Odin's Dad

Proud Socialist Papa moment

2009-11-29T06:56:36Z

Now, I know I'm writing to an audience of well-educated people with brains, but just in case there are Americans out there who don't know what socialism is actually about, it (arguably) boils down very nicely into one sentence:

"From each according to his ability; to each according to his needs." Acts 4:32–35 (paraphrased by 19th-century French socialists, popularized by Karl Marx)

It's simple, noble, obvious, and naturally, completely inachievable. But once in a while, it actually does happen.

We found out about Odin's autism early on, when he was 2. Naturally, a kid like him has quite a few more needs than your average Joe. Two years of special preschool that we would never have been able to afford south of the border. Occupational and speech therapy. A full-time educational assistant for his first two years of school, then half-time for the next four years, continuing presently on an as-needed basis.

And this being the birthplace of universal health care, he got them. He has cost the Canadian and Saskatchewan taxpayers a few hundred thousand, I'd be willing to wager, according to his needs.

So, what about his ability? We had his first ~~parent-teacher~~three-way conference of Grade 6 Thursday. He has the highest overall mark in his class, an otherwise-normal class of 24 in a perfectly ordinary public school.

If I ever wind up rich, I am never going to complain about my tax burden.

Happy happy joy joy

2009-11-25T16:07:26Z

I have a new favourite webcomic.

Finally, a game show for ME!

2009-11-24T15:04:23Z

That's NumberWang!

Play the online version! (But you have to watch the clip first.)

Got any fascist zombies or vampires on your gift list?

2009-11-21T06:56:33Z

Well, your quest for the perfect Christmas present is at an end!

Why does this amuse me so much?

2009-11-19T19:11:28Z

Yet one more reason to love the BBC. At about 55 seconds, James May makes the Understatement Of The 21st Century™. The rest of the clip is pretty cool too.

Session post (2h 38m, $-37.00)

2009-11-19T07:08:43Z

Ordinary session, I played average, nothing exciting happened. I had one amazing suckout in the first sit-n-go where I got all-in with pocket queens against pocket kings and a QJ; the last queen, my only out, appeared on the flop and I almost tripled up. Then it got eaten right back up by four successive all-inners sucking out on me, and that was the end of that. Poetic justice, I suppose.

Tournament 118746969
$12+1 No Limit Hold'em Knockout tournament
Entrants: 90
Start time: 23:24 18 Nov 2009
Balance at start of tournament: $1193.11
Full Tilt Points at start of tournament: 2530.25

Places paid: 9
Finish place: 22
Knockouts: 1 (coffeecrisp73)
End time: 00:43 19 Nov 2009
Balance at end of tournament: $1182.11
Full Tilt Points at end of tournament: 2544.25
Net profit: $-11.00
Full Tilt Points earned: 14.00
Regular Full Tilt Points earned: 7.00

Tournament 118761835
$12+1 No Limit Hold'em Knockout tournament
Entrants: 90
Start time: 00:52 19 Nov 2009

Places paid: 9
Finish place: 60
Knockouts: 0
End time: 01:20
Balance at end of tournament: $1169.11
Full Tilt Points at end of tournament: 2558.25
Net profit: $-13.00
Full Tilt Points earned: 14.00
Regular Full Tilt Points earned: 7.00

Tournament 118767864
$12+1 No Limit Hold'em Knockout tournament
Entrants: 90
Start time: 01:39 19 Nov 2009

Places paid: 9
Finish place: 74
Knockouts: 0
End time: 02:03
Balance at end of tournament: $1156.11
Full Tilt Points at end of tournament: 2565.25
Net profit: $-13.00
Full Tilt Points earned: 7.00

Session post (0h 34m, $+7.65)

2009-11-17T22:28:35Z

Only had half an hour to play this afternoon between my free massage and picking up Odin. Cards ran well, played perfectly adequately.

Session start: 16:51 17 Nov 2009
Bankroll at start of session: $1185.46
Full Tilt Points at start of session: 2504.50

Table: Affinity
Game: $1/2 Limit Stud Hi/lo
Stack at start: $50.00
Added to stack: $0.00

Session end: 17:25
Stack at end: $57.65
Bankroll at end of session: $1193.11
Full Tilt Points at end of session: 2530.25
Net profit: $+7.65
Full Tilt Points earned: 26.75
Bonus Full Tilt Points earned: TBD
Regular Full Tilt Points earned: TBD

Session post (4h 6min, $+296.00)

2009-11-16T23:32:13Z

(I decided yesterday that I'd start putting my hours played and net profit in the subject line, just to make things a little less boring. Then I have my session-of-the-year today!)

You can't win in poker without getting lucky. The contrapositive fails, though; it is quite possible to lose without getting unlucky. As you can see by the subject line, today was my day at the luck box.

I got some good luck early on in my first Sit-n-Go. There were two players on my right who had limped in on each of the first three hands, and on Hand 3 I woke up with AK, so I raised them. Another player who had already lost 2/3 of her chips(!) went all-in behind me, one of the limpers called, and I put him all-in as well. He had QT, and the other all-inner had JJ. A king came on the flop, and both of them were gone. News flash: QT sucks, especially in early position, at a 9-seat table, when facing a raise, an all-in reraise, and a re-reraise that puts you all-in.

So, 3 hands in and I'd already won double my bounty. Still a way to go before breaking even, but not a bad way to start. I also had more than twice the chips I started with, without even breathing hard. Now I was in a very good position - I could be a bully, I could sit back and wait for premium hands, whatever. A big stack gives you a lot of options. In a "cheap" tournament like this, with a lot of weak players, I prefer to sit tight and wait for cards, but I'll be happy to pick up stacks with some well-timed aggression as well.

And tight I was; I didn't see another flop until Hand 14, when I had suited JT in early position. The other limper who was still in the game, bubba1949, limped, I raised him, one other caller, and bubba folded. Flop was KT3, I bet out with middle pair and Badeass folded. (Where do they get these natural nicknames? Asks SaintMisbehavin.)

Badeass didn't last much longer, either; with uncanny déjà vu on hand 36, my AK beat his preflop QT, after I raised him all-in. News flash: QT still sucks as an all-in call. …With that pot, I was third stack in the tournament.

My biggest pot so far came from a good read. I did a late-position blind-steal raise on Hand 46 with Q9, and Ashtonelli called me on the button. Flop was K95 with two diamonds; I bet out about 2/3 of the pot, and got a quickish call. A third diamond came on the turn, I checked, and he made a pot-sized 3,900-chip bet, which was just over half his stack, and just under half mine. I ruled out a flush, as he probably would have bet somewhat less with that, hoping to string me along. Which meant he was hoping to drive me out. This meant I could probably drive him out by raising and representing the flush myself! So I gritted my teeth, raised, and sure enough, he folded. Against a bad player, I would have simply folded and let him take the 3,900 chips, saving the rest of my chips for a better situation; but I knew Ashtonelli was good enough to be able to fold, so I took the chance, and got rewarded with about 6,000 of his chips.

Around this point, the tournament did its normal quantum shift. Every tournament has a point where the blind levels overtake the stack sizes, and suddenly nearly everybody's short stacked, even the big stacks. Two things happen at this point. Firstly, everybody's playing style changes, whether by design (they notice the shift in the tournament) or by panic (Where have all my chips gone? I'm short stacked! Acck!). The second thing that happens, which is a consequence of the first thing, is that suddenly there are a lot more all-ins, hence a lot more risk, a lot more luck. If you're good, you can mitigate this, but not completely.

If I make it to this point of the tournament with a decent stack, I'm usually in good shape, because my short stack play is quite good (a lot of math involved ). In this particular tournament, I wasn't in good shape, because I had just suffered a series of bad beats and missed draws that had taken me down from third stack overall to a true-blue, all-in-or-fold, praying-for-a-double-up, short stack. I finally took a chance on a T5, and the big blind looked me up with a Q3, and that was the end of it for me.

That said, I knocked out 4 players, so I only wound up losing 5 bucks.

The second sit-n-go didn't start out nearly as auspiciously. It was an astonishingly loose-passive table, so I wasn't going to bluff myself into anything but bankruptcy. And there were two calling stations on my left, so I really needed a real hand. And I didn't get one until hand 22, by which time I had already lost over a third of my stack. My suited AT raise was called by pokmaster94 in the big blind, a player that I knew was playing with a lot of ace-rag hands (an ace with a weak kicker). The flop was 479, which looked innocuous, so I went all-in and he called. He happened to have A4, so that was basically the end of the line for me.

Until a ten came on the river, that is.

So I sucked out, doubled up, and was still in it. Notice that this is the first real suckout I've made since I started posting these things. I take this to be a sign that I've been playing quite well, because in order to suck out, it means you have to get your chips in bad. In this time I've suffered a good half-dozen suckouts at least, probably many more. This is a sign that I've been consistently getting my chips in good, which I like very much. It makes me feel more assured that I haven't been lying to myself and you lot about the cards running bad this month.

Speaking of cards running bad, hand 33 was amusing. I had AK again, so I raised, got reraised by rupentisqui, a good player to my left, and then pokmaster94 on his left re-reraised all-in, and so did Mjonlir (sic) on his left, so naturally I had to do the same. rupentisqui judiciously folded (he told us afterwards that he had AQ), and we all turned over…AK! Nobody hit a flush, and we chopped the pot three ways.

I muddled along until hand 55, not going anywhere especially, and the blinds eating into my stack. When lush123, the all-inner on my right, went all-in for about the fifth time, I went all-in right behind him with pocket fours, and Arbs56 went all-in behind us. lush had A7, and Arbs had suited AK. I normally only want the one caller when I'm in with a low pair, but because they both had aces, I was actually the slight favourite—41.7% to Arbs' 38.5%—until the flop came AJ3. At this point, I once again said, "gla", and got ready to move on.

Until a four came on the river, that is.

I don't count this one as a suckout, though, since I got my chips in good. Naturally, Arbs56 sees things somewhat differently, and he had a good-natured war of words until the first break. At this point I was second stack, and there were only three tables left, so I was at a point where I could almost fold everything and still make the money. Often when I get to a position like this, I will tighten up significantly and only play the best of the best.

Not always, though. On hand 79, pongi74 on my right made a min-raise preflop, and I called him with a suited KT, both clubs. When the flop came T92 with a club and he bet the pot, I raised him all-in and he called. There were a few hands I'd be behind with, but I wasn't that worried, and as it happened he also had KT, so we were going to chop the pot.

Until two more clubs came on the turn and river, that is.

That one was also not technically a suckout; that was a freeroll, since I was already guaranteed half the pot, and had about a 4% chance of taking the whole thing if I backed into a flush.

My luck kept running ridiculously well. I knocked out Arbs56 on hand 81 when my pocket eights turned into three-of-a-kind to beat his pocket tens, then knocked out rasowell on hand 96 when a queen paired my QT to beat his pocket tens. Those were both genuine dyed-in-the-wool suckouts.

Somehow, when we got to 11 players left, I had over 45,000 chips (out of 270,000 chips altogether in the tournament) and a narrow chip lead. Two players out from the money is a prime place to steal blinds, so I loosened right up and did just that. With only 5 players at my table, it was a good idea to loosen up at any rate, and everybody else had tightened up like a drum, so I picked up five of the last seven pots before the final table without a fight. I folded one of them, and the seventh one - hand 107 - I was in the big blind with J9, and micky60800 went all-in on the button with very few chips left. I hit a jack on the flop, and one more on the turn for insurance, to beat his AQ and make the final table with the biggest stack, about 80,000 chips all told.

My biggest problem at this point was my gastrointestinal tract, which decided to start acting up with a good half-hour until the next break; but everybody was playing very quickly, so I had to sit and bear it. I planned a quick potty-break for my next under-the-gun seat, since it and the two blinds which follow have the lowest expected values of all positions in Texas Hold'em. In the meantime, I kept picking up pots with astute position play and some particularly good reading to increase my advantage. People were limping in a lot, but folding to nearly every raise, so I took full advantage of that, raising whenever I thought I could drive somebody off a pot. Being the big stack didn't hurt, either; you catch more flies with honey than vinegar, but more still with a flamethrower. Sadly, I also missed an extra seat - the button, which has the highest E.V. of any position. And I'd had pocket tens. Sigh.

Made up for it with the next hand though; hand 130, where I had pocket nines, and ohiox2, a short stack, raised to my right, so I put him all-in. He had AT, which meant I was slightly ahead. Then the flop came, 8TQ. He was now ahead with his pair, but I still had four "outs" - if a jack came, I'd make a straight. The turn was a seven, which gave me four more outs (any six). The jack on the river sealed his fate. Again, not really a suckout, because I was ahead when the chips went in. And then there were seven, and not only was I the chip leader, I had well over twice the second stack's chips (106,000 to 44,000).

With a combination of bullying and bullying, I maintained a solid lead. rupentisqui was the short stack for a while and finally fell when he pushed with suited QJ on the button and I looked him up with suited K4 in the big blind.

Wiking7 and Something Horse fell in 6th and 5th, on successive hands (158 and 159), and so quickly that I didn't even have time to record what they had and what I beat them with. Luckily, Full Tilt's wonderful "table history" feature lets me know that I had pocket sixes to beat Wiking7's AQ, and a Q6 that beat Something Horse's K2 (a six came on the flop). From that point it went by in a flash—dimup eliminated 9deucewhat on hand 166, then I eliminated billaboule and dimup on hands 171 and 172 (A2 versus 55 and KQ versus K9). And suddenly I had $288 in my pocket, plus $2 per knockout.

In fact, I knocked out people so quickly that when I went and did my records, I found my account $4 ahead of what I thought it should be. I had to open up the FTP software again and look at my tournament history, only to discover that in fact I'd knocked out 13 players rather than the 11 I thought I had. So, $13 to enter the sit-n-go yielded $26 in bounties, plus my first-place payday, nets me just over $300.

So yes, I got ridiculously lucky today. But, I could still have easily lost if I hadn't played well on top of that. I was playing my A game again today, taking advantage of my lucky situation and making some (if I do say so myself) brilliant reads. I know I'm nowhere near a pro level of skill, but it's days like this that make one think, just maybe I can get there from here.

I'm not going to do this well every day, naturally, but if I run this lucky even say twice a month, and hold my own the rest of the time, my hourly rate should be exceeding the $3 an hour I got last week.

Tournament 118146880
$12+1 No Limit Hold'em Knockout tournament
Entrants: 90
Start time: 14:36 16 Nov 2009
Balance at start of tournament: $889.46
Full Tilt Points at start of tournament: 2490.50

Places paid: 9
Finish place: 20
Knockouts: 4 (scaner2003, John-n-Chi, Badeass, klausimausi3)
End time: 15:52
Balance at end of session: $884.46
Full Tilt Points at end of tournament: 2497.50
Net profit: $-5.00
Full Tilt Points earned: 7.00

Tournament 118164560
$12+1 No Limit Hold'em Knockout tournament
Entrants: 90
Start time: 15:58 16 Nov 2009

Places paid: 9
Finish place: 1
Knockouts: 13 (lush123, pongi74, Arbs56, rasowell, micky60800, ohiox2, rupentisqui, Wiking7, Something Horse, billaboule, dimup and 2 others)
End time: 17:52
Balance at end of session: $1185.46
Full Tilt Points at end of session: 2504.50
Net profit: $301.00
Full Tilt Points earned: 7.00

Session post

2009-11-14T06:50:06Z

Pre Scriptum: Go back to my last session post and check out my addition on the Full Tilt Points. This is the reason that God invented computers...

I decided to play some knockout sit-n-gos tonight. The way a knockout tournament works is that, in addition to the regular prize pool, part of your buy-in goes to your bounty (in the case of these $12 tournaments, $10 goes to the prize pool and your bounty is $2). Whenever you knock somebody out, you get $2, right there. This encourages people to play looser, usually looser than they should, and makes for a profitable situation if you don't fall into the bounty-hunting trap.

I wasn't stellar tonight, but I'm going to play a few more of these. I've had good results in the past, and finishing in the top 50% twice bodes well (not that it's hard—I could probably do that just by folding every single hand). If I'm cashing in tournaments like this one time in 6 or better, I'm making a profit; and if I'm playing like this, 1 in 6 should be an easily-achievable target.

Post Scriptum: Apparently, I miscalculated the rakeback. I only got $9.20 rather than $67.23 for the cash games. My guess is that what I actually get is 27% divided by the number of players in the given hand. This correlates fairly well with what I actually got, which is a bit more than 1/8 of my calculated value, and I was playing at 8-seat tables. I should expect to get a bit more than 1/8, as seats are occasionally empty, and players sit out sometimes to go to the bathroom or whatever. Anyhow, that's less relevant with my new régime, since I will be playing a lot less of the cash game.

Rakeback paid 11:34 13 Nov 2009
Bankroll prior to rakeback: $901.18
Rakeback paid: $10.28
Bankroll after rakeback: $911.46
Full Tilt Points, current balance: 2476.50

Tournament 117419354
$12+1 No Limit Hold'em Knockout tournament
Entrants: 90
Start time: 23:13 13 Nov 2009

Places paid: 9
Finish place: 29
Knockouts: 1 (Eightup8877)
End time: 00:22 14 Nov 2009
Bankroll after tournament: $900.46
Full Tilt Points after tournament: 2483.50
Net profit: $-11.00
Full Tilt Points earned: 7.00

Tournament 117575485
$12+1 No Limit Hold'em Knockout tournament
Entrants: 90
Start time: 00:28 14 Nov 2009

Places paid: 9
Finish place: 32
Knockouts: 1 (u-s-m-h)
End time: 01:30
Bankroll after tournament: $889.46
Full Tilt Points after tournament: 2490.50
Net profit: $-11.00
Full Tilt Points earned: 7.00

Session post

2009-11-12T17:43:24Z

I'm feeling much better this morning, and felt like warming up my poker chops again. Holly asked me to work again this afternoon at 2, so I didn't have time for a multi-table tournament. Instead, I played a sit-n-go.

It was frustrating. I'm fine when I run bad and get knocked out early, provided that I didn't do any major fuckups in the bargain. I'm fine when I run good and get into the money. But when I run just well enough to keep stringing me along, and then get knocked out "on the bubble", the last seat that doesn't get paid, and I know I've played my A game, that just hurts.

Of note in this sit-n-go is that one of the participants was David Bradley, a Full Tilt pro. Their names show up in red on the player lists, while we mere mortals are black. In multi-table tournaments, you get your buy-in back if you knock one of them out.

Got hammered on the first two hands. On hand 1, I started with AJ in the small blind. There was a mid-position limper and a late-position raise, which I called. Flop was JKK, and the only thing I was really worried about was a king, so I check-raised to see where I was at. Both players called, and I was reading them as loose players who had missed, or maybe one of them had something like QJ or a straight draw. The turn was a ten and the river was a three; I bet out twice and they both called. I was pretty sure I was ahead a this point, since anybody who could beat me would have put in a raise.

As it happened, the limper had a suited K8, and the late raiser had QQ! I had the third-best hand. In my defense, both of them played the hand badly. The K8 should have folded before the flop, and once he hit the three kings, he should have put in a raise somewhere (probably on the turn). The QQ didn't play as badly, but probably was in a raise-or-fold situation on the turn, leaning towards the latter given that both of us were still in the pot and one was betting. (The QQ player was the first player out.)

On hand 2, I had suited Q7 and the betting was folded to me on the button, so I raised. The small blind reraised behind me. This time the flop was QJJ, which I liked quite a lot, but I merely called the flop bet. Turn was a nine, which wasn't perfect, but when he checked to me, I bet, mostly for information, and he called. River was the ten, which I didn't like one bit, especially when he bet out. Now any eight, jack or king beat me, but I still had to make the crying call when he bet out. He happened to have AK, which meant he'd had nothing whatsoever until the river. One of those hands where everything goes wrong for you, even when you've played it fine.

There's no hand stats sheet for a HORSE tournament, but I wish I had one to show you. I played a total of 67 hands and took 5.5 pots (the half-pot was a split hi/lo pot), including one blind steal and one that was folded to me in the big blind, so 3.5 real pots. I didn't take a single real pot until Level 4, about 20 minutes into the tournament. Had I had average cards, I would have taken about 10 pots from those 67 hands. The one thing that I can say is, at least I did better than the pro, who had even worse cards than me and finished 7th.

Tournament 117093545
Tournament type: Limit HORSE Sit-n-go
Entrants: 8
Buy-in: $20+2
Bankroll at beginning of session: $923.18
FTP at beginning of session: 2462.50

Started: 11:32, 12 November 2009
Ended/eliminated: 12:17

Position finished: 4
Winnings: $0.00
Full Tilt Points earned: 14.00
Bankroll at end of session: $901.18
Full Tilt Points at end of session: 2478.50
Net profit: $-22.00
Full Tilt Points earned: 14.00

Non-update update

2009-11-11T22:09:06Z

Happy Remembrance and/or Veterans' Day. Thank you to all our troops. If you're a troop, thank you.

(Am I the only one who feels that it's incredibly disrespectful of the Country Music Association to hold their huge televised gala awards ceremony tonight?)

I haven't been feeling that great since about Saturday (not flu symptoms, mostly just upset stomach and headachey), and I was called in to work two extra shifts Sunday and Monday (boss was sick), in addition to my regular Tuesday shift and choir practice last night. Even if I had wanted to play poker these past few days, I wouldn't have, because I'd have been playing in sub-par conditions.

Anyway, a summary of my Tuesday-Monday play this past week:

Cash game sessions played: 5
Time played: 10 h 44 min
Net profit (before rakeback): $-56.70
Rake paid (= regular FTP earned): $249.00
Rakeback expected: $67.23
Net profit after rakeback: $10.53
Hourly rate: $0.98

Tournament sessions played: 2
Time played: 5 h 56 min
Net profit (before rakeback): $41.03
Rake paid (= regular FTP earned / 7): $4.00
Rakeback expected: $1.08
Net profit after rakeback: $42.11
Hourly rate: $7.10

Total time played: 16 h 40 min
Net profit after rakeback: $52.64
Hourly rate: $3.16

So, obviously I can't make a living at it, not with this size of bankroll, not unless I just had a really bad week (I think it was worse than it could have been, but not crazy bad).

But if you look at it from another perspective, how much does your hobby make for you?

Comment on "rake paid" figure above: This does not mean that Full Tilt made $249 off me during the cash games that I played this week; this is the amount they made off everybody at the table during the hands that I played. That said, it's clearly a profitable business. (And notice the difference that rakeback makes to me as well! I wouldn't even consider playing without it.)

And now for something completely different.

2009-11-09T10:09:21Z

A couple months ago, Dave Barry posted this link in his blog. As a public service, I decided to reproduce the best parts of the page, translated from Russian thanks to ~~my years of experience with the language~~ Google Translate providing me with a first guess. Thank you, yasviridov, for more laughs than one week should ever be allowed to contain! Some of the captions translate better than others, but I've included them all just because the artwork is, well, precious.

(Warning: The parts of the post that are NSFW due to partial nudity are hidden behind lj-cuts. Click at your peril.)

In one hand, his guitar. In the other, good luck. Ah, romance...

Give me more, Jorge! Show me passion, show me overwhelming emotion! I'm not taking passport photos here! There we go, much better!

On second thought, we'd better not send them and Bilan.
(Note to make this one make sense: Bilan is a Russian pop star who has represented them twice in the Eurovision Song Contest.)

"My God, what is this?"
"It's a record, Mom! We told you like a minute ago."
"Oh, right! ...My God, what is this?"
"Mom, it's a record, a re-cord!"

It must be acknowledged that not everybody appreciates the sound of a saxophone.

This picture of Wayne Newton was clearly not his "best of".

I could admire this cover for hours.

Maybe Uncle Bobo did have to strangle the three nurses, but he didn't have to do it on his niece's birthday and spoil it.

There was a time when guitars could sell literally anybody.

What is the secret of our family's happiness? Oral sex!

Heaven came down right on my hairdo.

Is it just me, or does this guy look like Fomenko?

The first time, William Tell used his daughter.

She hasn't made up her mind whom her heart belongs to—the man in the moustache, or the plush reindeer.

Orgies in the Fifties were considerably duller than nowadays.

In the Seventies, too.

Despite the men's best efforts, they still got drafted.

After a cup of acorn liqueur, Havtan got very playful.

I envy all of you 21st-century-dwellers!

"Why don't you have your fins? Aren't you coming to the dance?"

The right hand of the woman to the left is particularly frightening for some reason.

The new gym teacher was just like the two old ones.

The Russian porno perestroika had its forerunners.

They brought it home, and it turned into—Oh my!

The Bosnian guerrillas really got around. [Ed. note: Even I don't get this one.]

Returning from the field, Theodore found a lamb with a broken wing [sic] and brought it with him...

This album won a silver medal at the World's Fair of Merchandise for the Colorblind, Zurich, 1961.

Borat?

Igor Stravinsky's ballet "Firebird". The bird got old.

In the words of the poet Druk:
Dear Mother,
In this life
I am doing fine
I have four hooves
And an enormous head.

They were so poor that they had to paint Satan on a canvas.

I think I can safely say that most people know what this means. Although myself, for example, I have no clue what's going on here.

The tiger suit was stuffy, but it sure worked with the ladies.

"What do you mean, you're fresh out of Beatles?"

"We've got tons of 'em! Here's Yellow Submarine!"
"I think I'd better take the other one."

Take our easy course, and in 12 lessons you can be as cool as this guy with a guitar!

"I must draw attention to your son's behaviour. He threw a breadstick in the dining hall. And killed the headmaster with it."

He was beginning to feel that his life was going somewhere, and then he saw this...

...and this...

...and this...

...and this...

Two steps later, the unsuspecting zombie stumbled into the piano and hurt his knee.

"Hey boy! The urinal's a little more to the right!"

"Mommy! MOMMY!"
"Shh, calm down, calm down sweetie. It was just a nightmare. You were only dreaming that Uncle Bobo escaped from the psych ward."

"Excuse me, have you seen my contact lens?"

"So here's the offer: In addition to this fabulous 'Kirby' record player, you get a set of stainless steel teeth, and me, completely free! So, do we have a deal?"

People of Earth, we mean you no harm. Take us to your leader, or to your barber.

Dear Sir: We are sorry, but your sample photos were not accepted. Yes, our film "Brokeback Mountain" is about gay cowboys, but!

The Patriarchate of Moscow and the Sailors' Marine Union issued a joint press release criticising the new film "The Last Temptation of The Sailor."

Psst! Psst! Don't turn around, Masha. Keep smiling at the camera. But if you can also see these strange creatures, let me know by poking me with your elbow.

Not many people know that Tsereteli's first sculpture, "Boy With Weathervane", was made of plasticine.

Hey look, he really didn't expect a rattlesnake when he opened the pizza box!

Idiots! Where are you staring? The camera's on the other side! That's a theodolite!

I'm dedicating my next song to a dear friend who is in the audience tonight. My dentist.

I know, okay? Just pretend you're chopping, and afterwards we'll Photoshop in a tree and a beaver biting your foot.

"So I said, 'let's buy some vodka!' And you were like, 'if we're going to have some fun, let's get costumes and confetti!' And now look at us!"

Carlson, who lives with a hooker, pulls another prank.

I had used my first two wishes. What else would I ask for so that I didn't feel sorry? Maybe a dombura player?

All right, my dear, I'll do it. But promise me you won't look, I'm shy.

Outrageous! A naked girl on a Tchaikovsky cover?!

"I would advise against ordering the soup. I dropped a bar of foot soap into the tureen."

In the morning, she couldn't believe that she'd swapped all her clothes and furniture for the old phonograph.

With any other background, fine, it would fade away, but all the same... [Ed. I don't get it either.]

Part 2 tomorrow!

Look Ma, I remembered how to use lj-cut!

2009-11-08T06:06:02Z

I didn't blog about yesterday's session but I did keep the record, which is appended to this post.

I have decided to change my focus for the month. I was doing the Iron Man Challenge thing as more-or-less a reason to keep a schedule. But I've found myself stressing out about, when am I going to get my 50 points in, which takes about two hours of solid cash-game play, during which time I want to be in a good head space. And I'm busier than I was last time I tried this—even working six hours a week, plus commute time, means quite a bit less time on the computer. This is overall a good thing, but it makes achieving my goal more of a burden than a challenge.

And another thing is, cash games aren't really my strongest area. Not that I'm bad at them per se, but I feel much more comfortable in tournaments. The strategies are different because the aim is different, and there's also a different feel when the chips on the table are just chips and not dollars.

(You may be asking yourself: What do you mean, the aim is different? Poker is poker, right? Well ... the aim in a cash game is simply to make as much money as you can. In a tournament, your chips are not the end in themselves, but the means to a higher end, namely, knocking out your opponents—and conversely, not letting them knock you out. This leads to different decisions being made, different strategies being used, et cetera.)

Anyhow, the reason I was playing cash games is because from an hourly perspective, tournaments just don't give you as many Full Tilt Points. So, I'm revising my goals. Instead of aiming for 50 FTPs a day, I'm going to have a daily goal of one good hour on workdays (Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Fridays) and two good hours on other days. Since I have choir on Tuesday evenings as well as work during the day, I'm not going to sweat it if I don't get an hour in on a Tuesday.

So how did I do yesterday and today? I got in two average hours yesterday and caught enough bad cards to lose about $25. Today, I got in ... four good hours!

When I logged on, I noticed that a razz tournament was starting 20 minutes thenceforth. So I played at a cash game until the tournament started, ending up $6 to the good; not bad for 15 minutes of killing time.

It felt good to be playing in a tournament again, and playing well. I got my share of good and bad cards, and had to fight my way out of about three different holes. I set my sights on making the money, and I made a few plays that I'm very proud of which gave me exactly that result. Once I had made the money—albeit with the third-smallest stack—I set my sights on making the final table or going out in a blaze of glory; 9th place paid the same as 12th, so no point running the clock down any longer.

I was quite short stacked at this point, and I needed to earn chips. I did this by changing gears. I had been playing very tightly up to that point, folding more hands than my tablemates. But now I loosened right up. By this point in a tournament, stealing the blinds gives one's stack a substantial boost even when nobody plays against you, and I managed to steal several before anybody played back at me. Luckily for me, I actually did have a hand when somebody decided to look me up, and suddenly I was back in the middle of the pack.

Once the final table of 8 was decided, my luck went south in a hurry, but I felt that I did as well as I could have with the cards I got tonight. I was in the proverbial zone pretty much the whole time.

Note about the rakeback: They moved the payment date from Wednesday to Friday, and each Friday's payment covers the previous Tuesday-to-Monday. So I got a deposit today that amounted to 27% of the 50 cents' rake for the razz tournament I played on the 1st. Hey, they rounded it up, too! With the records I'm keeping here, I should be able to compute on Monday what I'll be getting the following Friday.

Rakerebate.net deposit
Time: 10:00, 06 Nov 2009
Amount of rake rebate: $0.14
Balance before rake rebate: $875.36
Balance after rake rebate: $875.50

Start of session
Time: 19:12, 06 Nov 2009
Balance at start of session: $875.50
Full Tilt Points at start of session: 2364.50

Game: Limit Stud Hi/Lo
Table name: Cline
Stakes: $1/$2
Stack at beginning of session: $50.00
Cash added during session: $20.00

End of session
Time: 22:32
Stack at end of session: $44.65
Balance at end of session: $850.15
Full Tilt Points at end of session: 2438.75
Net balance: $-25.35
Full Tilt Points earned: 74.25

Start of session
Time: 20:00, 07 Nov 2009
Balance at start of session: $850.15
Full Tilt Points at start of session: 2438.75

Game: Limit Stud Hi/Lo
Table name: Rio Royal
Stakes: $1/$2
Stack at beginning of session: $50.00
Cash added during session: $0.00

End of session
Time: 20:15
Stack at end of session: $56.00
Balance at end of session: $856.15
Full Tilt Points at end of session: 2448.50
Net balance: $6.00
Full Tilt Points earned: 9.75

Tournament 116168483
Tournament type: Limit Razz multi-table tournament
Entrants: 114
Buy-in: $24+2
Bankroll at beginning of session: $856.15

Started: 20:16, 07 November 2009
Ended/eliminated: 00:16, 08 November 2009

Position finished: 7
Winnings: $93.03
Net profit: $67.03
Full Tilt Points earned: 14.00
Bankroll at end of session: $923.18
Full Tilt Points at end of session: 2462.50

Session post

2009-11-06T05:23:16Z

Not much to report on this one. I won some, I lost some. Didn't get to the 100-FTP mark. It's more obvious when you're losing a hand in razz, so the players don't donate as quickly I guess. I think I should play this one at higher stakes just because the relative risk is lower.

Start of session
Time: 22:27, 05 Nov 2009
Balance at start of session: $876.26
Full Tilt Points at start of session: 2300.75

Game: Limit Razz
Table name: Garbage
Stakes: $1/$2
Stack at beginning of session: $50.00
Cash added during session: $0.00

End of session
Time: 23:59
Stack at end of session: $49.10
Balance at end of session: $875.36
Full Tilt Points at end of session: 2364.50
Net balance: $-0.90
Bonus Full Tilt Points earned: 24.50
Regular Full Tilt Points earned: 39.25

Session post

2009-11-05T23:00:29Z

Bleah. I found out, when I checked my Iron Man Page, the reason I was done so quickly yesterday. I had been playing during a "Happy Hour" and earning double Full Tilt Points. The snag is, the bonus points don't count toward the Iron Man bonus, so yesterday only 25.75 of my points counted, which isn't 50. Sigh. I didn't make the same mistake today, although I was again playing during Happy Hour for the first 47 minutes of my session.

Very different players at the table this time. Tight and passive players, which meant a different strategy. I held my own, but nearly every time I got into a hand with any size of pot, my opponent outdrew me. Even so, I was at break-even after the first hour. Then a couple of loose players joined the game, and everything changed. Unfortunately, I continued to get outdrawn, and it just so happened that I lost about 12 bucks on the hand that gave me my fiftieth non-bonus FTP. Rather than keep playing while annoyed and a little peckish, I decided to call it a session. I probably should have kept at it, because loose players are generally good for the pocketbook.

If Odin isn't hogging the puter tonight, I may put in some more time; I feel in decent playing shape. I just need a break for the moment. Also, today is the last day for the "Piece of Ivey" promotion, so it would be nice to have a shot at that.

I'm figuring that the loss in today's session was mostly down to cards, and just about cancels out the gain from the two monster hands yesterday. I could have lost more if I hadn't been playing well.

And obviously I'm not completely here this second; I forgot to grab my hand statistics for the session. The only thing remarkable about this stats set was the large number of pots I took on third street, a result of the table being so tight early on. It was just very easy to steal the antes.

Start of session
Time: 16:13, 05 Nov 2009
Balance at start of session: $909.26
Full Tilt Points at start of session: 2224.50

Game: Limit Stud Hi/Lo
Table name: Rio Royal
Stakes: $1/$2
Stack at beginning of session: $50.00
Cash added during session: $0.00

End of session
Time: 17:48
Stack at end of session: $17.00
Balance at end of session: $876.26
Full Tilt Points at end of session: 2300.75
Net balance: $-33.00
Bonus Full Tilt Points earned: 22.50
Regular Full Tilt Points earned: 53.75

In other news

2009-11-04T22:27:26Z

On Sunday's Choral Concert, CBC Radio 2 will be playing one or more songs performed by the Greystone Singers; check the site for times and audio feeds. The song(s) will be from their new CD, which probably includes some pieces from past years in which I sang.

If you want an idea what we sound like, go here and click some links (I wasn't at this session).

Session post

2009-11-04T22:14:27Z

I've decided that the session numbers should go below the fold. Scroll down to the end if you want to read them first.

I got my weekly rake rebate today, which reminded me to make this important public service announcement: If you're going to play poker for money on line, sign up for a rakeback program. I signed up through rakerebate.net, who offer 27% rakeback. Basically, for every dollar of "rake" money I pay to Full Tilt Poker, I get 27 cents back the following Wednesday (and presumably RakeRebate gets a chunk as well). This does not suck. There may be other sites offering better deals now, I don't know, do shop around.

Also, if you're thinking of signing up at Full Tilt, please tell me beforehand. If I invite you to the site, I get a bonus, and you do too, and it's substantial (up to 100 bucks, depending how much you deposit). And you can get rakeback on top of that. No point giving the bastards more than you have to.

Anyhow, on to my Stud Hi/Lo session, in which I made up for my Sunday night/Monday morning fiasco in just two hands.

Hand 18 gave me a premium A3/5 to start - excellent for low, and the hidden ace gives it nice disguised high possibilities too. Exactly the kind of hand you want in this game. Four players called, including bingostu, who was playing almost every hand. I paired my ace on 4th street and my 5 on 6th street. Two players folded on 5th and 6th, a third was all in, and bingostu called me down all the way. My "aces up" two pair beat his queens up, and there was no lo, and the pot was worth $48. Thanks, bingostu!

(Note, that does not mean that I made $48 on that hand; some of the money was what I put into the pot myself. However, more than half of it was profit.)

On Hand 27, I took down another $31 pot by scooping with "the wheel", A2345, an awesome hand if you can get it. Not just the best possible lo, it's also a straight for hi.

For the poker novices out there: In Stud hi/lo, half the pot goes to the best hand, as in a normal poker game, but half the pot also goes to the worst hand (provided that it is 8-high or worse).

The most important trick to this tricky game, Todd Brunson's "Platinum Rule", is: Don't draw at half the pot. If you have half the pot locked up solid, great. If you're drawing to scoop the whole pot, great as well. Otherwise, you're almost always better off folding. Half the pot is a mug's game.

I think I'm going to play more of this game; I got my 50 FTP in under an hour, and made quite a bit of money doing it, compared to nearly 2 hours it took me to lose 40 bucks Monday morning. People are even looser in this game, often with bad draws to half the pot. This makes it profitable financially and point-wise. Even with average cards I would have done well today, and I got those two exceptional hands that made the difference between a good session and a great one.

Rake rebate deposited 12:57, 04 Nov 2009
Amount of rake rebate: $3.71
Balance before rake rebate: $842.60
Balance after rake rebate: $846.31

Start of session
Time: 15:33, 04 Nov 2009
Balance at start of session: $846.31
Full Tilt Points at start of session: 2173.00

Game: Limit Stud Hi/Lo
Table name: Rio Royal
Stakes: $1/$2
Stack at beginning of session: $50.00
Cash added during session: $0.00

End of session
Time: 16:31
Stack at end of session: $112.95
Balance at end of session: $909.26
Full Tilt Points at end of session: 2224.50
Net balance: $62.95
Full Tilt Points earned: 51.50

Statistics for 55 Hands
Street Saw Saw/Total
Fourth 16 29%
Fifth 14 25%
Sixth 9 16%
Seventh 8 15%
Showdown 7 13%
Street Won Won/Saw Won/Total
Third 1 2% 2%
Fourth 0 0% 0%
Fifth 2 14% 4%
Sixth 0 0% 0%
Seventh 1 13% 2%
Showdown
- Split 3 43% 5%
- Scoop 4 57% 7%

Session post

2009-11-04T00:21:29Z

This one doesn't include hand statistics because it would be long and cumbersome and not terribly informative, given that I was playing 7 different games.

Start of session
Time: 17:16, 03 Nov 2009
Balance at start of session: $868.60
Full Tilt Points at start of session: 2159.00

Tournament: 115497296
Buy-in: $24+2 ($3,000 guaranteed prize pool)
Game(s): 7-game mixed limit
Entrants: 119
Places paid: 16

End of session
Time: 19:12
Position: 58
Balance at end of session: $842.60
Full Tilt Points at end of session: 2173.00
Net balance: $-26.00
Full Tilt Points earned: 14.00

I like mixed-game tournaments. I play HORSE, which is 5 fixed-limit games, frequently. Full Tilt has just begun offering a 7-game format which includes the HORSE games along with no-limit Texas Hold'em and pot-limit Omaha High. I think I like the format, although my PLO experience is very slim. The guaranteed prize pool was a draw as well, and Full Tilt did have to make good on their guarantee; 125 players was the break-even. That said, they still grossed over $3,000 including the rake.

This tournament was all about the cards. I muddled through the first 8 levels, with my stack fluctuating around the average stack size, and then promptly died when I missed my draw on two razz hands in a row. Again, happy with how I played, the cards just didn't come when they would have done me some good.

Session post

2009-11-03T07:47:31Z

I'm counting this one under Monday, since I started before midnight (-:

Start of session
Time: 00:35, 03 Nov 2009
Balance at start of session: $909.00
Full Tilt Points at start of session: 2103.25

Game: Limit Stud Hi
Table name: Gold
Stakes: $1/$2
Stack at beginning of session: $50.00
Cash added during session: $20.00

End of session
Time: 02:39
Stack at end of session: $29.60
Balance at end of session: $868.60
Full Tilt Points at end of session: 2159.00
Net balance: $-40.40
Full Tilt Points earned: 55.75

Statistics for 140 Hands
Street Saw Saw/Total
Fourth 36 26%
Fifth 31 22%
Sixth 19 14%
Seventh 16 11%
Showdown 15 11%
Street Won Won/Saw Won/Total
Third 6 4% 4%
Fourth 3 8% 2%
Fifth 4 13% 3%
Sixth 3 16% 2%
Seventh 0 0% 0%
Showdown 5 33% 4%

My objective for the session was to play until I earned 50 Full Tilt Points. Since I missed my quota yesterday and the day before, I wanted to make sure I got at least the minimum for today.

Generally, I played too loose. I pulled up my stats window after about 50 hands, and noticed that I was playing 26% of my hands to 4th street. That may sound tight to an amateur - folding 3 hands out of 4 before even seeing one additional card - but it's much looser than my target, which was to be below 20%. I was playing too many "trap hands" - low hands with flush or straight potential, for instance, or low pairs without a big kicker. By this time I was down to half my starting stack. I decided it was enough to keep playing with, and soldiered on, vowing to tighten up.

I actually did tighten up for a while, although the final stats sheet shows a different story. This basically boils down to about 10 hands in the middle when there were only 4 or 5 of us playing, in which case one has to loosen up quite a bit. Up to that point, I had brought my percentage down to 23%, which meant I was playing below my 20% target for that period.

Unfortunately, things were not panning out. The hand that hurt the most was when my starting pair of aces (a premium starting hand in 7-card stud) got stung by a guy who started with a hidden pair of fours (a pretty awful hand unless you manage to hit a third four, which happens about 1 time in 6). I got my two pair, he made his set, and suddenly I was below 20 bucks. I don't like playing that short-stacked, even in a limit game, so I brought another $20 to the table. I resigned myself to a losing session, but at least I'd get my 50 points.

I played a few hands past my 50-point limit because I happened to have two very loose players sitting on my right. Once one of them stood up from the table, I promptly followed.

I'm not happy with my play, but I did identify a couple leaks (see if you can spot one of them - it's plain as day if you know how to read the statistics). I think the cards were a little unfair to me, but not $40 unfair. I should have lost less than I did. I'm not completely surprised—I don't play my best when I'm tired, and I wouldn't have played at all if I didn't want to get those points. Lesson learned.

Session post

2009-11-02T00:04:39Z

Tournament 115198115
Tournament type: single table Razz Sit-n-go
Entrants: 8
Buy-in: $5+0.50
Bankroll at beginning of session: $914.50

Started: 17:53, 01 November 2009
Ended/eliminated: 19:01

Position finished: 4
Winnings: $0.00
Full Tilt Points earned: 3.50
Bankroll at end of session: $909.00

Statistics for 106 Hands
Street Saw Saw/Total
Fourth 30 28%
Fifth 15 14%
Sixth 9 8%
Seventh 7 7%
Showdown 7 7%
Street Won Won/Saw Won/Total
Third 11 10% 10%
Fourth 4 13% 4%
Fifth 1 7% 1%
Sixth 0 0% 0%
Seventh 0 0% 0%
Showdown 4 57% 4%

Comments: Razz is probably my favourite poker game, if only because I spent a month or so a couple years back analysing the living tar out of it. It's relatively simple as poker games go, which misleads people into thinking it's an easy game. Well, it may be a little easier than some, but a little skill still goes a long way.

This sit-n-go was pretty ordinary. As is typical at these levels, almost everybody was playing much too loosely. I sat back and only played the quality hands, pounding my opponents whenever I had something. Although I was pretty card dead early on, I still built my stack a little at a time, until I looked up about 40 minutes in and realised I had the chip lead. I held on to it until just before the synchronised break (Full Tilt has hourly breaks for all its tournaments, starting at 5 minutes to the hour), when there were only 4 players left and I caught a couple bad draws. Just after the break I lost half my stack when I drew not-quite-bad-enough-to-fold. This put me on the small stack, but one of the other players then obligingly lost half of his stack.

The last hand, I got my chips in very good - all-in with a made 7 versus a 6-draw with one card to go. He made his hand, and that was that. I'm happy with how I played, although I probably could have paid more attention to playing and less to writing this post. ...

Odin wants on the computer, so it doesn't look like I'm going to make my 50 FTPs (Full Tilt Points) today. I'm anticipating that I'll be playing a lot more cash games this month, because they tend to offer more FTPs per hour than tournaments. I am also going to play in higher-buyin tournaments; $5 is pretty cheap for my bankroll level.

How to not gamble

2009-11-01T22:44:17Z

I have a hard time convincing people of the following fact: Poker, played properly, is not gambling. Poker is investing. Very, very high-risk investing, but investing nonetheless. Let me give you an example of the difference.

If you're betting double-or-nothing on a fair coin flip, that's gambling. Your expected value is plain old flat zero.

If you're betting double-or-nothing that somebody's next baby will be a boy, that's investing.

What's the difference? Well, (approximately) 51% of babies are boys, 49% are girls. This is pretty consistent worldwide, under virtually any circumstance (pre-natal sex-screening of various kinds notwithstanding). So, for every fifty bucks you put in, you'd expect (in the long run) to get 51 bucks out. That's an investment with a 2% rate of return. (I don't know what the exact value is, but 2% isn't too far off, and that's what we'll use here.)

That said, you wouldn't want to put your life savings on it, because almost half the time you'd end up with zilch. It's a risky investment. In math-geek terms, the mean is positive (1.02, or 2% more than you started with), but the standard deviation is also very high (0.9998).

The challenge in any investment is managing risk. It's always possible to lower your risk, but it always comes at the expense of your reward. So the next question is, suppose I have $1000 that I'm using as my investment nest egg. How large a commitment would I be happy making to this investment?

To make a long story short, in a double-or-nothing situation, you get the best reward-to-risk ratio when you invest the same percentage as your rate of return. Since this is a 2% rate of return, you would like to invest (up to) $20. The remaining $980 is "invested" in lowering your risk (cash has 0 risk and 0 reward). If you get to make this bet over and over again on different babies, in the long run, your bank account will (slowly) grow.

Notice that your mean has decreased substantially. If you invested the whole thousand, your mean would be $1020, but the problem is that 49% of the time, your career as an investor would be over. By only investing 2%, $20, you're not just reducing this risk of ruin, you're actually eliminating it, since even if it's a girl, you still have $980 towards your next investment. This comes at a cost, though - your mean is now a mere $1000.40.

What you're actually doing is maximising the median. Suppose you make this investment 100 times in a row. If you invest the whole amount every time, your median is zero, since in order to have anything left, you'd have to win 100 slightly-biased coin flips in a row, which will happen about one time in 10^29, i.e., never. But if you invest 2% every time, your median is $1020.20. This is how much you will have if there are 51 boys and 49 girls among your 100 babies, which will happen about 8% of the time; the probability that there will be more or fewer boys are both approximately 46%.

Even if you get astronomically unlucky and wind up with 100 girls in a row (not that I have anything against girls!), you'll still be left with $132.62. The odds of this happening are substantially less than two people picking the same specific atom out of your house.

However, you don't want to invest too much. There is a critical value, very close to twice the optimum, and if you invest more than that, your median will become less than your starting amount. So if you went to 5% per investment, for instance, your median after 100 investments would be $975.24, and you're headed in the wrong direction. Now you're gambling again.

November 1

2009-11-01T20:28:35Z

Okay, so, my plan for the month. I have decided that I'm going to make an effort to get better at poker.

This month, I'm going to work on record keeping, a.k.a. How To Not Lie To Yourself About How Well Or Poorly You've Been Doing. This blog will be the record. So my blog for the coming month is going to have a lot of poker in it, although I'll try to put in enough real-world stuff to keep everyone else from tuning out.

I am going to make a post here every time I play a session, with the specifics of what I did. So, what my bankroll was at the start and end of the session, what game I was playing, where I finished if it was a tournament, and so forth.

My goal for the month is to make the Silver level in Full Tilt Poker's monthly Iron Man Challenge. This is their regular challenge to reward people for playing a lot at the site. To make Silver, I need to earn 50 Full Tilt Points a day on 25 days in the month, or 100 Points on 20 days, or 200 Points on 15 days. With the bankroll I have, I shall be aiming at one of the first two objectives. (I may elaborate on this later.)

My bankroll as of right now, 16:28 Full Tilt Poker time, is $914.50, and I have 2,099.75 Full Tilt Points.

My annual post

2009-11-01T20:26:43Z

Actually, this is going to be more than an annual post, but LJ has kindly reminded me that it's been 48 weeks (hello again!). I've made a resolution to make a post every day this week. (I was going to go for "every day this month", but I don't know if that's realistic.)

Things are actually going brilliantly for me right now. I have a psychiatrist who isn't trying to mother me or dismiss my issues. She also happens to have worked with my new family physician (Dr. Jack retired last year), and I'm in a much better head space than I've been, oh, probably since I got my Master's degree in '02. I am on a new-to-me antidepressant (Celexa) since Effexor had stopped working. I have joined a 40-voice choir that does fun music ("You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch" is a staple at our Christmas concert) and gives me a lift when we rehearse every Tuesday.

And I have a job. It's only six hours a week, but it's a start, and it's going great. I'm a "tutor" at the university's Math/Stats Help Centre, which is basically a drop-in centre for people having problems with the math in their courses (which range from Calculus to Econ to Chem Eng and sometimes even further afield). It's fun, the math is occasionally interesting, and it's a great mental workout for me thrice a week - and not just the math side of things but the teaching. You don't just have to know the subject, you have to also figure out where the student is at, and then (the challenging bit) how to get them where they need to be (and the really challenging bit) without just doing it all for them. I have cured at least three students of their fear of blackboards, and if I do nothing else this year I'll have accomplished that much.

My next post will detail why I plan to post daily over the coming week.

Official cry for help

2008-11-24T15:50:53Z

It was almost exactly half a lifetime ago that I dropped out of university the first time. I was just shy of 19 then. One of the things I did before dropping out was I went to a counselling group, which is basically where a bunch of people who want help sit around and talk. The first thing the "leader" had us do was each of us say why we were here.

With everyone else, it was something very specific, such as, I want to improve my study skills, or I want to stop having to pull all-nighters. Then it got around to me. I said something along the lines of, my life is falling apart because there are things that I'm expected to do that I can't do. (I'm sure I was more specific than that, but that was the gist.)

The leader asked me, '"Can't", or "won't"?'

I didn't have an answer at that time.

Almost exactly half a lifetime on, I'm pretty much sold on "can't".

I'm not stupid. Let's be honest, that's an understatement, I have at least a one-in-100,000 mind. That's not bragging, that's just me knowing who I am. Also: I'm a social moron (using the word as an analogy to the former clinical sense - I'd figure a social age between 8 and 12 is fair); I can't organise myself; I can't motivate myself outside a particularly narrow range of interests; I am a pathological non-multitasker, to the point where I can get overwhelmed just by being asked to do two things; I'm sure I'm autistic, although I don't have that particular diagnosis (officially I'm bipolar).

I am on welfare, trying to look for a job, but every time someone asks me to do one other thing... I am a two-time university dropout who was (according to the nice lady at Graduate Studies) 75% of the way to getting my PhD. I have a wife who is working three jobs because I can't even get one (and even with that we're still on welfare). I am behind on student loan repayments because I can't get up the energy and/or organization to apply for interest relief. My house is a pigsty. I am meeting my mother for lunch today to talk about job-hunting and I'm not even sure I can do it. If I'm not hitting bottom again, it sure as hell feels like I am, which makes the third time this decade alone.

I'm not stupid. If anyone thinks I'm here because this is where I want to be, because I'm proud to be dragging myself and my family down, because I love being so ashamed of where I'm at that I'm scared to talk to my own mother about it, because I'm somehow deliberately being difficult, or because I "won't" do it, you can fuck off right now. I've been dealing with that for almost exactly half a lifetime now, if not longer, and it hasn't worked. I'm 38, I'm not stupid, I know what I'm capable of and not capable of. Okay?

I need help. I need some kind of help that I haven't gotten yet. Specifically, there are things that society, my mother, my wife, myself, expect me to do, that I simply cannot. These are things that need to be done (get a job, pay bills, answer the phone...). I just can't do them. Yes, can't, not "won't". If I can't do them at 38, having tried to do them for two decades, maybe it's time to stop hitting my head against those particular brick walls.

And yes, I've talked to a shrink. She gave me some pills that did nothing but make me gain 40 pounds, and then somehow was surprised when I quit taking them. Then her husband passed away, just over a year ago now, and I'm still on the waiting list to see a new one. Not that I'm expecting much when I do.

What do I want? I want to find a job. I'll settle for any job, just to get people (my wife, my mother, my social worker, to a lesser extent myself) off my back. It has to be a job that I can do in Saskatoon. Ideally it would be a job involving math. I want to not have to do anything else while I'm looking for a job, but that just doesn't seem to be happening. I've been trying since September to do it on my own, but obviously that hasn't worked. I want to get my PhD, too, but given the way that ended, I need more time (and likely, a certain few professors to retire) before I can tackle that again. I want this to be the last time I ever hit bottom. I want people to stop expecting me to do things that, over the past two decades, I have firmly established I am not capable of doing.

What's my skill set? One-in-100,000 mind; I can write if I'm motivated; I can teach; mad math skillz; I know my way around a computer; I am useless with phones, marginally less so in customer interaction; I need someone else to organize for me.

My crazy-ass dream is to somehow have a $10,000 or so bankroll and try making a go of playing poker for a living. Could I do it? I don't know, but I do know I'd like to try. Poker is one of those things that I do get excited about (you kidding? A game that's 90% math? Hello!!!). I've managed to turn a $0 online bankroll into (currently) about $170, but even George Soros couldn't make a living on a $170 investment portfolio in high-risk instruments...

The sad thing is

2008-06-12T07:07:35Z

This is the best anti-Obama argument I've heard so far this year, and probably the best anti-Obama argument anybody's going to make between now and November. (Make sure you read it right through to the last sentence.) Thanks to Justin Webb of the BBC for pointing me at it.