Innovation - Top Ten #9

I am a big believer in innovation.

At #9 on our Top Ten of 2005, I have placed Alex Tew's website http://www.milliondollarhomepage.com

The 21 year old is selling adspace for $1 a pixel. It's just that simple.
The lucky part, was the Reuters press report which gave him the attention to make it to the 904,000 pixel mark, as of Dec. 27th.

Whats also amazing, is that he only started this thing as of late August, this year.

I see this as a great example of innovative simplicity, at its finest.

The Year That Was

so... to recap, 2005 was quite a year.

Many things happened.

In retrospect, the greatest thing, among many great considerable mentions, is I quit my slave-like job. My only regret is that I didn't give my lovable, cuddley, former boss the Indonesian peace sign on the way out the door. It's just like our American peace sign, but you drop the index finger.

Anyway, to commenerate all that was, I will begin a TOP TEN of 2005.

IN this, you will find my top ten events, ideas, songs, movies, people, which made 2005 a little slice of pie, to remember for always.

#10 - the movie "Millions" ... maybe a kid movie, but excellent in plot, and execution.

Stay tuned for #9.

'Tis the Season

IN this latest collection of words and imagery, you may have noticed the King Kong picture. And I, in the absence of others due dilligence, feel I must comment on the movie which has just hit the silver screen, and more broadly, the collective national conscience.

To describe was King Kong is, would be akin to describing what the great pyamids of Egypt are. Words, and bladder control almost fail me (I stole that from Sheen, on the Jimmy Neutron Christmas episode). Either way, it is a start-to-finish spectacle of movie magic. Afterwards, the audience laughed, we cried, and in the end, we ALL had a big group hug. Yes indeed, the world is a better place.

But the poker still sucks a big giant monkey butt.
In fact, here, you hear it first. I, under my own free will, am giving up poker.
At least until mid January.

Here is the sad, sad story.

Over the last few weeks, I have been getting knocked out of tourneys, three times, while holding A-A. Thats sucks, and I can look beyond that, in of itself. But the way in which I have lost can easily be summed up in this perfect example.

Last night, while playing an online $8k tourney, I play my usual tight style, only one or two hand involvement in the first hour. I had only gone up a little, due to small pots. I then pop a straight on some guy, who had two pair, to give me a nice little pot.
I'm up to about 5k in chips, with about 75 people still in it. The tourney paid out to 30, so again I realize I'm near the money.

I then get a suited A-J in the big blind, and one person raises a decent amount. Everyone folds except for the small blind who called it. I then re-raise. The original better (aka=OB) (who by the way, was a very active player, in and out of pots the whole time I was at the table) calls, and so does the small. This leaves three of us in it, with the flop to arrive, me sandwiched in the middle.

The flop goes 2-3-J, rainbow (meaning, no two of the same suit). Small blind checks, I bet heavy. OB raises, small blind calls. I think about, and I call too.
Turn is and Ace, and now a four card rainbow.
With this, I have two pair, and feel prety good about it.

Small blind checks, I bet very heavy, OB thinks for a very long time, and eventually folds.
Then, as if the moon, Jupiter, and Venus all align in a perfect axis, the small blind re-raises to all-in.

I'm stuck. I'm thinking, what the hell does this guy have? A-A? No, he would have re-raised himself after the flop... J-J, no, same thing, most will have re-raised before now. After thinking about how all the betting had transpired up to then, I really put him on the same hand as me, A-J, with two pair. So I call.

Nope. He held a friggin 4-8 offsuit, and has a four card straight, which to the layman, means jack squat. Nada, nil, nuthin. SO, for a brief a second I am happy. I should win.

But, alas, Texas Hold'em offers five community cards. And wouldn't ya know it, a five lands on the river, and moron catches a straight. Another four-outer sinks my battleship.

So, it happens again. I can play no better, and yet lose again to the worst, crappiest players.
And what is wierd, is that a few months ago, and all through the summer, I hadn't seen nearly as many dumb stupid luck-ass players as I have recently.

I figure it's one of two things.

1) Harry "Dumb Luck" Dilrod got his Christmas bonus from the ice cream cone factory, so he decided to play online poker for the first time.

or

2) Desperate times, call for desperate measures. I mean, after all, watch the news. Every year its the same thing, crime rises, and stupid people crawl out from under thier cave rocks to steal a pack of Huggies from the local Quick 'n Queezy Mini Mart. It's just a tiny piece of some people's human nature. They want sooo bad to have a merry Christmas, that they are willing to be a fool for it.

So, sometime after all the donkey brains get thier just due, and the world rotates back to some degree of normalcy, I will cautiously test the figurative, poker waters.

The da Vinci Dare

Here, you will notice one of Leonardo da Vinci's masterpieces.

For those who may not know, I am a true admirer of art, in it's finest forms. And Da Vinci was exceptional. I have gained a renewed interest in his work, specifically, after listening to the unabridged audio cd of "The Da Vinci Code."
It's an incredibly well written, suspense novel with great imagery, delivering unexpected twists and turns throughout. Much like poker.

Speaking of which, I vowed to take Tuesday off from the game, and so I did. Wednesday evening, I eased back into it, playing only two online events. Both were multi-table tourneys.

The first, I played great, got good cards, and began to think I could reel this huka in. 67 fools, um.. I mean people, entered for $24 a pop. They gave the top 3 finalists entrance into a tournament slated for this coming Saturday afternoon. That one, ponied up the top winners a $10k buy-in, to any one of four, choice, globally located poker events. With the likes of Paris, the Carribean, LA (lame), or Las Vegas. They will also throw in 2 grand, in free spending money to boot.

So, I'm playing great, and it comes to the last four of us. On the bubble as it's called. Meaning, one person gets bounced, and the rest can then rest assured, INSIDE the comfortable, prize-gaining-imaginary-bubble (I myself picture something from the original Charlie and the Chocolate Factory). Two dudes have 30k in chips, and this other dude and I, have about 15k in chips. Basically, two dominant stacks who can bully thier chips, and two of us, who have to dice it up, with our skimpy stacks.

We go back and forth for a while, shuffling small numbers of chips back and forth, when low and behold, I catch American Airlines (a pocket pair of aces).
I raise a decent amount, but not so much as to force everyone to fold. I get one caller.
Flop delivers a king, a ten, and a duece. I bet big, and I get a caller.
The turn gives a nine, and there are now a few of the same suit on the board, making the flush a possibility. So, I commit the rest of my stack, hoping to push out the potential flush draw. Home boy held a Q-J, and the nine game him a straight. Needless to say, he calls, I lose.
Bounced, off the bubble again.

The twists and turns make my head hurt sometimes. I guess I'll take the lousy $100 consolation prize for fourth, but dang, I was so close to a major, major event.

So, I then caught an episode of the new tv show, E-Ring, (pretty bad, I predict it bombs) and whence I could stand no more, I plunked myself down for one more online poker tourture... er, I mean, poker tournament.

Event #2 was another $24 entry, but this time playing for a seat in FullTilt.com's Saturday $30k tournament. Thirty something entered, and they dished out four seats. Long story short, I broke INSIDE the bubble this time, and this weekend I will be playing for a piece of some real pie.

Speaking of pie, for only $6 (about the cost of one Marie Callender blueberry pie [I'll admit I'm actually guessing the true price here, as I have only once set foot in such aforementioned fine dining establishment]) you can visit the Wynn art collection in Las Vegas, as I did, when I was there a few weeks back.
At an estimated cost of $400 million (ya, thats 400 x 1 million) I figured the six dollar admission price tag was far and away, a much better deal than any of the famed Las Vegas buffet lines.

Inside, it was small, no Da Vinci, but there was Picasso, Warhol (who sucks by the way), and Matisse, among others most do not recognize, who were featured.
I myself, did not know half of the other artists inside.

So, to wrap up, I dare to say, Saturday should be my day to make up for all the lousy poker that has been going on lately.

If it is not, there is always a high score on Centipede to break, and there are ALWAYS frozen burritoes somewhere on the horizon.

Centipedes and a Frozen Burritoe

Above is a picture I did not take, but it is a pretty picture... no?

I am staying at my dad's house, in Merced right now, not doing much. Well, besides the usual internet poker tourny's. I've been averaging about four per day. And I gotta say, I'm almost sick of it. So many bad beats, stupid players, and general bad luck. So it goes.

To alleve the drudgery, I have resorted to Links Golf, Madden '06, and Centipede to fill my day. And, wherever there may be a small gap in time, I find that frozen burritoes (2 minutes till microwaved perfection), with one dollop of sour cream, and just a dash or two of hot suace, tend to round out whatever may remain of any discontent.

Thats about it really.

Friday is a Good Day

This is me, as current a picture as exists.
This is for the benefit of those, for whom I have not seen in many a moon.

I have also included it, not to serve my own ego, but mostly b/c I have no other pic to represent my most current situational status.

Let me just say this, how I look here, is how I feel.

I'm also officially back on track, poker wise. Earlier in the week, I won a satellite to gain entry in a 60k online tourney. It will be this Sunday at 3pm.
In addition, last night I took 6th out of 160 entrants, netting me $618.

Of real world events, my bud Jeff just saw the birth of his first child, Jacob.
Congratulations to him and his family.

I also want to thank Jimbo for use of his bolt cutters. Wednesday, I returned to my storage facility in Discovery Bay and discovered the keys to unlock my 10x10 unit, had somehow disappeared somewhere within the last 4500 miles I had traveled. Sure, it looked funny, me with criminal looking facial growth, wearing wrinkled, smelly clothing, suspiciously cutting a storage lock. If I was to be busted by the law, it wouldn't be the first time in a storage facilty, at least. None-the-affected, I cut away and rummaged for my belongings. Found were the White Sox preseason tickets, and happy I was.

I'll have to return to the storage once more before heading north, to Oregon. My new set of keys, are in a guaranteed safe place this time.

Reno, to play Some Keno, In a Casino

Actually, I don't play keno. But I am in Reno. I left Las Vegas yesturday, and drove the 7 hours up highway 95. Seven hours of desert driving got me thinking. Las Vegas live poker tables suck a$$. And I'll tell you why.

It finally dawned on me why I can do so well in the tournaments, yet fail miserably on the cash tables. In every tourny, everyone wants to survive. So people play good cards, and don't chase inside gut shots. Odds are, the inside shots don't hit.
But on each and every cash table I played at, 1-2 limit, 2-4, 3-6, 4-8, 5-10, 8-16, 10-20, 30-60, whatever, every hand, at least 8 people are in it. With this ratio, someone will hit thier straight, or flush, if one can be made, nearly every single time. This makes every hand your in, independant of the cards you hold, almost pure 8-1 odds. Roulette, and blackjack have far better odds than this.

People will bet, and call multiple bets on long shots and four outers (where only four cards in the deck can make your hand).
This aggressive style relagates the game to a stupid roll of the dice. And whoever wins the dice more often than not, by pure luck, wins money that night.

It is a game, and anyone can play however they want, but Las Vegas tournament poker (or any tourney poker for that matter) is not even close to cash table, Las Vegas poker.

Case in point: $4-8 limit poker table at the Golden Nugget. I'm on the button with A-J. It is bet, and re-raised once before me, and I re-raise, all preflop. Everyone calls. Flop is A-5-8. It is immediately bet by someone I shall hereforth, call "crazy lady #1," or "CL1" for short. Three other dudes call, I raise. Everyone calls. Turn is a Jack. I now have two pair. CL1 fires off another bet. One dude calls, and I raise. Only CL1 calls. River is a 6.
She bets, I had to call, thinking the only thing she could have is a pocket pair, that tripped (made three of a kind). Instead, CL1 held a 4-7 off-suit, for the straight. Keep in mind it was bet three times before the flop, and multiple bets were made before she had anything at all. But CL1 never flinched, and fired off bets, at will.

And I tell you, every live poker game, in every casino in Las Vegas, was this way. It makes the patient, good card player odds reduced to competing with every Tom, Dick, and Suck Out. I lost a bundle, to say the least. I wish I had seen it.

It took a while to recognize it, mostly because about half the time, the winning hand is not seen, everyone folds to the one who caught thier crazy-outer, because after all, every one was chasing some miracle card as well.

In a tournament though, the pre-flop is usually bet up a few hundred, (in the early stages anyways, it is more as time goes by and as people gain chips) or at least 2-3 times the big blind, thus pushing out most 4-7 off-suit card holders. It then comes down to two or three people, at most four, who have cards that are worth putting up some chips for. After the flop, usually another bet is made, by someone who obviously caught a piece of the flop, or maybe a high pocket pair holder. Then the field is more often than not, reduced to two people who are heads-up (meaning mono a mono), if not folded by all. A showdown will thus ensue. This is how it goes. It's like clockwork.

A smart player will not chase the last two remaining community cards to catch someone who already has a made hand (unless it's a major combination draw: straight and flush draw, or it's an ace high flush draw). It's predictable, and you can control your fate, to the extent that you choose to commit, and to the stength your cards allow.

But not in the live games. Its all aggressive, and all about who catches thier "suck out" cards. It's a crap shoot. Completely contrary to text book (and successful I might add) tournament play.

Speaking of successful tournament play, here are my Las Vegas tournament stats.
Events entered: 10 muli-table tournaments, 5 single table satellites.

2 cash wins, one was a three way chop, meaning the final three of us equally divided the 1st-3rd prize money, equalling $682 apiece. The other cash payout was an 8th place finish for a wimpy $85.

I made two other final tables, one 9th, and one 4th. No cash for each of these however (payouts are always based on cost of entry, and total number of entrants).

Of two others, I made it to the final two tables, from fields of 50 or so.

The rest were either quick-outers (e.g. k-k vs. a-a), or no-card-catchers where I was slowly drained of chips.

This means I had 6 quality showings. Which I figure is pretty good and tells me I know how to make good reads on people, I know how to maximize my wins, and I know what, and when to throw cards away. I can always improve, but overall I feel I did well for just picking up the game 18 months ago, and only seriously, for a year now.

It still just eats me up though, that I didn't realize how the cash games are played. If I would have, I would have stayed away, and never will again partake. It's a fools game. Its funny too, b/c no where else, even in my travels round this great land, did I see games like this. Talking to my brother Billy, we concluded that there must be a lot of bitter locals, mixed with the "gambling" tourists, which makes the cash game an aggressive race to the end. This sucks, and there is no advantage to any one player. It's just who gets more dumb luck than the rest, It's actually a disadvantage to players like me, who don't chase, and play good cards only vs. a whole table of long shots. With 10 aggressive long shot players, I fold a lot, and get out drawn often, if not every time. End result, I basically took a major financial bath.

But there is advantage to the survival game of tournament. Case in point, the top poker players make final tables often, and have several wins per year, in the 30 or so major events throughout the year. This is skill, and experience at work.

It is worthy of mention, that as you get closer to the finish, the more luck you do need. But point is, if you play it safe, and only get involved in hands where you hold a strong starting position, you increase your chances to collect chips. Make good reads, posture yourself to your advantage, and stay aware... all these things are a simple formula to strong poker. Its just that simple.