darndangshootduggummitawhellnograciousme

I have spent the last 3 nights trying to beat the final level of this freaking game called The Conduit
And I fucking cant, admittedly I have read that this sequence of the game that takes place near a ruined version of the Jefferson Memorial is absolute nuts, but come on 3 frigging nights, a million deaths and i still cant beat this last leg/complete mission 1.

There are a million alien dumbass drones that attack me in swarms and waves and the fuck-face aliens just wont die. Fuck you SEGA.






Current state:

Ponderous

An old post from Jai that pretty much nails the topic top, dead and center (reproduced verbatim)

I have a friend who works for a bank in London. He’s doing well for himself but he thinks of his job as a necessary evil, something that must be survived for 10 hours each day while he tries to make time on the side for the things he really likes doing. His real passion, going back to our school days, is acting, and when I last met him he had just returned from a weekend trip to Ireland, to play a role in a short experimental film directed by a former classmate.

He loved the experience and couldn’t stop talking about it. “I wish I had the luxury of traveling to Dublin to be with those guys every week, he said, “or even just participating in three or four shows of a theatre performance in London each month. But it isn’t easy to juggle this along with the other stuff.” Looking at his eyes, I could see that the strain of the weekend was making itself felt. We parted after an early dinner; he was very tired and he needed to be at the bank – for “the other stuff” – at 9 AM.

It probably says something about the life I lead that such encounters come as minor jolts. At risk of causing serious annoyance, let me tell you something about myself: for the past seven years, my “work” has largely consisted of reading books, watching movies, and writing about them – all activities that I enjoy. There have, of course, been many commissioned assignments – which means often having to plough through less-than-engaging material – but after I established myself on my beat it became easier to pick and choose. Thus spoilt, I have to be regularly reminded of one of the most basic facts of human existence: that most working people in the world keep their professional and personal lives in separate, airtight boxes, and baulk when the two things chance to overlap; that they meticulously plan their weekends and weekday evenings (assuming they aren’t working late nights) and feel a bitter sense of loss if they don’t succeed in squeezing maximum utility from those precious pockets of “leisure time”.

Four years ago, I made another important career decision (with the help of a generous retainership offer from the newspaper I was employed with) and began working out of home, on my own time. Freelance writing may not be as lucrative as many other professions, but I rarely have to spend on books any more, and that’s where most of my money went in my pre-journalism days. It also means freedom from the ball-and-chain routine, freedom from neat and sterile office routines that make little sense to the writing life (what if the Muse goes AWOL between 9AM and 6 PM and comes calling at midnight instead?). It means being able to avoid the stress and the time-wastage associated with being stuck in Delhi traffic for over two hours each day.

I can spend quality time with my dog. I don’t have to shave every day, or every third day for that matter. Nor attend meetings or conferences, things that rank very high indeed in the long list of pointless manmade inventions based on the pretence that it’s possible to make sense of the world. Best of all, I don’t have to don formal clothes. (When I was a child, I wanted to be a vet. This partly had to do with love for animals, but I’ve come to believe that the real reason was the notion I had that vets weren’t required to wear ties or suits.)

And – to return to the all-important point with which I began this piece – there is no discernible divide between my “work” and my personal interests. I can spend my morning reading a great new novel by Orhan Pamuk (which is in fact what I did today), then watch a couple of films on DVD in the afternoon and evening (occasionally pausing to make little notes), and truthfully claim that I've spent the day adding value to my skill-set as a columnist/reviewer. My banker friend, who earns a lot more than I do, would probably agree that that really is luxury.

I see you turning green, reader, so here are a few crumbs of consolation: each of the benefits I’ve mentioned above comes with small minefields. It’s easy to become addicted to being anti-social. Getting out, even to go to the neighborhood mall, can feel like a chore. On the rare occasion that I do get into my car and travel a long distance, I find that my driving skills have deteriorated through disuse. Self-discipline is paramount in my line of work, and at times when it isn’t all coming together I find myself yearning for the extra shove that can only be provided by a martinet-boss. My dog is over-pampered and sulks mightily when I’m away for even a few hours. Power cuts, and visiting relatives who assume that because you’re home, you’re free, must be hazarded.

Turning something you enjoy doing into a career can be a tricky business in other ways; it can easily lead to a situation where you’re never really switched off from your “work”, and this can affect your family life. This is something I have to consciously guard against. My wife has standing instructions to smack me on the side of the head if things get out of hand. (Thankfully she’s a feature writer herself – albeit an office-going one – so she understands something of the compulsions of this life. But she’s afraid of discussing movies with me because I’m too “analytical”.)

All that said, would I trade this in for a regular working routine, or a high-paying job that I couldn’t be enthusiastic about? No way. Whenever I even consider it, I think back to a remote time in my past, a time when I had just graduated in Commerce from college and seemed set for a career in chartered accountancy (because it was the done thing, the inevitable thing. I’d been good in Maths and Accounts in school, so what else was there?). There’s a vivid memory of interning for my Articles in a middle-rung CA’s office, reading out and making tick-marks against debit and credit entries in an office ledger under the supervision of a genial man with whom there was nothing I could really talk about, while I secretly daydreamt of the movies I would rent from the British Council library later in the evening... if I got out in time.

When I think back to those days and reflect on the life I’m probably leading in a parallel universe right now, I can only thank my lucky stars.

Peter Joseph’s cult Internet film Zeitgeist posits a near-Utopian world (and a very improbable one) built on a high-technology, resource-based economy rather than the debt-perpetuating monetary system that all of us take for granted. One of its many conceits is a future where people won’t have to spend their lives chained to jobs (described as “paid slavery”) that they aren’t inherently interested in, but would find their own niches, adding value in little ways by doing things that are personally satisfying and meaningful to them. I like to think I'm already halfway there.


On the flip side, someone who took the leap and found himself struggling:

Post 1:
Running bad, playing bad, time to play some 100nl on UB to get my confidence back. Feel pretty down about leaving my job, when don't feel I can play the game at the moment. EDIT - I am fucked. Seriously giving up a big salary to play poker. Self excluded from FTP, and get fucked on UB. I hate this shit. 4 days till no job, down a lot this week. Posted by WhiteHeatSYD at 7:41 PM

Post 2

The year is pretty much done It seems that everyone else is reflecting on the year they have had. So I may do the same. There are so many people to thank, that have helped me out. I was going to walk away from poker at the start of 2009, at the end of 2008. I wouldn't of made it this far with out the help of Jared Tendler, the effect he has had on my life (in and outside of poker) can't be underestimated. He has helped me rational a lot of different things. I still have tilt issues, which I will continue to correct and need to iron out pretty soon if I am going to realise my potential. I desperately want to suceed as a poker player, but have maybe held on to tight. 2010 needs to be more balanced, as at times I became consumed so badly by poker. This has held me back a lot. I need to know when to play more/play less/study more/study less. Aaron Wilt continues to be my biggest supporter. I am truely grateful for the help that Aaron continues to give me, and asks for so little in return. So many times I have bitched to him about how shit things are, and he has always been there regardless of how bad he is running. Aaron has had a rough 2nd half to the year, but his patience will pay off and he will be crushing in 2010 no doubt. I am really looking forward to meeting Aaron (and Missy) in January at the Aussie Millions. Josh and Greg have been really helpful over the last few months, we have had some great meetings, and have managed to iron out a lot of my problems. Even if Greg's mic is always on mute. He is a bit older than Josh and myself, so is still trying to learn how to use a computer. TreeManG off DC, has become a great friend over the last six months, and I hope I can give him the support he needs to crush 50nl in 2010. My family have been amazing over the last couple of months. It hasn't been easy for me but they have always listened and tried to understand even if they don't understand how poker works. I got this great note from my Dad the other day. It is amazing how so few words can mean so much. There are a ton of other people to thank including the DC community, who have all been willing me to start crushing. i have received some really thoughtful messages, that I need to reply to. I hope in 2010 I can start crushing the games again. I want to repay the faith. The poker community is a very unique thing, and something we should be grateful for. So many different people with different stories are bonded by a passion for one game. To name a few over people that have helped me this year, and that I have formed bonds with included Malfaire, Riverrock, Marc, Big Owl, Simon, Stephen etc etc. I have missed a ton of people off this list, and that I am sorry for. As 2010 is a mere 11 hours away. It is time to relax take the time out, and hang with friends. I am going to relax my expectations on myself for 2010. The only thing I can control is playing consistently. It doesn't matter if I don't make it to mid-stakes next year, providing I have done my best. My tilting is unacceptable and that needs to be address first and foremost. 2010 can be a great year, it is just going to depend on how I choose to carry myself. So until 2010. GL everyone, and thank you all..... Posted by WhiteHeatSYD at 5:27 PM

In the end it probably boils down to this

Do I have the balls? Not yet.

Monkey trail

Via Amit Verma's blog, a really funny/entertaining/interesting few lines from a book called Thinkertoys

Imagine a cage containing five monkeys. Inside the cage, hang a banana on a string and place a set of stairs under it. Before long, a monkey will go to the stairs and start to climb toward the banana. As soon as he touches the stair, spray all the monkeys with ice-cold water. After a while, another monkey makes an attempt with the same result - all the monkeys are sprayed with ice-cold water. Pretty soon, when another monkey tries to climb the stairs, the other monkeys will try to prevent it.

Now, turn off the cold water. Remove one monkey from the cage and replace it with a new one. The new monkey sees the banana and will want to climb the stairs. To his surprise, all of the other monkeys attack him. After another attempt and attack, he knows that if he tries to climb the stairs he will be assaulted.

Next, remove another of the original monkeys and replace it with a new one. The newcomer goes to the stairs and is attacked. The previous newcomer takes part in the punishment with enthusiasm.

Again, replace a third monkey with new one. The new one goes to the stairs and is attacked. Two of the four monkeys that beat him have no idea why they were not permitted to climb the stairs, or why they are participating in the beating of the newest monkey.

After replacing the fourth and fifth monkeys with new ones, all the monkeys that have been sprayed with ice-cold water have been replaced. Nevertheless, no monkey ever again approaches the stairs. Why not? Because as far as they know that’s the way it’s always been around here.

So learning by repetition is not always a winning strategy?

I see what you did there

New fav movie

My memory is kind of on a self-granted vacation and I cant for the life of me remember where I heard/read the interesting reviews for this one, but man o man, this is one helluva ride.

Its like Kill Bill on a heady cocktail of acid, meth, coke and steroids.

The movie is TOKYO GORE POLICE.


Its a Japanese movie, where the Japs have gone pretty much nutso (theres a super crazy anti-harakiri ad campaign that should be played over and over again), shit funny gore (be ready for plenty of it), some super thrill-based-horror, a leading lady who likes to cut her wrists, often in manic frenzy , a new breed of criminals called the "Engineers" who have some bizzaro but novel mutation whereby their wounds turn into deadly weapons,

a villain (a bioscientist), a serial killer who murders women with an array of razor sharp suction pumps before hacking them up into tiny pieces and neatly storing them in a carton with not a drop of blood spilled at the crime scene.

The movie is quite novel, extremely fast paced (goes ape-shit berserk at times) and rates very very high on the gore meter. Apart from Antichrist this is definitely one of the more bizzaro movie I've seen in my lifetime. The only thing disappointing about TGP is its pathetic and downright sloppy back ground score.

Ratings: A
Warning: If you have a girl in your life who is squeamish, lock her up in the attic, grab some popcorns, turn up the volume and enjoy TGP.

WBCOOP time

I have registered to play in the PokerStars World Blogger Championship of Online Poker! Bloggers can register for to play for free in the WBCOOP, if you don’t have a PokerStars account you can get your Poker Download here.

Registration code: 488113

Resolution 010

Go pro by 2014.

Obsessed

Having been obsessed with the game of poker for the majority of '09 (trust me when I say that I've read and re-read and re-re-read every damn article, every damn strategy forum, every pro's blog that is out there on the internet, sent a million PMs to absolute unknowns but people whose game i respected, offered a guy in Houston that I would run all his weekend errands if he lets me watch him play online tournaments on Sundays) it would be apt to end the year with this snippet from an interesting thread on two-plus-two

Here's your problem. You don't have the fortitude, nor bankroll, nor temperment, to be a casino. A casino is a big ol' building, where people's dreams might possibly come true. Especially if you own the building.

Casinos get rich, expand a whole city, and get richer, by offering bets where the casino has a two or three percent advantage. But the bets have to be offered, have to be wagered, a million times. Roulette, for instance: red or black, odd or even, high or low, the house has a 5.25% advantage on all but one bet on the layout.

Will the customer occasionally have a streak? Of course. A full third of the customers that evening will actually have a winning night. The casino doesn't care. You, of course, would be willing to walk in front of a truck. Will one drunken guy actually make several thousand dollars, having started with twenty bucks? Of course. The casino doesn't care. You, by the way, will not even walk out looking for the truck, you will put a bullet in your brain, right there at the table. The casino is right, and you are not right. "correct mathmatically" might be a better term than "right".

You think, apparently, that when you have a winning hand, and the 'customer' is drawing to a flush on the river, You've Got Him Nailed. You don't. You have only created a situation where you have four times the advantage that a casino has. You have a situation where it's 80-20 that you're going to win.

Now I want you to work really, really hard on this, because you haven't yet. If it's 80-20 for you, how many times out of a hundred can we predict that the 'customer' will hit his flush? The answer is twenty times out of a hundred. ('Grab that man. Don't let him dash toward the highway'.)

Can the 'customer' have a streak of winners? You bet he can. ('Grab that revolver'). He might hit several in a row.

Why do you care? (Because you're an idiot). No, it's because you haven't given it the appropriate amount of thought, and because you're not bankrolled well, and because you care about the outcome, and you should not care.

You should have enough in your bankroll that you can offer the 'customer' his flush draw about a hundred times a day. You want him (assuming he's dumb enough: but you're right, there are millions of 'em) to call your bet, and shoot for his flush draw. 80-20 in your favor, if he's betting on the river, 60-40 in your favor if he's betting on the turn (and, you get to charge him MORE for the river, if he's not all in).

If he wins his bet, and you're smart enough to be a casino, you should comp him: buy him a few drinks, compliment that ugly date he brought with him, buy him dinner if you have to, but keep him right there, making his bet over, and over, again.

But not you: you are involved. You are worried. You are so upset that he won one, or ten, of those bets. But the fact is, if that happens a thousand times (that bet where you are 80-20), you will be a rich man. You should be grateful, when you have put the 'customer' in a postion where you offer an 80-20 proposition, and he takes you up on it.

Here's what you should do: change your attitude. Play standard poker. Lose your emotion. You don't care about this bet, or the next one. You just want the guy to keep playing, if he's going to keep playing at the odds you're offering. Charge him for his longshot bet. He'll pay? He'll go for it? OUTSTANDING.......

Grind it out. (They call it that, for a reason). Lose your personal involvement with one hand, or one session. If you're playing right, the money, in smaller amounts, will roll in. (Not in larger amounts: you're not entitled to larger amounts. When your opponent bets his flush draw and loses, you didn't win the whole amount. You won the whole amount LESS the fact that one out of five times you're going to lose, and thus give some back. But believe me, there will be plenty left over.)

Quit caring about your results. Play standard poker. If you're doing it right, the money will roll in.

Play standard poker. If you're doing it right, you're offering the customer bets where your advantage is four times that which built Las Vegas. Do it all day long. All week long. All year long. Grind it out

Happy Birthday

And a bonus Virgin Mary rant



courtesy full metal jacket by kubrick

Tigers Wood

Q: What course gives Tiger the most trouble?
A: Intercourse

Boooiyaaaahh

Obligatory year end TOP 10 lists

Since no one does it better than The Times, lets leave it to the experts.

24 days of christmas

Inspired by this thread in a high-stakes poker forum, a bunch of my poker-playing buddies at Houston decided to adopt a few families for Christmas and buy for them stuff like food, toys etc.

We went with this one.

We've already made one trip to Walmart and bought stuff worth about $450.00 (mostly toys and food). Hopefully as more and more poker players (ppl I dont know, but others do) in the Houston area, start chiming in we can make a few more trips to Walmart.

The cool thing is that, at this time we have had donations as little as $10.00, but in the grand scheme of things all of these have added up and contributed tremendously to this sudden spur of the moment idea.

A big shout-out to Alex, Htownkid (Matt), Javi and many others.

Godspeed and happy holidays.

Interesting read

While browsing my favourite poker forum, I came upon this thread that discusses the pros and cons of playing Mid-stakes poker professionally, pretty interesting read.

I'll probably edit this post and add my 2c later in the day, when I have a bit more time.

That time of the year

The one we call Christmas, whats on your list?

Mini turn-around

Graph in the first hour (1BB = $4, so thats about 1k burnt in about 2 hrs)



took a break, spent some time with the wife, friends came over for dinner and then decided to put in one more late-night session to try and get unstuck.




YUPPIEEEEEEE

GIVE ME A EFFING BREAK

SET OVER SET : TWICE
SET VS 4 OUTER ON RIVER
KK VS AA
SET VS FLUSH DRAW

ALL IN THE SPACE OF 200 HANDS.....

FUCK POKER

Decisions

Thankgiving weekends could be super tricky, trust me, possible pic repost

How can you be so obtuse?

For those that dont get it.. sigh DONKS

Jai Bharat

Perennial mojo

After all these years its still a one-man show , atleast I had the pleasure of watching it live on a jerky comp broadcast.

Transfer

Fingers crossed

Currently playing

Bit old, but in love with it right now

Extreme ways by Moby

"in quotes"

There is an inescapable sensation in the viewer's awareness that the love between them is of a kind that can only reach its perfection through tragedy

WTF

From the Calcutta Telegraph:

Rat bites patient’s hand
- Woman bleeds as rodent horror revisits SSKM
A STAFF REPORTER

A patient in the orthopaedic department of SSKM Hospital woke up late on Saturday crying out in pain — she had been bitten by a rat.

This was the second instance in five years of rodents feeding on humans at the state-run referral hospital which spends lakhs on pest control every year.

Sobharani Mistri, 50, was admitted to the orthopaedic department of the hospital with a tumour in her left ankle on September 18.

On Saturday, the homemaker from Regent Park fell asleep around 10pm.

Soon after the lights were turned off, the on-duty nurses heard a cry and rushed to Mistri’s bed.

“The patient was shivering in pain and fear. Blood was oozing out of her left hand. The rat was still on the bed,” said a hospital source. “She was administered injections and given other medicines. Nurses attended to her and dressed the wound.”

Though it is super appalling, the piece would not have had balls big enough to qualify for a WTF moment , until of course you reach the very end of the piece.

"A senior official blamed the rat menace on “inaction” by the company responsible for rat control and also a decision by the authorities in 2004 to remove cats from the hospital premises. “The hospital was not free of rats till 2004 but their numbers were under check. Since the cats were banished, the population of their prey has grown by leaps and bounds,” the official said."

As they say the sting is almost always in the tail... meeeeeeeeowwwwww

RIP Gately

When MTV first aired on Indian tv he was there.

Bizzaro quotient through the roof

Hmmmm

A Saturday that follows a Friday

Its raining final tables.

Nice way to spend a friday evening

Good start to October, godspeed. Planning to put in a massive grind over the weekend

October goals

1. Attain Goldstar status on Pokerstars, for this to happen I have to put in a pretty decent amount of grind
2. Take 2 fridays and saturdays completely off in the month.
   
3. Catch up on some movies
4. Plan the thanks-giving trip
   

Another one for the month

Just closed out one more 180 man tourney, played well, ran good, feels gooooot. Thats 2 for the month. So all in all September has been a good month in terms of profitability. Much love and appreciation for the knickers.

Sicko

Dhann-Tanaa-Tanaa

Fpiderman Fpiderman

Take a bow Manmohan desai, Vishal Bharadwaj is in the house.

After a couple of superb India-esque adaptations of Shakespeare classics, Bharadwaj's latest offering pays tribute to the 70-80s mad-caper-fultu-commercial-formula driven bollywood pot-boiler (the likes of Don, Amar akbar anthony, Sita aur geeta, Namak Halal) and manages to come with a recipe that atleast in someways reminds you of the great gangster mad-capers of the late 90s-early millenium (lock-stock, layercake, snatch, Pfiction).

While the madness/energy/entropy diven whatever can go wrong will go wrong logic is not quite at the same level, as say that of a Lock- Stock (I might be biased here btw as Lock-Stock remains my favourite movie of this genre), but it would suffice to say that Bharadwaj does a darn good job, atleast 80% of the time.

Quirky and eccentric characters, that are kind of a mainstay for this genre, are beautifully set-up and available in plenty.

Chandan Roy Sanyal as the coke snorting, perenially high, supra-unpredictable, and as Charlie says "Mental hai Faala", youngest brother of a Bengali Don trio is the show-stopper of Kaminey. Its a shame he didnt get a bit more screen-time and a bigger shame that the obvious love-angle between him and Charlie that had so much potential was underplayed later on. Hell, Charlie even married a girl in the happy-ending climax, though he did name his bookie-shop after his one true love Michael.

But the one character that kind of lacked the eccentricity/quirkiness and sometimes felt a bit dull and what I think is surely the biggest sore-point/let down of the movie is that of the pivotal Bhope-bhau character, the jai-maharashtra mouthing marathi-manoos don. This one had so much potential, but Bharadwaj didnt quite rope this one in nicely. For example the scene where Bhope bhau and Michael play a fake wooshka-wooshka gunfight, while Michael is superb, Bhope-bhau seems a tard mundane. I liked the character of his right hand man/brother-in-law much better, the one who loathes at the frequent threat of his mother will be fu*cked (teri maa ki *****) if he botches the job, from Bhope bhau.

Another let-down was the climax, Bharadwaj needed to up the antes a fair bit more than what he ultimately settled for.

Both PC and Shahid were pretty good, PC more so, as the pregnant marathi girlfriend.

All in all, Kaminey is a "good" movie in my book, it came close to being on the great list and had the potential of being a Tarantino-eqsue love-fest (the one in which I develop a supreme man-crush and start touting bummers like Grindhouse as masterpieces), but unfortunately Bharadwaj showed a little bit more restraint than he should have. He held himself back, that teeny tiny bit more and that in the end made all the difference.

Greatest scene : Charlie and Michael, holding hands and singing "Fpiderman fpiderman" in the rains.


Chota Fortcut

Closed one-- finally

After some disgusting/disappointing runs over the past week (1/24 to out in 18th after JJ<88, when 1st was 4.8k ) I finally managed to close a 180-man tourney last night. While the money wasnt great 400ish, feels good to finally close one.

I also have a coaching session scheduled with a top tournament pro on friday night, really looking forward to it.

Oh and Jennifer's body is here, at last !!!!!!!!

Antichrist

Is an opus magnum. Available on torrent. Not for the faint of heart, typical Von Trierisque manic depressive captivating movie and a brilliant performance by Gainsbourg (Cannes Best actress, 09) as a regular housewife who turns into a vindictive, self-mutilating, genitia hacking, husband blaming/killing monster after their child dies in an accident while the couple is busy humping like theres no tomorrow. Defoe is good as well. When will this be in US theatres??

Talking of movies I was thinking of 5 of the most disturbing movies I have ever seen and this is now firmly in second place. The hallowed list

1. The clockwork orange (Kubrick)
2. Antichrist (Von Trier)
3. Shining (Kubrick)
4. ..
5. .. (multi-way ties for the 4th and 5th spots).
   

Getting the hang of it

Slowly I am getting the hang of playing big field (1000 peeps+) small buyin (<$15) Multi table tournaments (MTTs). I strung together two 3rd place finishes in the last 7 days for a total of 2.3k playing these huge field MTTs, one had 1200 entrants ($11) and the other had 2500+ ($5.5). While I was super disappointed to get 3rd in both, but whatever.

Good start to september. Now lets try and maintain the momentum.

New found motivation

I have set up a goal to play atleast 10,000 hands in the pokerstars/Fulltilt 6-handed cash game this month at the smallest stakes to try and get some of my confidence back+solidify my game a bit. Lets see how it goes. Also stars is offering a bonus of upto 300 bucks for new deposit of $600, so these hands will count towards the bonus-whoring as well.

Note to self: Fold 67o in all positions except the button.

Frustrating tournament poker

Over the past 10 days, I played 2 live tournaments both of which had a some-what decent payday and managed to bust both in spectacular fashion.
The one that hurt most was a $125 tourney that got about 55 people. I was playing my A++ game and with about 30 left I had about 2.5 times what everyone else had and was feeling super. Usually if I start a live tournament well, almost always I close it out, finishing atleast in the top 3. Not this time, and not in the past month it seems. Since my back to back wins in live tourneys, towards mid june my live record is :
0/5.
I've been making some really brain-farty decisions, getting impatient/anxious, not thinking things through, and massively overplaying AK and each time running into KK/AA.

I got super frustrated and went back to grinding Heads-up cash online . Also started playing 6max cash. Currently playing at low stakes and averaging about $22/hour.

Anyhoo theres a big $322 tourney in September, which I won last year, and if I am feeling ok will probably play that.

Till then live poker is :

Knicker and butt ogling

Australia's latest fast bowling spearhead Mitchell Johnson seems to have managed to land a superhot WAG (Wives and Girlfriends). Introducing Mitchell's girlfriend Jessica Bratich.



Mitchell and Jessica went shopping for Australian Cricket Awards day (where Mitchell was the hands on favorite to win the cricketer of the year award), and in a moment of utter brain-fartiness the couple decided to pick a weird yellow wrap fabric which was somehow labeled as a summer dress. Unfortunately come Awards day, the wind decided to get naughty and as the couple walked in, the dress was blown all over the place. Fortunately for us we get to view Jessica's matching yellow knickers.




Mitchell btw played the part of chivalrous knight to perfection, dismissing the incident as an unfortunate case of blowing winds, he even wore a yellow tie to match his gf's yellow clown dress.



The month however has not been kind to red carpet celebrities. Harry Potter's Emma Watson (super-hottie potential) got bitch-drenched on the Half-born prince premier night and ended up giving us some more knicker views


On another red carpet of a different kind Obama and that French trash Sarkozy, having no rain/wind in sight, decided to try and make the best of the dreary situation

angry gemans playing poker

Hitler's online poker account banned



German Kid poker

T20 prediction

Jason will attack Lords with a 10 foot long razor sharp cricket bat and cut off Ajantha Mendis' balls. Pakistan being used to such acts of terrorism will take fullest advantage of the pandemonium and lift the trophy.



It would be later revealed that it was Yuvraj Singh, tired of being out-foxed by Mendis, wearing a borrowed leather/skull-face mask and posing as Jason. Subsequently he would be awarded the Paramvir Chakra for supreme service and bravery on the cricket field. Mendis' balls will be on display at the Indian National Museum.

Noosed, hosed and bagged

AND THEY CHOKED ........... AGAIN.

Rinse and repeat offset by a tooth

Following up on last monday's win, I managed to win this same tournament again this monday, setting up nice back-to-back monday wins. But the run-good in poker has been offset by a massive toothache that decided to rear up its ugly head on Tuesday afternoon and doesnt show any signs of giving up, so much so that I got over my intense fear of dentists and actually set up an appointment for later today.



Needless to say I am super-scared, if there is one breed of doctors that flip the shit out of me its the dentists, I guess watching Marathon man too many times does that to you.

A live tourney win

I havent played live poker for a very very long time, so yesterday I decided to play in this smallish semi-decent tourney (structure-wise) that runs in houston every monday and thurday. Its a $60 buy-in, gets about 45-50 players and 1st is about 1.2-1.5kish.

Starting table description: huge donks all around who have no clue about tournament poker, insanely loose in the early stages literally playing any 2 cards and insanely tight in the later stages and closer to the final table/money, 1 semi-decent middle-age player.

Some hands:

1. my stack 6500, 50/100 blinds: I havent played a hand and open 3-6cc UTG to 300, old man next to me calls, one of the better players (BP1)(very tight though, about 10k stack) raises from the button to 1k, I call, old man folds. Flop 3 2 K (one club), I check call 800 bet (??), turn 6d, I check shove his bet and crack Aces, upto 11k. Start building up a loose crazy table image.

2. stack 10kish, 50/100, I call an insanely bald-bad-middle-eastern (BBME) player's utg limp with 55 from utg+2, 2 more callers, serial killer (SK) looking horrendously bad player makes it 350 (??) from the button, utg bad-player calls, i call, flop KK5 (nutzo baby), checks around, Turn 7, utg bets out 700, I flat, button hems and haws and hollywoods (we are'nt on TV you stupid fuck) and calls, river 7 (board 5KK77), fuck me.. utg leads 1400, i snap fold, terribad button hems and calls, utg shows A high, button shows QQ.. sigh donks, down to 7.8kish

3. stack 9kish, 100/200, BP1 ( semi-decent player from hand 1 limps), I complete SB with KcTc, BB checks.. flop Qc9c6c, i check, super-donk-middle-aged (SDM) BB leads 200, BP1 calls, I tiny raise to 900, SDM calls, BP1 calls... turn 5d, I lead 1350, SDM snap folds (???), semi decent player starts hemming and hawing, asks me if I have 2 pair and fnally calls, river 2d, I bet out 1350 (live players do not cll big river bets) and again BP1 hollywood calls, and mucks and says I had 2 pair on the flop (???? did he limp Q9/69/Q6 from MP, roll my eyes).. upto 15ksih

4. stack 13kish, blinds 100/200/25(antes), I open KhJh UTG to 575, donk middle aged next to me flats, donk in cap next to him flats, new semi competent young bluffy player (moved to our table, with 9k behind, played with him before) raises to 1700, I shove and get hollywood folds, upto 16k.

5. stack 16kish, blinds 200/400/50, I raise QcQs utg+2 to 1250, insanely tight middle aged donk in red cap snap shoves 5k, ultra short MP snap shoves 1.5k, I call and see Q7h and J8o and hold, upto 22kih.

No notable hands for some time after this, till with about 15 left the following hand occurs.

6. stack 28kish in the BB, 400/800/50, Semi decent player (BP1 from #1,#3, 23k behind, doesnt like to flip/race with decent stacks) opens utg+3 to 3700 (this means he either has JJ-, or AQ+), folds to me, i look down at TsTd, and shove, he gets all fidgety and looks in pain and finally calls with AKo, I win the flip and am chip leader with 40k+.

Final table. I am chip leader with a big stack 70k+, table has plenty of donkeys, bunch of short stacks (6 paid) and no decent players at all, but blinds are getting big

7. stack 70kish, 500/1000/100, I open 5c-8c UTG to 2200, another big stack terribad middle eastern young player (friend of bald dude from #2, 35kish behind) flats, flop 862r, I lead 2250, get called check down and win versus AK. (hmm didnt want to show my hand there).

Start opening liberally and get little resistance till players start pointing out "u opening lot of crap i think, u bully, one hand and you'll double us up" and some such shit, so tighten a little.

8. stack 80kish, 600/1200/100, I open 6c7c in UTG to 2900, good-natured-rich-terrible-at-poker lawyer shoves 11k from MP, I call and see him tabling 9dTd (????), flop 6d8dTc (flopped the joint), turn Qc, river Js, ok no biggie doubled up an ultra short stack thats all.

Hand dead till the following hand comes up,

9. 8 left,stack 55k, 600/1200/100, I have AsAc in MP,utg+2 (16k) opens to 5100 (??), bald-middle-eastern guy(30k) raises to 12000, I shove, utg+2 snap calls with AQ, bald guy hollywood folds and I hold.

Kind of easy sailing from there and go into heads-up with over 5:1 chip lead and win KQ vs AQ to take the tourney down. I might play this on thursday again, if I can haul my ass into the car for the 20 min ride. Easy money for the takings.

Beer , porn and an anal violation of Uncle Ben

This one came out in february, and is perhaps one of the first instance of a top brand alligning itself with porno



Uncle Ben gets grilled big time

MS girl

While on our beach vacation, me and mrs.sen were fooling around with the camera and ended up shooting a mini photo session on the beach (me behind the lens as the expert photographer !!). My wife gets most of her suits from here and the company seems to be running a fun competition of sort for their customers.

So on a whim she sent in some of our vacation "photo-session" snaps and lo and behold we got an email today saying she won the june competition and she will be on the june edition of the 2009 malibu strings calender (comes with a 500 dollar gift voucher) as well as a request to be part of the malibu-string-girls-gang (invitation to the annual malibu string party at Vegas, all expenses covered)

Running good in life at the moment it seems.

ship it

The 2009 World series of poker (WSOP) is underway and I finally managed to satellite into the main event on my 4th try via a $650 satellite on Cake. 3 seats were guaranteed (12k packages for the winners), I pretty much got into cruise control from 30 left and went into the final table 2nd in chips. Was a pretty easy run in the home stretch, something that has not happened lately in tournaments for me.

Anyway the package includes : the 10k tournament buy-in plus 2k in expenses for the main event or the 10k buyin plus 1k travel expenses plus 5 day stay at the Rio,Vegas.
Heres how the main event schedule looks this year:

Fri, Jul 3rd 12:00 PM 13-Day Event		World Championship No-Limit Texas Hold'em (Event 57) No Rebuy/Add-ons July 3,2009 12:00 PM Day 1A (3,000 players) July 4,2009 12:00 PM Day 1B (3,000 players) July 5,2009 12:00 PM Day 1C (3,000 players) July 6,2009 12:00 PM Day 1D (3,000 players) July 7,2009 12:00 PM Day 2A July 8,2009 12:00 PM Day 2B July 9,2009 12:00 PM Media Event July 10,2009 12:00 PM Day 3 July 11,2009 12:00 PM Day 4 July 12,2009 12:00 PM Day 5 July 13,2009 12:00 PM Day 6 July 14,2009 12:00 PM Day 7 July 15,2009 12:00 PM Day 8 November 7-10,2009 TBD FINAL TABLE Structure Sheet		$10,000

All I need to do now is squeeze in a vacation from work, my wife will make the trip with me, her first poker trip, unless she has some really pressing issues at schools (her phd qualifiers are right after the summer). For the time being I redeemed the package from Cake-poker as there are a ton of stuff that needs to go right at work for my vacation to come through, allowing me to play. Keeping my fingers and toes crossed.

big day tomorrow

Lately I have been playing cash games mostly online with the occassional shot at a tournament without much success. I can go on and on about the sick beats, coolers that I've had in tourneys recently, but then again I am not playing those too well either.
Usually when I am playing a couple of tournaments, I'd open up some Heads-up cash games and end up focusing on those.

Anyway tomorrow is a potential big day, am playing 4 biggies tomorrow. Heres the schedule:

• $13 100k guarantee MiniFTOPS event 22 1:05PM
• $126 1 million guarantee FTOPS event 22 1:00PM
• $55 500k guarantee MiniFTOPS main event 6:05 PM
• $550 5 million guarantee FTOPS main event 6:00 PM

I need to try and keep my focus as lately in tourneys I am losing my focus pretty quickly. Also RUN GOOD ONE TIME. Godspeed

Eech beach pear plumb in comes tom thumb

On the memorial day weekend and no its not gonna be a choc-a-bloc teeming-with-millions beach. As per the brochure, if we are willing to drive a tad we can potentially have 50 miles of pristine beach all to ourselves.

WOOOOT.

EFFING FISH

Fuck poker

On the Balla wishlist

I've been eyeing this piece for sometime now (well over 2 weeks to be precise), I saw it on a close buddy of mine who took down a 35k first place finish at the Bay shooting Star casino,CA, poker tourney last month (one I almost played, but bailed out at the last moment due to work commitments). Of course he's got an even balla time-piece, but this Breitling Super Avenger would do nicely for me. First I need a poker score this month, I have been running like a one-legged kenyan all of March, and on a mini 5k downswing.

In the meantime here some more balla time pieces for your viewing pleasure (snaps by Nat taken at the Bellagio 25k World poker tour main event, Las Vegas, last year, one on the extreme right belongs to online poker phenom Sorel "Imperium" Mizzi and is in the 75k range):





In the meantime I went ahead and bought a bunch of gold this week, primarily as a hedge, and also because the market is so damn expensive.

Suggested weekend readings:Zerohedge

Irksome

1. People talking out of their arse at dinner parties.

2. Oh so you want to play poker for a living, wow thats kind of degen(erate) isnt it?

3. Gambling as a career, thats a first right?

4. How can slumdogg millionaire win even one oscar, its a pure desi masala movie yaar (usually from a dreaded desi chic who cant pronounce trainspotting).

5. You know, smoking kills.

6. I saw Pink Floyd in concert, did you know they are the greatest band of all time (sigh donk)

At this point, I think of Happy Gilmore, and try and conjure up images of a happy place, think of a happy place, do not, repeat DO NOT get sarcastic and start correcting them. But .... sigh

unzip my pants say you love me

At the recent Lakme fashion week, Akshay Kumar went, ummm lets see whats the right word, strip-teasey (?), and thus invoked the wrath of the indian moral brigade.



While walking the ramp he decided to stroll over to his wife and asked a bemused Twinkle Khanna to unbutton/unzip his jeans for her. Though there is something of a coochy-poochy lovey-dovey feel about asking your wife to publicly unzip your pants, whatever brownie points he managed to score in my books are lost due to those HORRENDOUS boots he's put on.

Whoever made Akshay wear those boots, please drink bleach and run into a brick wall ASAP.

Oldies

I was sifting through my music and came across these old favorites, ended up youtubing them. Reminded me of a time etched in memory.

Audioslave



We passed upon the stairs, Cobain at mtv unplugged


Jakob Dylan


BOC live, plenty of live improvisation on the signature reaper riff, around 2:45


s&m one, Hetfield at his snarling best, and notice how the band lines up for the signature one grunge (around 5:07)


november rain


bang bang



but if you could heal a broken heart
wouldnt time be out to charm you

Meet the Dumbest people in your corporation

The HR guys, they are driving me nuts. And they love meetings, they schedule milestone meetings, trademark meetings, celebratory meetings, meetings to discuss meetings, redundant strat meetings, and this when research is working on air-tight deadline mode, oh and we had a meeting to discuss our upcoming journal publications as well !!! ... dumb fuckheads.

A certain Professor at Stanford said it best "Let Engineers and Scientists run the country instead of Lawyers, MBAs and Economists." (v 2.1)

HR folks: please get aids and die ASAP

Playing the Coushatta 1k

I dont usually like playing in small-buyin casino tournaments (primarily because of the mind-boggling testicularly retarded slowness of live poker vs online poker), but a friend convinced me to take this trip with him, later this month, to Louisiana for the Coushatta Casino 1k buy-in main event. Hopefully the event attracts atleast 300 players (so that 1st is atleast 50k to make the trip and staying in hotels for 4 days worthwhile, FYI: I hate travelling), but given the current economy that might be a stretch.

Anyway 300 is the magic number, if they get less than 300 players I'm out, not worth my time by any stretch.

Anyhoo today was bloody sunday of online poker, and somehow I convinced myself to play some sunday special donkament tourneys : Results : 0/11. LOL Donkaments.

Crickets with balls

They justify my love for everything with balls. Long live sehwagology, may natalie portman parade more in Closer style Gs.

starbucks loves israel

Today I went to my regular grocery store carrying my starbucks frapp , the store is owned and operated by a middle-aged, supremely chatty, affable, middle eastern bald dude. Now I have always suspected that he thinks that I am a muslim. Anyway as soon as I get in he greets me "You know you should never buy anything from starbucks", Why, "Anything you buy at starbucks a % of the money is sent to israel to kill muslim children". You sure about that, "Oh yes ask Jamil (his brother/something like that) here". Jamil :" Fucking child murderers, killing allah's sons."

Hmmmm.

As an aside I recently added up my one month starbucks expense : $356.44. The wise might say I am an SBUX addict.

swingy

Dropped 6 buy-ins in HU (heads-up) NL last night. Though it sounds disappointing I think my play was fine, got rivered a lot and lost 4 straight flips (1.5 buyin donations to these flips).

Time for the upswing now !!

edit (02/07): made back 5 buy-ins after putting in a marathon all night session. Run good more please

Shooting cans

Lets go shoot come cans, u know mexi-cans, puertori-cans.



Disclaimer: I live in a Red state.

In pictures

About a month's worth of playing Sit and goes

tanni partner

[ ] has potential
[x] epic fail

09 day one

Hello world

Bell the cat

Season's greetings to one and all. Oh and I am tying the knot on the 16th of Jan.
Good game bachelorhood ... sigh :(

Mission Saree

No not for me, but tomorrow someone's gonna try it wearing it for the first time herself. Wish her luck (and me too).

As an aside if the said saree is the one that Draupadi had purchased, then as Baburao would say "pehente pehente poti paida ho jayegi"