This past weekend was the tournament for our beach volleyball league. How did we do? Great–we forfeited our opening game. Look, people were out of town, or they had plans for the rest of the weekend…and we were scheduled to play at 8am Saturday morning. I don’t need to tell you that eight o’clock comes early on the weekends. It was gonna be chilly, it was gonna be damp, and we were gonna get killed. So we could do like the Light Brigade and charge into the Valley of Death…or we could say the hell with it and gracefully step aside. Believe me, when I rolled over in bed Saturday morning and looked at my alarm clock, the phrase "quitters never win" never seemed more of a lie. I fluffed my pillow, cradled my head, and slipped back into Dreamland.

Not playing in the tournament meant that I had some free time on my hands, and even I couldn’t fill all that free time just by drinking beer. So I lugged the camera around and took about a trillion pictures of the weekend. I posted a bunch on my Flickr page, I’ll keep sifting through them and upload a few more as the days go by. I haven’t taken many pictures lately and I forgot how heavy that things gets when it’s hanging around your neck for hours at a time. But I needed to get some practice in before Aruba next month, and what better chance to hone my "skills" than a beach volleyball tournament?

I think Joe managed to blast this ball through the block:

My friend Rico, with a look of steely determination (or severe constipation) on his face:

That’s a block:

So is this:

Yeah, I can do this, no problem:

There are age restrictions on who can play, but they aren’t strictly enforced:

I didn’t play a single point all weekend, but it was so freakin’ hot out there that I was pouring sweat. Still, I missed not playing. Last year we played in the Rec league and I think made it to the semifinals, so we were playing pretty much the whole weekend. This year the league was split into three tiers, we played in the middle one, and got killed. Due in large part to the fact that I spend most of the summer in Vegas. And, uh, in part because we suck. There was talk that the bottom teams would get relegated and the winners promoted, but we’ll see if that happens. We may voluntarily move down to the bottom tier. Or, we may dedicate ourselves to the task at hand and arrive next year more focused, fitter, and prepared to do whatever it takes to achieve victory.Or, we may just forfeit next year too.

Which wouldn’t be THAT big a crime. There’s nothing wrong with sitting in the sun, kicking up a little sand, and having a beer or two. Or three. Or…I think Rick has four beers here…

Maybe we didn’t win, or even play, but it was still a fun weekend. With the champions crowned I relinquished my burden and played catch-up at the bar. And that was a nice way indeed to wrap up the weekend:

Mean Gene livin’ large, Mean Gene livin’ SO large.

Last night ESPN televised the final table of the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E. event, which I live-blogged along with Change100 and Logan. I was thrilled to cover what is perhaps the most prestigious poker tournament in the world, tho less so when I got a healthy taste of blogging stud games. That was no fun, hopefully Hold-Em will soon wipe all those games off the face of the Earth. Omaha/8, too, I’ve been getting killed playing Omaha/8 lately. Do away with it.

Anyway, I was interested to see how ESPN covered the weirdness of that final table. Believe me, it was weird, and ESPN showed a good bit of it. My ragged nerves probably contributed somewhat, but that night was one filled with bad energy. Fear and loathing. There was a lot of money at stake, a place in poker history up for grabs. The final table stage was jam-packed and there were scores of famous players in the stands watching their peers. Or their friends. Or, most likely, their horses.

Right now all the poker forums are lit up with people talking about Scotty Nguyen’s "performance". Scotty likes to drink at the table and that night it seemed like he got completely effed up. There was a moment of controversy right off the bat–Scotty drinks Michelob Ultra and the WSOP powers-that-be wouldn’t let him have a beverage other than Milwaukee’s Best Light on stage (and on camera). Forcing someone to drink Milwaukee’s Best Light would’ve deservedly landed WSOP Commissioner Jeffrey Pollack in the dock at The Hague, but cooler heads prevailed and Scotty was allowed to drink his Ultra with the labels peeled off.

How much did Scotty drink that night? How drunk was he? Was he drunk at all or just playacting? At the time I thought he was completely blasted. Even for Scotty Nguyen his behavior was erratic. He was talking really loud. He was laughing really loud, and he’d just keep on laughing and laughing maniacally until it started to get uncomfortable. He wouldn’t stack his chips, leaving them in ragged piles that were impossible to count. And he started dropping the F-bombs, and then the MF-bombs. He lost a hand and let loose with a barrage of profanity at one of the dealers that everyone in the room could hear in exquisite detail. I couldn’t believe that he didn’t get a penalty for that, but playing at a WSOP final table (especially one with ESPN’s cameras present) is like an overtime playoff hockey game. The refs swallow their whistles. Unless you commit felony murder on the ice, or the felt, play on.

The antics of the players really got on my nerves. And not just the ones seated at the table. Layne Flack kept walking onto the set, kept shouting "What’s UP…baybee?" to Scotty until that dead horse was well and beaten. Every player had their own little entourage, most of them were drinking pretty good (I had a couple at dinner and that soothed my savage breast) and the overall ambiance was pretty obnoxious.

When we got back from dinner it looked like Scotty had aged 10 years. He looked terrible, worn down and haggard. Yet he won the tournament. We were sitting 25 or so feet away and couldn’t hear all the table banter, and I really had no idea that Michael DeMichele and Scotty had locked horns as they did. The back-and-forth got pretty nasty, with Erick Lindgren floating above the fray but still finding time to give the needle with surgical precision. I was shocked to hear Lindgren say "I couldn’t beat a drunk" and "I hope the kid wins it" after he was knocked out. He was pissed, understandably so.

They didn’t show any of Scotty’s rambling (but fairly lucid) speech afterwards. Norman Chad wasn’t there to do the interview, which seemed odd as he’d shown up at other early-morning final tables. Scotty held court for a good fifteen minutes, taking a few final potshots at DeMichele ("I sent him back to school!") and then posing for pictures with his bracelet and the ghastly eyesore that is the David "Chip" Reese Memorial Trophy. Seriously, that thing is close-your-eyes awful. Do I have a picture of that?

Not the sharpest photo, but at least I cropped out Scotty’s exposed midriff. I’m not kidding.

It was a rough night. It wasn’t pretty. It wasn’t poker’s finest hour. And, two months late,  I’m glad I was there.

Isn’t she won-der-ful?

Bought a car today. Finally. After about 2 months of dickering and back-and-forthing. I got a decent deal, I think, and I got the car I like. After driving a car with no air conditioning and no radio for the last month (and worrying that it might belch and die for the last year or so) it was absolutely magical cruising down the road in my new ride, sunroof wide open, radio blaring.

I thought I knew what the word "love" meant. Maybe I did. Maybe I was a fool. But I love my new car. And I’m sure that love will never die…or, it won’t until I have to make my first payment.

I watched ESPN’s broadcast last night of the $1,000 rebuy event that I covered. Well, I half-watched it as I made myself a tasty little stir-fry. But I taped it so I can obsessively do a frame-by-frame analysis to see if I got any camera time. I did see myself during the segment where they interviewed Peter Gould. They showed a quick clip of him from the day before and I recognized my bloated frame in the background. I’ve been a good boy this week, exercising quite a bit, eating well. Gonna write up this post and hit the gym. And then…drink beer and eat wings. Ate wings yesterday, too. One step forward, two steps back.

Anyway. I watched the coverage and it didn’t quite jibe with what I remembered of that final table. The big thing I remembered was Peter Gould taking a long, long, LONG time to make his decisions, something Norman Chad noticed as well. I remembered Lyric Duveyoung and Alan Jaffray having a much bigger presence during the final table than they did during the broadcast (and I’m not just talking about Jaffray’s hat). I came away from that final table thinking that Jeff Williams is a pretty sick poker player, and the show bore that out.

Beyond that, to be honest, I don’t remember much about that tournament. I went through my pictures of that event and it didn’t do much to stir my memory. Next week is the broadcast of the $50K H.O.R.S.E., and frankly I don’t want my memories of that night stirred, as I nearly had a nervous breakdown. Live-blogging H.O.R.S.E. (actually, any Stud game) is NOT fun. I wonder how many of Scotty Nguyen’s MF-bombs ESPN will include in their broadcast? I wonder how many references Norman Chad will make about Scotty’s frat-initiation-night-caliber beer consumption?

Hard to believe the WSOP has been over for almost a month. Been home almost a month. In that month, there really hasn’t been that much hullaballo about the November Nine, has there? Maybe that’ll pick up as the Main Event shows start appearing on ESPN and we get closer to the final table, I dunno. I think for poker to thrive on TV it has to move toward live broadcasts, unless the WSOP and WPT plan on North Korea-quality media blackouts. And I don’t see many final-table participants willing to spend six months in a re-education camp until their show airs. I think I’ve watched two WPT episodes this year, and those with only one eye on the screen. It just isn’t that compelling when you know who won. And when they only show 20 of the 237 hands played. Not that watching the big blind win in a walk makes for compelling television, but neither does 95% of network programming.

I’ve been going through a lot of the photos I took in Vegas, looking for some hidden gems (or pics that aren’t totally awful) and I’ve also been sifting through my Vietnam pictures as well. My interest was re-piqued when I read Ryan Lucchesi’s two-part post about his trip to Vietnam with John Phan. Phan was born near Da Nang and regularly distributes food and supplies to the people in that area, Reading those posts (there will be an article in the upcoming CardPlayer about the trip) had me thinking back about all we saw and did on that trip. There’s some stuff I didn’t write about at the time that I’ll have to post, I’m sure I have more pictures to show as well.

Actually, here’s one. I had a heck of a time finding a power outlet that would charge my laptop–this might help explain why:

Kinda neat.

I didn’t watch the 4×100 relay in real time, but watching it this morning was almost as good. Odd–not so long ago, if you missed a performance like that you’d have to sit in front of the tube hoping and praying they show some highlights. If you wanted to see something a bit more obscure (the woman’s cycling road race, say) you were probably SOL. Today, you just hop on the net and visit NBC’s site (or use the Google and find the video elsewhere) to watch at your leisure. What a world.

Alain Bernard, he can’t be a happy guy today. When you’re the world-record holder in an event and you dive in the pool with the lead, that should be that. Lights out. It’s hard to say that Bernard choked, because how can you choke in swimming? Other than some water going down the wrong pipe, I mean. And Jason Lezak, of course, swam the fastest relay leg in human history, perhaps borne along by the huge wake Bernard generated. A performance for the ages.

The elation on the Americans’ faces after Lezak touched up was one of those perfect moments in sports, and one of the reasons why the Olympics are so compelling. Most Olympic athletes don’t make huge money, they aren’t famous (Phelps aside, of course) and they have to make huge sacrifices to reach this pinnacle of physical perfection. Which goes a long way to explain why I don’t like the Olympics all that much. I mean, did you see the French guys? Utter devastation. They’ve probably trained just as hard, sacrificed just as much…and they lost. By eight hundredths of a second. How long will those guys (and other athletes who see their dreams shattered) stare at a clock and realize that they missed out on ultimate glory and triumph by a fraction of the sweeping second hand.

And it isn’t like these guys get a chance to make things up in a couple of days. Maybe Bernard will win gold in the 100-meter freestyle (is that an actual event?) but for most Olympic athletes, you mess up, even a tiny bit, that’s it. You lose. And for many, that’s it for their career. You screw up, you have to work your ass off for 4 years to get another chance. And that’s assuming you can even make the team the next time around. That’s why I almost can’t bear to watch gymnastics or figure skating. It’s hard to appreciate the extraordinary skills of these freak athletes when all I can think is "Oh God, don’t take a half-step on your dismount!!! The judges’ll crucify you!!"

The stakes are just too high for me to properly enjoy what I’m watching. There’s no shame in winning a silver medal (or a bronze, I suppose, I guess) but who goes to the Olympics hoping for a silver medal? And pity the poor bastard who comes in fourth, you don’t even get a consolation prize. It’s like the bubble in a poker tournament, except that just about EVERYONE goes out on the bubble and goes home with nothing. And the participants tend to be a wee bit fitter.

Perhaps this is just my way of looking at the world, that I focus more on the depressed, downtrodden masses who failed in their quest than on those happy few exulting at the summit. As you might expect, I’m a hoot at a party.

Swear to God, I’m gonna finish those longish posts I’ve been bleating about. I can’t believe how much frickin’ writing I do that ends up in the trash. Make myself sick.

Anyway, thanks for all the advice about the internet issues. Talked to my bro today, and turns out he’s been having problems with Verizon. So, it might not be me after all. Tho I have had troubles at other locations in the past. So I may be trying out those solutions down the road. Like, tomorrow, when I have a volleyball game and will bring my laptop to the bar to have dinner and a beer before the match.

Taking care of Sunny has been no problem…except for this morning. I was sound asleep and having a FANTABULOUS dream. I was in a supermarket and was walking down the aisle. On the right side was an endless display of Cool Whip. Two for one, even. Standing to attention on the left were every Playboy centerfold from 1981 to 1985, inclusive. I was trying to figure out how to load Cathy Larmouth and Debbie Boostram into my cart when I had the rudest of awakenings.

I’ve been home for nearly three weeks now, but it seems like I’ve spent precious little time at "home". In my apartment, in my own bed. I’m not complaining, as I’ve been off to the lake twice and I don’t mind house-sitting for my brother while they’re off on vacation. But there have been quite a few nights when I’ve woken in the dead of night and asked myself, "Where the hell am I?" And I haven’t had a ready answer.

Last night was worse.

Like I said, I was sound asleep. My eye movements were rapid. Dawn had yet to break. And that was the moment when Sunny, my brother’s Golden Retriever, decided that she needed to go outside. Now.

NOW.

The past few mornings she’s woken me by lumbering to the bed and breathing like a steam locomotive. Sunny goes about 100 pounds and she’s not the lightest on her paws. When she goes down the stairs it’s more like a controlled golden avalanche (God, I’m gonna get some sick Google hits for that). On this morning I guess I was totally unresponsive and Sunny decided to be proactive.

With a mighty leap she bounded into the bed. Which rocked forward as if the earth was in the first spasm of a quake measuring 8.5 on the Richter scale. I pitched forward in the pitch-dark room, and was confronted by a blast of hot doggy breath in my face.

"HAA-HAA-HAA-HAAAAAAA!!!" Sunny huffed.

"HOLY JESUS CHRIST!!" I screamed into the darkness.

It took me a good 30 seconds before I was composed enough to take her downstairs. At least I know my heart is strong(ish), as I didn’t expire on the spot. She went outside to do her business and rested my forehead against the door and listening to my pulse go thump-thump-thump in my ears.

You might think a little night-terror might not make one sleepy, but once Sunny came back inside I hit the couch and I hit it hard. I was almost back asleep when Sunny grabbed a marrow bone she’d been worrying the day before and went to work on it. My brother has hardwood floors. Sunny, for all her good qualities, has never been described as a dainty eater. And the sound of her munching on that goddam bone was like someone rolling a square bowling ball across the floor.

"Here, Sunny," I said through clenched teeth as I tossed her a bacony doggie treat. She wolfed it down and I grabbed the bone and put it up on the mantle, well out of reach. With that I lay back down, closed my eyes, and returned to dreamland. Cathy and Debbie, alas, did not wait up.

Once again I turn to my readers for help. I know that lots of you are IT magicians or are in some way handy with computers, so here’s my problem–I keep having problems connecting to open WiFi connections. Or, I can connect to them, and I get a strong signal, but I can’t actually get on the internet. When I do the diagnostic test I get a little yellow exclaimation point between the router and my computer. Everything works fine from my computer to the router, to the router to the internet, back to the router…and then things break down. I’ve had trouble connection at places like Panera Bread, at the one bar I go to for volleyball…and now at my brother’s house. The one time I couldn’t connect at Panera I did some sort of mumbo-jumbo that worked, but I can’t remember what I did.

Sometimes I have no trouble and I connect with no problem. Sometimes I get hung up and spend an hour picking through the Network Connections folder like I have a clue what I’m doing. So, if any of yinz have any ideas, lay them on me. Many beers to the brilliant soul who can shine a light.

So far I’ve asked your advice on buying a computer, buying a car, God knows I’ve had tech questions. Be glad I don’t have children, else you’d be raising my kids. And I don’t think you want that kind of responsibility.

Been a busy/lazy time the last few days. I’m house/dogsitting for my brother, and his internet has been giving me fits. I’ve had to shuttle between the house and my flat to make sure that both Sunny and Ernie have adequate amounts of food, water, and attention. I’ve been trying to get two longish posts done, and obviously I’ve failed at that.

But I wanted to take a moment to congratulate Pauly on the Tao of Poker’s five-year anniversary. And to remind everyone that Pauly’s hosting a gala $5 tournament at PokerStars at 9pm tonight and that winner gets two nights at Borgata and a $5K entry into the Borgata Poker Open. Should make for an especially vicious final table, even for a blogger event. I’ll be there…provided I can find a reliable internet connection. I may have to play this one at home. Sigh, if Marzoni’s was still open, I’d play from there…

When my Mom retired last week she had a whole bunch of documentation about her pension and 401(k) she needed to file away, and my Dad cleaned out a big accordian file I used more than ten years ago. He put all the stuff I had in the file in a bag and gave it to me the last time I visited, and as I sifted through it found a few items of interest. My transcripts from Penn State and Pitt, and my GRE and GMAT scores (man, I frickin’ NAILED the GRE). Most of the rest was just junk from my days with the bank, and I got the all-over shivers as I picked my way through the refuse and remembered those unhappy days.

Then I found about 150 pages from my old day-planner lying at the bottom of the bag. Over the years I used to keep notebooks of my scribblings and when I was at that bank I used my planner as my journal/therapist. I read a few of the pages…and found how much, and how little, my life has truly changed. Still trying to lose weight (though back then I was, oh, 30 pounds lighter). Still going back-and-forth with the same gal. It was weird reading about people I haven’t thought about in a decade, yet still came across stuff about the friends I was playing volleyball with last night. Of course, like millions of others I eventually transitioned from writing in notebooks to writing a blog, though as I flipped through the pages of my old journal I can’t imagine anyone wanting to read it. Having an audience, even a small one, is a good thing for a writer. I think I’m gonna pitch those pages, and I’m tempted to finally dispose of the rest of my journals. Heck, I have a few that date back to high school. This would partly be a ceremonial break from my not-very-interesting past, and partly a chance to do some late spring cleaning. They take up room.

Five years. That’s forever in blog years. Long enough for some of the biggest and most powerful corporations in the world take the time to declare war. Fight the power, any way you can.

I would like to take a moment to give a standing ovation to my sained mother, who is retiring today. She’s taking her victory lap dahntahn at the bank and then she’s outta there, forever. And good for her, dammit. Originally she was going to work until March before hanging ‘em up, but she got a bit ticked off at something that happened and with her turning 65 and having a grandbaby to fuss over she said, "(Deleted) this. (Deleted) them. They can go (deleted) themselves for all I (deleted) care." Or something along those lines. There may have been more cursing.

I used to work for the same bank my Mom does (did). In fact, I used to work about three rows of cubes away from her. In fact, at one point, my mom worked for a department I dealt with every day, my (now) ex-wife worked about 15 feet away from me, and my sister-in-law worked across the hall. Yeah, that was frickin’ awesome. Anyway, Mom’s job was to deal with issues that didn’t get resolved the first time they meandered through the bank. Basically, once the shit hit the fan, it was Mom’s job to get out the tissues and wipe down the spinning blades. I had a similar job in a different department in the bank and I hated, hated, hated it. I also sucked at it. Mom was good at it and liked it enough to not jump out of the 38th-floor window. As I contemplated doing just about every day I worked up there.

On 9/11 we were both at work in the tallest building between Pittsburgh and Washington. The internet wasn’t working, phone lines were jammed, and strange reports kept filtering in. That the Sears Tower had been hit. That a plane crashed on the Mall in Washington. That there was a suspicious plane identified in Somerset County, PA. Not that it had crashed there, just that there was something suspcious. It didn’t take my overactive imagination long to come up with a scenario where a plane 10 minutes flight time away was targeting our building. I did what anyone would do–I went to my Mommy. The management had finally decided to evacuate and she was at her desk waiting for her boss to give them the go-ahead. "Let’s get the hell out of here," I said, or something along those lines. There may have been more cursing. Walking down those 38 flights was not a fun experience, but at least I knew where my Mom was. She was right in front of me, and I was there saying, "Come on!! Move it, lady!!"

On my last day there I sent an email to my main account that said, "You made it!". True, I quit my job there before I got fired and I didn’t have another job lined up, but at least I was out of there. Mom gets out with her 401(k), her pension, and her dignity and sanity. Of course, let’s see how long she and my Dad stay sane with both of them home all the time. I think he’ll be glad that he doesn’t have to drive her into town every day. I had lunch with them before I left for Vegas and they were talking about doing some traveling once she retired. I thought they meant little day trips to the Finger Lakes or D.C., stuff they’ve done before. Nah, they’re talking about Ireland and England sometime soon. Go. See the world. Do whatever you want to do. Spend my inheritance. Actually…why don’t you spend Ryan’s inheritance and put mine in Euros?

Anyway, congratulations Mom! Before you leave be sure to tell everyone exactly what you think of them, steal whatever you can carry, and give everyone the finger before you step on the elevator that last time. And then go out and get loaded.

Went to see Elvis Costello and the Police last night. Think I agree with Scott Mervis, the P-G rock critic, when he said he wished EC had been the headliner. Not that the Police weren’t great–they were–but Costello was only onstage for an hour and that just wasn’t enough. Costello was sporting muttonchops and looked like he could’ve been a Sergeant-Major in the Coldstream Guards. Sting wore a form-fitting shirt and looked like a million bucks. How old is that guy? Jesus. I felt bad for Stewart Copeland’s drum kit. That guy puts a vicious beating on those skins.

It was a bit weird hearing the Police turn "Every Breath You Take" into a peppy little sing-a-long, when of course it’s one effed-up song. Of course Costello did the same thing with "Watching the Detectives", a tune that contains one of my all-time favorite lyrics, "She’s filing her nails/While they’re dragging the lake". There are novels that have less tension, drama, and character than those two lines.

Last night demonstrated the awesome power of the Blog. We had some extra tickets to the show. I write up a little post saying such. Hundreds of miles away, in Cleveland no less, my friend Darcy sees it and gives me a call. And she drives down for the concert. I scribble a few words on the internet and gears start turning and wheels start…turning, and happy things happen.

In an unrelated story, I got an email yesterday letting me know that Steely McBeam is now following me on Twitter. You know my views on Steely McBeam–I think that Steely should follow the example of Joe Magarac. Today, preferably. I twittered that finding out Steely was following me was like learning the Antichrist had joined your bowling league. He (it?) twittered back " I bowl at 220 on average. You pay for the lanes, I’ll bring the beer. Can one bowl while carrying a steel beam?" OK, I’m not going there. I am not going to engage Steely McBeam in Twittertalk. I will not declare war. I will stay above the fray. The moral high ground, as I like to say. I will not allow the befanged, shrieking monster that lies just under the surface to take control. No.

I still don’t feel like I’m quite back up to speed after getting home from Vegas. Been running around a lot, which is good. But at times I feel myself sinking back into my familiar rut, which is bad. Been writing more, though not here. Not at the moment, anyway–working on something silly that I’ll post here eventually. For now, I gotta go out and buy my bed. The good times, they keep on rollin’.