We then head out the official liquor store of Roccopalooza: Famous Liquors. I called T and took her order as we filled a basket with goodies. We head back with our haul and unpack as Huck, Rocco and Knighty arrive. They immediately head out to... wait for it, wait for it... the official liquor store of Roccopalooza: Famous Liquors.



Alrighty then. Now that the fridge is stocked it's time to play some POKER!



The five of us start a .10/.25 NLHE cash game. T was the next to arrive (if I remember correctly) then Asian finally found his way to the hotel after something like 5 phone calls. Hard to believe that boy only lives 20 minutes away!

Huck started off donking it up like the Huck we know and love. He had already rebought once maybe even twice when this hand came up. I took a free flop 3 ways with Huck and Dan with Q7o. The flop AQX. Huck fires out A DOLLAH and I call knowing he's full of it. I don't remember if Dan called. Huck fires a couple more DOLLAHS on the turn when a blank hits and I say "I'm all in". He goes into the tank and says he had a part of that and eventually folds his Q face up and then I flash him mine. I had his kicker by one pip. This was the start of a glorious evening.

Side note: what is it about playing live cash that makes you think that calling a bet with a lonely little $1 chip is the thing to do on a board like that when, if I were playing online, I would have insta-folded that hand? $1 seems like so much more money when you are throwing it around on Full Tilt. We ended up with over $400 on this table. Do you ever see that on a .10/.25 table on Full Tilt? Ok, let me qualify that: any table that's NOT the Forum Table?

MTPockets, eriver, Sly round out the cast of characters when I hit my biggest pot. Eriver raised to $1 utg, Huck calls, I call with TT, and then I get up to look at T's cards cause she's off somewhere. MTPockets is between T and I and he reraises to $4 nanoseconds after I say "Oh, T's calling (the $1)". I then said, "Ok, now she's gonna have to decide for herself." T had 99 and opted to call the $4 as did eriver, Huck and I. The flop came down AQT. Woooooot! I hit bottom set and I'm hoping somebody has AQ and doesn't suck out on me. Eriver led for $10 and with $42+ behind I shoved (I bought in for $20 and had chipped up partly when I hit top two v Asians bluff shove!).


All in? Orly?

MT goes into the tank for a few and decides to call. The shocker was when eriver called as well. Eriver was on a heart draw and MT had AK. He later said it was a donkey call and I have to agree because he was waaaaay behind even just AQ at that point. My TT holds and I take down a HUGE pot.



The cash games breaks up and we decide to play a 6-handed PLO tournament. This is my first time ever playing PLO live. It took a while for us to figure out what a pot bet and raise were but I think we finally got it.

Did I mention that we started drinking as soon as we had booze?

Man I can't believe I left THAT part out.

Early on I had a wheel wrap draw that hit on the river and took some chips off of MT. He wasn't too happy with me but I did have outs. I was surprised at how fast people went out. I used the same structure I use for my home game and it's pretty slow. No need to donk it up. But I guess that's what happens when you give people 4 cards!

We had the final table around level 3 or 4 (20 minute levels) and the next 2 went out pretty fast. The bubble was upon us. Sly was the SB to my BB and he limped in. I popped it with a nicely suited Ace hand and he called. The flop came down A34 and Sly leads into me. Now, I'd been trying to represent a big hand and I did have an A so I re-popped him essentially putting him all in. Sly went into the tank and I really didn't want to a call here. Eventually he did call with A4 for two pair. Shit! After the turn I was drawing dead to a 7, not a good place to be but OMGWTF! the river was a 7 sending Sly home on the booble as my French ami Compton would say. Sorry Sly!


ITM Bitches!

This did nothing to improve my image with MTPockets; he was still whining about that wheel hand. MT takes T out and we end up headups. We push the same few chips back and forth for a while when we get to a hand we both want to get it all in with. He flopped top and bottom and I flopped middle set on a T64 board. My set of 6s holds up and I'm the Winnah! Woooooot!

As soon as T got knocked out I heard the words "strip club" and then the room was practically empty. I was like, um WTF!?!?!? did you bitches leave me here to go to a strip club!?!?!

So, it's 11:30 and I BUZZED! SRSLY BUZZED! I decided to take the rest of my stuff to my room. Once I got there I wasn't in the mood for any more drinking or poker and I crashed. The phone rings at 1:30 and a voice says T is trashed, let her in the door at the same time I'm opening the door. She falls the two steps in the door to her sofa bed and crashes without a word. I don't know what made me do it but I fixed up her bed before I crashed. Good thing, too.

I'm still pissed about the strip club. Srsly.

Stay tuned for Day 2!

Tuesday, January 22, 2008

Viggo Baby!

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll get to Roccopolooza soon.


In the mean time enjoy this NSFW video. Click through if you are using a reader.

Just to warm you up, some chat with my buddy T:

zooks: omg I have to watch the video
zooks: but it's nsfw
zooks: I'll save it for later
khan: gawd he is hot
zooks: uh huh
zooks: yah huh
zooks: yeah baby
zooks: do me, do me now, do me hard
khan: a guy we actually agree on
khan: lol
khan: omg hes nekkid
zooks: what are the odds THAT video will end up on my blog?
zooks: only like 100000000%
zooks: btw, this chat, in blog
zooks: count on it
khan: penis goes by too fast, i need to pause
zooks: lol
khan: DAMN IT
zooks: no, we will be buying that dvd
zooks: I assure you
khan: hehehe
khan: 50 HD
zooks: uh huh
zooks: lol
khan: oh i saw it that time
zooks: and you'll rip it for me
zooks: hahahhahahah
khan: holy fuck thats a nasty fight scene
khan: POPCORN

Saturday, January 19, 2008

Friday, January 18, 2008

Roccopalooza!

OMGWTF!!!!!

It's here! Who knew it would arrive so fast?!

My car is packed with tables, chairs, chips, cards, felts.... I think you know where I'm going with this.

I'm off for a weekend of poker and degeneracy with my favorite people on the planet! Chicago may never be the same again.

Stay tuned for updates and pics.

Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Bowling Brag

Zooks99 bowled his best game ever last Saturday and I was there to see it! He struck out the 10th frame! Wooooooooooooot!


My Baby is a Bowler!



As many teams do, we play poker as we bowl. You draw 2 cards for a strike, 1 card for a spare and 2 cards for a converted split. Some teams let you keep all the cards while others make you keep only 5 and throw away the rest. We only keep 5 but we use two decks so there's no reshuffling of the discards.

It can get a little exciting when somebody hits 4 or 5 of a kind. Last night I managed to get an open ended straight flush draw. Even with 2 decks I was drawing to only 4 outs and one was already dead - I needed either an 8c or a 3c and one of the 8s was already discarded.

I throw a strike and come back to get my two cards. I'm thrilled when I see 8c9c! Wooooooot I got my 8c!

Uh, HOLY SHIT!

I got a 9c, tooooooo!


Wooooooooooot!


My team is so happy for me!

Sunday, January 13, 2008

Full Tilt Loves Me

Too much.

I wheel on 5th. He has to boat or catch the case K to get half the pot. Sigh.




Full Tilt Poker Game #4849651211: Table Frandosa - $0.25/$0.50 Ante $0.05 - Limit Stud H/L - 19:40:57 ET - 2008/01/13
Seat 1: gadzooks64 ($11.55)
Seat 2: JennAce ($0) is sitting out
Seat 3: Thomwilson ($9.45)
Seat 4: cryontheriver ($15.95)
Seat 5: actors5 ($12.65)
Seat 6: VoipGW ($17.75)
Seat 7: Jddd ($18.90)
Seat 8: Lucas67 ($4.20)
VoipGW antes $0.05
cryontheriver antes $0.05
actors5 antes $0.05
Thomwilson antes $0.05
Lucas67 antes $0.05
gadzooks64 antes $0.05
Jddd antes $0.05
*** 3RD STREET ***
Dealt to Jddd [ ]
Dealt to Lucas67 [ ]
Dealt to gadzooks64 [ ] [ ]
Dealt to Thomwilson [ ]
Dealt to cryontheriver [ ]
Dealt to actors5 [ ]
Dealt to VoipGW [ ]
gadzooks64 is low with [ ]
JennAce stands up
gadzooks64 brings in for $0 .10
Thomwilson folds
cryontheriver folds
JadeFrog adds $5
actors5 folds
VoipGW completes it to $0.25
Jddd folds
Lucas67 folds
gadzooks64 calls $0.15
*** 4TH STREET ***
Dealt to gadzooks64 [ ] [ ]
Dealt to VoipGW [ ] [ ]
VoipGW bets $0.25
gadzooks64 raises to $0.50
VoipGW raises to $0.75
gadzooks64 raises to $1
VoipGW calls $0.25
*** 5TH STREET ***
Dealt to gadzooks64 [ ] [ ]
Dealt to VoipGW [ ] [ ]
VoipGW bets $0.50
gadzooks64 raises to $1
VoipGW has 15 seconds left to act
VoipGW raises to $1.50
gadzooks64 raises to $2
VoipGW calls $0.50
*** 6TH STREET ***
Dealt to gadzooks64 [ ] [ ]
Dealt to VoipGW [ ] [ ]
VoipGW bets $0.50
gadzooks64 calls $0.50
*** 7TH STREET ***
Dealt to gadzooks64 [ ] [ ]
VoipGW bets $0.50
gadzooks64 calls $0.50

Showdown :
VoipGW shows [ ] four of a kind Kings for high
gadzooks64 shows [ ] a straight Five high for high and 5 4 3 2 A for low
VoipGW wins the high pot ($4 .25) with four of a kind Kings
gadzooks64 wins the low pot ($4 .20) with 5 4 3 2 A

SUMMARY:
Total pot $8 .85 | Rake $0.40
Seat 1: gadzooks64 showed [ ] and won ($4.20) with HI: a straight Five high; LO: 5 4 3 2 A
Seat 2: JennAce is sitting out
Seat 3: Thomwilson folded on 3rd St .
Seat 4: cryontheriver folded on 3rd St.
Seat 5: actors5 folded on 3rd St.
Seat 6: VoipGW showed [ ] and won ($4.25) with HI: four of a kind Kings
Seat 7: Jddd folded on 3rd St .
Seat 8: Lucas67 folded on 3rd St.