Cops and Robbers

Finally! Something to write about! Unfortunately, the topic is a total cockchugger: the shutdown of my poker club.

Last week, another club on the east side of town was robbed. My immediate reaction: "Fuck." The reaction of the management and security at my club: *shrug* - and instead of tightening things up and laying low, they let in all the doucheballs from the other club!

Now, for some reason, when the other club got robbed, all people were concerned about was beefing up front door security. I had a different concern: the COPS! When a NYC talking head is spewing quotes like:

"I told the NYPD about the existence of this illegal gambling hall weeks ago . . . We're lucky that no one was hurt, but a bust could have prevented this dangerous armed robbery from happening. At least now this den of inequity (SIC) is closed for good"

It doesn't take a fucking CSI to figure out that the cops are going to have to do something to save face. Now, the cops clearly know about the club, and the club KNOWS that the cops know about the club, so they apparently made the level two thinking error of assuming they would be ok. How wrong. When I woke up Friday morning at 3:45am to see my cell phone flashing, and found a one word text from the Vortex: "Raided" - I knew our berry patch had been uprooted.

Since Channel 11 news was on the scene, turning it into a ridiculous, sensationalized story, I can't imagine this will be a case of "oh - we'll be open by Monday."

So, now I'll have to find another way to get my poker fix - like surfing the 2+2 message boards for ridiculous topics like this thread with a bold claim by David Sklanksy. I'm blatantly misquoting and oversimplifying, but Sklansky's basic thesis is that no one who is a certified Jesus Freak can beat him in a math test, because Jesus Freaks, are, by definition, not smart. Great stuff.

In more interesting poker discussion, Brian "SbRugby" Townsend made a recent post on his blog about a very important, very situation specific topic.

"An example of this would be if you were playing someone HU and raised preflop. The flop came down Kh Qh 2c you hold A8o and bet the pot and are called. The turn brings the 5 of clubs and your opponent checks and you check. The river brings another five and your opponent bets pot. Many players would say "I have ace high I fold" and if they held QJo instead they might say "I have middle pair I call." But the best players realize that these two hands have the same value on the river as an opponent value betting a queen is unlikely. I feel mediocre players would be more likely to call with the queen and top players would call equally with both hands. This is one of the little things that I look for when I am up against a new opponent, and to be honest very very few players call with QJ as often at A8 in that scenario, probably myself included, but the truly great ones call equally with both hands."

A key concept articulated by one of the games fastest rising young gunners.

In non-poker news, Mrs. Dynamite and I cooked some good stuff this week, including roasted vegetable meatloaf with potato and corn salad.

In even more important news, Oscar finally made his first visit to a hospital as a therapy dog! After passing the therapy dog test, we had to make it through all of the red tape at St. Vincent's, but both Mrs. Dynamite and I, as well as Oscar, are now fully registered as volunteers. Oscar even has an ID badge:

until next time,
KD