Hella Hold'em

If anybody needs a quick and easy dessert to bring with to Thanksgiving dinner, here it is! It might just be my favorite part of the holidays.

Frozen Peanut Butter Pie

* 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese
* 1 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar
* 1 cup peanut butter
* 1 cup milk
* 1 (16 ounce) package frozen whipped topping, thawed
* 2 (9 inch) prepared graham cracker crusts

1. Beat together cream cheese and confectioners' sugar. Mix in peanut butter and milk. Beat until smooth. Fold in whipped topping.
2. Spoon into two 9 inch graham cracker pie shells; cover, and freeze until firm.

The state of being too tired to do anything substantial but the time too early to go to bed without feeling like dinosaur... that's me, right now. So I'm playing a single table sit n' go on Full Tilt and chatting with you!

Well, not chatting, so much, as talking at you. Well, not talking, so much, as typing at you.

Anyway.

So, how many of you have turned on your outdoor Christmas lights? I admit, I'm one of those people that has occasionally turned them on the weekend before Thanksgiving (this weekend). But this year, I have refrained. I did hang the lights 2 weeks ago (because the weather was lovely), but I have not turned them on yet. And I just might hold out until after Thanksgiving, despite quite a few neighbors beating me to it this weekend.

Wow, I'm so exhaustedly restless that I almost just played K3 of spades in early position. hahahaha!!!!

I don't believe I blogged about the Trojan Wars game. What can I say - I'm not fan of rebuys, even when I make it through without having to rebuy. I went out 7th or 8th or something like that (out of 26 or 27 or something like that). Top 4 spots were slated to pay, and the top 5 ended up chopping. As per usual, Ryan put on an excellent game, and as per usual, I didn't take home any pie. (Then I gave away the rest of my money limping into pots and folding in the cash game). I do wish I'd brought my notepad - there was some insanity going on (and, Ed folded a CLASSIC quadruple-up all-in rebuy hand! I think hell froze over that night). Ryan mentioned the possibility of hosting a non-rebuy game in the spring, and I will look forward to that gleefully (as it will probably be the next live poker I play).

What about Vegas? I dunno. I lost half of the incentive to get my butt out there when my presence was no longer vital for room-sharing purposes, and the lure of buying a set of studio strobes for my burgeoning photography work is currently winning out in the desire category. Sure, I'd love to see everybody, as it has been way too long, and I'd love to play hours on end of poker, but... well, I'm not ruling it out, but I'm jonesing for a set of studio strobes pretty bad.

On a totally unrelated note, don't you hate it when you realize that someone in your life is a lot more important to you than you are to them? Damn it, anyway.

Oooh, pocket 10's! Raise and take it. Not a bad outcome.

Then give it all away with suited connectors on that, "Aww, what the hell..." attitude with a gutshot. LOL!

Then double up by flopping a straight after pushing all in and seeing I was totally dominated!

Wow, the poker action is flying around here. Well alrighty then, I'll chill out, since I'm back at the same chip count as when I started that fiasco. Hopefully somebody noted that I'm a donkey that'll chase anything, and it'll pay off for me later.

Who am I kidding? Nobody actually pays attention at this level.

Back to the Christmas thing. I spent the weekend in Frankenmuth, Michigan. Just an overnighter trip... fun place if you like Christmas. (I do, generally speaking). I managed to finish a research paper on photographer Richard Avedon in the car on the way home (thank goodness for mobile broadband, yay Sprint!) But back to Frankenmuth - check it out if you like Christmas. The Bronner's Christmas store was pretty cool, and the little main street area was nice. Lots of neat little shops. We stayed at the Bavarian Inn Lodge, which - while a bit theme-y - was quite nice too. I just wish we'd have had time to partake in the indoor miniature golfing.

Do I play too many suited connectors and one-gappers? Probably.

Since I upgraded to Snow Leopard, my version of Poker Copilot doesn't work anymore. I have to upgrade to the new version of that software for it to work with Snow Leopard, and I haven't gotten around to that. So who knows what my stats are.

Damn you, push-or-fold mode.

Well, that didn't work out so well, even with the nut flush draw. Nice typing at you all, though! :)

Riddle me this:

So, while the US passed health care reform tonight, I'm celebrating with a SnG on Full Tilt. I wanted to play one of my favorites... the 90 player turbo deep stack knock-out SnG, but that's a little too much commitment for this sleepyhead.

Several people have inquired if I'm going to Vegas this December for the bi-annual blogger tourney. I was planning to go, but recent developments have me thinking I might want to sink the grand I'd like drop in Vegas on a set of photography studio strobes instead. I haven't decided yet (and if I come across a flight under $250, I could be swayed in that direction), but making money from my new passion (photography) seems more of a +EV proposition than my old passion (poker), which tends to be -EV.

That said, I really need a vacation. I wish I would have had the cash on hand to drop on Dave Matthews tickets when they went on presale to the Warehouse fan club. That would have guaranteed my trip. (He's playing with Tim Reynolds the same weekend as the blogger tourney, and in all of the 32 Dave/Dave Matthews Band shows I've seen, none have been of the Dave & Tim variety. I'd really love to see a D&T show.

There we go. First hand VPIP, first hand won.

I forgot how many all-in scoobies play at this hour.

I've finally had some time to play Ultima Online lately. The Halloween quest is pissing me off. I've run it 32 times and I cannot for the life of me get the dream wraith costume reward. Grr.

I went to Starved Rock State Park today in Utica, IL. Beautiful place. We had some unseasonably warm weather here in Chicago today - topped out near 70. Probably the last nice weekend of 2009... and the last nice weekend for many months. The only saving grace I see to look forward to is that the Farmer's Almanac is predicting less snow than usual this year, and after being bombarded the last 2 winters, I'll take it. I hate the cold, too, but in these parts, the world doesn't stop when there's a foot of snow on the ground. It's business as usual - just with a much longer commute.

So, back to Starved Rock - took some pictures. They're up on my Flickr:
Starved Rock Nov 2009

Had some Photoshop fun with one of them - I love it. Feels like it's all tripped out in the 70's:



No, I cannot call a 4xBB PFR with QTo.

Good thing I only played a single table SnG. I'm getting antsy already.

Not much else exciting in my world. Guess I'll talk photography while I blind out of this damn SnG. I'm pretty certain (like 91%) that I'm going to end up going with a set of Alien Bees lights. All of the feedback I've read and heard from people has indicated that they're good lights at a reasonable price, with great customer support. And, they're made in the USA, which to me is a good thing.

Wow, guess you guys really don't want to hear photography talk. The world has saved you - I'm out of the SnG. :P

Ahh well. Scratched that itch. Time to go read a little bit more about the physics of light, and pass out. :)