More Empire news:

$62 - $11 SnG loss = $51

$51 - $11 SnG + $50 WIN = $90

So now I'm up to $90 from NOTHING in a week. It's remarkably similar to what I accomplished at Party a couple of months ago with some free cash (up to $150 and still pumping).

Five minutes after booking that win, I logged into a $33+3 on FullTilt and came in 2nd when my TT ran into AA heads up. Not sure there was anything I could do about that one. I ain't folding TT to anyone preflop heads-up, but I still pocketed a tidy $50+ profit there.

Almost time for my fearless football prognostications. Stay tuned.

Hint: the 49ers won't make the playoffs... Oh, I've given too much away already...

Ah, Empire… Recap time: They hand me $15 for, uh, nothing. They have rules about cash out. I ignore rules, try to run up money in SnGs.

I win. $62 now, and I’ve satisfied their betting requirements. Time to grow the Empire funds.

$15 - $11 SnG + $30 for second place = $34

$34 - $11 SnG (bad playing) = $23

$23 - $11 SnG + $50 for first place = $62

Since I’ve laid out $33 in stakes, I guess I’ve satisfied their cashout requirements because the money is showing up as unrestricted. Three days. And I’m up $62. I figure at this pace I’ll have $7500 in a year. And that’s just playing $11 SnGs. One per day. Suh-weet.

---

Oh, and to follow up my Heigl comments... A hint for you guys who have wives that complain when you ogle big breasts spilling out of blouse or dress:

Wife: You're so shallow, why do you always look at big boobs?
Me: If a guy walked by and had his dick hanging out, would you notice?
Wife: That's not the same thing!

Isn't it?

Start of the week, start of the school year, right after the Emmys thoughts:

- Evangeline Freakin’ Lilly. Holy hotness!

- Katherine Heigl looks to have, um, grown since the season finale of “Gray’s Anatomy”. My wife said “She must have just bought those boobs and wants to show them off”. I was applauding while my wife was giving me dirty looks.

- The Dick Clark tribute was cool right up until the time when he showed up on stage, almost incomprehensible because of the stroke. That really shook me up, because if Dick Clark is aging, what hope is there for the rest of us?

- And by having Simon Cowell introduce him, are they saying the TV mogul torch is being passed? Can you imagine Dick Clark being booed?

- The Aaron Spelling tribute was equally cool. I would’ve preferred to see more scenes from “Charlie’s Angels” and “90210”, his two signature (and historically iconic) shows, but the bonus of seeing the now elderly Angels troop out onto the stage was pretty nice nonetheless. Kate Jackson has aged well. So has Jaclyn Smith, though she must be using botox to look like that. Farrah… well, Farrah looked used, and her comments sounded almost coherent. I’m sure the producers had her in detox for the last week so her “speech” would be less slurred.

- Evangeline Freakin’ Lilly. I just wanted to say that again!

- I’m not sure I understand the fascination with Ellen Pompeo. Sure, if she was my doctor, she’d be hot. But compared to the Hollywood glitterati, she’s nothing special. Hell, Helen Mirren looked hotter.

- And I’m sick of the liberal fawning over the Daily Show. Have you noticed that it wins Emmys when it’s skewering a Republican President, but didn’t win shit when it was mocking Clinton? I hate liberals.


We’re going through our annual torture that comes with the first day of school (tomorrow). We’ve been trying to wake the kids up early to get their body clocks in tune with their schedule, we’ve been having “dry runs” so my daughter can get used to riding her bike to the middle school (big trauma since she walked two blocks to the elementary school), we’ve been running around buying school supplies since our kids seem to “forget” what they were told to bring. It’s basically been a fucking nightmare. Every. Single. Year.

Oh, Empire gave me some money this weekend. $15. Just handed it over. Desperate times over there… There are some stupid rules about taking it back if I don’t play raked hands within 10 days or something. Fuck ‘em. I played an $11 SnG and immediately came in 2nd, giving me some playing cash. I’ll play a couple more and try to build up my own little poker pyramid scheme. I’ll keep the blog updated with my progress. I’m up to $34. Not bad from ZERO.

This XM-radio thing is complicated. I’m probably going to go with the SkySomething2 doohickey with car kit and home kit. After reading up on it and talking to a friend that has it, I think it comes with a special decoder-type thingie that needs an antenna to pick up the satellite signal. If I have the decoder thingie in my car (and the antenna attached somewhere), I can play the signal through my cassette deck. If I have the decoder thingie in my house (and a different antenna attached somewhere else, pointing towards Antarctica or something), I can play the signal through my home stereo system. I think.

My first (and possibly only) fantasy football draft is this week. I have done NO research whatsoever. I bought a magazine yesterday, which will likely be the extent of my prep. I’m pretty sure that I won’t be picking any Bears, Raiders, Browns, or Vikings this year. Or any receivers with the initials T.O.

Pluto is no longer a planet. Of course, this move was hailed by scientists, astronomers, and elementary school book publishers who must now recant all of the “My very extravagant mother just spent Uncle Ned’s pay” mnemonics. I’m sure someone will come up with a particularly offensive one soon.

This is the astronomical equivalent of the English Premier League, and Pluto has just been demoted to the newly formed Second Division with Ceres and some other rocks that just happened to be pulled into orbit around this particular sun. In reality, does this affect anyone? I mean, are there Plutonian experts that are now getting cut off from grants and not allowed to come to planetary conferences? In other words, is this news?

Oh, and on the Jon Benet killer thing. I told you so. That psycho child molester got better treatment on the jet to the US than the American consulate in Thailand. Of course he wants to be here. And now his family wants to sell his story. Why don't we just fucking kill every single one of them?

Pokerwise, I’m taking a chunk of money from Neteller, previously held for whoring purposes, to buy XM-satellite radio for the family. This serves a number of purposes: it shows wifey that poker winnings can pay for cool stuff, I like the programming (NFL, NHL), and it lets me upgrade our home sound system. A good friend of ours has XM and we loved some of the stations. Sirius is too dependent on Stern to be a long-term option, and the sports programming is better on XM. The Giants are on KNBR, a 50,000 watt station that you can pretty much get anywhere west of the Rockies, so I wasn’t too concerned about getting their broadcasts via a satellite radio service.

Anyway, wifey is suitably impressed, both with my largesse and the poker profit. So it looks like we won’t have any more ugliness around my poker time. I’m planning a wireless speaker set-up, allowing the music to be heard anywhere in the house. I’m shopping around the Internet to find the best set-up based on range, quality, and cost. I’ll probably try to keep the expense reasonable (<$1K total), so I’ll still have some Neteller cash available. You never know when a nice 100% bonus for SnGs might come up!

p.s. Another profitable night in SnGs. I swear to God, if Party ever gets HORSE, I’m not gonna play anything but those tables. Hell, those people haven’t even figured out NLHE yet, imagine what a fish tank it will be for HORSE!

I haven’t gone off on a rant lately and now seems like an opportune time with all that is going on in the world…

- Soooooo, it appears that they finally caught JonBenet’s killer after, what, TEN years?! I want you all to think about this scenario, and tell me if it passes the giggle test. Authorities catch some pervert red-handed (like videotape “red-handed”) killing some kid in a foreign country. He’s about to be castrated and/or viciously beaten in a Thai jail and fed lizard shit and crickets for the rest of his life. Some American agents come by and say “If you confess to about ten unsolved murder mysteries, we’ll fly you back to the US, and you can spend the rest of your life getting three square meals at San Quentin. Of course, you’ll be cornholed every day, but you get to keep your Johnson.” What would you do if you were the perv? Is this possible? Likely?

- No more fluids on an airplane. Fine. If we have reason to believe terrorists want to use my Crest and my Garnier Fructisse to blow up a plane, we should stop them from bringing the shit on board. I get that. But, why are we still letting Middle Easterners on planes? I’m pretty sure all terrorist plane hijackings in the last ten years or so have been done by Middle Easterners, toothpaste or not. Haven’t been many blonde, blue-eyed hijackers since, oh, EVER. Haven’t been many Japanese or Chinese hijackers either. Hmmm, this might be profiling, but why not just restrict the travel of THE SINGLE ETHNIC GROUP that is committing all of the midair violence!

- Let’s just say you created a special airline just for Middle Easterners… Jihad Airlines. Of course, others can fly on the airline too… if they choose. Meals will be traditional ethnic meals, no more Spanish Omelettes or Roast beef. Flight attendants will be properly burqa-ed. No carry-on luggage at all, every bag will be gate-checked. Each plane will equipped with a remote detonator just in case someone saw “World Trade Center” or “9/11” and felt nostalgic. Every non-Middle Eastern traveler can stay on American or United or Lufthansa or whatever airline and go back to the pre-9/11 security measures. Of course, this is an extreme example, but would anyone really have a problem with this?

- Think about it this way. If you have a dog run… you know, one of those open field areas where people let their pets run around and crap and piss and hump with impunity…, and there are multiple fights and several dogs get killed. Each time it happens, it’s a Pit Bull who does the killing (or a Pekingese or a Shar-Pei, stay focused!). Would you make every dog take out his teeth before they’re allowed in, or would you simply say “No Pit Bulls”?

- Congratulations, Floyd Landis. Not only did you piss on the entire bicycling community and basically kill the Tour de France forever, but now you’ve killed your father-in-law. Have a nice trip down to hell. Don’t forget to pack your lycra shorts for the trip.

- Considering they’ve busted just about every cyclist for doping and/or drugs except Pee-wee Herman (different crime), maybe I should enter the Tour de France next year. Oh, and how come they can catch all these bicyclists, but there still aren’t any positive drug screens on Barry Bonds? His blood has been tested, they’re shooting for perjury charges now because they’re hoping that testimony from others will outweigh Bonds’ claims of innocence. Apparently, they have NO physical evidence on him.

- What’s the over/under on a Jamie Gold movie? Two months? Three? I can’t imagine a Hollywood sleazebag wouldn’t already be talking deal with the studios.

- It’s that time of year again. I dragged out the 49er highlight videos (yeah, I said “videos”… I’m old) from 1984, 1988, 1989, and 1994 to show my son what things were like when the 49ers were the best fucking team in the world, and not the collection of discards and never-were’s they are today. I pointed to the artistry of Joe Montana (GOD), the athleticism of Steve Young, the grace of Jerry Rice (pre-Dancing with the Stars), the violence of Ronnie Lott. Being a product of a cynical father, he said “Well, yeah, they look good, Dad. It’s a HIGHLIGHT tape.”

I’m planning to show him a tape of the 1985 Super Bowl where the 49ers dismantled the Marino-led Dolphins. Most of the pre-game show was dedicated to Marino and the Marks (Clayton and Duper). Most of the game was dedicated to Montana, Clark, Craig, and the defense. It was probably as dominating a performance you’ll see between two “evenly matched” Super Bowl teams. Even the 49er blowout of the Broncos was predicted by many. Super Bowl XIX was supposed to be a shootout, but only one team brought a gun. Maybe then he’ll appreciate why the 1984 team was probably the best 49er team ever and one of the top five NFL teams ever.

Won a $30+3 HORSE SnG last night. Funniest part was that I didn’t play particularly well in the Stud games (R, S, E) and that’s where I usually accumulate chips. Typically, these games start losing people around the 2nd round of Razz and that’s where I start picking up chips. By then, I have an idea who knows how to play and who doesn’t and I start targeting the bad players and only get involved with the good players if I have a monster.

This time, I jumped out to a pretty hefty lead during the first set of Hold ‘Em. Ax sooted turned the nut flush against top two pair and added 500 to my stack when blinds were only 20/40. I bled down during the Omaha section, but made a few mental notes about the table. One guy would raise with A2 or A3 all the way to the river, even if he was duplicated. He didn’t seem to get that a low pair wasn’t going to win high OR low. Unfortunately, I didn’t have any playable hands. I continued to bleed down during Razz where I made an ill-fated bluff attempt with two baby pair against a calling station with 98 that probably should have folded to my board. Mental note made.

During the first “cycle”, I can get some pretty valuable information by just watching the betting patterns carefully. You’ll see who raises with any Ace in Hold’Em. If I see this, I might stick around with any connectors and bet into him with an ace-less flop, even if I miss it. I stole multiple pots from one guy by doing that. In Omaha, I knew a guy had A2/A3 and kept pushing him when I knew I had him quartered with the wheel AND the 67 for the higher straight. He obediently kept raising and took his $0.25 on the dollar.

HORSE is still a new game to most people, who were wet-nursed on NLHE. I wrote about this months ago. But it’s still true. HORSE is still an experiment for a lot of players. With money. They’re dipping their toes in the waters and they’re willing to pay for the lessons. They don’t know that connectors (especially sooted) have good implied odds in Limit. They don’t know that A2 ain’t a guarantee of anything or that top pair is worthless in Omaha. They don’t look to their left in Razz to see if anyone behind them might have worse cards. I saw guys fold with a door 2 with only face cards showing behind them. If they had completed, they would’ve taken the pot in all likelihood. Amazing.

One side note: After I won, I went to kiss my son goodnight and told him that I won the HORSE tournament. “I’m sorry, Trev, you don’t know what HORSE is, do you?”

“Of course I do. Isn’t that the one with multiple games? I want you to teach me that one, Dad.”

I was so proud.

OK, I don't get why some people feel a need to belittle, especially when they've been outplayed.

Full Tilt Poker Game #895211641: $22 + $2 Sit & Go (Turbo) (5998714), Table 1 - 250/500 - No Limit Hold'em - 1:45:23 ET - 2006/08/14
Seat 3: 459triple3 (5,672)
Seat 6: ToddCommish (7,828)
459triple3 posts the small blind of 250
ToddCommish posts the big blind of 500
The button is in seat #3
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to ToddCommish [Ah As]
459triple3 calls 250
ToddCommish raises to 1,500
459triple3 calls 1,000
*** FLOP *** [6h 3d 2h]
ToddCommish bets 1,500
459triple3 raises to 4,172, and is all in
ToddCommish calls 2,672
459triple3 shows [4d Kd]
ToddCommish shows [Ah As]
*** TURN *** [6h 3d 2h] [6c]
*** RIVER *** [6h 3d 2h 6c] [Kc]
459triple3: nice luck $##
459triple3 shows two pair, Kings and Sixes
ToddCommish shows two pair, Aces and Sixes
ToddCommish wins the pot (11,344) with two pair, Aces and Sixes
459triple3 stands up
ToddCommish stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 11,344 | Rake 0
Board: [6h 3d 2h 6c Kc]
Seat 3: 459triple3 (small blind) showed [4d Kd] and lost with two pair, Kings and Sixes
Seat 6: ToddCommish (big blind) showed [Ah As] and won (11,344) with two pair, Aces and Sixes
459triple3 [observer]: donkey

Me? What does that make him? And I had the lead the entire fucking hand! And I goaded him into pushing with the worst hand. And I'm the donkey.

So, keep an eye out for 459triple3.