by john | Dec 26, 2010 | Uncategorized
Because it was all supposed to be pretty smooth. My sister Bonnie had been dropped off at her daughter’s place, Suzy and I had exchanged gifts (she got me a treadmill and a recumbent bike, so hopefully there will be less of me to love in 2010), and Suzy was off to get a pedicure Friday morning while I was chilling in the recliner watching Netflix with a cat in my lap.
Then, as so often happens, the phone rang and it went all pear-shaped.
My sister’s ringtone is Dierks Bentley’ cover of the Bob Dylan tune “Senor,” so when she called I answered with lyrics – “Where we headed? Lincoln County Road or Armageddon?” When she answered, I knew it was bad. Her voice was shaking, and she said, “it is Armageddon. Tommy’s house is on fire.”
My brother’s house went from a home to a pile of rubble in the time it took for him to go finish his Christmas shopping. We believe the problem started in the wiring, but no one is really sure. What we are sure of is that on Christmas Eve everything he and his wife owned, including their two incredibly loving Jack Russel Terriers, went up in smoke.
So I packed two suitcases, one full of clothes that are two small for me so that Tom would have something to wear, and another full of my clothes and toiletries in case I needed to stay down there for the weekend. I got in touch with Suzy, and we decided that she would follow me later, and I hit the road.
I grew up a volunteer firefighter, and the smell of a house fire is something you never forget. It’s a mix of wood, plastic and dreams, all mixed in with cold air and tears. I was only seven when my older brother Bob’s house burned 30 years ago, so I don’t remember much about that time, but this was fresh. I spent a ton of time in that house as a kid, playing Nintendo with my nephew or even a little babysitting for Tom’s kids. So it was a devastating loss for the whole family, especially given the crappy timing.
The rest of the day was a lesson in small-town caring. The community came out in droves before the coals were even cold, bringing food, clothing and money to my parents’ house. The love and compassion shown by that community of working-class people blew me away and brought tears to my eyes and those of my entire family.
Tom and his wife Sherry are now settled into my parents’ guest room for the time being while they fight over insurance and work hard to rebuild their lives. There are things lost that are irreplaceable like Sherry’s parents’ wedding bands and all her photos of her deceased mother, their poor dogs, and all of their keepsakes and memories. Clothes have pretty much been replaced with everything that has come in, but the sheer volume of stuff that it’s going to take to get their place rebuilt and refurnished is astounding. Even with insurance, it won’t cover everything. It might cover the note on the house, and maybe some of the contents, but it’s doubtful that they can get everything rebuilt and refurnished with what insurance will pay out.
That’s why I’m writing this. Time and again, my community of invisible internet friends has chipped in to help someone in need, and this time it’s my family. I’m putting a paypal button here on the page so that people can donate to help out. This goes to my account for now, but I will be setting up a special account for them as soon as I get all the details like internet access for Sherry set up, since my parents don’t have internet and her computer is now a pile of melted plastic. So if Santa left a little something in your stocking this year, please chip in and help out my brother, who got left a lump of coal where his home used to be.
And thanks.
by john | Dec 15, 2010 | Poker, Travel, Vegas
This will be a multi-part trip report, spread out over several posts, over several days. Don’t get all impatient when I get sidetracked by – Oh look, squirrel! – and it might take me a while to get back to it, but all the stories I remember will be told eventually. Let’s start at the beginning.
My flight sucked.
Let’s be really clear, here. My flight suuuuccccckkkkkeeeedddddd. I t was crowded, hot, bouncy, and I was uncomfortable for most of the four and a half hours. It’s times like that when I’m supremely jealous of friends like Special K, who get upgraded all the time. Then I think about how much time they have to spend in airplanes to get said upgrades, and I get less jealous. So I got there, and headed to the MGM to crash for a couple of hours before I kicked it into high gear in the evening.
And kick it into high gear I did. The IP is where they’ll stick the hose if they ever give Las Vegas an enema, but for some reason we all congregate there at the Geisha Bar every year to drink like college kids. Since our visits typically coincide with the National Finals Rodeo, there are pretty good drink specials going on around town. So I end up taking extreme advantage of said drink specials, and doing myself grievous bodily harm. Last year I started a tradition, a particularly unhealthy tradition, of drinking cheap beer out of buckets until I pass the blood alcohol content of an Irishman at a Dropkick Murphys concert. So I did.
Then I made my mistake – I decided to play poker. Now I’ve played a lot of cards at the IP over the years, a lot of it with bloggers. But little if any was played when I was as obliterated as I was Thursday night. I bought in for the table minimum ($60) for the first orbit, and blew that away pretty quickly. Then I reloaded for $300, the table max, and tried to play reasonably while also trying to remain upright in my chair. Neither of these things proved easy. But I managed for a little while, and after I’d bled through around a hundred bucks, I decided to get up and join the 8PM tournament as a late entrant.
This is my new strategy for tournaments in Vegas – never play the first level of blinds. Every tourney allows registration for at least two levels after the event begins, and some allow it for up to four levels. And the only saying about not being able to win a tournament in the first level, but being able to lose it then is certainly true. As long as I can come in with a reasonable stack relative to the blinds in level two or three, I’m going to skip the first couple of levels every time. This strategy has proved solid for me a couple of times at the Venetian, and also paid off last Friday at Aria. It didn’t really help at the IP, because although I doubled up on the first hand (of which I recall zero details as I was on pitcher #4 of 7 at that point), I ran into aces with ATo at the final table and resumed my drinking.
Somehow a couple of hours later I found myself back at the IP poker room, seated at a table that included CaityCaity and some other folks that I recognized and am sure were more than happy to relieve me of my money but whom I don’t remember. Apparently at some point there were a lot of people warned and/or tossed from the poker room, but I missed all of that. I may have taken a nap or two between hands. Really, that was napping. I swear it. I left that table because I fear CaityCaity’s poker drunk or sober, and went to sit next to PokerGnome. This was not my best move, because even though I had position on him, the Gnome can also outplay me when I’m sober, much less biblically inebriated. But somehow I managed to triple up at that table, I think at the expense of the civilians to my left, because I’m a drunken out-of-position ninja. Or because I was too drunk to fold. One of those.
I did find myself playing second pair a lot stronger when drunk than I have been sober, which was something I specifically wanted to work on this trip. The playing second pair thing, not the drunk thing. The drunk thing was a given. I’ve been playing second pair like a nutless wonder, folding to obvious c-bets, but after pitcher #6, that didn’t happen. Of course, after pitcher #7, I have no idea what happened. But I did manage to cash out a small profit (if my recollection of only buying in for a hundy is correct), and staggered off to bed around 4:30 in the morning. I made it back to the MGM and did something I haven’t done since college – not puke, but I fell asleep with my contacts in, which led to all sorts of festivities on Friday morning and a huge pile of grateful to the fact that I always travel with a spare set of contacts.
End of Day 1 – down around $200 in poker, probably another $200 in food, booze and cabs.
Still to come – my annual donation in mixed games, tournament silliness, bounties galore, and Full Tilt Food!
by john | Dec 7, 2010 | Real Life
There are a lot of preparations going on around the Casa de Hartness this week. Not only am I getting ready to head off to Vegas to play poker and drink like a college kid with some of my best friends (most of whom I see once a year if I’m lucky), but we’re also getting ready for a houseguest.
An invalid houseguest.
While I’m gone.
And it’s my sister.
If there was any question about the sainthood of my wife, it goes away when I tell you that for the second time in three months, my sister is staying with us after she has hip replacement surgery. She had the first hip done a little over two months ago, and now that the first leg is healed enough, it’s time to get the second one done.
Tomorrow.
So I’m picking her up tonight and she’ll spend tonight at our house, and Suzy will take her to the hospital tomorrow morning in the predawn frost. I’ll go off to work like normal, stop by and visit her tomorrow night, and then Thursday I’ll head west for my annual weekend of ridiculousness. I expect Bonnie will get home Friday, and if it’s anything like the last time, my wife will play nursemaid for the week while I cavort in Vegas and then come home and work just like nothing’s out of the ordinary. Because she does that. Suzy’s got the caregiver gene that I am apparently totally missing, and she takes such great care of anyone who’s sick, be it her relative or mine.
So I might need advice from a couple of my girly friends this weekend on a suitable gift to bring home, don’t ya think?
by john | Dec 6, 2010 | Travel
From the Great White North, although it wasn’t really white, in the sense that there was no snow, but it was cold in New York City this weekend. Suzy and I went up for our anniversary, just a quick Friday-Sunday jaunt, and had a great time. We spent time wandering around Rockefeller Center looking at all the decorations there, then checked out some of the 5th Ave. store window decorations, like the killer windows at Saks, then I took her shopping at Mood Fabrics on Saturday (she’s a Project Runway junkie, so this stop was a must), and I got to pop into Midtown Comics on the way back to the hotel.
Saturday night we saw American Idiot at the St. James, and it was a great show. Except for the seats. Let’s face it, I’m a big guy. I know I’m overweight, but I should still be able to fit into a seat in most places. But the older Broadway theatres are built for midgets! I literally had to sit almost completely sideways in my chair with my legs out in the aisle, because there was no way I was going to fit comfortably facing completely forward. This of course led to a sore neck by the time the show was over. But the show was very good, I highly recommend it to both fans of Green Day and of high-tech shows, because this was certainly a technical bonanza. If you’re looking for deep plot, go elsewhere. We both felt that there were several cliched moments in the show, but that the strength of the popular songs and the incredible lighting covered for it. On a purely lighting geek side, now I see what the new VLX fixtures can really do, and I was blown away by the intensity.
Then we went right next door to Angus McIndoe for a nice post-meal dinner, and I’m pretty sure it was the most reasonably priced, well-prepared, well-served meal we had all weekend. The service was excellent, the food was great, the atmosphere was wonderful. I highly recommend it for a quick bite after the show. We got out for under a hundred bucks, in a restaurant in the heart of the theatre district, so you know you can’t beat that. And we each had a drink with our dinner! Very reasonable prices and great food.
Here are a few photos from the trip –
Rockefeller Center
View from our hotel window – gotta love travelling on Marriott Rewards points! Two nights in the heart of Times Square for free!
The Mood Fabrics shop dog – Swatch
Suzy in front of the big tree
Me in Times Square with the World’s Greatest Hat
