More on the DirecTV HR21

So we've had a few days now with the HR21, and I have to say, it's nice. As I said in my last post, I don't particularly miss the TiVo menu system. The HR21 shows a picture-in-picture view of the current program while you're in the menus or in the guide, unlike the TiVos. I also hooked our receivers to the network, which enabled home media viewing and DirecTV on demand. It took a day or two for the on demand feature to work, but now that it does, it's quite compelling. I've already downloaded an episode of Californication that Scarlet had missed from last season (of course, you can't get shows on-demand for channels to which you do not subscribe). They also have some extra channels that have concerts, Olympic stuff, and even an Adult Swim VOD channel.

Among the new niceties with the HR21 is that PPV events now are not charged until you actually watch them. It is free to record a PPV event - or even download one with on-demand. You only get charged when you start watching it. The downside is that, like iTunes rentals, you have a 24 hour window in which to finish watching.

The AM21 seems to work pretty well. The only quirk is that although we've selected "channels I receive" as the default guide, the over-the-satellite local channels still show up, even though we don't actually get them. This means that when you're picking a show to record, you have to make sure to pick the one that is over-the-air. Fortunately, they're easy to spot - they have a sub-channel number (like 9-1 instead of just 9).

The HR21s have an eSATA port on the back, which allows you to replace the internal hard drive without any tools. I don't know if we'll take advantage of this or not. Unfortunately, it doesn't cascade the two drives, so when you plug in an external drive, you lose access to the recordings on the internal drive. But adding a 1TB drive (and they're not that expensive anymore) would triple the capacity. Time will tell if that is necessary or not.

Wiring the system up with the SWM module was just as easy as wiring up any older multi-switch. I decided to keep the terrestrial wiring separate, but the SWM-8 does have a terrestrial input so that you can diplex everything together. DirecTV apparently has a new LNB in the works that integrates an SWM-8. That will make DirecTV much more like cable TV than it is now - just one wire leaving the dish that can be split with ordinary splitters as many ways as desired (feeding up to 8 tuners). But with the SWM-8, you can achieve the same thing right now if you want (though the SWM modules are not cheap, unfortunately).

There's only one feature missing from our setup that I'd like to see added - the ability for two DVRs in the same household to share content over the network. Right now, I have to set up a series link (aka season pass) for The Soup on both DVRs to be able to watch it in either room. If DirecTV would allow sharing content over the network - even if they don't allow downloading directly to a PC - that would be just about perfect in my book.

DirecTV - good product, incompetent service

So we finally decided to move with the cheese. Every DVR we've ever owned has been a TiVo, and the last few have been so-called "DirecTiVos" - DirecTV DVRs powered by the TiVo software. But not so long ago DirecTV ended their relationship with TiVo and started making their own DVRs. They also launched new satellites to carry HD programming that were not going to be compatible with the TiVo DVRs. So we were going to face a stark choice some day - either switch to Comcast and buy real TiVos, or go with the "can't believe it's not TiVo" DirecTV DVRs.

I'd been watching the various forums for a while and finally decided that the software on their DVRs was ready enough and called them last week to get them to install the new 5 bird dish and a pair of HR20 DVRs. Well, when they came on Saturday, they said that they had HR21s, which do not have an ATSC receiver in them to receive local channels. Well, that ruined the plan, so I told the installer I didn't want them. I then called up DirecTV and spent an hour on the phone with them. Turns out that the HR21 does not have an ATSC tuner, but you can get one as an accessory add-on (the AM21). But you can't just add an AM21 to your order and have the installer bring it, you need to have an HR21 on your account first before their computers will let you buy one. Stupid. So, fine, I had them come out Monday.

The next problem is that we have two RG6 lines running to the living room. Since one of them is going to be dedicated to terrestrial signals, that means that if I want the two-tuner functionality, I will need to use the new SWM technology. When I explained that to the installer that came Monday, he said that they could not do an SWM installation except for new customers with more than 5 tuners. Grumble. So I told him to just install it with one tuner and I would do the SWM thing myself. So I've placed an order for the two AM21s and an SWM-8. The good news is that the cost of all the stuff I need to buy to make it right is about the same as the cost that I expected to pay for the new receivers and the installation (which it turns out was free).

The installer left before the software updates were complete. Of course, the receiver in the living room got stuck. My brother-in-law called DirecTV up and read them the riot act, and they said they'd send the installer back, but he never showed. I finally power-cycled the thing and that fixed it.

Now that it's all in (except for the AM21s), I have to say I'm reasonably happy with the functionality. I don't really miss TiVo's menu system. Time will tell, but I may miss the suggestions (the HR21s don't save anything you don't actually request), but it's nice to see Discovery channel programming in HD.

More later.

Hit by CalTrain - learn from my mistake

This morning on my way to work, I got hit by the northbound CalTrain train that I was supposed to board at the Santa Clara station. I was taken to the hospital to be checked out, but only suffered from bruises and scrapes and needed two stitches on my forehead. Service was delayed for everyone else for 20 minutes while the police investigated. For those inconvenienced, and to the crew of the train, I offer my apologies.

The Santa Clara station is one of the few stations remaining that are so-called "hold out" stations. That is, there is a platform between the two tracks intended for use by passengers boarding (or disembarking) trains on the far track - which are the Northbound trains. Well, today, the Northbound train was on the opposite track. When I heard the train approach ringing its bell, I glanced over in that direction and saw the train approaching and slowing down, but did not see that it was on the wrong track. So I started to cross the Southbound track - where the train was - and got hit. The train was going maybe 5 MPH, but it still threw me 10 feet onto the platform. I thank my lucky stars that it threw me onto the platform rather than onto the tracks.

Generally, I wait until the head of the train passes me before I venture across the crossing. Today I didn't do that, and it nearly cost me my life. I don't intend to repeat that mistake. Please don't anyone else repeat it either.

I'd like to see CalTrain fix all of the "hold out" stations. They're working on California Avenue right now, and they've shut down weekday service to Atherton, but I haven't heard about any plans for Santa Clara.

WPT Champions Boot Camp

I just spent 3 days at the WPT Boot Camp Champion's camp. There they teach advanced no-limit hold'em tournament strategy. I won't spill the beans on everything I've learned, but I did pick up a few tweaks to my game that I hope will make the difference. I came in 3rd in the STT, and made an early exit in the MTT, but both of those were just cold decks. I've learned first and foremost that you have to have a plan. Chance favors the prepared mind, and all that.

Let's see if things will be a little different now.

Extra class

Passed my Extra today. w00t.

Back in college, the extra was a written exam that was slightly easier than the Advanced class exam, plus a 20 wpm code test. I passed the extra written once, but could never get the 20 wpm code, so I gave up on that. Now that they've gotten rid of the code requirements, the extra written is a little tougher than before (since it has some of the Advanced stuff, I think). I tried a couple weeks ago to pass it without any study, but that didn't go well. Since then, I've taken practice exams on the AA9PW exam page, and every question I got wrong I took the opportunity to learn something new. Some of the questions were formula based. For that, the W5JCK site's cheat sheets were invaluable. After taking enough practice exams, I felt confident enough to try again.

One suggestion: you'll want a scientific calculator for the test, but you don't want one that is "too smart" - particularly a programable one, since the VEs may disallow its use if they have any concerns that it is may have answers or formulas or anything like that programmed in. So for the test, I went to Walgreens and bought a cheap $8 sharp calculator. You want one that has trig, inverse trig (preferably in degrees), square root and 10^x. That's all you'll need.

I don't really care all that much about the extra 200 kHz or so of HF spectrum. This was really all about checking off another box on the life experience list, I guess. That, and now I can be a full fledged VE if I want to.

WAS... not... :(

I went through all my old QSL cards this evening. Alas, I can no longer claim WAS (worked all states) 20 meter AMTOR. I actually am 11 states short of that, though for 9 of those states I have QSL cards for other bands or modes. Somehow, however, I don't have a card for Rhode Island or West Virginia.

The WAS rules state that you must work all states from either one QTH or if from multiple QTHs, none can be more than 50 miles away from any other (fancy way of saying that you have to have done it inside of a 50 mile diameter circle). Fortunately, the old QTH in Stockton is just barely less than 50 miles away from the current QTH. Barely.

So now I must somehow manage (while we're in the ass end of the solar cycle) to find a band open to RI and WV and have a QSO and get a QSL card. That'll be a challenge.

Don't ever limp

In general, far too many people limp in in early tournament play. The only excuse for limping - particularly in early position - is as the first part of a limp-reraise play. Other than that, you should only limp with a hand that you'd be willing to call a raise with. And there aren't many of those given that with tournament poker there is the gap rule, which says that you should call a raise only with a hand better than that with which you'd be willing to make the same raise.

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: $10 + $1 Sit & Go (_), Table 1 - 20/40 - No Limit Hold'em - 22:34:09 ET - 2008/05/06
Seat 1: (1,400)
Seat 2: (2,170)
Seat 3: (1,260)
Seat 4: (2,445)
Seat 5: (525)
Seat 6: (3,180)
Seat 8: (1,270)
Seat 9: hero (1,250)
Seat 1 posts the small blind of 20
Seat 2 posts the big blind of 40
The button is in seat #9
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [Ad 4d]
Seat 3 calls 40
Seat 4 calls 40
Seat 5 calls 40
Seat 6 calls 40
Seat 8 calls 40

Come on. Everybody limping? None of that!

hero raises to 340
Seat 1 folds
Seat 2 folds
Seat 3 folds
Seat 4 folds
Seat 5 folds
Seat 6 folds
Seat 8 folds

Uh huh.

Uncalled bet of 300 returned to hero
hero mucks
hero wins the pot (300)
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 300 | Rake 0
Seat 1: (small blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 2: (big blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 3: folded before the Flop
Seat 4: folded before the Flop
Seat 5: folded before the Flop
Seat 6: folded before the Flop
Seat 8: folded before the Flop
Seat 9: hero (button) collected (300), mucked

An important lesson in tournament strategy

The setup:

This is a super-satellite tournament. We are 5 handed. 6th place was the bubble. 5th place gets a booby prize. 4th through 1st tie for the win.

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: Super Sat to FTOPS Event #16 (_), Table 2 - 60/120 - No Limit Hold'em - 0:09:21 ET - 2008/05/05
Seat 1: victim (910)
Seat 2: hero (11,925)

Heh. Nice stack, dude. :) I caught lucky once or twice, but for the most part, I played a good game and didn't get screwed.

Seat 3: (3,625)
Seat 4: (3,870)
Seat 5: villain (3,670)
hero posts the small blind of 60
Seat 3 posts the big blind of 120
The button is in seat #1
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to nsayer [Qd 8d]
Seat 4 calls 120
villain raises to 240
victim raises to 910, and is all in
hero calls 850

What?! With a suited queen?

Well, it hardly costs me anything to make the call, and tripling him up, if that's what happens, doesn't really change the table significantly from my point of view. On the other hand, if I catch, it's over. But the villain may have a better hand than me. It is in our joint interest that one of us have a better hand than the victim.

Seat 3 folds
Seat 4 folds
villain calls 670

Remember this moment carefully. I tip my hat retroactively to the villain here.

*** FLOP *** [4c 7s 4d]
hero checks
villain checks
*** TURN *** [4c 7s 4d] [Qs]

*DING*

But what if the victim has pocket kings, the villain has ace high, and an ace is coming on the river? It is still better to simply check it down.

hero checks
villain checks
*** RIVER *** [4c 7s 4d Qs] [6d]
hero checks
villain checks
*** SHOW DOWN ***
victim shows [Th Td] two pair, Tens and Fours
hero shows [Qd 8d] two pair, Queens and Fours
villain shows [Ad As] two pair, Aces and Fours

Oh ho!

The villain would normally have been perfectly justified in re-raising pre-flop to make me go away. I certainly would have folded. But my hat goes off to this villain - he recognized the situation perfectly. What if the victim had A4 and I had 58o? The villain would have had the 3rd best hand, the victim would have been chipped up, I would still have been a monster chip lead, but he would have been seriously wounded. By letting me draw all the way to the river, I might have won the pot instead of the victim, and it would have been over.

villain wins the pot (2,970) with two pair, Aces and Fours
victim stands up
villain stands up
hero stands up
Seat 4 stands up
Seat 3 stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 2,970 | Rake 0
Board: [4c 7s 4d Qs 6d]
Seat 1: victim (button) showed [Th Td] and lost with two pair, Tens and Fours
Seat 2: hero (small blind) showed [Qd 8d] and lost with two pair, Queens and Fours
Seat 3: (big blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 4: folded before the Flop
Seat 5: villain showed [Ad As] and won (2,970) with two pair, Aces and Fours

Web stupidity

Why do webmasters create "About us" links on their web pages? Isn't the entire site "about you"?

6 times out of 10 when I visit a web page, it's because I want to either call them up or get their address. Typically the best way to get that is to click either a "store locator" link or a "contact us" link. I like it when sites put those on their pages.

The anti-example of that level of cluefullness is the web site for the Camino Medical Group. First, when you go there, it redirects you to their parent organization, which has a deep link back to their site. That's pretty stupid. Furthermore, there is one of those stupid "about us" buttons, but there is no easy way from the front page to find a list of clinics and their addresses. I had to click "find a doctor" and from that page, "find a location."

To quote one of the old VW TV ads, "You get an F."

Amateur PSK31 and Mac

I've been a dormant ham for a while now, but with some encouragement from my wife, I've recently got back on the air. Back in the day, I managed to work all the states on 20 meter AMTOR. Since then, the new AMTOR is a mode called PSK31. It's a digital mode optimized for keyboard-to-keyboard QSOs.

You have to use computer software to work PSK31. It converts your typing into audio, then converts the tones it hears from your transceiver back into text. It does the latter by listening for signals throughout the audio passband of your rig, showing them all in a waterfall display that you click on to choose either a blank spot to call CQ or on a signal to decode it and set up your transmitter to reply to.

So to make it work, you need to do three things:

1. Get the receiver's audio into the computer
2. Get the program's transmit audio into your transceiver
3. Allow the program to control your radio's PTT button

The grand plan was to buy a TigerTronics SignalLink USB. It looks to me to be the best possible solution. It connects to your computer only via a USB cable. It has an internal USB audio device and the signal isolation transformers necessary to keep the two apart. It uses VOX to key the radio (that is, when audio comes out of the audio device, it keys the radio automatically). All in all, it seems ideal. Unfortunately, however, they're 4-6 weeks backordered, since it appears that I'm not the only one who thinks it's an ideal solution.

The next best thing is a RigBlaster Plug-n-Play. It makes 3 connections to your computer - audio in, audio out and a USB connection. The USB connection is for a USB-to-serial adapter that is used for PTT and for an (optional) radio control serial port interface. The port's RTS line is connected directly to the radio's PTT actuator. There is a software download on West Mountain Radio's site that contains an unsupported MacOS X driver. From what I can tell, it works just fine.

On the software end, there is a program called MultiMode, but the interface seems awfully primitive to me. Plus it costs almost $90. Instead, I went with cocoaModem. It has an auxiliary helper program called cocoaPTT that will do the serial port RTS for PTT thing on behalf of cocoaModem. You just have to make sure that the rigBlaster is plugged in, then start cocoaPTT, then start cocoaModem.

What REALLY sucks about poker

I guess the worst thing of all about poker is that literally nobody I know really well cares about it. So I have nobody to talk to about it. I am on a cold streak that, as all cold streaks do, seems to stretch back as far as I can remember. I can tell them about the fact that your heads-up opponent has 20:1 odds of holding a pocket pair, and that losing because you've held the under-pair 6 times in one day is spooky bad luck, not bad play, but they don't get it. I am playing as correctly as I know how, and getting screwed. And there's no one I can have a conversation about it with. I think that, more than anything, is why I keep going to boot camps and trying to find a tutor. At least there I can have a conversation with someone. You can't do that at Bay 101 or Garden City - you go there to take people's money.

Sigh.

This just sucks.

The problem with poker

Alright. It's finally become clear that people who play online are just too stupid to fold. You can tell them a consistent story all the way to the river and you can see through the screen as they shrug their shoulders and toss in their last chips, knowing that they're beat.

Full Tilt Poker Game #6005794296: $20 + $2 Sit & Go (45724711), Table 1 - 15/30 - No Limit Hold'em - 14:13:39 ET - 2008/04/12
Seat 1: (1,470)
Seat 2: hero (1,470)
Seat 3: (1,500)
Seat 4: villain (1,545)
Seat 5: goat (1,545)
Seat 6: (1,470)
hero posts the small blind of 15
Seat 3 posts the big blind of 30
The button is in seat #1
*** HOLE CARDS ***

I'm going to keep my cards secret for now.

Dealt to hero [?? ??]
villain calls 30
goat calls 30
Seat 6 folds
Seat 1 folds
hero raises to 150

Standard raise - 2 limpers = 5xBB

Seat 3 folds
villain calls 120
goat calls 120
*** FLOP *** [9d 6s 4d]
hero checks
villain bets 270
goat calls 270
hero raises to 600

3x check-raise

villain calls 330
goat calls 330
*** TURN *** [9d 6s 4d] [2h]
hero bets 720, and is all in

Now let's just pause here. If you were in their spot, what is the WORST possible hand I could reasonably have (if I'm not bluffing with nothing at all).

Remember: I raised pre-flop, I check-raised the flop and went all-in on the turn.

A9?

I could have an overpair, I could have flopped a set.

villain calls 720
goat folds
hero shows [Kh 7h]
villain shows [Ac 4c]

WTF?!?! SECOND TO BOTTOM PAIR?!

*** RIVER *** [9d 6s 4d 2h] [Qd]
hero shows King Queen high
villain shows a pair of Fours
villain wins the pot (3,720) with a pair of Fours
hero stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 3,720 | Rake 0
Board: [9d 6s 4d 2h Qd]
Seat 1: (button) didn't bet (folded)
Seat 2: hero (small blind) showed [Kh 7h] and lost with King Queen high
Seat 3: (big blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 4: villain showed [Ac 4c] and won (3,720) with a pair of Fours
Seat 5: goat folded on the Turn
Seat 6: didn't bet (folded)

Crispin is right. Bluffing online just doesn't work.

sid-milter and SMTP AUTH

I use sid-milter. It works well enough for what it does, but there is a stumbling block. I have my laptop set up for SMTP AUTH so that if I'm not at home, I can still send e-mail as long as I can reach my home mail server. My home domain has an SPF record that includes a "-all" clause in it so that if someone tries to joe-job me, at least those who look at SPF records won't get misled. The problem is that sid-milter doesn't seem to know to check to see if a message was sent with SMTP authentication. I get the Authentication-Result: header with all failures in it. That tends to look bad, even if a spam filter somewhere doesn't trigger on it and junk my e-mail.

Well, since I am out of town and it's happening to me, I decided to fix it. I got into the source of the sid-milter and added a check nearby the "ignore domain" list code. It checks to see if the message has the {auth_authen} macro set, and if it does, it does the same thing as if the "ignore domain" list check matched - it just accepts the message without doing anything.

Here's the patch:

--- sid-filter.c.orig 2006-07-20 15:28:09.000000000 -0700
+++ sid-filter.c 2008-03-24 15:55:00.000000000 -0700
@@ -1892,6 +1892,13 @@
   return (testmode ? SMFIS_ACCEPT : SMFIS_REJECT);
  }
 
+ char *auth_authen;
+ auth_authen = smfi_getsymval(ctx, "{auth_authen}");
+ if (auth_authen != NULL) {
+  /* User used SMTP auth. No problems */
+  return SMFIS_ACCEPT;
+ }
+
  /* if the responsible domain is one we trust, just accept */
  if (domains != NULL)
  {

Oh, note that you must add define(`confMILTER_MACROS_ENVFROM', `i, {auth_authen}') to your sendmail.mc file.

Still here

No, I'm not going to be one of those folks who abandons their blog. I just don't have anything interesting to post about of late. I've decided everybody is tired of me whining about bad beats and cold decks, and there really isn't anything interesting on the mac front.

I did get a chance to play the Thursday morning tournament at Bay 101 last week and came in 9th. I didn't have to rebuy, but I did buy the add-on, so that $80 turned into $170. w00t.

As soon as anything interesting happens, I'll post about it.

Hooray for Time Machine!

We were beset by thieves at the office this weekend. I had my company MacBook Pro on a Kensington lock, but the thieves rummaged through my drawers until he found the key. D'oh! They did, however, leave behind the Time Machine drive. Well, the IT staff replaced the laptop this morning, and with fingers and toes crossed, I booted up the Leopard install DVD and went into the Time Machine restore menu item. The entire process was completely painless. About two hours later, the machine rebooted just as if nothing had ever happened. I did lose the Windows XP virtual machine, but that was because I told time machine to ignore it. It's a 20 GB opaque file that changes every time I run Windows, and I figured that would take up all my time machine space. I don't regret the decision, though, because all I used Windows for at work was to run Outlook and TOAD, both of which simply need to be reinstalled on top of a fresh Windows installation.

Nice call, damnit

What a night. 0 for 3. KK over QQ, an idiot rivering two pair to beat my overpair, and then there's this hand:

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: $10 + $1 Sit & Go (_), Table 1 - 30/60 - No Limit Hold'em - 21:18:22 ET - 2008/02/27
Seat 1: hero (2,060)
Seat 2: villain (1,900)
Seat 3: (5,040)
Seat 3 posts the small blind of 30
hero posts the big blind of 60
The button is in seat #2
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [Ah 5c]
villain raises to 210
Seat 3 folds
hero calls 150
*** FLOP *** [8s Tc Jc]
hero bets 400
villain calls 400
*** TURN *** [8s Tc Jc] [8d]
hero bets 1,450, and is all in

Now, look at it from his point of view. What might I have that would allow me to be so aggressive? We're 3 handed, 9Q is not out of the question. 97 is maybe pushing it, but how about AJ, KJ, AT? Maybe an 8?

villain calls 1,290, and is all in
hero shows [Ah 5c]
villain shows [Kc Qc]
Uncalled bet of 160 returned to hero

Unbelievable. Ace high is the winner at the moment. But he has a straight-flush draw and over-cards. So he has 6 outs for the overs, 6 9s and aces that aren't clubs, and 9 clubs. 21 outs. Since we're on the turn, though, that's still less than 2:1 odds, and if the river is a red deuce, he's gone. Using strict pot odds, any call on the flop is correct, since he's the favorite. And on the turn, he has to call 1290 to win over 3800, so that's correct. But this is a tournament. If he fails to suck out, or if I've already got a boat or quads (in which case he has exactly two outs), he's out on the bubble. Since he was the favorite on the flop, he should have pushed immediately. I, of course, would have folded my bluff hand, but if I had the AJ I was representing, I would have called.

Of course, as it turns out...

*** RIVER *** [8s Tc Jc 8d] [9h]

Grumble.

hero shows a pair of Eights
villain shows a straight, King high
villain wins the pot (3,830) with a straight, King high
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 3,830 | Rake 0
Board: [8s Tc Jc 8d 9h]
Seat 1: hero (big blind) showed [Ah 5c] and lost with a pair of Eights
Seat 2: villain (button) showed [Kc Qc] and won (3,830) with a straight, King high
Seat 3: (small blind) folded before the Flop

Bad beat du jour

Seriously. Can I please have a 3 day period go by without one of these? I don't think I'm asking for much.

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: $10 + $1 Sit & Go (_), Table 1 - 30/60 - No Limit Hold'em - 22:51:00 ET - 2008/02/13
Seat 1: hero (3,230)
Seat 2: (1,170)
Seat 3: villain (2,900)
Seat 4: (1,700)
hero posts the big blind of 60
The button is in seat #5
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [9c Kd]
Seat 2 folds
MrStrehl raises to 180
Seat 4 folds
hero calls 120
*** FLOP *** [Qd Th Jc]
hero checks
villain bets 360
hero raises to 1,200
villain raises to 2,720, and is all in
hero calls 1,520
villain shows [Qc Qs]
hero shows [9c Kd]

Get all your money in with the best hand....

*** TURN *** [Qd Th Jc] [3c]
*** RIVER *** [Qd Th Jc 3c] [Td]

And then get fucked up the ass.

villain shows a full house, Queens full of Tens
hero shows a straight, King high
villain wins the pot (5,800) with a full house, Queens full of Tens
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 5,800 | Rake 0
Board: [Qd Th Jc 3c Td]
Seat 1: hero (big blind) showed [9c Kd] and lost with a straight, King high
Seat 2: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 3: villain showed [Qc Qs] and won (5,800) with a full house, Queens full of Tens
Seat 4: didn't bet (folded)

Is Leopard Apple's Vista?

It's a harsh thing to say, I know, but Leopard has been more troublesome than any other release of MacOS X to date. Let's run down my list of problems:

1. Mom doesn't like the way iCal's detail panel works. I can't say I blame her. What was wrong with the drawers, Steve?

2. On Scarlet's machine, the dock periodically disappears. The workaround is to kill Dock.app, but why is this necessary?

3. Suddenly screen and disk sharing from one of the mac minis to my laptop doesn't work. It says the password is wrong when you try and screen share (bullshit. It's the same password that works for ssh and screen/disk sharing from any other machine), and disk sharing just says that an unknown error occurred. In general, this is the one problem with macs. When shit doesn't work, it can sometimes be completely impossible to figure out why.

4. Back to my mac randomly works or doesn't work, depending on how lucky you are.

5. Time machine over airdisk. We were all but promised this functionality. We're on the eve of 10.5.2 [edit: 10.5.2 is out now] and still nothing.

Maybe my luck is turning around

Although one hand does not a swing make, all in all this was a refreshing tournament. I wasn't party to any hands where someone sucked out. Incredible.

But the capper was the last hand, which offers the lesson that it is not simply necessary to get a monster hand, it is also necessary for your opponent to have a hand almost as good:

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: $10 + $1 Sit & Go (_), Table 1 - 60/120 - No Limit Hold'em - 19:32:34 ET - 2008/02/09
Seat 5: hero (4,840)
Seat 6: villain (4,160)
villain posts the small blind of 60
hero posts the big blind of 120
The button is in seat #6
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [Ac Td]
villain calls 60
hero raises to 360
villain calls 240
*** FLOP *** [Qh 2s As]

That board doesn't bother me. Let's slow-play it.

hero checks
villain checks
*** TURN *** [Qh 2s As] [Ah]
hero checks
villain bets 400

Here I let the timer run a little before calling.

hero calls 400
*** RIVER *** [Qh 2s As Ah] [Ad]
hero bets 300

Gosh, how could that 3rd ace have helped me at all? I must be completely bluffing. Tee hee. If he has a queen, then the only hand that beats him is pocket kings or the case ace. If he has a queen, you can be sure that if he has his way, all the money is going in the middle.

villain has 15 seconds left to act
villain raises to 1,000
hero raises to 4,080, and is all in
villain calls 2,400, and is all in
Uncalled bet of 680 returned to hero
*** SHOW DOWN ***
hero shows [Ac Td] four of a kind, Aces
villain mucks
hero wins the pot (8,320) with four of a kind, Aces
villain stands up
hero stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 8,320 | Rake 0
Board: [Qh 2s As Ah Ad]
Seat 5: hero (big blind) showed [Ac Td] and won (8,320) with four of a kind, Aces
Seat 6: villain (small blind) mucked [Qd Ks] - a full house, Aces full of Queens

Too bad for him we weren't at a cash table at Lucky Chances. That hand would have scored him the bad beat jackpot (aces-full or better getting beat).

Happy birthday to me

It's my birthday. Look what I got for it:

PokerStars Game #_: Hold'em No Limit ($0.10/$0.25) - 2008/01/27 - 21:37:58 (ET)
Table '_' 9-max Seat #5 is the button
Seat 1: ($17.95 in chips)
Seat 2: ($26.80 in chips)
Seat 3: ($54.65 in chips)
Seat 4: hero ($25 in chips)
Seat 5: villain ($58.70 in chips)
Seat 6: ($22.40 in chips)
Seat 7: ($17.55 in chips)
Seat 8: ($10 in chips)
Seat 9: ($8.30 in chips)
Seat 6: posts small blind $0.10
Seat 7: posts big blind $0.25
hero: posts big blind $0.25

Yup. First hand. Just sat down. The button just passed, so I decided to post.

*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [9c 8c]
Seat 8: calls $0.25
Seat 9: folds
Seat 1: folds
Seat 2: calls $0.25
Seat 3: folds
hero: checks
villain: raises $1.25 to $1.50
Seat 6: folds
Seat 7: calls $1.25
Seat 8: calls $1.25
Seat 2: folds
hero: calls $1.25

A suited connector is in relatively good shape against the sort of hand that would raise, and there's 4.50 in the pot and it costs me a buck and a quarter to call, so the odds are right.

*** FLOP *** [2s Js Td]
Seat 7: checks
Seat 8: bets $0.50
hero: calls $0.50
villain: raises $3 to $3.50
Seat 7: folds
Seat 8: calls $3
hero: calls $3

With two others in the pot, whatever the bet is, I have odds to call with my outside straight draw.

*** TURN *** [2s Js Td] [Qh]
Seat 8: checks

There's my straight. There's a flush draw, though, so time to pull the trigger.

hero: bets $20 and is all-in
villain: raises $33.70 to $53.70 and is all-in
Seat 8: folds
*** RIVER *** [2s Js Td Qh] [6d]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
hero: shows [9c 8c] (a straight, Eight to Queen)
villain: shows [Ac Kc] (a straight, Ten to Ace)

Ouch.

villain collected $54.05 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $56.85 | Rake $2.80
Board [2s Js Td Qh 6d]
Seat 1: folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: folded before Flop
Seat 3: folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: hero showed [9c 8c] and lost with a straight, Eight to Queen
Seat 5: villain (button) showed [Ac Kc] and won ($54.05) with a straight, Ten to Ace
Seat 6: (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 7: (big blind) folded on the Flop
Seat 8: folded on the Turn
Seat 9: folded before Flop (didn't bet)

The bluff that roared

PokerStars Game #_: Tournament #_, $12+$1 Hold'em No Limit - Level I (10/20) - 2008/01/24 - 21:52:51 (ET)
Table '_ 1' 6-max Seat #2 is the button
Seat 1: (1850 in chips)
Seat 2: hero (1140 in chips)
Seat 3: (1500 in chips)
Seat 4: (1360 in chips)
Seat 5: (1760 in chips)
Seat 6: (1390 in chips)
Seat 3: posts small blind 10
Seat 4: posts big blind 20
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [5d As]
Seat 5: calls 20
Seat 6: calls 20
Seat 1: calls 20
hero: calls 20
Seat 3: calls 10
Seat 4: checks

Family pot. We have almost no chance at this.

*** FLOP *** [8s 6h 4c]
Seat 3: checks
Seat 4: bets 20
Seat 5: calls 20
Seat 6: calls 20
Seat 1: folds

Minimum bets are suspicious to me. They're weak as hell. Besides, now there's 180 chips in the pot and it costs me 20 to call. That's more or less correct odds to try and catch my inside straight draw.

hero: calls 20
Seat 3: folds
*** TURN *** [8s 6h 4c] [3d]
Seat 4: bets 20
Seat 5: calls 20
Seat 6: calls 20

Oh, come on. There's 260 chips in the pot now and nobody's going to make a try for it? Screw that! Now there's a whole bunch of potential hands that made a straight. Let's pretend we have one.

hero: raises 130 to 150
Seat 4: calls 130

just call?! That's suspicious, in retrospect, but at the time I put him on a straight draw still.

Seat 5: folds
Seat 6: folds
*** RIVER *** [8s 6h 4c 3d] [Kh]
Seat 4: checks

Well, my ace-high is for sure a loser. Let's try and make something that looks like a value bet.

hero: bets 200
Seat 4: calls 200

Crap.

*** SHOW DOWN ***
hero: shows [5d As] (high card Ace)
Seat 4: mucks hand

WHAT?! He called my river bet with a hand that lost to ACE HIGH?!

That may be the stupidest thing I've seen all week.

hero collected 940 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 940 | Rake 0
Board [8s 6h 4c 3d Kh]
Seat 1: folded on the Flop
Seat 2: hero (button) showed [5d As] and won (940) with high card Ace
Seat 3: (small blind) folded on the Flop
Seat 4: (big blind) mucked [7c 9h]

He called my river bet with a brooklyn straight. A word to the wise: If you miss your flush or straight draw, you probably have the worst hand.

Meanwhile, I bet seats 5 and 6 were... a bit upset. :)

Seat 5: folded on the Turn
Seat 6: folded on the Turn

All rise for the royalty

PokerStars Game #_: Tournament #_, $12+$1 Hold'em No Limit - Level II (15/30) - 2008/01/23 - 22:19:27 (ET)
Table '_ 1' 6-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: (2095 in chips)
Seat 4: hero (3310 in chips)
Seat 5: (1965 in chips)
Seat 6: (1630 in chips)
hero: posts small blind 15
Seat 5: posts big blind 30
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [Qc 4c]
Seat 6: folds
Seat 1: calls 30
hero: calls 15
Seat 5: checks
*** FLOP *** [Jc 2c Kc]
hero: checks

Now, trapping here can be considered dangerous. You're potentially letting the singleton ace get a free card.

Seat 5: checks
Seat 1: checks
*** TURN *** [Jc 2c Kc] [Tc]

Damn! Sure enough. Now I have to worry about that ace, so I have to be prepared to fold the 2nd-to-nut flush if I get serious action.

hero: checks
Seat 5: checks
Seat 1: checks
*** RIVER *** [Jc 2c Kc Tc] [Ac]

HOLY MOTHER OF GOD!!!

The problem now is getting value. There's only 90 chips in the pot because I tried to trap on the flop and got scared on the turn.

hero: bets 50
Seat 5: calls 50
Seat 1: calls 50
*** SHOW DOWN ***
hero: shows [Qc 4c] (a Royal Flush)
Seat 5: mucks hand
Seat 1: mucks hand
hero collected 240 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 240 | Rake 0
Board [Jc 2c Kc Tc Ac]
Seat 1: (button) mucked [3c 9d]
Seat 4: hero (small blind) showed [Qc 4c] and won (240) with a Royal Flush
Seat 5: (big blind) mucked [6c 5h]
Seat 6: folded before Flop (didn't bet)

So that's how tonight has gone. Since it wasn't a cash game, I didn't get any sort of bonus for my Royal. And I netted a grand total of 160 chips on the deal. I wound up getting 2nd place - my only cash for the whole night - when I flopped top 2 and the other guy flopped a set. Every other time I got my money in good all night long, I got screwed. 2008 has been the suck so far, no doubt.

Time machine and AirDisk

How was this not broadcast over the entire Mac-loving portion of the tubes?!

If you want to use Time machine over AirDisk (a USB hard disk connected to an Airport Extreme), type this into a terminal window on your mac:

defaults write com.apple.systempreferences TMShowUnsupportedNetworkVolumes 1

Mischief managed!

thanks to this guy. Credit where it's due, and all that.

San Mateo county home poker tournament busted up by police

Clearly having solved all other higher priority issues on their to-do list, sheriff's deputies in San Mateo county raided a home game and arrested two people and took a 13 year old away from his parents. According to the complaints, the tournament proceeds were being skimmed by the organizer (he denies this), and a "refreshment fee" was charged the participants, which amounts to an illegal rake for a home game.

Congratulations, super cops, you've clearly made the world a better place by not allowing our neighbors to play poker at home for low stakes.

There is, however, a lesson to be learned. If you want to advertise a home game outside of a circle of personal friends, take some time to familiarize yourself with the law. If you don't want to be stuck with the bill for refreshments, make a point of describing the event as BYOB. Never ever rake the pot in any way, don't open the game to minors, and do whatever you have to do to make sure that the game is completely honest (if someone catches someone cheating, the cheater can ruin your life if they claim you were in cahoots with them).

The cops will have a much, much harder time justifying wasting the courts' and DAs' time with your home game if there are no grey areas they can use to hassle you.

Macworld '08 Keynote - more questions than answers

So, as usual, the keynote was fun to watch, even if you have to watch it tape delayed. His Steveness is, as ever, the eternal showman.

My wife and I have iPhones, and we love them. It's nice to see the new features, which indeed were downloadable before the sun set on the day they were announced. Left un-announced, however, were a few things I'd still like to see support for:

1. GPS over bluetooth connectivity, for up-to-the-second positioning and turn-by-turn navigation. No, I don't want or need GPS built-in to the phone. The current functionality demonstrates sufficiently that it is not really necessary. Perhaps we'll see this in a TBD 3rd party native app when the SDK arrives.

2. Since day 1 I have been unable to make the phone's wifi work with internet connection sharing on a mac. This is a pretty glaring one, Steve. I'm not the only one either. The mac support forums light up with this one pretty frequently.

3. Dinging the iPod touch folks $20 for buying them sooner rather than later seems like deja-vu for us who bought the iPhone on the first day. At least the magnitude of the sting is less.

4. No A2DC profile for the iPod touch or iPhone? We still have to use wires and adapters? Humph.

I have a little bit more ire for the announcement of the Time Capsule. This is nothing more than the existing Airport Extreme with a hard-disk built into it. Steve billed this as a fix for those who found that at the last minute the ability to use Time Machine on a laptop with a USB disk shared from the airport was removed.

So help me figure this out, people. Somehow it's the 480 Mb/s USB interface that's the problem that's going to make it impossible to fix this without buying a new box with the drive built-in instead?

Now, in Steve's defense, he didn't say that this functionality wasn't going to be addressed for existing airport owners, and the new price points are competitive with what the prices of an old gigabit airport, external USB enclosure and drive would be.

Since I work at Netflix, I won't blog about the movie rental or Apple TV stuff. Sorry.

Lastly, though, was something I can't really complain about. The MacBook Air looks like a really fantastic machine. I know exactly to whom I'm going to recommend it. My mom! The 4 or 5 of you reading this who know me well are probably stunned by that, expecting me to name my wife or even myself. Nope. The time is right for mom's old, aging iBook to go. She's needed the optical drive on about 10 occasions, and she could use Dad's in a pinch. But for her, small and light trumps it all. I really think she'll love it. She'll particularly love jumping from a 1.mumble GHz G4 with 640M of RAM to a 1.6 GHz core 2 duo with 2 GB of RAM.

And no, it's not a surprise - I won't be buying it. :)

Donkeys upset me

PokerStars Game #_: Tournament #_, $6.00+$0.60 Hold'em No Limit - Level II (15/30) - 2008/01/13 - 17:38:57 (ET)
Table '_' 6-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: (255 in chips)
Seat 2: villain (2865 in chips)
Seat 3: hero (1655 in chips)
Seat 4: (720 in chips)
Seat 5: (1900 in chips)
Seat 6: (1605 in chips)
villain: posts small blind 15
hero: posts big blind 30
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [Ad 9s]
Seat 4: folds
Seat 5: folds
Seat 6: calls 30
Seat 1: folds
villain: calls 15
hero: checks
*** FLOP *** [5d 8d 9d]
villain: bets 30

This guy is the worst player I can remember seeing. He has repeatedly made terrible, terrible calls, and has made these minimum bets whether he hit or not. With top pair and the nut flush draw, it's time to teach this guy a lesson.

hero: raises 1595 to 1625 and is all-in
Seat 6: folds
villain: calls 1595

At this point, we turn 'em up, and he had T7o with no diamonds - an outside straight draw with a flush showing.

Retard.

*** TURN *** [5d 8d 9d] [Tc]

Oh, of fucking course!

*** RIVER *** [5d 8d 9d Tc] [Qs]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
villain: shows [7c Th] (a pair of Tens)
hero: shows [Ad 9s] (a pair of Nines)
villain collected 3340 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 3340 | Rake 0
Board [5d 8d 9d Tc Qs]
Seat 1: (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: villain (small blind) showed [7c Th] and won (3340) with a pair of Tens
Seat 3: hero (big blind) showed [Ad 9s] and lost with a pair of Nines
Seat 4: folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 5: folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: folded on the Flop

I shot the sheriff

PokerStars Game #_: Tournament #_, $10+$1 Hold'em No Limit - Level I (10/20) - 2008/01/11 - 17:32:47 (ET)
Table '_' 9-max Seat #9 is the button
Seat 1: (3180 in chips)
Seat 2: villain (1550 in chips)
Seat 3: hero (1760 in chips)
Seat 4: (1470 in chips)
Seat 6: (1430 in chips)
Seat 7: (1280 in chips)
Seat 8: (1380 in chips)
Seat 9: (1450 in chips)
BSUfan41: posts small blind 10
rocton: posts big blind 20
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [Kd 9s]

I've decided to bluff here, I've got aces, and I'm going to the wall with it.

hero: raises 40 to 60
Seat 4: folds
Seat 6: calls 60
Seat 7: folds
Seat 8: folds
Seat 9: folds
Seat 1: folds
villain: calls 40
*** FLOP *** [8d 5s 7h]
villain: bets 80

If I had aces, I'd be afraid of that flop. Any one with a would have a straight draw, and the 45 or 9T hands have an outside draw. So I can't give a free card.

At this point I actually said in the chat window, "No draws allowed!"

hero: raises 120 to 200
Seat 6: folds
villain: calls 120
*** TURN *** [8d 5s 7h] [7d]
villain: checks
hero: bets 600
villain: calls 600
*** RIVER *** [8d 5s 7h 7d] [9h]
villain: bets 140
hero: raises 580 to 720
villain: calls 550 and is all-in
*** SHOW DOWN ***
hero: shows [Kd 9s] (two pair, Nines and Sevens)
villain: shows [8c Tc] (two pair, Eights and Sevens)

Now, if you were in his shoes, would you honestly think your 2nd pair was good at this point? I've had a pretty good image at this point, so I think the full bluff would have been unexpected.

hero collected 3170 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 3170 | Rake 0
Board [8d 5s 7h 7d 9h]
Seat 1: (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 2: villain (big blind) showed [8c Tc] and lost with two pair, Eights and Sevens
Seat 3: hero showed [Kd 9s] and won (3170) with two pair, Nines and Sevens
Seat 4: folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: folded on the Flop
Seat 7: folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Pave BAREC

Silicon valley has outgrown its agricultural past. The state finally saw the reality of the situation when they decided to close the Bay Area Research and Extension Center - a small plot of land run as a research and educational farm. The question now is what to do with the land. The answer is obvious. The bay area is one of the most expensive places to buy a home in the country. Despite the overblown talk about a housing crisis in this country, it's clear to me that the best use of that land would be the use proposed by measures A and B - part affordable senior housing and part park.

Those opposed to this plan want to keep this land as some sort of "urban farm" experiment. In actual fact, their motives are clearly less pure. Look for the "NO on A & B" signs in Santa Clara - they're concentrated in the southeast corner of the city near the site. This is NIMBY, pure and simple.

So, if you live in the city of Santa Clara, I urge you to vote "Yes" on measures A and B. We have more need of affordable housing than we have of NIMBY agri-fanatics.

Table sheriff

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: $10 + $1 Madness (_), Table 1 - 15/30 - No Limit Hold'em - 12:30:44 ET - 2008/01/05
Seat 1: villain (675)
Seat 2: (1,455)
Seat 3: (1,455)
Seat 4: (2,325)
Seat 5: hero (1,590)
Seat 6: (1,500)
Seat 4 posts the small blind of 15
hero posts the big blind of 30
The button is in seat #3

So first, a bit of setup. This is the fourth hand in the tournament and I've just raised the last 3 and picked them up before the flop.

*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [Qs Ac]
Seat 6 folds
villain calls 30
Seat 2 folds
Seat 3 calls 30
Seat 4 folds
hero raises to 135
villain raises to 240

There's a new sheriff in town. Too bad he's a short stack.

Seat 3 folds
hero raises to 1,590, and is all in
villain calls 435, and is all in
hero shows [Qs Ac]
villain shows [6c Th]

The downside of wearing a tin star is that it gives the other fellow a nice mark to shoot at.

Let's pretend he thought I was stealing. Was it worth a third of his stack (with a crap hand) to write me a speeding ticket?

I've spoken before about pot commitment and tournaments. Yes, he only had to cal 435 to win 1395, but it was his last 435 and he had ten high! Even if I was stealing, wouldn't I have done it with, oh, say, KJo perhaps? Maybe even QTo? either of those has him crushed pre-flop. Even a suited connector is in pretty good shape against a 3-gap hand.

Uncalled bet of 915 returned to hero
*** FLOP *** [As 5c 9s]
*** TURN *** [As 5c 9s] [8d]
*** RIVER *** [As 5c 9s 8d] [Kd]
hero shows a pair of Aces
villain shows Ace King high
hero wins the pot (1,395) with a pair of Aces
villain stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 1,395 | Rake 0
Board: [As 5c 9s 8d Kd]
Seat 1: villain showed [6c Th] and lost with Ace King high
Seat 2: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 3: (button) folded before the Flop
Seat 4: (small blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 5: hero (big blind) showed [Qs Ac] and won (1,395) with a pair of Aces
Seat 6: didn't bet (folded)

Gambling propositions

We Californians have an election coming up. As has been the case several times over the last few years, there are propositions on the ballot to once again tinker with the indian gaming setup we have going on. As is always the case, it pits two powerful sets of special interests against each other: the indian tribes on one side and nevada gambling interests, card rooms and horse tracks on the other.

And, as always, poker players find we have no dog in the hunt. All of the fuss is about slot machines and other "house games." Poker is a completely different animal from those - with Poker, the vying is between all of the players seated at the table and the house has no interest in the outcome (because they rake the pot by the same amount regardless of who wins it). In virtually all other casino gaming, the player plays not against the other players present but against the house, and the house always has an odds advantage which insures the house will be profitable over the long term. Even bookmakers don't have any interest in the outcome of the events upon which they are making book, because of the "vig" - the difference in odds between the two sides of the proposition. If you want to be a profitable book player, you need to be better than everybody else at picking the outcomes, and so much better than you can overcome not only the odds, but the vig as well. At least with poker the rake is typically so small that it's easy for reasonably good players to overcome it. Besides, with poker you have a much larger percentage of the available information at your disposal when making a decision. But this isn't intended to be a diatribe espousing the virtues of Poker over other forms of wagering.

So where do I stand? I am voting my continued disappointment with the state of the restrictions on Internet poker players we currently enjoy in the U.S. I am voting "no" on all gambling-related propositions other than those that are aimed at restoring the rights of players to easily move their money back and forth between the financial institutions of their choosing and sites that provide honest and fair Internet poker.

I urge my fourteen readers to do likewise.

Fixing vonage voicemail to work with the iPhone

We have vonage. We're pretty happy with it. One thing that's particularly nice is that they will e-mail you voicemails as attachments (I wish they would not then also store them in a voicemail box that has to be hosed out periodically, but that's another issue). The one downside is that these voicemails are attached as µLAW WAV files, which aren't compatible with the iPhone.

Not to worry: if you run your own mail server, a little bit of perl can re-encode them as MP3s, which the iPhone is perfectly happy playing. So now vonage voicemail comes in as e-mails on the iPhone, with MP3 attachments that can be listened to. Huzzah!

To use this, set up an alias in sendmail to pipe the e-mail through this perl file, adding the destination e-mail addresses as arguments. For example:

vm-fixit: "| vonagevm.pl user@example.com other@example.com"

Then, set the vonage e-mail address in the voicemail set-up to vm-fixit @ your domain. With the example above, it will change the audio to an MP3 and mail it to user@example.com and other@example.com.

#! /usr/bin/perl

use Email::MIME;
use Email::MIME::Modifier;
use File::Temp qw/ tempfile tempdir tmpnam  /;

my $in_msg;

{ local $/=undef;
  $in_msg = <STDIN>;
}

my $message = Email::MIME->new($in_msg);

$message->walk_parts(sub {
  my $part = shift;
  return if ($part->content_type !~ m[audio/wav]);

  ($fhw, $filenamewav) = tempfile( SUFFIX => ".wav" );
  print $fhw $part->body;
  close $fhw;

  (undef, $filenamemp3) = tempfile(SUFFIX => ".mp3");

  system "/usr/local/bin/sox $filenamewav -t wav -w -s -r 8000 - | /usr/local/bin/lame -m m -b 32 - $filenamemp3";

  my $mp3audio;
  { local $/=undef;
    open FHM, $filenamemp3;
    $mp3audio = <FHM>;
    close FHM;
  }

  unlink($filenamewav);
  unlink($filenamemp3);

  $part->body_set($mp3audio);
  $part->content_type_set("audio/mpeg");
  $part->name_set("voicemail.mp3");
  $part->filename_set("voicemail.mp3");

});

open SENDIT, "|/usr/sbin/sendmail " . join(" ", @ARGV);
print SENDIT $message->header_obj->as_string;
print SENDIT $message->crlf;
print SENDIT $message->body_raw;
close SENDIT;

Suck and re-suck

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: Table Camino Del Santo - $0.10/$0.25 - No Limit Hold'em - 0:29:51 ET - 2007/12/29
Seat 2: ($32.40)
Seat 3: ($24)
Seat 4: ($3.10)
Seat 5: ($23.30)
Seat 6: villain($11.05)
Seat 7: ($9.75)
Seat 8: hero ($25)
Seat 9: ($53.35)
Seat 3 posts the small blind of $0.10
Seat 4 posts the big blind of $0.25
hero posts $0.25

The button has just gone by, so I decided to post rather than wait. So this is the first hand at this table for us.

The button is in seat #2
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [5h 8h]
Seat 5 folds
villain raises to $0.75
Seat 7 folds

Well, the odds we're being offered here are 2:1. That's actually about right for this hand. You see pros make these kind of calls on TV. They don't make them because "any two cards can win," they make them because a combination of the immediate pot odds and the implied odds are favorable. But you have to play it right - either it flops a monster catch or you check-fold.

hero calls $0.50
Seat 9 folds
Seat 2 folds
Seat 3 calls $0.65
Seat 4 folds
*** FLOP *** [4c 8d 5d]

Nice!

Seat 3 checks
villain bets $1

Not only is this likely to be nothing more than a continuation bet, but even if it wasn't, look at the flop: the best hand he could likely have is a big pair, which we have crushed. We can't give the flush draw a free card, but there's no need to go crazy.

hero raises to $3
Seat 3 folds
villain calls $2
*** TURN *** [4c 8d 5d] [Qh]
villain checks

With that last call, he is now pot committed. Time to make him pay.

hero bets $8
villain calls $7.30, and is all in
hero shows [5h 8h]
villain shows [Qd Ac]
Uncalled bet of $0.70 returned to hero
*** RIVER *** [4c 8d 5d Qh] [Ah]

ARGH!!! I hate it when 5-outers catch on the river.

hero shows two pair, Eights and Fives
villain shows two pair, Aces and Queens
villain wins the pot ($21.95) with two pair, Aces and Queens
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $23.10 | Rake $1.15
Board: [4c 8d 5d Qh Ah]
Seat 2: (button) didn't bet (folded)
Seat 3: (small blind) folded on the Flop
Seat 4: (big blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 5: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 6: villain showed [Qd Ac] and won ($21.95) with two pair, Aces and Queens
Seat 7: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 8: hero showed [5h 8h] and lost with two pair, Eights and Fives
Seat 9: didn't bet (folded)

PokerStars native Mac client!

It's finally here! PokerStars now has a native Mac client. If you're familiar with P* on Windows, you won't find anything out of place here.

Of course, my first two tournaments with it were met with unbelievable cold deck losses, but it's been a bad night all 'round. I'm just happy to be able to get back on P* without the hassle of firing up Windows.

Just go to PokerStars (no, I don't get a kickback for the link) and click download. If you're using a Mac, you'll get sent to the mac download page. Like most Mac software, you just open the disk image and drag the application to wherever you want.

Nuisance bets

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: $10 + $1 Sit & Go (_), Table 1 - 15/30 - No Limit Hold'em - 2:36:26 ET - 2007/12/17
Seat 1: villain (1,395)
Seat 2: (1,695)
Seat 3: hero (1,680)
Seat 4: (1,500)
Seat 5: (1,230)
Seat 6: (1,500)
hero posts the small blind of 15
Seat 4 posts the big blind of 30
The button is in seat #2
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to nsayer [Jd 3s]
Seat 5 folds
Seat 6 folds
villain calls 30
Seat 2 folds
hero calls 15
Seat 4 checks
*** FLOP *** [Js 7d 7h]
hero bets 90
Seat 4 folds
villain calls 90
*** TURN *** [Js 7d 7h] [Ts]
hero checks
villain bets 30

Oh come on! There's 270 chips in the pot. Why would you bet a ninth of the pot? A bet should always have a purpose behind it. What purpose could possibly be served by offering your opponent such ridiculous odds? Normally, I take nuisance bets (as I like to call them - bets that are, say, less than a quarter of the pot) as a sign of weakness and make a pot-sized raise, but here I decided that since he called a pot-sized bet on the flop that he had at least a 7 or a jack, and I'd either be throwing chips away or wouldn't be able to chase him away from the split-pot.

hero calls 30
*** RIVER *** [Js 7d 7h Ts] [8h]
hero checks
villain bets 30

This bet represents less than a tenth of the pot. That bet gives ace-high proper odds to call. A better play is to just check. That, at least, can look like step 1 of a check-raise. But a wimpy little 30 chip bet just looks like stupidity.

hero calls 30
*** SHOW DOWN ***
villain shows [Jh 5s] two pair, Jacks and Sevens
hero shows [Jd 3s] two pair, Jacks and Sevens

Figures.

hero ties for the pot (195) with two pair, Jacks and Sevens
villain ties for the pot (195) with two pair, Jacks and Sevens
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 390 | Rake 0
Board: [Js 7d 7h Ts 8h]
Seat 1: villain showed [Jh 5s] and won (195) with two pair, Jacks and Sevens
Seat 2: (button) didn't bet (folded)
Seat 3: hero (small blind) showed [Jd 3s] and won (195) with two pair, Jacks and Sevens
Seat 4: (big blind) folded on the Flop
Seat 5: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 6: didn't bet (folded)

Checking the river

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: $10 + $1 Sit & Go (_), Table 1 - 15/30 - No Limit Hold'em - 1:58:52 ET - 2007/12/17
Seat 1: (3,435)
Seat 2: (975)
Seat 3: hero (1,620)
Seat 4: villain (1,470)
Seat 5: (1,500)
Seat 4 posts the small blind of 15
Seat 5 posts the big blind of 30
The button is in seat #3
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [5d Kd]
Seat 1 folds
Seat 2 folds
hero calls 30

In position with a suited king and no limpers or raisers. I suppose I could have raised here, but it's early yet.

villain calls 15
Seat 5 checks
*** FLOP *** [9d 2d 4d]
villain bets 90
Seat 5 folds

Nice. The 2nd-to-nut flush and the opposition is betting into me. Let's trap.

hero calls 90
*** TURN *** [9d 2d 4d] [Tc]
villain bets 270
hero calls 270
*** RIVER *** [9d 2d 4d Tc] [Jd]
villain checks

There are two possibilities. Either he has the ace of diamonds and is getting ready to check-raise, or we have him beat. But look at it from his perspective: There are four diamonds on the board and no pairs. If he has either a small diamond or no diamond at all, is he going to call a bet here? What's the upside if I make a bet here? Nobody is likely to just call. Either they're going to raise with the ace of diamonds or fold. If the ace of diamonds is trying to check-raise, then I save chips by not falling into the trap, and if nobody else is going to call, I gain nothing by betting. What do I do if he raises? Fold, having probably lost another 600 chips or so? At the very least, checking it down let's me show that I was trapping with a good hand when I called on the flop and turn and will hopefully improve my table image.

hero checks
*** SHOW DOWN ***
villain shows [9c Ah] a pair of Nines
hero shows [5d Kd] a flush, King high
hero wins the pot (810) with a flush, King high
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 810 | Rake 0
Board: [9d 2d 4d Tc Jd]
Seat 1: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 2: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 3: hero (button) showed [5d Kd] and won (810) with a flush, King high
Seat 4: villain (small blind) showed [9c Ah] and lost with a pair of Nines
Seat 5: (big blind) folded on the Flop

CSI:Miami's DX4 "vaporizer" isn't entirely vaporware

The latest episode of CSI: Miami featured a plot that revolved around a weapon they called the DX4 or the "vaporizer." In the opening scene, three gun smugglers are blown into tiny pieces my a mystery weapon later revealed to be an electronically fired multi-barrel gun. Though lots of folks may have thought it a flight of Hollywood writer fancy, there is a grain of truth to be found.

The technology behind the DX4 is, in fact, been in development by an Australian company called Metal Storm for some time now. The animated technology demo given on the show to illustrate how the gun worked was wrong. They had a single shot per barrel, making the DX4 the biggest single-shot blunderbuss I've ever seen. The real Metal Storm system uses stacks of ammunition in each barrel.

But after getting the technology wrong, which is de rigueur for Hollywood, you have to look at more basic plausibility issues. And if you do, you won't like what you see. For one, it's unclear why the perpetrators of the three opening scene murders resorted to such ridiculous over-kill when a double-tap would have been just as effective (and given the victims' line of work would have raised far fewer eyebrows). Then there's the problem with assassins moving swiftly and silently through the shadows lugging a giant sedan-chair sized weapon around - never mind aiming it properly at 3 armed stooges who presumably are trying not to be shot. Lastly, if you were to set off all the barrels in such a gun at once, with the purpose being to vaporize a human target, the recoil would be, well, memorable. Do we even need to mention the ever present exploding gas tank myth?

But despite all that, the episode was rescued at the last minute by Horatio Caine shooting the perp in the forehead in mid sentence. In that one instant, I was transported back to "The Good, The Bad and The Ugly," and Tuco's memorable advice to all would-be villains who find themselves with the upper hand on their nemesis: "When you have to shoot, shoot. Don't talk."

So close, and yet so far.

More cash game action.

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: Table Ann - $0.10/$0.25 - No Limit Hold'em - 21:24:39 ET - 2007/12/13
Seat 1: villain ($25.10)
Seat 2: ($25)
Seat 3: ($11.45)
Seat 4: ($15.15)
Seat 5: ($29.75)
Seat 6: ($5.15)
Seat 7: ($9)
Seat 8: hero ($25.35)
Seat 9: ($78.65)
Seat 9 posts the small blind of $0.10
Seat 1 posts the big blind of $0.25
The button is in seat #8
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [Td Ad]
Seat 2 folds
Seat 3 raises to $1
Seat 4 folds
Seat 5 folds
Seat 6 folds

Early position raise. We have a medium-to-big suited ace. Let's see as cheap a flop as possible, especially being on the button, and see how we fare.

hero calls $1
Seat 9 calls $0.90
Seat 1 calls $0.75

The blinds came along. That's a bit unfortunate, since it raises the possibility we'll flop an ace and be out-kicked. But the ten wasn't a big enough kicker to re-raise with before the flop.

*** FLOP *** [Jd Kc Qd]

Lawdamighty!!!

The nut straight and the royal flush draw!

Seat 9 checks
villain bets $2.50
Seat 3 calls $2.50

We've got this one. The goal here is to try and get as much money into the center as possible. My thinking here is that at least one of these two limped with a bigger ace and thus has two pair [Stupid Nick, there was no ace on the flop]. If I raise, I'm sure to get at least one caller.

hero raises to $10

It's a slight over-raise because it's designed to put one of the two of them all-in.

Seat 9 folds
villain calls $7.50
Seat 3 folds

Seat 3 later claimed in the chat window to have AQ. I'm rather surprised he got away from it, but perhaps that's a consequence of my over-raise [Of course he got away from it, dummy, he had 2nd pair with an ace kicker].

*** TURN *** [Jd Kc Qd] [8h]
villain checks

We're both committed now. No point waiting.

hero bets $14.35, and is all in
villain calls $14.10, and is all in
hero shows [Td Ad]
villain shows [Kd Qh]

Aaaaaaw!!!! He had my Kd for the royal flush! Too bad.

I still have him crushed. He has 4 outs for a boat. If he had any other king but the king of diamonds, he'd have only 3 outs, since the Kd would give me my royal.

Uncalled bet of $0.25 returned to hero
*** RIVER *** [Jd Kc Qd 8h] [9s]
hero shows a straight, Ace high
villain shows two pair, Kings and Queens
hero wins the pot ($52) with a straight, Ace high
villain is sitting out
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $54.70 | Rake $2.70
Board: [Jd Kc Qd 8h 9s]
Seat 1: villain (big blind) showed [Kd Qh] and lost with two pair, Kings and Queens
Seat 2: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 3: folded on the Flop
Seat 4: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 5: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 6: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 7: is sitting out
Seat 8: hero (button) showed [Td Ad] and won ($52) with a straight, Ace high
Seat 9: (small blind) folded on the Flop

Oh, the irony

So one of the latest Get a Mac TV ad has the the PC saying, "If your printer doesn't work with Vista, buy a new printer!" As if Vista is guiltier than most OS upgrades at breaking older hardware.



Uh huh.

When we upgraded to Leopard, one of the things that didn't survive the upgrade was our HP PSC-1610 printer/scanner. So what did we do? We bought a new printer. Because our printer didn't work with Leopard. Pot, kettle, black.

Turkey Frying - Safety First

We're going to fry our turkey again this year. I don't think I'd have ever even considered it until I saw Alton Brown's "Turkey Derrick."

When you consider the turkey frying act, it is fraught with danger. You have a tank of propane about 4 feet away from the culinary equivalent of a rocket engine, atop which you've placed 4-6 gallons of peanut oil which you have heated to about 300° Fahrenheit (150° Celsius for you foreigners), into which you're going to drop 16 pounds of room temperature, damp meat. I don't know about you, but I don't really want to be too close when that happens.

I don't yet have a picture of this year's festivities, but here's a picture from last year.



As you can see, the rope allows you full vertical control of the poultry from a safe distance. And, of course, if you're going to fry a turkey, please keep a fire extinguisher handy. The house you save will likely be your own.

IPv6 and Leopard

After a while of not having it working, I've managed to get IPv6 connectivity back to my house from the office. Huzzah! Now I can work around the broken Juniper VPN that we normally use.

Having got this working again (it's a combination of OpenVPN and the MacOS X port of the tun driver), I've rediscovered that AFP file sharing works over IPv6, like it used to in Tiger. Not only that, but Screen Sharing works over IPv6 too! The only hiccup there is that so far as I can tell, Screen Sharing can't figure out how to connect to IPv6 only DNS names. I've tried flushing the DS cache (with dscacheutil -flushcache), but that doesn't seem to help (nor was it necessary to get AFP by DNS name to work). Connecting to literal IPv6 addresses (wrapped with square brackets), however, does work.

So Big Ups to Apple for their commitment to IPv6! Now they just have to fix that one thing.

Apple has a sense of humor

This is kind of funny. In MacOS X 10.5 (Leopard), convenient file-sharing functionality has been added to the Finder. It will show all the machines on the local network, and if it's an Apple device, it will use a picture of the machine as the icon. However, if it's a Windows machine (or anything else using SMB), you get a picture of a monitor with the BSOD. Ha ha.



It may be a little hard to see in the preview. Click on the picture to see it full size.

I hate donkeys

It's been another ridiculous week for me. Shit like this. By the way, this was the very first hand of the tournament:


Full Tilt Poker Game #_: $10 + $1 Sit & Go (_), Table 1 - 15/30 - No Limit Hold'em - 19:05:26 ET - 2007/11/17
Seat 1 posts the small blind of 15
Seat 2 posts the big blind of 30
The button is in seat #6
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [Ad Ah]
Seat 3 calls 30
Seat 4 calls 30
villain raises to 165
nsayer raises to 450
Seat 5 folds
Seat 6 folds
Seat 1 folds
Seat 2 folds
villain calls 285
*** FLOP *** [9c 5d Qd]
villain bets 1,050, and is all in
hero calls 1,050, and is all in
villain shows [Kh Td]

Stupid donkey.

hero shows [Ad Ah]
*** TURN *** [9c 5d Qd] [Jh]

And I get fucked again.

*** RIVER *** [9c 5d Qd Jh] [Jd]
villain shows a straight, King high
hero shows two pair, Aces and Jacks
villain wins the pot (3,105) with a straight, King high
hero stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 3,105 | Rake 0
Board: [9c 5d Qd Jh Jd]
Seat 1: (small blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 2: (big blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 3: folded before the Flop
Seat 4: folded before the Flop
Seat 5: villain showed [Kh Td] and won (3,105) with a straight, King high
Seat 6: hero (button) showed [Ad Ah] and lost with two pair, Aces and Jacks

Wii would like to play

We bought a Wii last night. The concept of position and motion sensitive controls is truly revolutionary. Nothing that has come before has been as immersive. Our Wii came with the Wii Sports title, which includes Tennis, Baseball, Golf, Bowling and Boxing.

The baseball game is sort of one dimensional and boring. All you do is pitch and bat. It's a lot more like Over The Line than Baseball. I don't like it so much. Tennis is a bit more challenging. Tennis is played as doubles, and in addition to swinging the controller at the right time, you need to pick whether to swing forehand or backhand correctly depending on where the ball is. Golf is kind of fun. You can't swing too hard or it will just accentuate any hook or slice you've imparted on the ball, so controlling your swing is what it's all about. Boxing is played with the numchuck, which is a second controller wired to the first one (the primary controllers are wireless). The numchuck also has a position sensor in it, so with the controller in one hand and the numchuck in the other, you throw your fists around like real boxing.

But the pièce de résistance is Bowling. You swing the controller just like it was a bowling ball, and let go of the trigger button to let go of the ball. The english you put on your swing gets imparted to the ball. It has to be the single most accurate sporting simulation since the treadmill.

Scarlet and I really got some exercise last night. We bought a Wii because we decided to see if it really was true that you could get into playing the games as an exercise program. Well, the hype is true. I think this is going to be very good for us.

The only issue now is that I'm not sure what other games we'll want to buy. I'm sure we'll get tired of Bowling some day, but I can't really see that day from here.

Football sucks around here

I would really, really enjoy watching football on TV if it weren't for the fact that we live in the San Francisco/Oakland/San Jose TV market.

The problem comes about because of the NFL blackout rules. The rules say that if the 49ers or Raiders play a road game or a sold-out home game, no other local station may air a competing game. That means that we never see a game that doesn't involve the Raiders or 49ers except for the Sunday and Monday night games and weeks where either team has a bye week.

And if you haven't been paying attention, this is not the same 49er team that was helmed by Joe Bill Walsh [ed: how'd I get that wrong?!] back in the day. And I'm not sure the Raiders have ever been worth watching. The most memorable Raiders moment I can recall was seeing a fan with a paper bag over his head with the words PSL HOLDER written on it.

It's almost worth signing up for the DirecTV NFL package, but that's $180 a year. I don't like football quite that much.

Maybe if we're lucky folks will realize just how bad the 49ers and Raiders suck and they'll stop selling out their home games. Then we'd at least have a 50:50 chance of a choice.

We can but hope.

Earthquake damage

Humpf. The earthquake really did do some damage.

Two things, in fact.

One of Scarlet's porcelain angels fell over on the bookshelf and broke. I'm not sure what it cost, but though I offered to glue it back together, Scarlet said it was a total loss.

And the shaking must have rattled something a bit too hard between the hot water heater and the circulation pump I installed. It started leaking. Fortunately, it was caught by the flood sensor I installed as part of our alarm system. We got a call at 6 AM from the alarm people that the flood sensor had gone off. Just to be on the safe side, we called our favorite plumber (Gus from Castle Plumbing) to come out and fix it - mostly just so we could get him to check to make sure it wasn't more serious. He said it was just loose, so he tightened it. $100.

Earthquake etiquette

We had an earthquake this evening. It was a 5.6.

Everybody has an opinion, and here's mine: A quake doesn't even count until it's a 4. Between 4 and 6, it's either an amusement or a nuisance. 6 and above, and you can expect stuff to actually break. A 6 in the Bay Area, and you can expect the San Francisco marina district to (once again) fall down and burst into flames. Why they simply don't pave it over, I'll never understand. It's not as if San Francisco couldn't use the extra parking. But I digress.

Of course, anytime there's an earthquake big enough to get on the news, the first thing everyone does is call us. That's the worst part of anything between a 4 and a 6 - the phone won't stop ringing. It's damn annoying.

We get it that you're concerned. Thank you for that. It shows you care. BUT...

1. If it's not at least a 6, don't be concerned. Maybe it knocked a picture or two off the mantle. But probably not.

2. If it's a 6 or better, well, then you can expect that the phone lines will be needed for much more important phone calls. People needing emergency help from fire and rescue folks, for example. Your call will be taking the place of a potentially much more important one.

So, in short, let us call you. If things have really hit the fan, we'll call someone out of town and let them relay the news. If not, we'll probably want to talk about how fun it was.

Recognize counterfeits

A little cash game action, for a change.

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: Table Churchfield - $0.10/$0.25 - No Limit Hold'em - 17:17:17 ET - 2007/10/27
Seat 1: ($26)
Seat 2: hero ($6.45)
Seat 3: ($34.80)
Seat 4: ($10.90)
Seat 5: ($25.35)
Seat 6: ($7.65)
Seat 7: villain ($13)
Seat 8: ($39.95)
Seat 9: ($23.65)
Seat 6 posts the small blind of $0.10
villain posts the big blind of $0.25
The button is in seat #5
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [4d Td]
Seat 8 calls $0.25
Seat 9 folds
Seat 1 folds

Let's gamble. They're soooooted. :)

hero calls $0.25
Seat 3 folds
Seat 4 calls $0.25
Seat 5 folds
Seat 6 calls $0.15
villain checks
*** FLOP *** [Th 9c Tc]

Whomba!

Seat 6 checks
villain bets $1.25
Seat 8 calls $1.25

Let's not scare anyone away yet.

hero calls $1.25
Seat 4 folds
Seat 6 calls $1.25
*** TURN *** [Th 9c Tc] [7s]
Seat 6 checks
villain checks
Seat 8 checks

Now the potential straight is too scary. Time to pull the trigger.

nsayer bets $4.95, and is all in
Seat 6 folds
villain calls $4.95
Seat 8 folds
hero shows [4d Td]
villain shows [9d 7h]

Now, I'm fairly confident that the villain here called because he thought his 9s over 7s was good. What he neglected to notice is that pairing his 7 was worthless - his hand was already two pair (9s and tens) on the flop. It was actually a really dumb call. Let's look at it from his perspective. He flops two pair with the over pair on the board. That means that probably nobody else at the table hit, but if they did, he's almost certainly crushed. He leads out and gets 3 callers. That should scare him. Perhaps one of them has a straight draw, but at least one possibility is that there's a ten out there. If I'm in his spot, I shut down. The turn was a potential straight card (68, 8J - remember, nobody raised before the flop). Of course, it also gave a boat to pocket 7s, but you can't look for monsters under the bed. So he checks and a short stack moves in. What is his 3 pair hand beating? Maybe he's got one card to come to pull what he sees as a 6-out draw for a boat to beat a straight (which is already pretty thin odds - about 7:1). In actual fact, he was drawing completely dead. Any card that gives him a boat gives me either quads or an over-boat.

*** RIVER *** [Th 9c Tc 7s] [2d]
hero shows three of a kind, Tens
villain shows two pair, Tens and Nines
hero wins the pot ($15.35) with three of a kind, Tens
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $16.15 | Rake $0.80
Board: [Th 9c Tc 7s 2d]
Seat 1: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 2: hero showed [4d Td] and won ($15.35) with three of a kind, Tens
Seat 3: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 4: folded on the Flop
Seat 5: (button) didn't bet (folded)
Seat 6: (small blind) folded on the Turn
Seat 7: villain (big blind) showed [9d 7h] and lost with two pair, Tens and Nines
Seat 8: folded on the Turn
Seat 9: didn't bet (folded)

Stupid call du jour

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: $10 + $1 Sit & Go (_), Table 1 - 40/80 - No Limit Hold'em - 0:14:57 ET - 2007/10/14
Seat 1: (1,285)
Seat 3: (1,975)
Seat 4: (2,540)
Seat 5: villain (1,220)
Seat 6: (2,040)
Seat 7: (675)
Seat 8: hero (2,535)
Seat 9: (1,230)
Seat 1 posts the small blind of 40
Seat 3 posts the big blind of 80
The button is in seat #9
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [5h 5c]
Seat 4 folds
villain raises to 220
Seat 6 folds
Seat 7 folds
hero calls 220
Seat 9 folds
Seat 1 folds
Seat 3 calls 140
*** FLOP *** [7h Kh 7s]
kcher checks
villain checks
nsayer bets 1,000
Seat 3 folds
villain calls 1,000, and is all in
hero shows [5h 5c]
villain shows [Qh Qc]

And that, dear readers, is the stupidest call I've seen all week. There's no way I had a king? I'll admit that having a 7 would have likely made me slow-play, but how could he not put me on a king?

*** TURN *** [7h Kh 7s] [6s]
*** RIVER *** [7h Kh 7s 6s] [Ts]
hero shows two pair, Sevens and Fives
villain shows two pair, Queens and Sevens
villain wins the pot (2,700) with two pair, Queens and Sevens
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 2,700 | Rake 0
Board: [7h Kh 7s 6s Ts]
Seat 1: (small blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 3: (big blind) folded on the Flop
Seat 4: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 5: villain showed [Qh Qc] and won (2,700) with two pair, Queens and Sevens
Seat 6: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 7: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 8: hero showed [5h 5c] and lost with two pair, Sevens and Fives
Seat 9: (button) didn't bet (folded)

Intelligent comments on meat and adrenaline

I have a couple videos on YouTube. One of them is rather popular. One of the downsides of that is that it is a target for comment spam. Comment spam sucks. Whether it sucks more than other kinds of spam, I'll leave for some other debate, but one thing you can definitely say about comment spam is that the subject matter is far, far less varied. Virtually all of the comment spam is one of these exact topics:

• heaven


• naked chicks


• read this comment and you will die in an hour unless you spam 19 other videos


• hit F5 for the name of your next gay lover


• go sign this petition to tell the Japanese to stop slaughtering dolphins

That's it. The Nigerians are at least more creative.

The last one on the list is the topic for today. The spam decries the Japanese for engaging in a dolphin or whale slaughter or whatever and makes particular mention that the hunters involved attempt to inflict in their victims a maximum amount of fear and pain because the adrenaline released makes the meat taste better.

Now, the spam is bad enough, but the claim that frightened animals taste better than others always seemed like something rife for either confirmation or rebuttal. Well, after googling relentlessly for a minute or so, I've found the best argument on the proposition I think I could envision.

Get in touch with your inner Gus

Of course, by Gus, I mean Gus Hansen.

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: $10 + $1 Sit & Go (_), Table 1 - 15/30 - No Limit Hold'em - 23:11:08 ET - 2007/10/07
Seat 1: (1,485)
Seat 2: (1,455)
Seat 3: hero (1,425)
Seat 4: (4,515)
Seat 5: (1,500)
Seat 8: (1,500)
Seat 9: (1,620)
Seat 4 posts the small blind of 15
Seat 5 posts the big blind of 30
The button is in seat #3
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to nsayer [?? ??]

Let's just play this one in the dark for now.

Seat 8 folds
Seat 9 folds
Seat 1 folds
Seat 2 folds
hero raises to 105
Seat 4 calls 90
Seat 5 folds
*** FLOP *** [Jd Ac 7h]
Seat 4 checks
hero bets 240
Seat 4 calls 240
*** TURN *** [Jd Ac 7h] [4d]
Seat 4 checks
hero bets 530
Seat 4 calls 530
*** RIVER *** [Jd Ac 7h 4d] [5s]
Seat 4 checks
hero bets 550, and is all in

Ok. I'll let you all in on it. My hand? Qc 9c.

This isn't about what I have, it's about what I can make him think I have. I'd like to think that he's thinking hard about A4o, or at least AKo. Maybe even pocket 4s.

Of course, the danger is that I'd be up against a donkey who likes his 3rd pair despite the evidence in front of him.... and makes the spectacular suicide call.

Not this time, however.

Seat 4 folds

I always wonder what I got my opponents to fold in spots like this. I'm thinking perhaps it was a small ace. Nothing else makes much sense. Why would he hang in there with anything less? For that matter, why would he keep up with me worrying about his kicker?

Uncalled bet of 550 returned to hero
hero mucks
hero wins the pot (1,780)
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 1,780 | Rake 0
Board: [Jd Ac 7h 4d 5s]
Seat 1: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 2: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 3: hero (button) collected (1,780), mucked
Seat 4: (small blind) folded on the River
Seat 5: (big blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 8: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 9: didn't bet (folded)

MST3K lovers rejoice: RiffTrax!

Those of you more connected to MST3K than I am will deride me for being so out of touch, of course, but better late than never.

Since the MST3K crew reunited as The Film Crew, I've come to realize how much I missed MST3K. I also managed to connect to a bit of my own personal history having found some clips of Disasterpiece Theatre, which was an MST3K like show that aired on XETV in San Diego when I was 12. I used to stay up way late to watch Sal U. Lloyd and The Other Guy skewer bad 50s B movies. They mostly used chroma keying and Chyron rather than voiceovers, but it was still funny stuff.

Anyway, by chance I managed to learn that Mike Nelson came up with a compromise allowing him and his co-riffers to skewer movies without having to actually obtain rights to them. How? By writing and performing commentary tracks that you play along with the movie. Of course, you need to synchronize the two streams, but they have a pretty ingenious method for doing so - a disembodied computer-like voice periodically chimes in during the commentary with lines from the movie that should synchronize precisely with an actor in the movie delivering the same line. If the movie line is late, you pause the commentary for a little bit. If the movie is early, pause the movie. It even works with Netflix's instant watching feature (I tried The Matrix).

Keeping them in sync isn't as hard (or as critical) as it sounds, and the riffing is just as good as it ever was on MST3K or The Film Crew. And to top it all off, the RiffTrax are for movies you've actually heard of!

Go check it out. Most of them are either $2.99 or $3.99 and they're DRM-free MP3 files.

FTP tiered satellites

I think I've found something fun.

FTP, for a while now, has had $26 and $75 satellite tokens you can win in some tournaments. They're good for any tournament of any kind with the given buy-in amount. I haven't been too hot on them in the past, since they're usually available in tournaments with fairly low percentage payouts - usually you have to win the thing outright.

Well, I've discovered a pair of satellites in the structure that are much, much better. They are 18 handed, but pay out the top 6 players (though 6th place gets cash). That's 30% - certainly doable. In fact, I won a $26 token last night. Tonight I will try and parley that to a $75 token. Once there, there is a $69+$6 satellite into the $200+$16 $750,000 guarantee tournament on Sunday. At the moment, that tournament will pay over $130,000 to first place. For a total cash investment of $8.70!

The one thing that's odd about satellite tournaments at FTP is that once you get to the point in the prize structure where everybody gets the same thing, they should just end the tournament, because any further play is moot. They don't, though. I guess they figure people are going to want to play it out for pride. The trouble with that idea is that a large fraction of the table all simply goes all-in with any two cards just to get it over with. I did and lost 3 hands in a row, coming in, officially, in 4th place. But who cares? 5th through 1st were all the same. So if you want to stick around to collect first for pride, it's meaningless since you're going to play it against people who have nothing to lose or gain. Like play-money tournaments. Why waste your time?

Justice is served!

This was quite nearly another lament about a bad beat dished out by a donkey making a horrendous call. But then, shit changed.

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: Tier One $8+$0.70 (_), Table 2 - 30/60 - No Limit Hold'em - 21:53:12 ET - 2007/10/04
Seat 1: hero (3,830)
Seat 2: (3,155)
Seat 3: (725)
Seat 5: villain (1,100)
Seat 6: (1,720)
Seat 7: (2,085)
Seat 8: (3,005)
villain posts the small blind of 30
Seat 6 posts the big blind of 60
The button is in seat #3
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [7d 7s]
Seat 7 folds
Seat 8 folds
hero raises to 180
Seat 2 folds
Seat 3 folds
villain calls 150
Seat 6 folds
*** FLOP *** [2d 3d 3s]
villain checks
hero bets 920
villain calls 920, and is all in
hero shows [7d 7s]
villain shows [3c 5c]

35?! I haven't played a hand the whole tournament so far and you call my raise with 35? What, because they were sooooted?!

*** TURN *** [2d 3d 3s] [Qd]
*** RIVER *** [2d 3d 3s Qd] [8d]

Serves him right!

hero shows a flush, Queen high
villain shows three of a kind, Threes
hero wins the pot (2,260) with a flush, Queen high
villain stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 2,260 | Rake 0
Board: [2d 3d 3s Qd 8d]
Seat 1: hero showed [7d 7s] and won (2,260) with a flush, Queen high
Seat 2: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 3: (button) didn't bet (folded)
Seat 5: villain (small blind) showed [3c 5c] and lost with three of a kind, Threes
Seat 6: (big blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 7: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 8: didn't bet (folded)

Go Cats, 2007 AFL premiers!

Just finishing up watching the AFL Grand Final for 2007 between the Geelong Cats and the Port Adelaide Power. Geelong thoroughly pwn3d. The final score was an incredible 24.19 163 to 6.8 44. I've never even heard of a margin even half that wide, much less in a Grand Final. Wow.

Alas, that means that there's no more footy until next year. Sigh.

Watch me play!

I've decided to join the latest poker blogging phenomenon - I bought some screen recording software and a USB mic and have recorded myself playing a SnG at Full Tilt!

I was fortunate enough to actually win the tournament on my first attempt to record one - I would have posted it regardless, though.

Check it out:

Idea for Apple

We have a mac Mini hooked up to our HDTV in the living room. Originally, the thought was we'd use it as a media player (DVD, Netflix Watch Now via VMware, games, etc), but over time it's become the machine I spend a large fraction of my time using. It's just very comfy to sit in the recliner and... well, whatever.

So when we upgraded from the old full sized plastic bluetooth keyboard to the new aluminum one, I was quite pleased.

But there is still one thing that isn't quite nirvana.

The mighty mouse is nice, but it needs to sit on a flat surface to be conveniently used. We have a mouse pad sitting on a fold-down faux table built-in to our sofa, but that's not very convenient for right handed users sitting on the right side. It's ok, since I usually set on the left, but I've got a better idea: A bluetooth trackpad. Such a device could be designed to attach to either side of the new aluminum BT keyboard, or Apple could come out with a new BT keyboard and trackpad combo. In fact, the trackpad could be designed to work with both the USB and BT keyboard. It could use some sort of mechanical attachment system combined with a (proprietary or USB) electrical connection that could be provided by both versions of the keyboard.

So let's get cracking, Steve!

There's always a better time

Full Tilt Poker Game #_: $5 + $0.50 Sit & Go (_), Table 1 - 20/40 - No Limit Hold'em - 20:24:17 ET - 2007/09/28
Seat 1: (1,400)
Seat 2: villain (1,415)
Seat 3: (2,095)
Seat 4: (900)
Seat 5: (1,455)
Seat 6: (1,250)
Seat 7: (1,320)
Seat 8: (1,200)
Seat 9: hero (2,465)
villain posts the small blind of 20
Seat 3 posts the big blind of 40
The button is in seat #1
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [As 4s]
Seat 4 folds
Seat 5 folds
Seat 6 folds
Seat 7 folds
Seat 8 folds

And ace in the cut-off, folded around? Let's steal.

hero raises to 140
Seat 1 folds
villain calls 120
Seat 3 calls 100
*** FLOP *** [Ks Ac Jh]
villain bets 210
Seat 3 folds

Maybe he has me out-kicked, maybe he doesn't. If he does have an ace, maybe I can make him think hard about QT. I need to raise here anyway so as to not give out a "free" card, but a raise here is enough of a fraction of his stack that he'll be committed, so let's just commit him now.

hero raises to 2,325, and is all in

At this point the villain calls me a bully in the chat window. He then thinks for a very long time, and then...

villain calls 1,065, and is all in
hero shows [As 4s]
villain shows [Ts Kd]

?!

We've not gotten very deep into this tournament. Would I really, really throw down for half my chips with a hand that could be beaten by kings in this spot? I mean, maybe if he was really short, but if he was short, then he'd be pot committed, which would make him unbluffable.

If he knew his king was no good, was the 4 outer inside straight draw really worth his entire tournament life?

Uncalled bet of 1,050 returned to hero
*** TURN *** [Ks Ac Jh] [Ah]
*** RIVER *** [Ks Ac Jh Ah] [7h]
hero shows three of a kind, Aces
villain shows two pair, Aces and Kings
hero wins the pot (2,970) with three of a kind, Aces
villain stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 2,970 | Rake 0
Board: [Ks Ac Jh Ah 7h]
Seat 1: (button) didn't bet (folded)
Seat 2: villain (small blind) showed [Ts Kd] and lost with two pair, Aces and Kings
Seat 3: (big blind) folded on the Flop
Seat 4: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 5: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 6: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 7: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 8: didn't bet (folded)
Seat 9: hero showed [As 4s] and won (2,970) with three of a kind, Aces

Desecration of a classic

They could light up a small town with the energy created by Keith Moon spinning in his grave tonight. The only reason we can't all live a carbon-free existence is that the same cannot be said about Roger Daltry and Pete Townsend.

What am I talking about?

The theme song to CSI:NY has, since its inception, been a slightly edited (for time) version of Baba O'Riley, by The Who.

This year, for whatever reason, they have decided to totally ruin it.

Though the Roger Daltry vocal track is still there, the music bears little resemblance to the original. It's a bizarre mishmash of synth instruments and way, way, way too much drum solo. While they were at it, they totally redid the actual opening credit video as well. That didn't offend me so much. But farming out the audio to some low-rent MIDI programmer? I call that a bargain. The worst I've ever had.

Full Tilt lowers the cash-out bar

I used to complain about FTP's cash-out policies. Requiring $300 to get a check was just too hard a level to reach. But I've actually been getting close to $300 lately and I've come to discover that they've lowered their cash-out level down to just $100. Not only that, but they'll do an electronic bank transfer. We'll see very soon how well that works, but I'd expect the recent legislation to make it harder to get money in rather than out. But if you don't trust the electronic method, they'll mail you a check for a $100 minimum.

So now you just have to double-up. Sweet!

All in all, I have to say that $100 is a reasonable minimum. PokerStars has a $75 minimum, which is even more generous, but they also have a minimum deposit of only $10 instead of FTP's $50.

That was a tough one

I only played one tournament tonight. It was a $10+$1 STT SnG at Full Tilt. Big deal, right?

This one was tough. It took an hour and 20 minutes, and 115 hands. The blinds got all the way up to 250/500 before it was done. And with a total of 13,500 chips, once we were heads-up, it came down almost to nothing more than a game of showdown.

We spent forever in bubble purgatory - everybody playing super tight, and the blinds going up and up and up. But since everybody was being so patient, you had to respect their raises.

It was tough, but I was patient and wound up taking it down. Yay!