My neighbors the Rednecks

I'm sitting here on the back deck of my wonderful new house. Unfortunately, the reason I'm here and not meeting up with my pool partner is that I got paged for work. Been working on a system for the last 2+ hours, and now I'm waiting for someone to get back to me with some info so I can finish this thing up.

So, I'm sitting here on the back deck. The neighbors decide to come out on their front porch for a smoke. Thank God I don't have kids. They'd know about 15 different vulgar phrases by now. I've heard a whole lot of "Fuck You", "Shithead", "Shut the fuck up, Fuckhead", and just the general use of the word "fuck" as a verb, noun, and adjective. I mean, all you need to do is hear any of them talk and you'll know that their daddy is also their uncle or something similar...

And to think, I spent all this money on the house to have neighbors like this. I guess they're trying to make me feel at home, but the reason I left the backwoods of New York state was to get away from these people!
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OMG!! I was going to end this post, but something just happened. I swear to God... I just heard a FART from across the street. It sounded like a wet, nasty one too. Thank God I wasn't eating... Just think, next party we have, we can have everyone on the deck to watch the rednecks. It will be like a day at the zoo.

My Night at the Bar (or, Why I Drink at a Social Club)

My posts concerning poker have been few and far between lately. I'd taken a pretty massive hit to the bankroll (like 95% of it), and although I knew most of it was luck and not my play that caused the massive drops, I decided to take a step back. My heart and my wallet just couldn't take anymore. At the risk of alerting the poker gods that I'm starting to wade back into the pool again, I'm happy to say that I'm doing better now and beginning to enjoy it again.

Of course, if I'm not playing poker, I have to be doing something, right? Lately it's been shooting pool. I used to hang out in a pool hall in high school (there was nothing better to do unless it involved booze or sex, and I was a good girl - was...) but it's been a while since I've put any serious time into it. I'll soon be joining a pool league at the Social Club I belong to, and some of my future teammates have been helping me brush up on my skills. I spend lots of time there, drinking and trying not to be the worst person on the team. I may not be able to hit some of the easier shots, but my saving grace is that I leave the crappiest shots for the person I'm playing against. Johnson pool. :-)

Since my shift in hobbies, I haven't been hitting the Boathouse much. Last night, I decided that it would be a good night to go back to the home ground. Thursday is trivia night, and it's nice to have a little competition that pays for your bar tab.

The night started out well enough. Nice weather. Favorite bartender Terri working. (StB's favorite bartender too - she was born in Milwaukee, but I think it's her "geography" that he likes staring at. Hi StB! BTW - did you get my dial-a-shot message?) Night started out slow... beers, a shot or two. Royce had a few of his buddies show up. LOTS of shots.

At some point, Al goes up to visit ScubaSteve. A drunk chick celebrating her 22nd birthday is trying to get into the dj booth, and of course wingman Al comes to the rescue. He offers to bring her back to the bar and buy her a shot. Normally I don't mind when Al does this, but things weren't quite right with her. She kept petting my hair. (I have a friend that plays with my hair, but I've known her for a couple of years.) And she kept telling me how beautiful I was. And wanted a hug or three. I figured she was drunk so it wasn't really a big deal... right?

Time progresses. Team AlCantHang (me, Al, BigMike, and Caucci) kicks ass on trivia. We make it to the final round - up against the second place team. We answer the 15 questions and wait to find out the results. Now, drunk girl is back. More drunk than before. (It seems that she was seen doing a pole dance on a pool cue at some slightly earlier point of the night.) She sees me... I should've run. Nope, I stay where I am and let her stumble up to me. More hugs. This time she goes for a kiss. Not a friendly, on the cheek kiss. On the lips. Not once, not twice, but THREE times. I can only imagine what I looked like, dodging her lips. I look over and the bouncer is staring with slack-jawed interest. (I was going to say he couldn't believe what he was seeing, but I know that's a lie. Interesting stuff happens there all the time. I just don't think he expected me to be in the middle of it!) I can see him laughing at me as I try to extricate myself from her hug. He'll get payback one of these days.

After one more short trivia round, Team AlCantHang wins another week and remains the Boathouse champion! It was a good week - we won 90% of the prize pool. It goes a long way towards covering the bar tab.

It's around 10:30 PM now, and ScubaSteve isn't feeling well. He offers to let me iPod-DJ again. hehehe I love this stuff. I get to play all the music I love and everyone else can all go to hell. Well, not really, but I get to play stuff people haven't heard before. I did this for about 2.5 hours. I introduced people to the Gourds, Elliott BROOD, Rufio, Anberlin and other lesser-known songs and covers. I think I may have a spot for late-night DJ. (I just have to prepare and make playlists next time. It stinks having to be stuck to your iPod for a few hours.)

Royce finally sobers up enough from all the shots he's done to be able to pick his head up off the bar, where it's been for quite a while. It's 1 AM, and he has to be at work in 3.5 hours. Not good. I think the room is still moving on its own a little bit for him. Between the shots and many cans of Red Bull, his stomach has had enough of this crap. He's a hurtin' camper. He's sobering up rapidly though, and BigMike offers to stay a little while longer to make sure he's ok. We head home...

So, that's my story. What would have happened if I'd just hit the Social Club like normal? I would've had a few beers, maybe a shot or two. I'd have played about a dozen games of pool (if I was having a good night - less if I couldn't hit the broad side of a barn) and hung out with the guys. All good people - usually the same group, (mostly) responsible people, always amusing. Instead, I got molested by a drunk 22-year-old chick and got to DJ for a few hours while waiting for drunk boy to sober up. (And yes, just for you perverts, she was cute. At least I attract cute women. Maybe Bobby Bracelet should take Boathouse lessons from me. lol Love ya Bobby!)

So, now that I've eaten my breakfast, drank my tea, and settled in (blogged) for the morning, maybe I should get some work done. Half an hour until lunch, and I'd hate to be late for that. Happy Friday!

Post to come later

I know I'm still lazy as hell when it comes to posting. Way too much going on.

I had to put this up though. Mom sent me an email with this, and I've been laughing for the last 10 minutes over this. Now, Mom has a problem with forwarding way too many chain letters, but occasionally she passes on a gem like this [WARNING - if you're at work and have easily-offended co-workers, turn off your sound. There's captions, but make sure you listen to the song later lol]:

In what is a not too subtle dig at Bush's subpoena of their search records, Google is getting their own nasty dig at 'W' before the gag orders go into effect.

I don't know how long this will work, but go to http://www.Google.com then type in the search word: asshole

Then, DO NOT press "search," but do hit the "I'm feeling lucky" button right next to the Search button.

The result is hysterical, and I have to admit I absolutely admire Google's nerve.


Hopefully this will still be up so everyone can see it. Happy Friday! (close enough)

Happy Easter (almost)!

It's getting late on a Friday before a holiday weekend. The hallways echo when there happens to be someone walking down them, which doesn't happen more than once or twice an hour. I'm the only one left from my group - only two of us showed up today. It's nice... lol

I decided to take this time to say hi to everyone out there and wish them Happy Easter/Passover/whatever holiday you celebrate. I'm a Catholic/Easter kinda girl, so I'll be anxiously awaiting the bunny with the chocolate. Yeah that, and the resurrection too. :-) Can't lose sight of what's important.

Driving up to my parents' house in NY tomorrow. 5.5 hour drive. I used to make a trip like that once a month, but that was many, many years ago - when I first moved into the area. I've settled in quite well over the last several years and I haven't been up there in about a year. I know I'm not missing much.... the area is economically depressed and there's nothing besides some pretty cool scenery to recommend it. Of course, how much scenery can you stare at?

I'll try to catch up with a few old friends while I'm there and probably head up to the Indian reservation casino while I'm there. I know some of you have been to the Turning Stone. It's only about 20 minutes away from my parents' house, and the only entertainment in the area. I played my first live game there - 2/4 limit - and doubled up in about an hour. Maybe it's time for an encore performance. :-)

Speaking of poker... I actually played some poker this week. My bankroll is shot to hell right now. I've been playing baby limit tables to try to make up a little more. And freerolls. I made the mistake of a mid-week PokerStars freeroll in the 9 o'clock hour. Almost 10K people. Up until almost 3 am. Busted out high 40-something. All that time, and didn't get anything. Good practice though.

Here's a question for you statistical-type people. What are the odds of getting pocket 4's three hands in row? With the 4 of hearts in all 3 hands. And the 4 of diamonds in the first and third (the middle hand had to mess it up with the 4 of spades). And not hitting another 4 on the flop, turn or river in all 3 hands? :-)

I'd had a couple of close calls in that tourney, too. I was getting close to being short-stacked and hadn't seen anything good for a long while. I get KJs and push all-in. Get called by the big stack. Pocket As. I got a K on the flop, but I still had to hope for a miracle. I remembered Pauly's move at last year's WSOP and called for a J on the river. I was even pointing to the spot on my screen. In much the same way as Pauly sucked out on Shannon Elizabeth, I caught my J on the river to put me back in a safer place.

We'll see if I have anything to post this weekend. Plus, the area where I'll be in NY is lousy for wireless or high-speed internet of any kind. I'll probably have to use a dial-up (*GASP*) connection if I want to check my mail, etc. I'm going back to the stone ages again.

I hope everyone enjoys the weekend. Take care traveling. There will be people like me driving the roads. :-)

It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.
--Mark Twain

My reason for not posting much over the last month or two. Besides being busy, I haven't had much to say. Sure, I could whine about some creep hitting my car and leaving the scene without as much as an "I'm sorry" scrawled on a used McDonald's napkin from the floor of their white hoopde car. I guess I could always go on some tirade about how I hate getting old and feeling older than I am. Or that I work too much. Have too much stress. Tired of getting up in the morning to the same old crap. How about I whine about the fact that I need a vacation, even though I just had one less than a month ago? Or worse... write some crap post about a game like poker that I haven't played in a while and definitely don't know much about?

Nah... nobody deserves to have to listen to that. So I don't bore anyone who happens to hit this blog with my ramblings. The person who gets to listen to that is Danielle, since I just buy her beer and get her drunk so I can rant and rave all I want. Only problem is that she's building up a tolerance to beer. I'm going to have to start her on the rufies soon...

Instead - give this game a shot. *WARNING* - You might want to make sure the boss isn't standing behind you for this one. Might not be safe for work. Official warning. And you can blame MY MOM for this. Anyone who wonders about my personality can stop wondering. My Mom can be demented, and she seems to have passed it all right on to me.

I'd tell you all about Big Mike's bar crawl on Saturday, but there are large sections that are a bit fuzzy. I knew I'd have to drive, so I drank early so I could sober up. The middle got to be a complete blur. I don't think I did any shots though. I was lucky enough to have kind people make sure I ate, too. I didn't drink in the 8th or 9th bars and had plenty of water, so I was fine by 1:30 AM when we left the bar. So much for my exciting write-up.

Maybe I'll get the motivation to try for some great masterpiece later... until then, I'm alive. Grumpy, but alive.

I know it was only a freeroll, but...

I remember why I took a break from playing poker... Luck keeps bitchslapping me. My KQc against K3o - he tried to push me off the hand like he'd done a couple of other times. He was just defending his blinds and pushed all-in. I'd seen him do it way too many times before, and I finally had a hand. Called it, and watched as a 3 took me out. I had 4x the average stack too. DAMMIT!

That's the way the game goes... now, back to our regularly scheduled lack of posting.

[Hopefully I'll have some exciting stuff to report one of these days, but until then...]