Tuesday, October 04, 2005

Green Bay Sucks!

Last night was more affirmation that the NFC North is indeed the red-headed stepchild of the NFL this year. How else could someone explain that an 0-4 team is only one game out of first? Farve will chuck TDs to Donald Driver all day (for my fantasy team of course) but they're still producing the same results as the Packers of the 80s led by Don "The Magic Man" Majkowski. Being a Vikes fan I'm delighted of Green Bay's misfortune and hope they continue to choke on the turpentine they swill before games. But, I'm also sad that the competition in the "black-and-blue" division has been reduced to Pop Warner youth league levels. 7-9? That's most likely going to be the "winning" record of the division leader and the only team that will stumble into the playoffs to be crushed by the Seachickens or the Giants (my picks for wild-card teams).

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Las Vegas and the Crossing Jordan cross-over thing blissfully came to an end last night... I hope. Bring back Penn and Teller or Joe Rogan, but leave Jerry O'Connell and his tighty-whiteys in Ms. Uncle Jesse's bedroom.

More Nikki Cox please. The little cameos of "I'm going to __________ with Jake" is getting old. Get her and Molly Sims back into the picture.



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Poker? Yeah I dinked around the lower limits last night and had FUN! Ms. Princess was holding court and bOObs for us male pigs at the micro-limit PLO tables. THG, Gamecock, GCox, and myself all took turns flinging pennies with the skill of an armless machete juggler. I'm not sure if I won or lost but I got lucky when my sOOOted aces managed to suckout on Maigrey's wrap draw but it didn't matter because I had fun, and that's what the intent was.

You can have fun but also learn a little about how to play these games. Folding, while frowned upon, is a good thing when you know you're beat, unless its to showoff that Omahammer that you bluffed with (the bluff-call is a VASTLY underrated poker play). These games can teach a subtle lesson of how to play in a loose game (you just need to dig beneath the smack talk). When the pot odds are giving you 8:1 odds to call you are correct to call with any four cards (two card games are meh, m'kay?).

Remember that most of the players will call you down with anything at these levels so its mildly prudent to keep that in mind while betting. But... if you do want to apply some fancy play go ahead and act like a rock for a while and when the flop pairs the board bet at it, you are more likely to pick up a couple of uncontested pots this way. Even penny ante players take notice of pot size bets on a scary board.

Uncontested is the key word, if you do get called by one of the eight people still in the hand you're probably beat. I have a hard time releasing hands once I go into aggressive mode, failing to take my foot off the gas when an opponent is telling that I'm beat. These tables are a great way to practice getting around this mindblock. Don't look at the denominations of the chips, look at how much of your stack you're throwing out there.

Thanks for dropping by, now here's the 1971 Sears catalog with commentary just for Daddy and Bobby Bracelet so they can enjoy those saucy 70s lingerie models.

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