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So glad to be off of savings time. Almost makes me want to move to Arizona or Hawaii to avoid it ever again. The new game I bought online finally arrived in the mail last night. Well, it's not exactly a new game, but an ongoing series of refinements to become THE space game, because Universal Combat Collectors Edition from 3000AD is the game for me. You have to want to play a game like this. It is not an arcade game, nor a series of puzzles, but more of an open universe where you can roam in one of many career paths. A diplomat, an explorer, a mercenary, a police or military commander working your way up the chain of command to obtain fleet command and control of the hundreds of ships of/as various races, in dozens of systems with planets and thousands of mission zones on those planets. You can swim underwater, walk/run to another base, drive a vehicle, pilot a fighter, shuttle, deploy mining drones, beam up to your command craft in a transporter, and involve yourself in the political history of this universe. This game is going to suck a lot of my entertainment time up. There is also work time, poker hobby time, apartment cleaning time, local politics time, Dodger time, that all have to be addressed. Is it any wonder that I do not believe in 'savings' time?

Fourteenth of Forty

Argh again. Right before the second break, I get my chip stack eaten away at. The coup de gras was the last hand of the sixth level where I was the big blind for eight hundred, ante'd a hundred and only had three hundred left after that. Four folk on my left folded and got ready for the break when a loose-agressive player went all in. The rest of the late position players folded, the cutoff and the small blind folded, and I look and find a King and a eight of different suits. I know he has a worse hand than this terrible level eight hand that I have, but how bad? It takes me a few minutes after the break started to finally call off my last three hundred. He shows a nine and a eight of diamonds and we are off to the races. The flop comes with two nines, and with a jack on the turn, I'm drawing dead. The four on the river was no help so his three nines wipe me out and I head home before making another final table. Maybe better next week.

Fortieth of Eighty

Argh. Played at the large club last night in the seven PM tourney and barely made it to the first break. I thought it would be a small halloween crowd, but no, entrants kept lining up right up to the start time. Starting to recognize half the crowd at this large club. Same entrants over and over. Two or three players from the hay days of the smaller club too. I was dealt a number of great hands during these fifteen levels, but was either raised over the top and driven out, or called by even better hands. For a few hands, we were just passing the chips around the table. Then the bets got smaller and the chip stacks evened out a bit. Three of us were larger, and two were really small with a lot of action every other hand. I didn't stop myself from calling the all-ins by the short stacks and eventually became one of them when two others doubled-up through me. No re-buys in this tournament and I was finally knocked out in about fortieth place. Lesson learned. This tournament is twice a day, everyday, but I don't think I'll be playing that often here, since it is still only a hobby that pays for itself and I do have a job that supports the rest of my life. Ramble...

Mini Explosion

There are now a half a dozen mini coopers in the company parking lot. Mine was the second one, and I'm still the only convertable with a turbo sports package. All different colors too, there's a red one, a white one, a green one, oh, you get the picture. Let's Motor!

Twelfth of Fifty

Monday after work started towards the card club, and realizing I was two hours early, spied and stopped for dinner at some joint on the side of the boulevard called Angelo's Fine Italian Cuisine. They were not kidding. Some of the best fettuccine with shrimp, peppers, and red sauce that I have ever tasted. The two glasses of wine helped to enjoyment that much more. Finished up the Police box set on the way to the club and arrived in a good mood. Paid my sawbuck and was assigned table four seat one. Oh boy. When the characters started to take their seats for the tournament, I noticed a lot of folk who like to gamble approach table four. Lucky me, seems I was in for a couple of hours of folding as they pushed their chips all-in on just about every hand. I was prepared for this, and didn't mind at all. On the last hand of the re-buy period, I bought a super-size add-on which consists of twenty five hundred in chips for another twenty five bucks. When you start with only three hundred in chips, this is a big bonus. The second hour has four fifteen minute levels, and when the antes start to kick in, a round of poker gets expensive. Table five after three hours. Finally our table four broke up after three and a half hours of play, with me folding almost every hand during that time. I'm moved to table one with a much more laid back crowd. A couple of the quieter players follow me from table four. Right off the bat I'm dealt a pair of aces and called someone else's all-in raise. His king-jack could not catch up and I doubled up and crippled his stack. The very next hand I call another all-in with Ace Jack, they showed a pair of nines and with an ace on the flop, I eliminate him and and add a few thousand more to my stack including additional limper's chips who did not call with all they had. Wow, I was being blinded away at the old table, and within two hands moved up respectively to over ten thousand in chips. The next hour went smooth as I was just starting to get settled in. Table three breaks up, and then table two starts knocking players out ever other hand to the point where the director starts pulling from our table one to fill in the empty seats on their table two. Gets down to twelve players, six at each table and the guy on my right raises to five grand. I look down and find ace-queen, both of diamonds and have to make a decision. To go all in for about fifteen grand and try and take him on, or fold and wait for a couple of others to be eliminated and coast to the final table. It took a minute or so, but I finally pushed all-in and he quickly called with two jacks. I received no help from the flop, turn, nor river and was out in twelfth without any prize money. C'est la vie. I coasted all night, and then went out with nary a whimper. I will probably be back there next week. Wish me luck.

View of Smoke from Space

Check out this NASA image site for smoke trails from Southern California.

Chop Top Two of Fifty

After checking the P.O. Box after work last night, I still had plenty of time to check back at the little local card club for the Monday night tournaments that the security guard at Dodger Stadium told me had started up again. It use to be a fun time, even though it was canceled the last couple of times I went there. So I zagged down through Bell Gardens and was listening to the Police Box Set. The mood just seemed right. I walk in and see how the place has been fixed up. Tables are all arranged at a sweeping angle between the doors instead of harsh logical settings as it was before. One cash game was going on, and a Pai Gow game was starting up against the back wall. I turned the other way and sat in the restaurant for a meal, since I was over an hour early for the start time and hadn't had a meal in six hours. Sat, ordered, grabbed a Poker Pro magazine, chatted up the floor man to confirm start time and waited. Read a few good articles and a dozen bad ones, then wandered over to the window to sign up. Parted with a sawbuck, received my seat card, and walked outside to wait some more. Clear night sky above. No stars. City lights to bright. Also smoke haze was all around the horizon. Malibu to the west, Santa Clarita to north, Riverside to the east, and Irvine to the south, all ablaze and smoking in the distances. It was over thirty miles to fire nearest to where I was. Just before start time, I walked back in and sat down at my table. Looks like four tables are setup and players wandering everywhere. From the seven seat at table two, things looked okay. A loose aggressive player on my right that had me folding many large, but marginal hands pre-flop, and a tight aggressive player in the ten seat across from me, forcing me to be sure of my raises and calls. I ended up folding over ninety percent of my hands for the first three levels. That first hour or so, nearly a dozen other players wandered in and wanted to play, so near the middle of the third level, the director called another dealer and setup a fifth full table. Cool, a pool a fifty. In this tournament, you can buy a single re-buy for ten, [which gets you five hundred in chips] a double for twenty, [a thousand in chips], or wait and do an add-on at the end of the third level for twenty five [and get twenty five hundred in chips]. Since I was folding to outrageous raises when it was my turn to be the blinds, I did a double re-buy and just kept waiting and folding. I was watching the other players playing, having a good time, bluffing, and re-buying two and three times to stay in during those first three levels. What a wild hour or so. At the end of the third level I left my twenty-five for the add-on on the table and went out to discuss the tourney so far with the few folk I recognized there. Most had extreme stories of bad beats and fluctuating stacks of chips. I mentioned that I have only played three hands and folded all the rest due to the action at my table. I did not mention that was working a strategy that included folding large marginal hands. After the re-buy and add-on period was over, I started to look for hands with appropriate situations to play them in. Tighten up and raise with only the best hands in early position behind the blinds, and loosening up in late position including on the button if no other raises were in yet. The opportunities were few and far between as many times I would have a small pair or two Broadway cards only to be behind a raise and a re-raise already at the pot. I was not going to war with these types of hands against those types of raises. Finally I was being dealt a pair of aces here, a pair of kings there, and was the one doing the raising and re-raising take a few pots and eliminate a few of the shorter stacks. This cycle of low cards to high cards usually happens every twenty to thirty hands or so, but it was more like fifty hands for me. I scraped up enough to make it to the final eleven players, only to see a middle position raise from the short stack of seven thousand all-in, and me in the big blind for four thousand already holding a three-six of hearts. Ugh. Everyone else folded to me and I could either let him have the antes, and blinds of almost ten grand or put up a few more thousand and call his raise and race a flop, turn and river cards for the pot. It was my toughest decision of the night, and even with pot odds of three to one, my cards were a much bigger underdog if he had a high pair. I called three grand leaving another ten grand in my stack and he shows two black jacks. All black cards showed up on the board and I ended up contributing to his rise to the final table. Finally the other table after four hours of play knocked out the remaining couple of players so that we could form a final table of nine. Instead of paying just the top four, we voted to pay down to ninth place, and send ten percent out to the dealers. Play continued after a break and we drew for seats. To my right sat a woman who I guessed that she had a set of queens when she did when I had two pair of kings and jacks and folded to her big raise, another player called her and she showed that I was right by eliminating the other player in eighth place. I did pick up a few hands and no one called my raises from the small blind nor from the button for a few rounds as I stayed a medium stack and others started falling to my amazement faster than leaves in fall. Some were falling by playing any ace, even if their other card was as low as a two. I wasn't playing anything lower than ace-ten and my cards were luckily holding up. That's what I said every time I won a pot. That I was 'lucky'. I wasn't telling them that I was folding the kind of hands that they were playing. When it got down to four players, the chip leader had about thirty thousand more than second place and fourth place and I had about fifteen grand each with blinds going up to four thousand and eight thousand and five hundred each in antes. My ace-jack beat won a race with the leader who had ace-eight. The chip leader won a couple of races and eliminated both fourth and second chip players chip stacks before I could stretch and say 'wow, heads up play time'. The final two of us battle as I took three straight pots to nearly even out the our stacks and offered to be sent away for five hundred. I re-raised the next hand and offered to go away for four hundred [second place paid 350 that night and first paid 725]. I reminded him that if he won six hundred or over that it would involve immediate paperwork for the IRS and the director nodded when he looked at him. I took another small pot with a raise and the director put the final grand on the table and showed us what we were playing for. I mentioned that it was my lucky night and I was going to end up with all the playing chips. The other player's eyes went big when I reached into half of the prize money and pushed all the five dollar chips to the other leaving five hundred in one stack and putting five seventy five on the stack closest to him and saying, I'll even go for this split, and he finally said OK. Five Benjamins for me and just under six for him. One AM and the alarm goes off in four hours, thanks, it was great, gotta go, and we shook hands, signed the roll, and parted from the card palace. All in all, a good night for Proto.

Wind fanning the flames

Malibu observer writing about the fires and stalkaratzzi: http://www.laobserved.com/malibu/

Across the Universe

The two part Menagerie will be playing in 300 theaters around the USA on Tuesday, November 13th to promote the HD-DVD version of Star Trek episodes. Might be fun watching an old 4x3 TV episode on the big screen. They are still casting younger actors for the latest movie. Zachary Quinto of Heroes' Sylar as Spock and Chris Pine is considering the role of Kirk. Korean-American actor John Cho as Sulu, and Simon Pegg as Scotty. Star Trekkin' is still alive.