Whew, back from a week in Canada. A week of lounging around, fishing and swimming at my brother-in-law’s lake cottage in Western Ontario. All of the fishing was catch-and-release, since I have NFI how to clean or gut a fish and no one else at the cabin cared to do it either. Caught some Northern Pike (my son caught a three-pounder with basically a Walmart pole), some Smallmouth (I caught a two-pounder that made those fags on Bassmasters look WEAK), and some Walleye. Now I’m back at my desk, pretending to do some work…

At the cottage, one of my wife’s brothers brought the “Hold’em for Dummies” set. I watched them play for about two hands before ignoring the game altogether. The cards actually have instructions printed on the face OF THE PLAYING CARD on when to play and when to fold. For example, if you get a four, the card says that you should fold in early position no matter what your other card is, play in middle position with another four or suited Ace, and play in late position with… I can’t even remember. Anyway, the instructions were appallingly bad and I had no interest in playing with a group that would follow such instructions.

My wife wanted me to join her brothers in some sort of bizarre family poker bonding ritual, but quickly realized my contempt for the entire exercise. I told her that I would play if they’d have a REAL cash buy-in rather than chips with no value, arguing that it wasn’t really poker if you had no actual risk of losing, and they might as well play the cards face-up since everyone was staying till showdown on each hand. I probably said it too loudly because I attracted some grumpy frowns from the table of wannabes.

Anyway, once we got back on Sunday, I wasted no time in firing up a quick $10+1 SnG on Party. Of course, I got knocked out in fifth or sixth after getting crippled by a three-outer and finally busted on a two-outer. Ahhh, the joys of Party. I’ll be spending a lot of today getting caught up… at work and on the blogs.

Oh, and I joined the blogger fantasy football league run by the Donkeypuncher. I think he has the details on his site. You might have to dig a little bit since he’s been rather prolific with this blogging recently, but it’ll be worth it to join. $20 per player, Yahoo hosting, trash talking galore. Look for my team, “Sooted Connectors”, to be taking the title and the cash this year.