The Dead of August....the doldrums!

OH MY GAWD!!! Football season...hurry up and get here! I am finding myself watching MLB games that dont matter, golf that puts me to sleep, Little League WS prelims, BOWLING!!!!! and I'm just about to watch the USA vs. Brazil in a soccer game that means what? No idea.

But on that note...isn't it fun to watch Tiger Woods play the worst golf of his life? Fires his swing coach..."I don't need a swing coach, I can find my flaws by watching video!" Hey Tiger....looking good brother!!!!


A little correction. Daniel Tosh...his show is called Tosh.O and does NOT appear on E! but on Comedy Central...which CableOne does gives us here in Biloxi. My bad. So I have now DVR'd every episode. And oh yeah...another little pet peeve of mine...can we ALL please LOSE the expression, "I TiVo'd that last night!" Really...WHO actually owns a TiVo? I mean, aren't we all using DVR's? I actually bought Squirrel a TiVo for her birthday several years ago...and getting it set up was a joke! Seems like you HAD to have a home phone line for one thing. And their customer service SUCKED. Okay...enough on that.


I have a question for everyone: Is it my imagination or are there a ridiculous number of church burnings in the south? Why? Not totally sure, other than I think they just take their religion a little more seriously down here than in the East, West, or North. So here is the question. And its motivated by an observation made at one of our local churches that burned to the ground 15 months ago.

'Knowing that churches get torched quite a bit...if someone burned down your church, and you decided to rebuild it...would you AGAIN construct it from wood!??'

I mean, at some point, wouldn't the thought of building a church from, say...bricks come into play? At least cross your mind? Maybe there is a racket going on between the people who run the church and insurance scams. Knowing they will probably get torched once every 5 years or so...they will make money off it, and get a new church. Make sense? I don't know...I just don't get it.

Sat down in a poker room Sunday. An online poker room! Decided to play all the Sunday majors. This after not playing a single hand of poker on Saturday. Wait...what? Yeah...you heard me. Trust me, I had reasons.

The lawn was getting out of control, and despite it being a million degrees, I got out there and got after it. I literally felt like I was going to war. Well, I was able to advance on the St. Augustine troops with a wicked frontal assault...led by the leading element of our force...a 17 inch metal blade spinning in a circular motion...which did suffer a setback after rolling over a large, exposed tree root. It did, however, manage to survive the battle.

And there was a slight delay in the fighting, as we had to stop and observe the Squirrel, who had decided to give 'the Jasper' a hair cut...then took to giving both of them a bath in the backyard. Topless! Heck, I was sweating profusely, and the troops were tired as well, so a break was much needed.

After finishing the lawn...I took a 2 hour cold bath...and finished reading my 3rd David Baldacci novel, 'Total Control', a 700-page thriller. A very exciting, didn't-see-it-coming conclusion. Next up: 'The Winner.'

Then it was off to dinner...at High Cotton Grill...where we met Gabe Costner and 'The Claw.' We had margaritas and ate our faces off. I love that place. And the menu is very diverse, and really affordable. 'Claw' picked up the check...claiming it was a birthday gift to Squirrel. Well, that was sweet. Then we went and watched the movie "The Other Guys" with Will Ferrel and Mark Wahlberg. Hilarious. But maybe it dragged on a little bit. As Will Ferrel movies rank...I'm not sure it was in my Top 5...but it was definitely funny. Oh...and just when I had convinced myself that I wasn't really that old, come to find out that Claudia had NO IDEA that Mark Wahlberg had another life before being an actor...that he was Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch's front man. Wow. Suddenly feeling old again. What a fantastic career Mark has had, right?

Gabe shared with me the thrilling night he had the previous night...which involved a trip to New Orleans with Cub to play in some guys 'BIG' housegame. Sounds like some crazy shit goes down at that game. Not anything I want a part of. Especially after I heard about a hand where there were several raises, followed by a $400 re-raise by a guy with AA...only to have a guy with 5k in front of him raise to $2000....and then call a 4k all in by the guy with AA. What did the other guy have? 10-4. Yeah. You heard me. Flopped two pair. It held. 4k...down the tube...holding AA. Yeah...no thanks. This progress that I am making on my 'behaviour' would all be swept away in one second if I encountered that kind of shit.

Anybody hear about this one? Took place at the Astros vs. Atlanta baseball game this week. This little hottie, Sarah, was at the ball game with her WUSS of a boyfriend, Bo...who will be lucky if he ever hits that sweet ass again...check it out. This foul ball comes their way and he scrams...letting her get drilled. Then as the network's reporter, also a fairly attractive lady, went down and questioned him about it...its pretty clear that the guy is (1) a doofus (2) a Liar and (3) a coward. Time to move on Sarah!!!!



So yeah...I sat down Sunday and dialed up a LOT of MTT's...and very few SNG's. I was cashing at an alarming rate. Earlier in the week, I finished in the top 27 in one of those satellites for the Lamborghini on Pokerstars. So in THAT satellite, you had to finish in the top 2000 to make the final in October. I managed to accomplish that. But more importantly, 1st place was $5000. I was hungry for that. But I didn't get it. Went out 130th...out of something like 18,000 players. I won a double shootout into the Sunday Million, but then didn't play it. Bottom line...I kept cashing light. Friday night I made two Omaha H/L Final Tables...both as chipleader...and in both got hit with the stupidest beats like three hands in a row...and ended up finishing 8th and 7th. It was ridiculous. I should have won about 2k. Instead? $150.

I see these guys who win TWO big MTT's in one day and I just have to ask myself...how? I hear people talking about there being HOT IP addresses, and SUPER USER accounts...and all that. Then all the talk about hacking and cheat software. Who knows? I wouldn't even care if P'stars would just let me win ONE of these damn tourneys that I get deep in...JUST ONE....and I would go back to taking all my stupid 1 and 2 outers for another year or two before they let me win again. It just gets so fucking irritating to get it in good over and over and over and constantly get fucked. And when people give you that famous line...you know the one:

"If it's so bad, why do you even bother PLAYING online poker? Why???"

Why? I think most of us all KNOW why, right? I buy into a tourney for $3 to win $2000. I buy in for $5 to win $5000. I buy in for $10 to win $7500. I buy in for $50 to win $14,000. In a word>>> VALUE!!!! I can't even compute that kind of ROI (return on investment) but I know its ridiculous! So you play in hopes of scratching out a profit...while hoping to hit that one nice, fat score. And that makes you...or me...or us.....a....you got it.....a.....RAT...ON...A...WHEEL!!!!!

This soccer game is about to start. Hmmm...it's our first look at the new Giants/Jets football stadium...which looks shockingly like the old one. Interesting.

I still havent updated my spreadsheet for my backer since I got home from Vegas. If I ever win a big...hey wait a second, maybe I could get Squirrel to do it? Yeah...right.

And I still haven't done my taxes. Got in touch with this lady who came highly recommended by one of my readers and friend...was supposed to meet up, then went to Vegas...she filed an extension for me...got home, called her several times...to no avail. Hmmm. Wondering if my extension has expired. Anyone know how long an extension is good for? Taxes....ugh....hate them. But I really have to get it done.

Wow, in the 1st two minutes of this game, Landon Donovan almost just scored a goal. Almost. (in proofreading this 5 minutes later...Brazil tacked on 2...Brazil 2-0 at halftime)

After looking at my buddy Jason Young's blog...which appears on Cardplayer.com (yes I'm jealous) I have decided to steal an idea from him. A new feature called '20 Questions and Answers with the Monkey.' I've asked John Dolan to be my first 'victim'...we shall see what happens.

Responding to a reader's comment...about whether I think its true that what you have heard has any validity, as far as the online random generator shuffling non-stop as the hand is played out? In other words...in a live poker game...the deck remains stable, in its original form from the start of the hand til its conclusion. There are a lot of people who have suggested that online, it is always in a state of re-shuffling. Some think that acting on a hand quickly and/or slowly results in two different conclusions. The answer...or MY answer? Is that I don't have a clue. Do I think its possible? Sure.

I will say this...and it could be coming pretty soon...since our Congress, or maybe it was the House of Representatives, passed a bill last week that challenges the one passed two years ago making online poker 'illegal' as it was at least supposed to make people think. Really it was just a bill to punish bankers who did business with online poker sites. It's been pretty comical listening to those hicks from god-knows-where asking me at the poker table wherever I happen to be playing...."how do you play online poker? I thought they outlawed that stuff? Are you worried about going to jail?"

Sigh. Simpletons. I would like to thank my mother for not smoking crack while I was in the womb, or having sex with the guy who worked for a bug extermination company.

Back to my point. I was about to say that I think one day in the future we are going to find out that there was a lot of twisted, sick shit going on with internet poker during the last decade. And most of it won't shock any of us 'full-timers' one bit. Like when all that shit went down with Russ Hamilton and made it onto '60 Minutes?' Who found any of that to be shocking? I mean, most of us already knew about it MONTHS before it came out on '60 Minutes.'

So why do I think we are going to find out about it a lot sooner? Because of this bill. Here is what I think is going to happen. The lawmakers in this country are going to 'legalize' and 'regulate' online poker...making it a money-making venture for the US Government. Which, hey! I'm all for if we can get them to use that money for something useful. The poker companies (Party Poker, Paradise Poker, for example) that ceased operating in the US after that first 'law' was passed 3 or 4 years ago...will be seen as 'compliers' and get liscensed to operate in the continental U.S. while companies like Full Tilt and Pokerstars...who defied the ruling, could be in trouble. And it doesn't take much to block them...all they have to do is block the signal, the IP address, that U.S. users have to connect with to play on their sites. I think you will see the Harrah's, and the Wynn's, Boyd Gamings, and the MGM's of the gaming world start to bring online poker to U.S. customers...and while they make their small fortune, the U.S. government will also get theirs. What will also, hopefully, result from that action...is that tighter security measures will be put in place.

I honestly believe that if online poker were 100% legit and 100% secure, that I would EASILY be able to sit at home on my ass...play 10 tables at a time, and make over 200k a year. EASILY. I know how easy this game is when I am sitting in a live tourney against bad players...and the internet is overloaded with them. But online, they just seem to suckout ALL THE TIME! And it feels like they are being rewarded...to keep them around, pumping that rake. You know what I mean? It just doesn't resonate as reality when you sit there and watch it happen 100 times a day. As a good player, there are at least 50% of the outcomes where you feel you should have won, where instead you got fucked. Am I right?

Okay wow, this just became a very long post.

I also have not been to the gym since Vegas. This is my DOWNTIME! I should be at the gym every FREAKING DAY! I really need someone to light a fire under my ass.

How many days til football season starts?

Monkey