I forgot to mention Mrs. Dynamite's vicious Monopoly wheeling and dealing last week when we went home to her parents' house for the weekend: In a family game of Monopoly, the seemingly innocent Mrs. Dynamite showed that she learned some real world cut-throat business sense in b-school after all, when she snapped up Boardwalk and Park Place. The real coup was the way she traded off pieces of the future revenue from the two properties (ie, you get 15% of all Boardwalk and Park Place revenues, and I don't have to pay any rent at any of your Orange properties) to each of her opponents. By the time all was said and done, Mrs. Dynamite had traded away 95% of the revenues of Boardwalk and Park Place, which she promptly mortgaged, as she counted all the I.O.U's she had accumulated in exchange, and laughed until she almost threw up. I was so proud.
In more serious news, Red Auerbach died last night. Red was the driving force behind the history of the Boston Celtics - leading the indominable Dynasty in the 1960's, before moving to the front office and building the legendary Larry Bird teams of the 1980's. The image of Red with a cigar in his mouth is a staple in Boston sports.
Switching gears again: Watching Joe Hachem on the weekly ESPN WSOP broadcasts makes me admire how hard it is to be a professional poker player. Joe was the defending world champion, and is probably not hurting for cash, but the beats he takes in huge situations drive home the point of the mental toughness that is constantly being tested.
In the Main Event, Hachem got a decent sized stack in three ways preflop, holding AA vs JJ and AQ... With a great chance to triple up deep into the tournament and contend with the chipleaders, Hachem was dismayed to see a jack hit the board, and had to hit the exits. Before that, at a $10k WSOP circuit event, he took another tough beat at a final table, when his KK was sucked out on by Kido Pham's J-T, after they got all the money in preflop and Kido spiked two jacks on the flop. Against Dutch Boyd heads up for a bracelet this year, Dutch was reduced to moving all in virtually every hand, and although Hachem repeatedly got his money in as a 2-1 and 3-1 favorite, Dutch eventually got lucky and sent him home by spiking a 3 outer on the river.
This week, Hachem was down to the final three again, and was sent home by Gentleman John "Let's Hug It Out Bitch" Gale, who, despite Hachem telling him "I've got you beat, John, don't call" called Hachem's al-in as a 6-1 dog (getting roughly 3.5-1 pot odds, showing a seeming lack of understanding of pot odds, as he uttered "I'm sorry Joe, the pot is too big") and spiked a 5 outer on the river to send Hachem packing again.
Knowing he's in the spotlight, Hachem takes the beats as well as he can on camera, but if you think he just walks off the set and smiles, saying "Fuck it, I'm a World Champion, I don't care," well, then, you've never player poker and had these beats grind you down.
Finally, Mrs. Dynamite and I cooked last night: we made a wicked sweet meal (all from scratch) of:
-grilled chicken and rotini pasta with mozzarella ball and homemade pesto
-grilled eggplant, zucchini and portobello mushroom
-bruschetta on baguette toast
-pecan pie!
In the grocery store, I was looking for a "9 inch pie crust," but they didn't have sizes printed on them. As I held one up in front of my hammer, a passing lady in Juicy sweats eyed me, "What are you doing?"
"I need a 9 inch pie crust," I grinned nonchalantly. "Does this look about right?" as I glanced southward.
Instead of smiling seductively and licking her lips, she made a look like she had just thrown up in her mouth, and seemed to be looking around for a can of mace. Oh well - can't win 'em all. ***
The meal was just warmup for our second annual Thanksgiving Heads Up Gourmet Bash which will be coming in a few weeks.
until next time,
KD
*** Pie crust story is completely fabricated, unfortunately. The pie, however, was real, and spectacular.
In more serious news, Red Auerbach died last night. Red was the driving force behind the history of the Boston Celtics - leading the indominable Dynasty in the 1960's, before moving to the front office and building the legendary Larry Bird teams of the 1980's. The image of Red with a cigar in his mouth is a staple in Boston sports.
Switching gears again: Watching Joe Hachem on the weekly ESPN WSOP broadcasts makes me admire how hard it is to be a professional poker player. Joe was the defending world champion, and is probably not hurting for cash, but the beats he takes in huge situations drive home the point of the mental toughness that is constantly being tested.
In the Main Event, Hachem got a decent sized stack in three ways preflop, holding AA vs JJ and AQ... With a great chance to triple up deep into the tournament and contend with the chipleaders, Hachem was dismayed to see a jack hit the board, and had to hit the exits. Before that, at a $10k WSOP circuit event, he took another tough beat at a final table, when his KK was sucked out on by Kido Pham's J-T, after they got all the money in preflop and Kido spiked two jacks on the flop. Against Dutch Boyd heads up for a bracelet this year, Dutch was reduced to moving all in virtually every hand, and although Hachem repeatedly got his money in as a 2-1 and 3-1 favorite, Dutch eventually got lucky and sent him home by spiking a 3 outer on the river.
This week, Hachem was down to the final three again, and was sent home by Gentleman John "Let's Hug It Out Bitch" Gale, who, despite Hachem telling him "I've got you beat, John, don't call" called Hachem's al-in as a 6-1 dog (getting roughly 3.5-1 pot odds, showing a seeming lack of understanding of pot odds, as he uttered "I'm sorry Joe, the pot is too big") and spiked a 5 outer on the river to send Hachem packing again.
Knowing he's in the spotlight, Hachem takes the beats as well as he can on camera, but if you think he just walks off the set and smiles, saying "Fuck it, I'm a World Champion, I don't care," well, then, you've never player poker and had these beats grind you down.
Finally, Mrs. Dynamite and I cooked last night: we made a wicked sweet meal (all from scratch) of:
-grilled chicken and rotini pasta with mozzarella ball and homemade pesto
-grilled eggplant, zucchini and portobello mushroom
-bruschetta on baguette toast
-pecan pie!
In the grocery store, I was looking for a "9 inch pie crust," but they didn't have sizes printed on them. As I held one up in front of my hammer, a passing lady in Juicy sweats eyed me, "What are you doing?"
"I need a 9 inch pie crust," I grinned nonchalantly. "Does this look about right?" as I glanced southward.
Instead of smiling seductively and licking her lips, she made a look like she had just thrown up in her mouth, and seemed to be looking around for a can of mace. Oh well - can't win 'em all. ***
The meal was just warmup for our second annual Thanksgiving Heads Up Gourmet Bash which will be coming in a few weeks.
until next time,
KD
*** Pie crust story is completely fabricated, unfortunately. The pie, however, was real, and spectacular.
2 comments:
Well played on the pie crust story.
Top notch!
Well what else can I say? :-) Congratulations anyway!
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