Sunday, January 21, 2007

$2 MTT fun

I played in a $2 + .25 today on FT and it was amazing. 457 runners, 176 left at the first break!?!?

The blinds were 50/100 at the break, I cannot fathom why they insisted on impaling themselves on each other. Consistently.

I was a few hundy above average at the break and never really saw great cards. Two biggest pots were 56s where my OESFD missed but my bluff won (second hand of mtt) and a key double up against a maniac when I had 88 about 45 mins in.

81 spots pay, so my goal was to simply make the money and then start taking some more chances. That got a little tougher with 137 left when the SB caught a flush and cost me about T1600. My read that my middle pair was good on the flop, his K5c was flushing on the river and I paid him off on the Q high board. Tighten up or get looser to accumulate and make a real run? That was the question. I thought that I had enough chips (T3900) with 100/200 blinds that I could still wait for some premium hands and spots. Let's see if that works. One double up with the right donkey (and there are still some left around) and I am sitting pretty.

One small problem, the homebrew is starting to kick in a little. I am trying to drink enough so that I have 28 empty bottles for my next batch which I will be bottling next weekend. Tough job, I know. I have a lot of the high octane stuff on hand right now (10.5% abv) so two a day is a tall order.

92o in the BB. Doubt I get to see it for free. Surprise! I did, but the QJ6 did not help me at all. Fold to the raiser.

A9s in the SB and I flop OESD. It fills on the turn and I check it heads up. River pairs the board and my 600 bet is called. The hand holds up and I get some ammo.

AQo very next hand and it is folded around to me on button. Bet 700, SB goes all in for 250 more and BB folds. Hmm, have to call here. He flips AK and I am in trouble, especially when the K flops. NH sir, I give back my gains.

T3740 when the blinds hit 120/240 25 ante. 109 left, money starts at 81. First hand for me at this level is 1010. Win the blinds and antes. T4275 and I promptly get moved for the first time in the MTT.

First hand on the new table is KJo in the BB. I raise pot on the SB limp and he ejects. Cool. AQd is next hand and the early pot bet looks fishy. Apparently I was smelling myself because I jammed on him and his AKc hit a flush. T720 and the beep of life support can barely be heard over the gasps of this fish. I really considered folding that, should have trusted my fishy intution.

In an amazing run, the cards start coming and who am I to deny them? AJ two hands later and I turn my T650 into T2450. Then, one hand after that, my 99 gets all the chips in the middle PF and I am up against KJ. I hit a 9 on the flop and he is out. T4430. That was quite a fast and wild little ride. Let's check the tourney info. 61/95. I am in the BB for the old price when the blinds go up, that never hurts.

I am roughly 13x BB and I get AA in LP and one limper in front. I raise pot, folds around to him and he jams. Easy call, plus I have him covered by 1200 and he shows 88. The flop gives him 4 more outs with a gutshot and it does not materialize. T7290. Wheeee this is fun with good cards.

Stats look like this with 92 left:

Statistics for 111 Hands
Street Saw Saw/Total
Flop 19 17%
Turn 15 14%
River 13 12%
Showdown 8 7%

Street Won Won/Saw Won/Total
Pre-flop 4 4% 4%
Flop 2 11% 2%
Turn 0 0% 0%
River 3 23% 3%
Showdown 5 63% 5%

Random Thought while playing - I saw Freedom Writers last night and I had to admit I was moved some by it. It was not my choice of movie, but I was glad I saw it. It inspired me enough to call and thank the teachers in my life, my mother and my brother's wife. It was certainly a variation on the Dangerous Minds theme with hot white teacher doing right by the minority class, but I found it much more adept at tugging the heart strings. There were several points where the painful lump in my throat rose and I was not too far from crying. Not sure why that was, I guess I could identify with the characters and the respect themes. Last time a movie did something like that to me was Legends of the Fall. I know even admitting seeing both of these movies might put me "under suspicion" but I have to admit that I cried during the mustard gas scene in Legends of the Fall. Something about a movie with three brothers and the military made it very easy for me to put myself in the shoes of the characters. (I have two younger brothers and I served as an Armor Crewman from 93-96) The scene where Brad Pitt watches his younger brother get mustard gassed and then tangled and stuck in concertina wire and then chewed up by machine gun fire got to me. For some reason I could see that as myself and my younger brother Jared.

As I typed that, we lost 9 more and the bubble is ready to burst. 83 left and I am falling behind average. 5790 with 8300 avg stack. Hand for Hand begins and I fold A10o to a raise in EP. I get 88 in MP. Decision time. I decide to go in a blaze (the bubble popped and the difference between 80th and 64th is $0) I jam and get one caller with J8. Cool! I dodge his three outs and very dubious call (he only has 4300 left now and I have T12300) and I am back in the saddle.
Two hands later, AJo in the BB. I dislike this hand. Two raises in front make it an easy fold.
Blinds escalate to 250/500 with 50 ante and I am sitting 22/69 with 11k. I get a support call from work and now I am really multi-tasking. Auto-folding and the large blinds/antes are taking their toll. T9900 and no cards and still on the phone.

300/600 75 Ante. 8700, still on phone and no cards. This is an issue with the firm's CIO so it will take the time that it will take.

500/1000 100 ante. I go out 31st while I am still on the phone when my A7 splits the pot with A3 and then I get A7 the very next hand. I interpret this as a sign from the poker gods and that justice will be served so I go all in PF just like last time and get called by AJ this time. Fickle poker gods! 31/457 and I am not too unhappy with that. I think I could have gone farther if I had not spent 40 plus minutes on the phone troubleshooting a local mail replica issue with the CIO during a very crucial phase of the mtt, but that is how it goes. I am rewarded with a massive 3 dollars in profit and the feeling that my game is not in bad of shape as it sometimes feels.

Tuesday, January 09, 2007

For the Record: This Sucks

From the "Goddamn Politicians Creating More Work for Me" file, allow me to present you this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Policy_Act_of_2005

For the unaware (which I assume are many), Mr. Bush and our bicameral legislature decided it would be cool to extend our Daylight Savings Time by 4 weeks starting in 2007 (in addition to a lot of other junk in the act, but that is the specific change that has me riled up). 3 weeks at the front end and 1 week at the back end.

Hey, the kids get an extra "hour of light" on Halloween!! What's the big deal?

Allow me to enlighten you.

Once I get beyond the fact that I never got Daylight Savings Time (DST) in the first place - I prefer the analogy of cutting of 12 inches off of the bottom of your bedsheet, sewing that 12 inches onto the top of the sheet, and then calling it longer - this is going to create a lot of extra work for IT departments throughout the world and possible frustration for many corporate and home users.

Microsoft has released Operating System patches for its servers (unless you are on a Windows 2k server... good luck with that) and for Windows XP clients with the new rules for DST. Ok, cool. That addresses that.

Now, what about all the stuff that runs on top of the operating system. Like say, perhaps, my beloved Lotus Notes. That inherits its DST rules from the OS. Ok, that sounds good too. Patch my OS, Notes will inherit the new rules. Call it a day and crack a cold one. Not so fast.

This thread on the Domino forums sums it up nicely: (C&S is Calendar and Scheduling and DWA is Domino Web Access, a method that users can get access to their mail file from their home computer)

I have a client where the C&S system is about the most critical thing in the environment. Especially for executives.

So here is the best case scenario. On December 12th when it shipped you applied the MS Windows patches to all of your workstations and servers as well as the appropriate APAR's to your servers. As soon as you did that all meetings previously scheduled for the three weeks in question now appear one hour later than they should except on your Blackberries which aren't patched because the patch isn't available. Now you start creating more meetings for that time period which are stored and appear correctly except on Blackberries where they will appear an hour earlier than they should.

This is the BEST scenario. It falls apart very quickly if you take a while to get the Windows patches out or if you can't patch EVERYONE fairly close to each other from a time perspective.

Oh by the way if users are using DWA from home their machines probably aren't patched so they will potentially be scheduling bad entries right up to the deadline.

BTW, the worst thing that will happen is that ALL your meetings occurring in the US and Canada will be screwed up for three weeks.


Good Luck!!!

Rob


http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/nd6forum.nsf/DateAllThreadedweb/f1029f0dcf860b4d8525725a0072f792?OpenDocument

Another poster posted his plan, it is very similar to mine right now:

I think you are right Rob..Everyone who works on large enterprise should freek out. This change will impact every individual's calendar. Here is our plan

1. Complete the OS patch across all Laptops, Desktops, PDAs, Servers, LPARs etc by end of January

2. While this patch is being loaded, work with IBM and start testing Agents to fix Calendar entries that have been scheduled before OS Patch. Testing should include running agents on Rooms & Resource Database

3. Apart from R&R, we also have external application which we use to reserve Conf Rooms with VTC. Hence will have to patch application

4. Once all clients are patched, final step would be to run the agents. Keeping my fingers crossed and hoping agents work as expected and don't kill the servers :)

5. We use lot of application databases that use Calendar functions. We have to modify IBM agents to run against all our application databases.

6. Setup a swat team for March 11 to perform some testing. Not to mention, Keep IBM support person on standby

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

There is also an effort underway to patch Sametime Meeting Servers, as all meetings will move 1 hour ahead like Notes meetings.

Notes Admin who is not worried about this change, should read the problem between the lines, else will see Admin Assistants standing next to him on 12th March :)

I am a little ahead of the last guy and I am attending a call with IBM tomorrow night at 9PM (might miss the Mookie) that I hope will shed some more light on this situation as far as the "tools" they will have for us administrators to ease the burden and pain for our staff. I am hoping for an agent that we will be able to run centrally that will adjust the affected entries in each calendar and also in the Resource (conference rooms, projectors, etc.) Reservations databases. As it stands right now, it will be a piece of code that each user will have to run on their own computer. I know anyone of you that read this blog with any regularity would fall firmly into the "user" category. No offense, but if I have the choice of leaving something important up to you or doing it myself... I will take the latter everytime.

To sum it up, this could be viewed as a mini-Y2K. The ramifications are not as dire, but it is an external change that will affect computer systems and may have some unknown consequences. At a minimum, I am expecting some disgruntled staff that go to the conference room they had reserved only to find it already in use or people showing up for meetings an hour after they start... basically, a lot of corporate fun.

For the non nerds out there (I expect DNasty to be the only one that made it this far... and that is iffy) enjoy your blissful ignorance of the IT stress that is going on in the background because of the wonderful Energy Policy Act of 2005 and that extra hour of daylight on Halloween.

Trick or Treat.

Sunday, January 07, 2007

For DNasty




JJ vs AK is how it went down.
I can honestly say that "Vegas" took all my money.

F-ing hooks, I mostly hate 'em. 3.33 an hour - far from a living wage.


Thanks for sweating me D

Friday, January 05, 2007

Nothing to Read Here

Keep it moving folks.

I seem to have misplaced my muse but feel compelled to make a post to the blog. Recipe for less than mediocrity? I think so.

How about a quick catch up for any family and friends that read this. The holidays were great and I enjoyed spending time with both families (in-laws and out-laws). The chance to spend time with family and friends certainly trumps any material gifts and there were quite a few material gifts given. How about a quick top 3? I was most excited to give my wife her Garmin 330c GPS. The more cynical out there might question my motivation (to get my GPS back) but that was just a nice byproduct of this thoughtful gift.

For the non techies and the late adopters out there, a GPS equals piece of mind and carefree driving. This was driven home to me recently on an out of state trip without one. It sucked. I had to pay attention to where I was, wonder if I had gone too far or not far enough before I stressed out looking for my next turn. I also had no idea how close I was to making my 5 PM arrival deadline. A GPS mitigates all of that bs. It lets you know exactly how far you are from your next turn, offers a surprisingly accurate estimate of your arrival time, and prevents arguments with your spouse who swore that she needed it more than you and then was at home when you called home to see if she was really using it (she wasn't). It is hard to express the freedom to someone that has not used one in a new city or foreign country, I think Detroit qualifies as both, and just how cool it is. I got a sweet deal (~$320 delivered to my front door, www.pricegrabber.com) and had a bow on it for our drive to Columbus. SteelerSteph was excited when she finally saw it and the detour function came in handy when I-70 came to screeching halt. We had to make the kennel before they closed at 6:30 and the detour button took us off the highway at the first available exit and put us back on a few miles down the road. Smoooove.

All that stuff I just said, ditto it for the exact same model my father received from my mother and me. He was geeked too and for some reason that still escapes me was proud that he navigated back to the house with it one day by doing the exact opposite of "bitchin' Betty's" instructions. "Off Route, Re-Calculating.....Turn Left in 500 feet" I suspect that he had to eventually give in to her coaching. I love my dad.

Personally, I got some good geek gifts from the Mrs. (4 GB iPod Nano, Scala 500 Bluetooth Headset). I purchased the Nike + kit post Christmas and will be seeking motivation to TripJax myself using the Nike website and the little shoe fob and reciever. A buddy at work has it and showed me his running progress over the past four months. Pretty cool. Football season as I know it is over so there is little excuse for chicken wings, pizza, and Sundays that I don't leave the couch. I am mourning a post season with no Steelers presence and the departure of Coach Cowher. Hard to imagine the team without him but the NFL goes on.

Poker has been extremely lackluster lately (none live and online is biting my ball bag big time). Perhaps this is highly correlated to my misplaced muse. Hmmm. Poker stinks, I have not ridden since the middle of November..... might as well delete this blog!

Does anyone else feel funny or like an impostor offering poker advice when you are a losing player? I do! 2006 was a good year, but a disastrous December found me ending the year down a few bucks online. I know that I have personally grown as a player and if I kept track of live play I would be decently ahead for the year, but I still feel that I am not one that anyone should take an opinion from. I know that I am 10x the player I was at the start, but this run of poor decisions and bad cards has me questioning my "poker skills". I am looking forward to the triumphant return of DNasty to Detroit and playing more live games to re-stoking the flame and helping me continue to improve. I think we both feel that the other has something that we could learn from as we struggle to find our own game. Hurry back D, my bankroll needs your discipline and patience!!

How long has it been since I have blogged? My hands hurt from typing all this! This is the first weekend in a long time that I will not be moving/unpacking/working/travelling/visiting in what feels like forever so don't be surprised if there are more posts to this dusty corner of cyberspace. Right now my agenda includes brewing my next batch of homebrew (a Fat Tire Amber Ale clone), attending the motorcycle show down the road from here, and spending some time with SteelerSteph. Will get some poker in if the mood strikes and some motorcycling if the weather permits. Yay me!!