Portraits

Oh my god, thank you so much Mimi Smartypants for this link.

I must have a picture of me and Stevie.

After a spur of the moment date with K tonight (she was supposed to be out of town), let's just say I'm not so worried about chemistry problems anymore.

No, I didn't get laid. But everything is working itself out very, very nicely.

Whew…

I was a little bit worried that taking care of my family after I win tonight’s Mega Millions jackpot (cash option, roughly $17M) would take away most of the fortune that I am due.

I figure that after paying off debts, giving M $100k towards a house, Bob $150k (more expensive in Detroit) towards a house, buying my own $750k home, buying a $350k condo in Vegas, and giving each member of the family $100k (x7), I’m still up $14.675M.

Thank god. I don’t know how I could possibly make ends meet for under $10M.

I probably fantasize too much about winning the lottery. Back when my summer job was running a punch press, it’s all I thought about for each eight hour shift. I’d imagine chartering the limo to go pick up the check. I could see the Governor handing me a big phony trophy check with more zeros than a Bachelor Auction at a Star Trek Convention. I could see myself sitting on my front porch in a mountain meadow at my ranch home up near Jackson Hole. I dreamed about giving away scholarships to kids that were like me at my old Utah high school, and by doing so brewing controversy when the media got wind of the fact that I was purposefully excluding the majority of the kids out there.

I’ve never been the type to feel that money could solve all my problems, although I’m sure there was a period of time prior to my ex-wife’s depression sinking deeper that money would certainly have alleviated most of the misery, albeit temporarily. Like most people, I just feel that a ridiculously huge sum of money would just allow me to have more fun, that’s all.

Fun like experimenting with playing the horses or poker “professionally” for a period of time. Fun like learning a craft like cheese making as an apprentice to a master. Fun like living in Italy for a period of time and really concentrating on improving my skills in the kitchen. Fun like opening my own deli/grocery with the types of products on the shelves that people deserve to have in their kitchens.

I do look at the lottery in a different manner than I look at the other gambling I take part in. I’m no math wizard, but I do know that it’s ludicrous to buy many, many tickets for the lottery. I probably purchase, on average, somewhere around $20 worth of tickets in any given year. That probably covers 15 drawings at minimum. If each ticket has a 1 in 500 million chance at winning, why buy $50 worth? That, to me, makes no sense. It’s a loser’s game. The opportunity to realize a return on your investment is nearly zero. So, for me, the lottery is a $1 investment in a daydream.

It’s completely different with my other gambling habits.

Playing the horses for me has interested me on a couple of levels. First and foremost, it’s a nice, clean place to go and drink cheap beer, smoke cigarettes, and have some entertainment on the TV for a few hours. Plus, it’s a great place for solitude. Everyone wants to be left alone at the track. Secondly, I was always a sucker for an opportunity to solve a complex problem. With all the data you can see on the race program, you can take handicapping the races as seriously as you want to. To me, the only feeling in all of gambling that beats watching a horse with high odds that you had found a legitimate reason to bet on cross the line first, is the pit you know you just put in someone’s stomach with a check-raise trap after they’ve thrown a lot of money at the pot already.

Speaking of poker (and aren’t I usually doing just that?), I like poker far less for the social aspects of my home game than I do for the logic, math, and theory behind it. One thing I’ve been pretty good at so far in my home game is maximizing the pot when I actually am holding the best hand. With every different set of pocket cards, and every different flop, there’s a different set of choices to make in order to maximize your winnings. That’s what I like best about poker.

Mostly, I like the gambling I do for the return I get on my investment. It’s not always financial either. I don’t mind sitting at the track for five hours, drinking three beers, and walking out of there $45 lighter. I don’t go to the bar, and I haven’t really been out to dinner more than a handful of times in the past six months. $45 a week in an entertainment budget is cheap at the price. Not to mention that sometimes you win. $10 to buy in to the home game for poker is also cheap. I get (usually) four to six hours of cards, and have the opportunity to put my mind to work forgetting about all my other problems during that period. That’s easily worth $10 a week.

I feel confident that gambling won’t ever become a problem for me. Why? Because I’m not looking for the “big score.” It is cool and fun to bet on a horse at 40-1 sometimes, but I’m still only putting $6 on him. I’m not laying my paycheck down looking to double it. Gambling is just for fun. That’s all. Nothing else.

Cherry Picking

Why is it that every time I see Jason Richardson “highlights” on SportsCenter, it seems as if he’s getting some sort of monster dunk out of his cherry picking? Van Exel gets a steal, and miraculously there’s J Rich already alone and halfway into the frontcourt. Does that dude play defense, or just wait out a chance to dunk?

A couple of thoughts on Michelle Wie… First off, I’m wowed by her swing. It’s really a terrific swing, and when you’ve got a six foot frame (at fourteen frigging years old) that can twist like hers, no wonder she’s slamming 300 yard drives. Secondly, she’s kinda cute isn’t she? I mean, she’s not Hilary Duff or Olsen Twins at 14 cute (in that “you’re going to be a hottie when you’re 18” sort of way), but as long as she doesn’t pack Venus Williams muscle on to that six long and lean feet of hers, she’ll stay pretty cute as she gets older. Third, she is exactly what female sports needs, provided she can continue to improve her game. She’s telegenic without being Kournikova, who is intimidatingly beautiful. She’s young enough that she’s going to be a novelty for another few years. She hits the ball as far as a man (in some cases, farther). She seems to have a pretty good personality. Provided she continues to improve her game and stays out of trouble, she’s going to be an excellent poster girl for women’s sports.

Speaking of athletes of Asian descent, I have a big crush on Michelle Kwan. Not enough of a crush to watch figure skating, but damned if that girl isn’t hot as hell. Especially out of the severe makeup, yanked back hair, and sequined tutu hell they put these skaters in. She’s a real natural beauty.

Last thing I want to say about female athletes: ESPN.com ran a poll last year asking readers whether Anna Kournikova or softballer Jennie Finch was hotter. Finch won. In a landslide. I can’t think of anything more ridiculous than that. Finch is a pretty good looking girl, granted. But Kournikova might be the best piece of ass on the planet. Seriously. There’s not a damn thing wrong with that girl, except maybe her personality. But if we’re going on looks alone, there’s no contest here.

HDub asked me my opinion yesterday on Paris Hilton.

Let’s start with the basics. Let’s say she wasn’t “Paris Hilton,” but was “Jenny from Grand Rapids” out with her other slutty friends at the local bar. Without the name, the fame, and the fortune behind her, she’s just another sunken-eyed heroin chic blonde that wears too much makeup. “Jenny from GR” would get about a 7 on the 1-10 scale on any average night at the club. She’d have hotter friends, she’d have less hot friends. If I didn’t know her, didn’t know anything about her second hand, and wasn’t dating anyone at the time, I’d go home with her. Absolutely.

But she’s not “Jenny from GR.” She’s Paris Hilton. Would I sleep with Paris Hilton? Well, probably more to be able to tell my friends that I had than because I wanted to. There are a lot of things about that girl that turn me off. First, she’s stupid. I don’t think she even finished high school. Secondly, that body type generally doesn’t turn me on at all. I enjoy the hell out of breasts, and she’s got none to speak of. Third, you know damn well that the paparazzi would shoot photos of me going in and going out of wherever we decided to get down. Yes, I’d have the pictures to prove what happened, but I’d also probably have months of being stalked by tabloids (PARIS HILTON’S SEX TOY A CHRONIC MASTURBATOR! SEE OUR SECRET SPY PICS ON PAGE FOUR!) and getting constant calls from them asking me to spill the beans (PARIS’ BOY TOY SPEAKS FOR THE FIRST TIME! “SHE HAD FLAPJACK BOOBS UNDER ALL THAT GUCCI” SAYS RECENT FLING!). I don’t think I’d want any of that business. Lastly, it’s not like I only ever intend or want to have sex with virgins, but good god it seems like Paris gets around. And around. Right round like a record baby. That’s not so good.

I also don’t think I’ve got the personality or ability to hold my liquor to keep up with Paris. So HDub, there’s my opinion on Paris Hilton.

By the way, the one celebrity I’d sleep with just so I could sell sordid stories to the tabloids would be Martha Stewart. Really. I’d tell the Enquirer that she enjoyed golden showers and was a fecalphiliac and all that good stuff. That’s the type of crap we should be reading in the Enquirer. You’d see my big smiling mug, arms folded in smug satisfaction beside a picture of Martha, maybe covered in a little mud (looking a little dirty) after gardening. “After meeting the Queen of Clean in a local specialty foods market, 29 year old Boy Genius was as seduced by her promise of homemade flan as he was by her overt sexual overtures in the produce section. ‘She promised me flan,’ said Genius, ‘and who am I to turn down the opportunity to crap in someone’s mouth in exchange for flan?’”

It’s 1145AM. I had seven items on my “To Do” list today, which would comprehensively close my week. I have accomplished all seven, and still have had time to write nearly four full pages of blog content. I don’t know whether I love my job sometimes or not. If I could surf the ‘Net without fear of getting fired, my job would be 1000% more likeable. For now, I’ll just take my paycheck and be content.

Here’s a list of the websites outside of the company’s scope since I started here:

Bank One for my banking
Amazon to track my packages for Xmas
Gap to track packages
UPS to track packages
eBay to see if I won an auction
Yahoo Yellow Pages as a reference
Yahoo Maps
My blog, but only in the very early stages when I only had my dog’s picture posted (and nothing else)
Google
Google News

That’s it.

And that’s why I post so damn much every day. Because it’s 1150AM, I’m not going to lunch for another 40 minutes, and I don’t have a whole helluva lot else to do on the daily.

Blogging 101

As is the case with any burgeoning way to use technology, blogging now has its share of “how to” instruction books.

I’m baffled by this.

I can understand a book that deals with the web programming essential behind creating and maintaining your own blog independent of the services like BlogSpot and whatnot.

But these books aren’t about that. They’re about how to create an engaging blog that people will want to read.

Aren’t you either an interesting person or a dull one? On top of that, aren’t blogs, almost by definition, an individualistic sort of thing? Isn’t a manual for a blog somewhat against the spirit of what you’re trying to accomplish anyway?

Well, I guess if you’re blogging for a purpose it helps to have a map on how to get there. I’m thinking of the “Dean for America” blogs that are so prevalent on the web right now as an example of that.

Personally, I think my blog would be a lot more dull if I had any sort of rules to which I adhered. I write in sentence fragments. My subject matter varies from personal embarrassments to poker, from ranting about my ex-wife to reporting on my day at the OTB. I’ve found a blog community on my own, I didn’t need to join some sort of pre-fabricated list of “similar” blogs.

I don’t want to be a “similar” blog to anyone else’s. I know what I’ve got going for me. It’s variety. Well, variety and volume. I’d have to be in the top tenth of one percent of all bloggers for unique content on a daily basis since getting this new job of mine. And I’m not just regurgitating news articles either, not that there’s anything wrong with that. “Random Thoughts and Thoroughbred Selections” is what it is. I’m no “Maddox from xmission,” but I’ve got a sense of humor. I’m no Iggy, but I like my poker. I’m certainly no Anna, but I’m not shy when talking about my past.

I like having this blog because it gives me a greater opportunity to think about my past and my present, and it’s often therapeutic to get some of my anger, frustrations, or lamentations out of my system. I like that people do come here and read what I have to say, but ultimately I’d still be here and still be writing six to eight pages a day if no one really stopped by.

I just don’t give a shit about putting these words down for anyone to read. And no style book out there could ever help me put this content neatly into a little box.

Happy Birthday Barb

Look at our little girl. She’s growing up so quick. Since I didn’t get you anything for your birthday, I’ll have to make you something special. And seeing as macaroni pictures tend to lose their glitter when mailed across state lines, I’ll have to write you a poem. Here you go:

Dorky Barb she is so cool
Like Mr. T once said
I pity the fool

She goes to school up where it’s cold
Thanks to mom’s eggs and dad’s sperm
She’s now 21 years old

She comes around and reads my site
Merry Christmas to all
And to all a good night

Happy Birthday. Sorry about the lousy effort you got here. I never was good at poetry. Always happy to do a little something for the readers though.

I caught another disdainful look from a woman today.

I was at Quizno’s for another overrated, overpriced sub sandwich (the underwhelming “Italian”), and behind me in line was a so-so looking Hispanic girl about my age. I had ordered and stepped to the side, and she asked the girl behind the counter (a really cute short haired girl):

“OK, I want the Turkey, and I only want the small, but can I get half of that for here and half of that to go? I’ll be eating some of it here I’m sure.”

To which I replied,

“Oh, they don’t do that here. You’re going to have to choose.”

And then, the look.

What, because I’m not Brad freaking Pitt I can’t crack a friendly joke to you in line at a lousy sandwich shop? Good god.

This is the one thing that women do that pisses me off more than anything. That look just says, “Thanks funny boy, now take your sandwich and go back under the bridge where you and the rest of your troll people belong. I’d never date any of you and your kind ever, so please just avert your eyes until I choose to leave the premises, OK?”

I swear to god I’m not really that bad looking either. Not that bad. I was just being funny too, it wasn’t a flirtatious thing whatsoever. And for a girl that is “in my league” to give me that look? Please. I’ve had better than you.

Do women just generally have their deflector shields up in case, god forbid, someone tries to pick them up when they’re out to lunch? That attitude works just like Mace. I hope being a bitch to people gets her awfully far in life.

I hate it when people take a dump on your day like that.

What Do I Really Want?

Let’s play a little game here. I’ll give you five choices, and it’s up to you to figure out how these rank for me.

In other words, from what I’d take first to what I’d take last, if a magic genie granted me the opportunity to choose just one…

A) One weekend of wall-to-wall sex with anyone I wanted (and it would probably be Anna Nicole Smith circa 1993)
B) Expertise on the absolute top level in handicapping sports betting, horse racing, and dog racing.
C) A Detroit Lions Super Bowl victory sometime in the next five years
D) The ability to play jazz piano like Bill Evans
E) A physical “reset” on my body, getting rid of all my minor problems and putting me in peak physical condition. Then it’s up to me to maintain it.

Do you have your guesses in?

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Do you now?

OK, here’s how it breaks down:

First Choice - The top three I’ve ranked here are all pretty close. I mean really close. For #1 I went with (E), the physical reset on my body. To have the energy and stamina again to get out there and play full court basketball would be great. To not have liver problems any more would be spectacular. I could actually drink hard liquor again. The weird foot freckling I have, which is benign, would go away. If I could get to peak physical condition without having to struggle to get there, I could probably maintain it.

Second Choice - Again, this was really close. My #2 choice would be (C), the Lions Super Bowl Victory. I have this ugly feeling I won’t see one in my lifetime, and there’s nothing I deserve more in this world than to see my Lions win the Super Bowl. I’m not kidding.

Third Choice - Third would be (D), the ability to play jazz piano with expertise. Maybe it’s not as close to the Lions Super Bowl victory as I thought, but I still think it’d be a great thing to choose. How many chicks could you get by playing something soft and soulful at the piano?

Fourth Choice - (B), the handicapping expertise comes next. Part of it is because I don’t think I could ever really live the life of a professional gambler. The highs are pretty high, but the lows are gut wrenching. And who wants to spend that much time pouring through statistics and watching lines move by half a point during a week?

Fifth Choice - Lest you think otherwise, (A), the Anna Nicole lost weekend of lust is the last choice on the list. Did you notice I used last, lest, list, lost, and lust in the same sentence? I’m such a genius. Anyway, as great as this would be, it’s only a weekend, and I know that a Lions Super Bowl victory would probably bring me more pleasure than any woman ever could. No, I’m not kidding. Now, if the choice had been for an Anna Nicole circa 1993 Holodeck to be built in my closet, I’d have to move the choice up to probably #2. No, I still want the Lions to win. But this lost weekend is only two nights and I’d rather have something that lasts.

My Old Stomping Grounds

Long before I discovered the wonderment of this little thing called BLOG, I was a regularly active participant at an online message board at Madden Mania. It’s a site that revolves around the EA Sports video game Madden series, but I spent the vast bulk of my time in the “Soap Box,” which is a catch-all forum for pretty much any and all off topic questions, concerns, statements, remarks, and rants.

Due to the new job, the discovery of the joys of online poker, and the time and effort I’ve spent on this blog, I really haven’t been an active participant on the boards there in quite awhile.

I was on the AOL Instant Messenger yesterday, and one of the moderators of the site happened to catch me and stopped to chat.

Turns out, (sniffle) I’m missed over there (sniffle sniffle).

That’s always nice to hear. As one of the older guys posting on that site, I did my best to try to raise the level of discourse over there.

Now, by saying “raise the level of discourse,” I mean bring up topics other than “which rapper is better, Tupac or Biggie,” and “how hot is Vida Guerra.” We’re not talking about discussing Freudian theory or dissecting FDR’s economic policies, but you’ve got to have more interesting things to talk about beyond rap and ass to keep me entertained.

So, I made a promise to visit the site there a little more often than I have been. It always feels good to be part of a community, even if it’s only online.

Thanks RJ.

One Hour...

Ramming and jamming didn't work too well for me tonight. One hour, six BB down.

I got busted three times in one hour when dealt pocket pairs by the guy on my left, who had one higher pair in his pocket twice, and 88 to my 44 the other time.

It's OK to fold the low pocket pair... It's OK to fold the low pocket pair...

I kept getting 44 and 55 and 66, and never once came close to making a hand. And every time I'd get KJ or AT, everything but those cards would hit.

Weird night at the table. I hate losing, but ramming and jamming is quite fun.

Would you guys have played this differently?

**** Hand History for Game 335659719 *****
Table Card Room Table 2977 (Real Money)
Seat 10 is the button
Total number of players : 10
Seat 4: koolhand77 ( $51.5 )
Seat 6: bigb3388 ( $124.5 )
Seat 7: pokercards10 ( $32 )
Seat 9: runner16 ( $13 )
Seat 10: gfair ( $126 )
Seat 1: Boygza ( $138.5 )
Seat 8: maybluff ( $61 )
Seat 3: cnote11 ( $72 )
Seat 2: HRearden ( $100 )
Seat 5: stevolator ( $77 )
Boygza posts small blind [$1].
HRearden posts big blind [$2].
stevolator posts big blind [$2].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Boygza [ Qh Qc ]
cnote11 folds.
koolhand77: nh and np
gfair: u guys are driving me crazy
koolhand77 folds.
stevolator checks.
bigb3388 folds.
pokercards10 raises [$4].
maybluff calls [$4].
runner16 folds.
koolhand77: as long as your taking thier money do you really care
gfair calls [$4].
Boygza raises [$5].
gfair: u r killing me
HRearden raises [$6].
stevolator folds.
pokercards10 calls [$4].
maybluff calls [$4].
gfair calls [$4].
Boygza calls [$2].
** Dealing Flop ** [ 2c, 9h, Tc ]
gfair: u better have aces
Boygza checks.
HRearden bets [$2].
koolhand77: lol
pokercards10 calls [$2].
maybluff folds.
gfair: my turn
gfair raises [$4].
Boygza calls [$4].
HRearden raises [$4].
pokercards10 calls [$4].
gfair calls [$2].
Boygza calls [$2].
** Dealing Turn ** [ Ts ]
Boygza checks.
HRearden checks.
pokercards10 checks.
gfair: o boy
gfair bets [$4].
Boygza raises [$8].
HRearden calls [$8].
pokercards10 folds.
gfair calls [$4].
** Dealing River ** [ 2s ]
Boygza bets [$4].
HRearden calls [$4].
gfair calls [$4].
Boygza shows two pairs, queens and tens.
HRearden shows two pairs, kings and tens.
gfair doesn't show.
HRearden wins $99 from the main pot with two pairs, kings and tens.

Online "Poker Games" at Party Poker.com for Live Poker Players

**** Hand History for Game 335638131 *****
Table Card Room Table 2977 (Real Money)
Seat 10 is the button
Total number of players : 10
Seat 2: oversteer ( $120 )
Seat 3: jbgotsoul ( $46 )
Seat 4: koolhand77 ( $9 )
Seat 5: a2zaccents ( $85 )
Seat 6: bigb3388 ( $98 )
Seat 7: pokercards10 ( $68 )
Seat 9: runner16 ( $20 )
Seat 10: gfair ( $126.5 )
Seat 1: Boygza ( $96 )
Seat 8: maybluff ( $68 )
Boygza posts small blind [$1].
oversteer posts big blind [$2].
maybluff posts big blind [$2].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Boygza [ Qh Jh ]
jbgotsoul raises [$4].
koolhand77 folds.
a2zaccents folds.
bigb3388 folds.
pokercards10 folds.
maybluff calls [$2].
runner16 folds.
gfair folds.
Boygza calls [$3].
oversteer folds.
** Dealing Flop ** [ 9h, Ts, 3h ]
Boygza checks.
jbgotsoul bets [$2].
maybluff folds.
Boygza calls [$2].
** Dealing Turn ** [ 8s ]
Boygza checks.
jbgotsoul bets [$4].
Boygza raises [$8].
jbgotsoul raises [$8].
Boygza raises [$8].
jbgotsoul calls [$4].
** Dealing River ** [ 8d ]
Boygza bets [$4].
jbgotsoul calls [$4].
Boygza shows a straight, eight to queen.
jbgotsoul shows two pairs, jacks and eights.
Boygza wins $55.50 from the main pot with a straight, eight to queen.

Welcome Back My Friends, To The Show That Never Ends

I saw a familiar face on TV yesterday.

Remember Khrystyne Haje? The redhead from TV’s “Head of the Class?” She’s in a cold medicine commercial now. Still a beautiful woman too. She’s one of those women that are just going to age beautifully. For example, when Pam Anderson turns 55, she’s going to look awfully weather-beaten (and frankly ridiculous with those balloons still looking perky). A woman like Haje will have passed her considerably by that point.

You can also see another face from sitcoms past, Josie Davis (the dorky sister on “Charles In Charge”) on Chrysler commercials. Don’t blink at the end, or you’ll miss her though. She walks through the frame in those “at the dealership” spots, and says something like, “come see your Chrysler dealer, today!”

She’s way hotter than Nicole Eggert now, by the way. Check out her pictures in her IMDB file.

I wish that I had in my repertoire the talent to identify an average girl who was a year or two away from blossoming. Take Josie Davis for example. I guarantee you she didn’t get one-tenth the attention Nicole Eggert got, but grew into that gawky frame and really shot up the charts. If I could have gotten in early on that curve, that would have solved the whole “love me for who I am, not just for my incredibly hot body” thing.

I’d love to be able to run into a few of the girls I knew from high school who I bet have just gotten seriously hotter over time. Not that I would necessarily have a shot now, but it would be interesting to see.

For my senior year in high school, my family had moved back to Michigan to my old hometown (which I had left in fifth grade), and I had to essentially make an entirely new set of friends. There was this group of girls that were a year behind me that a couple of my friends and I would hang out with periodically that we called “The No-Clue Crew.” They earned that moniker because there seemed to be a legitimate fear of boys circulating in this group. They’d lament not having boyfriends, but couldn’t for their lives figure out that “getting freaked out” is no way to land a man.

There was some serious talent in the group, but these girls were damn near impossible to separate from their group. Berta was the most intriguing. Berta was this tall, willowy, delicate girl who had one of the most uniquely beautiful faces I’d ever seen. The first time I met her my jaw hit the floor. I really wanted to get to know her, date her, whatever she had to offer I’d take it.

But the poor girl was mortally frightened of boys. I couldn’t ever get her alone. She would barely talk to anyone. She’d barely make eye contact in the hallways unless she had her group around her. I could tell that she had a little bit of a bi-polar type of thing going on. She’d be a fun and confident person when all her girlfriends were having fun with her, but would lapse into a heightened panic when expected to fly solo in any capacity.

I hope college agreed with her personality. I bet she’s spectacular looking now.

My high school crush has also gotten better looking. She’s in great shape, and is getting her teeth fixed (not that they were problematic, but re-aligning her jaw agrees with her). She ended up marrying a really cool guy, who I didn’t want to like originally, but do anyway.

Which brings me to a thought. I’ve had many more “crushes” in my life than I’ve had actual relationships. And aside from my ex-wife, I never once got any of these crushes to materialize into a date.

Maybe I’m just better at internalizing my feelings, romanticizing about them from afar, than I am at pushing my chips into the middle of the table and taking a chance.

Or maybe it’s something about me.

My high school crush knew I wanted to date her. Another crush from high school knew. I’m fairly certain my big Utah crush knew. None of them ever let me get anywhere past “friend” in their eyes.

That was really frustrating with the “other high school crush.” M was this absolutely brilliant girl who I was always terribly puzzled by. She invariably had these unbelievable loser boyfriends. This is a high IQ girl that went to Michigan’s Med School and is a doctor now. But in high school, she always picked guys who probably couldn’t spell their own names.

And it wasn’t as if these guys were those “dark, brooding, dangerous bad boys.” Nope. They were essentially just losers. Guys who are probably still bagging groceries now at age 28.

To be fair, I got the impression (and I could be way off) that her father was a loser and that she didn’t generally know any better than to pick guys like her father. Either that, or maybe she tried to pick guys she could try to “save.”

I’m no Adonis, nor am I any sort of Valentino type. But even I know when I’m losing to a guy I shouldn’t be losing to. And that always frustrated the shit out of me.

I’m a little worried that I’m going to fall into the “friend” file with K. Not that being her friend would be the worst thing in the world, I just want more.

But it’s been awhile. It’s really been literally five and a half years since I’ve been through this “early relationship” stuff. The “just checking each other out” dance. I’m positive as to where I’d like this to go, I’m just really unsure as to the speed it needs to get there. Plus, there’s been enough damage done to my self-confidence that I’m really self-conscious about “how I’m doing” during our time together.

She told me she dumped NASCAR boy because there “wasn’t any romance there,” and so far there’s not really any romance here either.

But it’s early.

I’m sure I’ll figure this out. I’m not really killing myself over this (even though it may seem like it), but I’m positive that once the awkward “first move” is out of the way, the chemistry question will be answerable.

I’ll keep you posted.

From the Detroit Lions Blog I’ve linked to above, there were a couple of interesting notes from beat writer Tom Kowalski’s visits to the MLive Lions Forum.

First, there was the requisite free agent discussion, which seems to always come back around to Tai Streets. Seems as if the Lions aren’t going to be big free agent players this off-season, as it looks to be a pretty poor class out there anyway. Kowalski speculated that there would be interest in Damien Woody to shore up one of our OG spots, and that if Ruben Brown is released from Buffalo, which is likely, he would draw strong interest from Detroit as well.

At WR, the Lions apparently like Tai Streets a great deal. I’m not really sure why. It’s going to take more than he’s worth to sign him, as he’s going to be one of the two or three most desirable players at his position on the FA market. While I understand receiver is a definite position of need, I feel that you shouldn’t break the bank to bring someone in just to bring someone in. Streets is an adequate receiver, but if I were Matt Millen I’d work to shore up other areas of need, hoping that this current receiver corps can be sufficient this year.

Apparently, there isn’t much more speculation that the Lions will look to attract any “big names” to the fold. As long as Keyshawn doesn’t don the Honolulu blue, I’m generally OK with that.

Kowalski also touched on a possible draft scenario that wouldn’t be the worst thing to happen to the Lions. A forum dweller asked Tom what would happen if we didn’t like any of the RBs enough at #6, and if Taylor, the safety from Miami was off the board. Tom didn’t discount the possibility that Robert Gallery, the mammoth OT from Iowa, could be a good pick. If they grabbed Gallery, signed Woody or Brown, and moved Backus to the other guard spot, suddenly they’d have one of the most formidable OLs in football.

I really rather like that idea. All of this would be predicated on the Lions being able to get an RB they liked in round 2, but that might not be too difficult.

By the way, file this prediction away for future reference… If the Lions do not take an RB at #6, and do not trade down, look for a team to leapfrog the Lions to the #3 or #4 pick in round two to get the RB (Kevin Jones? Stephen Jackson?) that was supposed to slip to Detroit’s pick. Someone’s going to slip. But someone else is going to get in Detroit’s way. I’ll bet it’ll be Dallas (wouldn’t a package of maybe Chad Hutchinson, their own #2, and next year’s #2 help them move up?).

I think my pipe dreams that somehow, some way the Lions will land a premium FA at a glamour position are spinning down the drain. Chances are slim that Champ Bailey or Julian Petersen will be available, and I know we won’t sign Terrell Owens (drooling over Owens/Rogers on the outside… that’s like my Madden 2004 dream team lineup).

Well, at least we have all these big Assistant Coach signings to be proud of over the last week or so. [/sarcasm]

I had this really strange dream last night where a couple of friends and I drove to a horse track in a rented motor home, and by the time we came out hours later, the entire motor home was stripped barren on the inside. Every last thing had been completely taken out of there.

And I was fretting because I didn’t sign for the extra insurance coverage with the agent at Enterprise when I rented it. “This’ll take care of anything that could possibly happen,” promised the agent.

I had left the front door unlocked, and so it was my fault.

I’m still trying to figure out if this dream means anything, or if it’s some sort of amalgamation of finding my car had the trunk popped open all night on Tuesday night in the driveway, and Enterprise Rent-A-Car calling me Wednesday night to do a “How was your service?” follow-up survey.

Speaking of amalgamation, my old employer, Bank One, is merging with JP Morgan Chase.

A short banking history lesson is probably due here. Back in 1998, Bank One moved to acquire First Chicago NBD Corp, a move that really brought Bank One the Midwestern foothold they were looking for.

At the time of the merger, I was working for FCNBD’s Mortgage group out of Metro Detroit, which was one of the most profitable arms of the company. I had just come out of two extremely lucrative years as a Mortgage Originator, and wasn’t sure what the future was going to hold.

Things got really interesting during the merger. Bank One had originally positioned the merger publicly as a “Merger of Equals.” Bank One had an extremely aggressive and successful consumer presence, and FCNBD had a tremendous advantage in the Midwest in commercial lending. FCNBD was also an attractive “merger” partner due to its relatively high amount of assets.

The NBD Mortgage group I was in did more business out of one geographic area than the entire Bank One group did out of their entire branch system. We were continuously told that they would “take the best of both worlds,” and that the competitive advantage that we worked hard to build would not be taken away.

That mentality lasted fewer than three months.

Bank One started changing everything over to the Bank One way. Our group immediately became uncompetitive. I left for another job, and within three weeks 90% of the remaining NBD Mortgage group, from managers down to processors, made a midnight move over to National City Bank.

I guess the moral to the story is that bank mergers can be ugly, and we’re seeing the early stages of this with news today that 10,000 jobs “between the two companies” (in other words, on the Bank One support side) are going to be nearly instantly eliminated.

I love Bank One for the web banking I can do, but I’m seriously considering changing banks. The customer always gets screwed in the end when bureaucracy piles up on bureaucracy, and I guarantee you that’s what’s going to happen here.

Just fair warning…

A Valiant Try with "The Hammer!"

**** Hand History for Game 333893499 *****
Table Card Room Table 1400 (Real Money)
Seat 4 is the button
Total number of players : 10
Seat 1: SURVIVOR54 ( $154.5 )
Seat 2: mhbrook1 ( $96.5 )
Seat 4: shadrock05 ( $39 )
Seat 5: Bronson10 ( $282 )
Seat 7: WizFace ( $185 )
Seat 8: tennisgolfer ( $60 )
Seat 10: HogSpringer ( $174 )
Seat 3: Boygza ( $121.5 )
Seat 9: scottycards ( $67 )
Seat 6: fifthman ( $115.5 )
Bronson10 posts small blind [$1].
fifthman posts big blind [$2].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Boygza [ 7c 2d ]
WizFace folds.
tennisgolfer folds.
scottycards folds.
HogSpringer folds.
SURVIVOR54 folds.
mhbrook1 calls [$2].
Boygza calls [$2].
shadrock05 folds.
Bronson10 calls [$1].
fifthman checks.
** Dealing Flop ** [ Qs, Kc, 8s ]
Bronson10 checks.
fifthman checks.
mhbrook1 checks.
Boygza bets [$2].
Bronson10 folds.
fifthman calls [$2].
mhbrook1 folds.
** Dealing Turn ** [ 8d ]
fifthman checks.
Boygza bets [$4].
fifthman calls [$4].
** Dealing River ** [ 3c ]
fifthman bets [$4].
Boygza folds.
fifthman doesn't show.
fifthman wins $23

ESPN Insider: ESPN Insider: Whispers (01/13): "Lions team president and CEO Matt Millen said aspects of potential free-agent WR Keyshawn Johnson's game interest the team. The Lions have made a possession wide receiver a priority since drafting Charles Rogers."

Fucking hell...

NFL.com - Quentin McCord

Just for Bob - 12/22/02 vs. the Lions went 7 for 182 and a TD. Had an awesome game.

Why did I have to do it? He asked for it, his man saw it, so it don’t mean shit to me. He’s gone. That’s how it’s supposed to be.

It’s always good to hear a couple of great songs on the XM on the way into work. Today’s drive in featured that Kwame’ song that has him singing that Minnie Riperton song “Lovin’ You” in the middle, then Brand Nubian’s “Punks Jump Up,” then I flipped over to the jazz station and caught Kenny Burrell playing “All Blues.”

I passed a train while listening to Burrell play, and the engine blew its horn at a perfect moment and perfect pitch with the song. That was cool.

“Punks Jump Up” was a nice treat as well, as I feel like I can do a pretty good karaoke knock-off of Grand Puba’s voice while driving and rapping. The other rapper whose flow I can handle? Dr. Dre. I sound especially stupid trying to rap along with Snoop Dogg and Ice Cube. Just FYI…

I did watch “Celebrity Poker” on Bravo last night. Well, the last hour of the game I mainly played poker online, but I did watch the first hour pretty closely. It kills me to see these guys pushing chips in the pot with Q6o and no pairs on the board. David Cross, I’m looking in your general direction here.

By the way, if Phil Gordon isn’t self-conscious about his “out loud” laugh, he should be.

I can’t really figure out if Nicole Robinson is cute or not. I know she’s not hot. That’s for sure. She’s either got a hell of a forehead, or has an unfortunate hairline, and that’s a black mark against her. She’s also just a little too… stumpy? Can I call her stumpy? Well, I just did. I mean, I like a woman with natural curves (that’s not a secret), but her arms and legs seem unnaturally short. Maybe she’s got some midget in her. I didn’t really have a difficult time figuring out whether Shannon Elizabeth is cute or not. That’s not up for debate.

I did love the comment about the Craft Services David Cross made. “But when Affleck and Schwimmer show up, they break out the Taquitos.” Good stuff. I don’t understand the bathrobe thing though, and I’m not going to even try.

At least freaking Willie Garson didn’t bring his fantastical magical river cards with him this week.

By the way, I promise not to give a fuck about celebrity poker ever again. Really.

And I didn’t win the lottery last night. That’s all I’m saying about that.

Speaking of a woman with natural curves (really, I just was), I’ve decided that if they ever create a “Holodeck”-esque virtual sex experience, but are limited to creating just one female form to contain in that room for me, I’d have to have them use Anna Nicole Smith’s Playmate of the Year figure as my template.

Of course, Anna Nicole wouldn’t be my pick if they had to attach her personality as well.

Ranked in order of preference, just on body/looks – nothing to do with who they are as a person – are my top ten choices for my personal virtual sex Holodeck:

1) Anna Nicole Smith – the juiciest of them all. Of course, I’m forgetting that these last five years even existed for her. I’m talking Guess modeling, Playboy posing Anna Nicole.
2) Carmen Electra – although she’s ultra-annoying and constructed completely of plastic… well, what do you want me to say?
3) Aria Giovanni – the one porn star on my list.
4) Laetitia Casta – she’s that Victoria’s Secret model. I’m not sure there’s a more perfect body out there.
5) Katie Holmes – breaks the mold, I know, but when she got naked in that movie “The Gift,” men all over the world gasped. None of us were aware she had all that going for her underneath it all.
6) Phoebe Cates – in the red bikini, right out of “Fast Times.” Like the beer commercial says, “It just doesn’t get any better than this.”
7) Stephanie Seymour – circa the GNR “November Rain” video. Maybe even a year or two before. When Victoria’s Secret first started carpet-bombing their catalogs everywhere, our college house got them in the mail. There were all these beautiful models, and then there was uber-sexy Stephanie Seymour. She oozed sex. It was like seeing a nasty biker chick at Baptist Church. Wow.
8) Angelina Jolie – my god, what I wouldn’t do to that woman. Not that I could conceivably handle the real life edition.
9) Sophia Loren – from that one picture I’ve seen of her, probably from the early 60s, where she’s wearing a soaked and clingy blouse playing in the surf at the beach.
10) That one Latina actress whose name I can’t think of – She did that movie with the guy who played “Puddy” on “Seinfeld” and Tim Allen.

Bonus Content

Just on the topic of sex and celebrities, I’ve decided a few things…

- I would sleep with Shakira over any other female singer/musician out there. And I would sleep with Christina Aguilera over Britney Spears, even though Britney Spears would be the #1 choice on the “Who would you most like to brag to your friends that you banged?” list.
- I’ve decided lately that I would probably sleep with Queen Latifah. Although I don’t think I’d feel comfortable calling her “Queen” or “Latifah.” She’s a little big, even for me, but she really is a good-looking woman.
- There’s no amount of beer that would ever get me into bed with a midget. Little hands. I’m just saying… I guess that’s not really about a celebrity.
- I bet Alicia Keys looks really good naked. So would Kelis. She’s round in all the right places.
- Performance anxiety would never allow me to have sex with Jenna Jameson.
- If Drew Barrymore wasn’t “Drew Barrymore,” she’d be in my league. The upper end of that league, but doesn’t she look awfully dumpy sometimes?
- Former “Chicks of the Week,” which my roommates and I used to declare include Teri Hatcher, Vanessa Marcil, and the chick who played Sami’s sister on “Days of Our Lives” (Sami on that show used to be a cow and is now awfully hot. Amazing transformation).
- Former “My Future Wives,” include Jodi Foster (yeah, I know), Winona Ryder (especially in “Dracula,” where she had every opportunity to get naked), Stephanie Seymour, and Kate Winslet.

Poker Update

I didn’t get a chance to try to win Grubby's “Hammer Challenge” last night. I did get dealt 27 once, but it was suited. I saw the flop with it, and was forced to run away when JJQ was turned over. Trust me when I tell you that I will find a way to swing that hammer.

Last night’s PartyPoker experience was disconcerting. I sat down at my first $2/$4 table and caught KK within the first couple hands, won, and went up nearly $40. I caught no other flops for the next forty minutes, and ended up $51 down.

I got up and went to another $2/$4 table and caught a pair on my BB entry hand that turned into a set on the turn. I took $35 on that hand, and spent the next twenty minutes building that up to about $75. Had I not been kicked in the groin by that AT (higher straight) in one of my last few hands, I would have felt pretty good about things. But I did end up +$1.25.

Which is better than being down for the session.

But I’ve got some major holes in my game that I’m conscious of, but still can’t seem to correct. I just keep clicking the bad choices in these scenarios, even though my brain is yelling at me to knock it off and play sensibly.

Weaknesses

(just referring to Limit Hold ‘Em)

1) Chasing small/middle pairs into making sets - Let’s say I’m holding A5 suited. Flop hits K85 rainbow. If there’s $20 in the pot, and it costs me $2 to call, I’m getting 10-1 odds. If I’m not mistaken, the chances I’m going to hit my set are in that 10-1 neighborhood (2/47 – 2/46 roughly 10%). So a call isn’t a bad play there. Where it gets bad for me is when I call, then there’s a raise. “It’s just another $2,” is my mentality, but shouldn’t I see the warning signs that I’m likely beat here? Shouldn’t I be getting out? I mean, let’s say there’s $26 now in the pot, and it’s $2 more for me to call. I’m getting 13-1 now on my $2 bet, which is mathematically, “the proper price to chase.” But I’m also now $6 in on $26, which is really only 4-1. And I’m going to wince when anything but a five hits the turn.
2) Chasing open-ended straight draws - Again, mathematically, I think I have a pretty good grasp as to when I should throw these away. Unfortunately, the cowboy in me wants to ride all the way to the river in hopes of landing that capper to my straight. I see far too many raises when I’m holding these straight draws. It’s a major, major leak.
3) Playing the small kicker - This is probably the habit of mine where I’m yelling at myself the loudest in my head. Last night was a perfect example. I’m holding A2 suited in the BB, raise, and there’s only two of us that see the flop. It comes A86 rainbow. I bet, she raises, I call. Why do I call? In a big pot, maybe. The turn shows a 5. I bet, she raises again. Can I effectively put her on something like A9 or AT? Yeah, probably. At least that or better. I called her all the way to the river like that, and sure enough she had the better kicker. That kills me.
4) Not check-raising on the flop enough - If anyone is taking notice while playing in some of my sessions (where I’m not hitting great cards), I can be pushed off of the flop too easily. I need to be more aggressive in this spot to get myself in a position where people don’t think they can just get me to fold. That $4 check-raise once or twice an hour is an attention-grabbing tool.
5) Playing while distracted - If I’m not in the right frame of mind, I’m not playing good poker. Plain and simple.

Well, at least I know what I need to work on. And I need to read Sklansky/Malmuth again (this’ll be #3). Not that I think it’s a great tool for online poker, but I’m definitely looking to go to the casino again, that’s for sure.

Lions Update

Although I don’t really know how the new position coaches that Mariucci is bringing aboard will perform, I do know that I’m confident that he’ll put good people in place to hopefully build a winner.

There isn’t a lot of news out of Allen Park since the end of the season, but one set of signings that perked me up when I saw them was our recent acquisition of two former Atlanta Falcon WRs, Quentin McCord and Trevor Gaylor.

I like these signings on a number of levels. First, I believe both are upgrades in talent over the guys they likely will be replacing, Shawn Jefferson and Scotty Anderson. Second, both of these guys are capable of hitting home runs out there. Especially McCord. I think McCord has the potential to be a dangerous, Az Hakim in his prime, type of player for us. Third, these guys should be more successful on a team with (gulp) better receivers on it than Atlanta had. Charles Rogers and Az Hakim alone, not to mention whoever else we might add to augment the corps, demand more respect than Peerless Price and Brian Finneran do. Therefore, these guys will be part of a system that will give them more opportunities to see mismatches and single coverage.

The last reason I really like this signing has less to do with the players involved than it does with their position. Wide Receiver. The more receivers we can acquire, the greater the probability Bill Schroeder will not return in 2004.

Nice moves Millen. I hope McCord and Gaylor pay off for us.

”Thank you for your patience. All representatives are still busy. Please continue to hold.

Every ten seconds I hear the same refrain. Who was complaining about this the other day?

I have one lousy question to ask, and I’ve been on hold nearly fifteen minutes as of this point. I don’t know what drives me more up the wall: the wait, the “smooth jazz” hold music, or the automated encouragement I’m receiving to wait on the next available operator.

As part of the training for my first job out of college, my training class was selected to work the bank’s 1-800 Mortgage Help line. 99% was Q&A stuff, real basic, but I did get one phone call that was pretty interesting.

Keep in mind that no one was monitoring our calls, so we could get away with being a little callous, as long as we sounded polite.

BG – “Thank you for calling The Bank. How may I help you?”
Upset Woman (UW) – “Y’all sent another collection notice to my house for the mortgage. I don’t know what to do with this thing.”

Now, normally we didn’t handle collections. But I kept digging.

BG – “Ma’am, I’m pulling up your account now and it looks like you haven’t made a payment on this in over five months, and you were late on payments prior to that too.”
UW – “How do you want me to pay for this mortgage? I ain’t got no job. I can’t work. I’m injured and can’t get no job.”
BG – “I’m sure that’s difficult ma’am, but you can’t just not pay a loan and expect it to go away.”
UW – (yelling at me now) “But I ain’t got no job! Y’all can’t just take my house from me. I could burn this goddamn place to the ground. Then what would you do, huh?”
BG – “I don’t know ma’am. What would you do if you burned your own house down?”
UW – (still yelling) “I ain’t got the money. I got a settlement that’s supposed to be coming in, and I can take care of it then. But y’all don’t want to wait for it. Y’all’d rather kick a woman out of her own house.”
BG – “The bank can’t wait on a settlement that you may or may not get ma’am.” (I took such guilty pleasure in “speaking for the bank.”)
UW – (really upset, probably crying) “You can’t come take my house! My daughter’s got special needs! I can’t move, I gots nowhere to go!”
BG – “Well ma’am, I don’t really know what else I can tell you.”
UW – “How about if I just killed myself, huh? You’d like that wouldn’t you. I could kill myself and burn this house right down to the goddamn ground. How would you get your money then? Huh? How would you get your money then?”
BG – “Ma’am, you don’t want to do anything rash. But the bank will get its money, trust me. One way or the other, we’ll be OK.”
UW – “Asshole.” (click)

I don’t remember the whole conversation verbatim, but that’s pretty close. I can really be a prick when given the opportunity. And there was no better weapon when talking to people than shrugging your shoulders and blaming it on “the bank.”

“Sorry ma’am. The bank doesn’t do things that way.”
“Sir, unfortunately the bank can’t approve your loan.”
“I’m sorry to tell you, but the bank recalculated your closing costs this morning, and you’ll need to bring another $843.72.”

Another one of my favorite things to do was when a couple of us had to stay later than the managers to man the line “after hours,” I’d leaf through the phone book, find something like an escort service, dial the number, and transfer the call instantly to a co-worker. He’d pick up and there’d be all sorts of confusion that ended with the person on the line saying, “but sir, you called the A-1 Escort Service.” That was always fun.

Back to my original point, I am always suspicious of those “please hold” messages, as we were really quite lackadaisical about picking up the phone. Even when getting pounded by calls, we often just sat there and talked rather than jumping on the ringing lines.

Hell, it’s not like we were getting paid by the call or anything.

I’ve been sending random text messages to my best friend’s phone this week. He’s across the country, and has no reason to suspect that I’m the one doing the text messaging.

I’ve sent him such inspirational messages as, “Nate smells like a monkey’s butt,” and “Nate thinks romantically of salmon.”

I’ve been sending them via the TMobile website, and signing them all as “?.” Of course, now he probably thinks garage band legend ? of ? and the Mysterians is harassing him.

Can a guy named ? legally press charges?

I sent a bunch this morning again. My favorites were “Nate is paying a nickel to TMobile for every insult he gets,” and “How many starving Ethiopians could eat with the money Nate pays to read about how his butt smells over the phone?”

Send anonymous text messages to all your friends. It’s really quite fun.

Plus One Hundred Twenty Five...

...yeah, pennies.

A little over an hour on one $2/$4 table on Party, and I could only muster a $1.25 profit. To be fair I was up $35 and got absolutely nailed on my last hand I played. I was able to ride a pair of Jacks into a gutshot straight (holding JT) with a JK9 flop, then Q on the turn. Blank hits the river, and I'm re-raising and capping with another player.

Hoping that he isn't holding the one hand that can beat me - AT.

Sure enough...

So I got spanked on that one and called it a night when Party's tables got dreadfully slow.

My most frustrating hand was an AK suited where the flop came 789 suited, and then the fucking T (at least it was off) came on the turn. Fucking hell.

It's all good. I'm still trying to tell myself, "I'm just playing for fun."

Uh huh. Sure...

He's an Osteopath, from Great Neck

I bought the "Curb Your Enthusiasm" DVD set this morning. If you haven't seen the "Survivors of Incest" episode, it's great stuff.

Nothing in particular…

Were I to write a novel, I would probably break a record for most ellipses utilized in the course of fiction. It’s a piece of punctuation that I probably use too often, but I feel it does a good job of closing a thought that maybe I didn’t really intend to close verbally. Does that make sense?

It’s one of those days today where I fantasized on my way in about how today should really break down, were I a luckier person than I am:

7:55AM – Pull into parking lot at work, notice the building looks awfully dark.

7:56AM – Find out that a blown transformer has caused massive power outages to the entire city (in which I work, not the one in which I live), and that there’s no hope of restoring power during business hours.

7:57AM – Pull out of parking lot with smile on my face.

8:15AM – Stop at dad’s house, call my boss who’s already heard the “bad news.” Tells me that since the entire campus is down that I can just put my feet up and relax at home, he’ll take care of everything today.

8:25AM – Stop at the Morningstar Café for flapjacks, sausage patties, wheat toast, hash browns, and too many cups of strong coffee. Read the USA Today cover to cover over the next hour.

9:30AM – Stop on the way home at a party store, picking up six-pack of Bell’s Double Cream Stout and a lottery ticket for tonight’s Mega Millions Lottery (you see where this one is going already).

9:45AM – Arrive at home, change into my flannel-lined jeans and a big sweatshirt. Play with dog while mindlessly surfing the web.

10:30AM – Log into PartyPoker, find more than 27,000 people playing, and join the loosest $2/$4 table they have to offer.

11:30AM – I’ve just cracked my first beer in celebration of being up $80 in my first hour.

12:30PM – Even with a “West Wing” rerun diverting my attention, I’m up now a total of $220. I just caught an amazing run of cards, nailing the nuts on just about every flop over the last hour.

1:30PM – At this point, I can’t believe I’m up $300 for this session. I log out and figure it’s time to hunt down lunch.

1:45PM – With the dog in tow, I venture out to Best Buy and pick up the new “Curb Your Enthusiasm” DVD set.

2:00PM – I stop at BW3 and pick up a dozen wings and a chicken sandwich and fries for the road.

2:30PM – Back at home, my message light is blinking. K is looking to have drinks after work. I pop in my “CYE” set and watch a couple episodes.

3:30PM – After confirming drinks at Clover Bar at 6PM, I pop back up to the PC to play more poker. I move up to a $5/$10 table for fun.

5:00PM – Although the competition was much more fierce, I’m up $150 in my ninety minute session. My total winnings for the day are $450. I put the wheels in motion to cash it out.

6:00PM – K joins me in a booth at Clover Bar for pizza and beers.

8:00PM – She has to go, but at least this time I get a proper good night kiss.

8:30PM – Back at home, resisting the siren’s call of PartyPoker, I watch a couple more episodes of “CYE.”

11:35PM – Miraculously, my EZ Pick lottery ticket hits the jackpot. I have my flight to Vegas booked by midnight.

12:00AM – My day of luck is complete.

Of course, it’s now 8:45AM, and all the lights are on in my office. Can you go to jail for blowing up a transformer? Probably. Shit.

By the way, Mean Gene and Anisotropy are going to get the links they deserve over in my link list. I know I’m in their lists, and I feel badly that I haven’t reciprocated in that respect.

I’m actually quite proud that Iggy found my site and has included me in his links. His site is easily the best place on the web to begin any sort of wander through the vast world of poker opinion and news coverage.

If it weren’t for Iggy, my readership wouldn’t be as large as it now is. I went from something like six to eight people a day (unique visitors) to an average of about 40 different people visiting good ol’ RTATS on the daily. Google has had something to do with this (you wouldn’t believe what mentioning Detroit Fox2 News anchor-babe Lucy Noland has done for my hit count), but it’s mostly Iggy.

So, thanks.

I click through all my links on the daily, and am always entertained by the stories I’m hearing. Anna’s is still my favorite though. The one thing she has gotten away from is digging through her memories of past encounters. That’s all right though, as her current life is sexy enough for entertainment purposes.

One thing I forgot to mention on here, but meant to…

We got clobbered by snow late last week. It was pretty brutal. That being said, what’s with the local weather people breaking in to regularly scheduled programming with “updates.” It’s wintertime. Look outside. If it’s snowing, it might snow for awhile. When did six inches become a major event (that’s what she said… alright, I’ll shut up)?

All sorts of school closings and other cancellations were being reported on the crawl at the bottom of the screen. My favorite, however, was this one:

Meals On Wheels Grand Rapids – No Delivery Tomorrow – Use Emergency Meal

Let me figure this out. Let’s say I sign up for Meals On Wheels. When they bring you your first meal, do they give you a can of Dinty Moore and tell you not to open it unless “it’s an emergency?” Do they wall mount a glass case to your kitchen with some freeze-dried astronaut food and a “break glass in the event of,” sticker? Maybe they give all the Meals On Wheels people a live chicken and a bag of feed. The elderly can then either live off the eggs or just kill the damn chicken. Knowing the disadvantaged elderly of this area, they’d probably eat the feed once they ran out of Purina Cat Chow.

I never will understand why some old people eat cat food. But I really want to know what’s in this “Emergency Meal.”

So I just got off the phone with the Meals on Wheels people. Every senior in the program was delivered a box of non-perishables that featured four complete meals with instructions not to eat the food unless they didn’t get their delivery. There were things like tuna and oatmeal, and the representative said that the food takes no power to heat and eat.

Good to know.

I still prefer the image of a little old lady swinging her walker violently at the case mounted in her kitchen causing the protective glass to shatter all over her floor. She takes her old, frail hands and moves them gingerly into the box, avoiding the jagged edges threatening to slice open any one of the varicose veins prominent on her forearms.

She feels around inside and finds only a single can. Carefully controlling her arthritic tremors, she slowly pulls the can from the depths of the darkness inside the box.

Spaghetti-Os.

“Thank God,” she thinks, “at least they had the sense to give me the ones with the little meatballs.”

NFL Conference Championship Weekend

Man, these playoffs have been something else, haven’t they? This is usually the best weekend of football of the year.

And I don’t think it’s going to disappoint.

AFC Championship Preview

The Colts fly in to Foxboro to visit the surging New England Patriots. This is a game of streaks. The Patriots have won something like 13 straight. Peyton Manning has been brilliant for three straight.

Something’s got to give.

Indy’s offense has looked great lately, sparked by a resurgent Edgerrin James and a group of receivers and tight ends that have made the plays count when they’ve had to. Their defense has been opportunistic, and is still learning how to capitalize on mistakes.

New England is riding a tremendous crest of positive energy right now. For all the talk about KC’s winning streak to start the season, New England’s streak to finish has been far more important, and far less talked about. Again, I refer you to the fact that there’s not one mega-star on this roster. Their best player (Richard Seymour) is a DE/DT combo that gets far less recognition than he deserves. There’s not one skill position player that puts up Pro Bowl-esque gaudy numbers.

So, just like in their Super Bowl season of two years ago, they’re doing it as a team.

And I think they find a way to pull this one off as well.

I really can’t begin to figure this game out. Is there potential that New England’s defense causes havoc in the Indy backfield all game long and ends Manning’s hot streak? Absolutely. Could this be another shootout on par with the Colts/KC game of this past weekend? Yep, we saw that in week 13 already.

I wouldn’t be caught dead playing the O/U line on this one. It could easily go either way. I’m thinking Indy will keep this one close. If Indy’s getting three, I don’t think that’s enough. New England pulls it out with a mistake-free performance. PATRIOTS 27-COLTS 22.

NFC Championship

Are the Carolina Panthers the 2003-2004 edition of the 2000-2001 Baltimore Ravens? Great defense, solid running game, less-than-flashy passing attack?

No. Not with Stephen Davis out they’re not. I heard a radio talking head say that DeShaun Foster is such a good runner that “you don’t lose much going from Davis to Foster.”

OK, a guy off of freaking micro-fracture knee surgery who hasn’t seen 25 carries since the USC game three years ago? He’ll, of course, be sharing carries with Rod “He Hate Me” Smart.

Unless Stephen Davis’ groin gets as much rest as my groin will this week, he’s not playing. And that will spell doom for the Panthers.

Why? Because a couple of fluke performances by that passing game will have Delhomme convinced he’s Kurt Warner circa 2000.

Too bad they’re up against a team with a solid veteran secondary. It’s not going to happen for Carolina. They aren’t going to be able to break 17 points this week. Not without a healthy Davis. Philly will roll at home behind rabid crowd support, and Donovan McNabb will get his Super Bowl berth. As a matter of fact, I’d put just about any of the playoff teams up against Carolina this week and I’d still be picking against the Panthers. It just won’t happen.

John Fox, you’ve had a nice run. They’re giving you guys 4.5 points. I’m not biting. Philly wins in a rout, picks off Delhomme three times, and may even pick Rodney Peete off once for good measure. EAGLES 30-PANTHERS 10.

Things I Don’t Understand

- Why a driver in a big SUV enters a driveway gingerly, as if he were driving a low rider Cadillac and didn’t want to damage the undercarriage.
- The driver who comes nearly to a complete stop before making a turn into his driveway (or onto a side street).
- The driver that slows down before entering a long and vacant turn lane.
- Brake lights on the freeway.
- How Tim Horton’s restaurants get away with calling donut holes “TimBits.”
- Why there is an attraction to the coffee at Tim Horton’s
- Why people in smaller towns don’t support their local merchants and instead encourage chain stores to come to their area.
- How a woman can bitterly hate another woman she doesn’t even know because of how that other woman hit on a guy in a bar that she didn’t even want to hit on.
- Why Boston area sports fans feel so goddamn slighted and cursed all the time, even though they’ve had dozens of Celtics championships and a Patriots championship to rest on. Shouldn’t Cleveland have the biggest complaints?
- Why baseball doesn’t do something about the fact that 20-25 teams in the league cannot compete with the top 7-12 because of uncapped free agent spending.
- Why people think Linkin Park is a great band.
- Why Paris Hilton gets as much press as she does, even before “the video.”
- Why I can’t find another Hold ‘Em home game to take part in.
- Why some drugs and all prostitution isn’t legalized, regulated, and taxed up the yin-yang.
- Why I can bet on horses in Michigan, but I can’t bet on the Patriots to cover.
- Why I can order a martini on Sunday in a restaurant, but not a beer or glass of wine in my county.
- Why “The Sports Guy” doesn’t have his own show.
- Why there are so many reality shows about makeovers or renovation.
- Why MTV has a Music Video Awards show, but doesn’t even show complete videos during programming except for odd hours.
- Why Neil Diamond and Barbra Streisand have Xmas albums.
- Why women love Celine Dion and Bette Midler so much.
- How Star Jones hasn’t been caught in public eating fettucine alfredo at a buffet on all fours with her face buried in the chafing dish.
- Why Alan Trammell and Jack Morris aren’t in the Baseball Hall of Fame.
- Why I buy books like “Infinite Jest” or “A Remembrance of Things Past,” read 100 pages, get intimidated because I have 4500 pages left, and put them down for good.
- Why I haven’t won the lottery yet.
- How “Titanic” could have won the Oscar over “As Good As It Gets.”
- Why people go to Branson.
- Why people still love Elvis so much.
- Why there doesn’t seem to be that line anymore that distinguishes “corporal punishment” from “beating your kids.”
- Why only HBO seems capable of putting great original TV programs together nowadays.
- Why there isn’t a magic weight loss pill yet.
- Why a gambler can claim they’re “good at slots” with a straight face.
- Why every action movie trailer on TV features Limp Bizkit’s music.
- Why all marketing targeted to youth is either urbanized or extreme.

Of course, there’s plenty more I don’t understand. This is just a start.

Lottery tonight is $26M. A win, minus taxes and cash option reduction should yield $12.75M.

In a transparent attempt to strike some good karma, here are my promises, should I win the jackpot on my own tonight…

1) The poker blogger’s SNG game will take place, but in person, in Vegas. Yes, you’re all invited, and the plane ticket, rooms, and a little cash are on me.
2) I will set up a scholarship fund for my old high school in Utah. One kid every year will be chosen to receive two full years tuition. They must not be Mormon, can’t be related to Mormons, and must go out of state for school (it’s an “escape” plan).
3) I will add to the “scholarship fund” of some lucky young ladies out in Vegas, who will be hired to deal cards and serve drinks during the poker blogger’s SNG game.
4) I will make a futures bet on every team except the Lions, which will guarantee their 2005 Super Bowl victory.
5) I will spend a cold night visiting the homeless handing out blankets and hooch.

Let’s go charity! If you don’t hear from me in the next two weeks, I’m the guy in Michigan who won and am already in Vegas.

Working for the Weekend

Have you ever looked at your salary (assuming you’re not hourly) as a per/hour wage?

Basically, if I played poker for a living instead of going to work, my eight hour days would only have to yield an average of +4BB/hr (at the stakes I normally play) to exceed my salary. That is, of course, assuming I don’t declare any income on my taxes.

I could play +4BB/hr on Party for eight hours a day. Of that, I am confident.

But I’m not quitting my job just yet (well, or ever I imagine).

At least now I’ve got something more to look forward to on weekends.

As I mentioned in the comments widget below, the dinner date with the “I Kinda Met A Girl” girl (hereafter to be known as K) went really pretty well.

The Menu…

For dinner, I made my world famous lasagna. My lasagna features homemade red sauce (with only San Marzano tomatoes), beef (usually put sausage in, but she doesn’t eat sausage – ok, quit your chuckling…), ricotta cheese (whipped with egg to help it melt more creamy), mozzarella cheese (couldn’t find fresh, used Kraft), Asiago cheese, and real Parmagiano-Reggiano cheese. Oh, and fresh basil.

On the side, some canned green beans (I love canned green beans) and a loaf of half decent Italian bread.

We also knocked off two bottles of wine, the Mondavi La Famiglia California Barbera and the Carmenet Dynamite Cabernet.

She made a homemade turtle cheesecake, which was pretty darn good, for dessert.

The Evening…

Well, the day didn’t exactly start off well for me personally. I actually had to bring Frye the Dog into the Vet on Saturday morning, as he had eaten what I suspect was a cork on Friday night, and spent all night puking and having the runs all over the house. So I take him in and $50 later I walk out with a semi-tranquilized dog and a bottle of prescription doggie Pepto.

The one thing that Frye’s illness dictated was that we were going to be effectively anchored to the house all night, so dinner and a movie was definitely all at home that night.

I stopped at Blockbuster on the way home from the Vet and the store and grabbed “Annie Hall,” “Waiting for Guffman,” and two of the Beavis and Butthead video collections. Those last two were just for me. I figured “Annie Hall” was a good choice, as it’s one of the most thoroughly enjoyable romantic comedies out there, and “Guffman” I picked up on the off chance she hadn’t seen it (she had).

So I got home and got the lasagna noodles cooking on the stove. She gave me a call to see if there was anything else she should bring, such as a movie, and I told her I had both those movies. She had actually seen them both, and then I mentioned that I had “This is: Spinal Tap” on DVD as well (seeing as she liked “Guffman”), and she immediately rattled off a quote from the movie.

Yes, it was the “They all go to… eleven,” quote. But that’s still good for big old bonus points in my book.

She promised to bring some movies, and would be over a little later.

So I got back to the noodles (cooked very al dente, which got me a nice compliment from her, which scored her more bonus points for knowing not to eat soggy overcooked pasta), finished those, and made the sauce. I figured I’d save the rest of it for when she got there.

I also had a helluva cleanup from poker night the night before (don’t ask, I had sick dog distractions and shit for cards), so I had to get cracking on that too. By the time I had vacuumed everything, changed my bedding (it was smelly, so just in case), and wiped down the whole damn house, I was sweating pretty good with no time for a shower. Dammit. So I took a quick rag bath (sink + washcloth = semi-fresh feeling) found a clean t-shirt (I was cooking, lay off), and got back to my food.

She showed up about five looking pretty damn good. I was personally going for the carefree, not intentionally overdressed look (t-shirt and jeans, but I was cooking), and she came in with the wearing-jeans-but-still-looking-dressy look. She wore horizontal stripes on her blouse, which is flattering on any girl with a nice rack, and the blouse also featured a nice open squared neck, which prompted the following exchange after dinner:

BG: “I like your blouse, is that buckle functional or just decorative?”
K: “It’s just there for decoration. I love this blouse though, the neck shows off my collarbone.”
BG: “Would you say that’s your best feature, your collarbone? It’s really quite nice you know.”
K: “Thank you, but no, I’d have to say my eyes were my best feature.”
BG: (remembering what her name translates into from its original ethnicity) “Well, I’d have to agree there, my beautiful eyed lady of the meadowlands. I’m not really sure what my best feature would be. I’ve been told it’s my ass, but I can’t really see back that far you know.” (I was obviously joking around)
K: “Actually, I’d have to say it’s your smile. You have a nice smile, but you don’t use it enough.”
BG: “I’m very self-conscious about smiling. Everyone always tells me I don’t do it enough.”

So I thought that was a nice exchange. And the non-functional buckle didn’t look stupid on the blouse, by the way. And it wasn’t as if I was fishing for the compliment either.

Anyway, she came in and I poured her a glass of wine and had her help me in the kitchen get the lasagna stacked up in the pan. I put her to work whipping eggs, and saw her face sour a little bit when I pulled out the ricotta to add to the eggs. “I don’t really like ricotta, but I’ll live.”

Eesh. Lucky I didn’t make stuffed shells like I thought I might. That would have been freaking disastrous.

I did assure her that by mixing the eggs that it would be “melty and creamy and not at all clumpy,” and that she’d barely know it was there.

As dinner was cooking, she mentioned that she had a strange phone call from her mom that day. A girl she went to high school with was stabbed to death earlier this week in her hometown. It was one of those mixed emotions sorts of feelings, as this girl used to pick on her mercilessly, and it wasn’t as if they were ever close. Oddly, I had heard about this murder from the news, as it had enough of a twist to it to be a pretty wild piece of news from earlier in the week. So that sparked a good conversation about high school. Of course, it’s still strange to me that I’m over ten years out of high school, and she’s only five or so past.

But that’s the only time I’ve really felt old with her at all. She, like myself, has always gotten the comment that she acts far older than she really is. I think in that respect, we click pretty well. She’s six years my junior, but it really doesn’t feel like it.

When dinner finished, we sat down and continued to talk. I mentioned to her that she ought to know that the book exchange I engineered long ago was a sham:

BG: “Can I be honest here? You are aware that the ‘book exchange’ was simply a flimsy excuse to ask you out, right?”
K: “Yeah, and I’m sorry about that.”
BG: “About bringing your boyfriend to our date?”
K: “Yeah, that was bad. But he and I have been broken up for a little while, I found your book, figured you’d want it back, and thought you might take the opportunity to ask me out again.”

Which I did.

I was a little worried she didn’t really like the lasagna, as ten or fifteen minutes into the dinner it only looked like she had poked around lightly at it on her plate. But sometime over the next ten minutes I looked up, looked back down, and she was swabbing her plate absolutely clean with a piece of bread.

BG: “You know, if you want to pick the plate up and lick it clean, that’s OK by me.”
K: “Oh, you’d like that wouldn’t you.”
BG: (facetiously dreamy) “More than you could ever imagine.”

That really impressed me, actually. A girl that isn’t afraid to eat her food. Not bad.

I let her pick the movie, and she selected “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil,” which I found to be a little too long winded. I think that’s a hallmark of Clint Eastwood’s directorial efforts. For example, what’s with the pointless relationship between Cusack and Allison Eastwood’s characters? Nothing ever really happens because of it. And the cross-dressing Ms. LaMore? It was completely pointless to have that character in the movie. Did we need to see the cotillion scene? Was it important to have the friend of the dead Jude Law testifying at the trial? No and no. Just like “Bird,” Eastwood just doesn’t seem to know he can take the movie to an editor to trim five minutes here and there.

All we did was watch the movie and talk a little. Which was cool. Although it’s always fun to have that sort of “dry humping on the couch like we were 14 again” type of mentality, this is working out quite nicely so far.

On her way out the door to go home, she mentioned she didn’t have a TV to watch the Colts game on Sunday (her dad lives in Indy, she goes way back with the Colts), so I offhandedly extended an invite to come back if she wanted, no big deal, I’d just be on the couch watching the game anyway.

I did get a kiss on the cheek on the way out the door.

Sure enough, she takes me up on the invite and came over shortly after halftime. We watched the rest of the game, had a little late lunch (she had made red sauce the day before as well, hers is more of a smoky, peppery brand. Mine’s a tomato basil. She brought hers over), and played a couple games of cards.

Then, I decided we had to get out of the house for fear of her thinking that’s all I do all day long (i.e. – learning the truth). So I took her to go see Michelangelo’s Pieta sculpture. It’s actually quite neat that the local Catholic Church has one of only four life-sized castings in the world of this extremely famous sculpture. And it’s the first time either of us had gone up close to see it. I did hit the Virgin Mary with a lightly tossed snowball, earning stern admonishment from K, so I apologized and pled for forgiveness. After all, if you’re going to appeal to someone for forgiveness, the Virgin Mary has got to be the President of that division, right (with God as Chairman of the Board, Jesus as CEO I’m sure)?

We then went out for a beer and decided to go catch “Paycheck” playing at the theatre. Not a terrible movie, but had a lot less cool action than your average John Woo movie.

I took her back to her car and managed to upgrade the kiss on the cheek to a short one on the lips.

I figure that at this rate I’ll get laid by October.

Anyway, things are moving along nicely. I’m not getting ahead of myself here, but will give you a top ten list (in no order) of things I already like about this girl.

1) Doesn’t come from money – not that I’d like her less if she did, but it’s nice to know there’s no pressure to play myself off as some sort of high roller with fancy dinners, gifts, and such.
2) Acts older than she is – combine that I’m not a lampshade-on-the-head drunken maniac with the fact that I’m six years older than she is, and that could have been problematic for hanging out and/or conversation. So far, it hasn’t been.
3) Is great with children – no, I’m not thinking about marriage and having kids with her or anything. What I am saying is that she’s so good around kids that it makes you notice and scores her bonus points. Just general bonus points.
4) Is generally happy pursuing her chosen field – early childhood education agrees with her. She likes what she’s doing.
5) Wasn’t intimidated to have a discussion with me about the book I let her borrow – and wasn’t afraid to be critical of the book and challenge me a little in the discussion. Not to say I’m some sort of genius or anything, but I’m opinionated and can make a good point if challenged. Sometimes people just want to not be controversial. Wasn’t a problem for her.
6) Knew the lyrics to Cream’s “SWLABR” – what other 23 year old girl can sing along with a little known Cream song like that? Nice… By the way, after hearing my gripe about my friend Dan never letting me sing the Jack Bruce part on “Sunshine of Your Love” (I was always relegated to the Clapton part), she offered that next time it was on that I could sing the Bruce part and she’d sing the Clapton part.
7) Has paid me nice compliments on my cooking, smiling, and acting – that’s always nice.
8) Seems comfortable in her own skin – this summer while doing the play she stripped off her shirt to put on her costume, ending up for a few moments just in her bra (well, and pants), and didn’t seem like she had to hide anything with a bunch of guys around. Big difference from my ex-wife, who hated being seen naked/close.
9) Seems comfortable with who she is – look, the girl has basically flat-out stuffed her face all three times we’ve been together. And that doesn’t bother me at all. One thing that made me smile was that we had almost all our popcorn gone before the movie started, which she remarked on. You half expect the girl to lightly graze the bag and eat very, very little. Not this girl. That was 75% her doing. And she didn’t care. I like that.
10) We have good conversation chemistry – at bare minimum, we can talk to each other. I was a little worried about “how I’d do” in that respect, as I really can’t exaggerate enough how much of a hermit I have been over the last three years or so. I didn’t know if I’d remember how to have a good conversation. It hasn’t been a problem at all so far.

Look, I’m not going to get ahead of myself here. Really, the only thing I’m at all concerned about is if the chemistry is right. But that’ll settle itself out eventually. For now? I’m just having fun.

Alright, so I’ll talk a little bit about my gambling for the weekend.

Friday night was home game poker night. And somehow, someway, Dan was catching cards. Unreal cards. Well, the boy knows how to stay in on a draw, that’s for sure. He’s the worst player at the table, but ended up knocking the first three players out, tripling up within the first hour.

One of which was me.

Which worked out fine, all things considered. I couldn’t have played another 90 minutes because of my dog’s puking and his runs drawing my attention. I actually played in the second game we got started (while the first one was still going), built up a nice chip lead, and then just gave away my chips so I could go take care of my dog (and all the stains on the carpet he wrought).

So, between $20 wasted on the home game, and $50 in distracted PartyPoker play (I should know better than to play when I’m mad or know I’m not going to play disciplined), I lost $70 on Friday night.

I did hop on Party on Sunday, waited nearly fifteen minutes for a table, and then got on for FIVE FUCKING HANDS before I got pulled off the computer for twenty minutes. I got back on, took another ten minutes to get seated, and got in another SEVEN FUCKING HANDS before I got pulled off again. Pissed me right off. I think I was up $1. Woo freaking hoo.

I’m not even going to try to gloss on about how I got bad cards all weekend or how I didn’t deserve to lose. Frankly, I did deserve to lose. Any time I sit down at a table and am not thinking about poker, I deserve to lose. I don’t play well, I make bullshit “gambler” moves (instead of smart card player moves), and tilt off on the “I don’t give a shit, here’s a raise of 500” mentality.

And then I make the mistake of busting out in 50 minutes and playing PartyPoker for 40 minutes ($2/$4) and go down 13BB in that period. Because I’m stupid.

So that’s that. I erased a portion of my gambling success this weekend, and can partially blame it on my dog. Not entirely, but partially. Damn dog!

random thoughts and thoroughbred selections: "Here's my picks and predictions for the NFL Playoff games happening this weekend:

SATURDAY

Carolina @ St. Louis -
This is a game that could finish 17-14, or it could end 38-10. I think of all the games this one will be the hardest to predict.

St. Louis looked horrible in their season-ending loss to Detroit. If the Lions' front seven can demolish the Ram line, what's going to happen when Rucker, Peppers, and company step on the field? Lucky for St. Louis, they're a team that is capable of making a mistake or two and still hanging 35+ on the board. But will the clock munching running game of the Panthers allow St. Louis enough chances to put the points they'll need on the board?

I don't like Carolina because of a suspect secondary and an inexperienced QB playing on the road. I don't like the Rams because I think Marc Bulger will spend quite a few second and third downs picking himself up off the turf.

I do like that Carolina appeared to cruise easily in their first round playoff game, and played about as perfectly as they could have. They're going to be on a positive momentum swing stepping into the Edward Jones Dome. Look for the Rams to try to take the wind out of their sails early. If the Rams can put up a TD on their first possession, they'll have this game won.

If not, look for Carolina to squeak one out, further indicting Mike Martz as more of a riverboat gambler and less of a coach. CAROLINA 20 - ST. LOUIS 17. Carolina benefits from at least three Ram turnovers."

Wow, how smart do I look this morning for this pick? No early Ram TD, three St. Louis turnovers, and a close game that Carolina wins.

How do you give Marshall Faulk only 19 carries in one of the longest playoff games in NFL history?