Programming

After rereading Stephen Nealson's awesome tech-thriller Cryptonomicon, I've been inspired to pick up programming again. I've started to touch up and publish my notes and exercises from the book C Progamming Language (the original intent of this site), which you can read here. I have a lot of catching up to do with the whole tech scene(four years in the real world is about 200 in the tech world), but I have a bunch of free time, so why not.

It has been beastly hot out lately, so I've been forced to do all my golfing in the morning. This has required that I abandon my former sleep schedule which found me rolling out of bed at the ass crack of noon, and passing out around 5 a.m. I find it amusing that golf has been able to motivate me to do this, while school never could. But as I see it, truth is eternal, while golf (at the moment) exists only from 7-12 a.m. So there.

At last!

A good movie! Batman Begins rocks. Fairly clever writing and dialogue, good acting, good action. Christian Bayle is hot. This Batman bucks the traditional style set by Tim Burton and goes for a more realistic feel instead of campy comic book style, which really helps to throw off the bad taste in my mouth from the last few Batman movies. The psychology and origins of Batman are developed and revealed intelligently, and constitute the majority of the movie. The final conflict in the end is fun, but the concept behind it is Really Stupid. **spoiler warning**

Apparently, when every society reaches a peak of decadence and decay, a secret society known as.. drum roll.. the Shadow Society (!) comes along and destroys said culture. The fall of Rome? The SS. Apparently Gotham has reached the point where the death of every citizen serves a greater good than letting the government and police be run by corrupt officials. Said society, after this amazing value judgment, proceeds to spend the next century infilitrating the political infrastructure of Gotham to effect said jugment. After a precipitous stock market crash, their first attempt is foiled by none other than Daddy Wayne. We all know what happens to him. So who will stop their latest attempt? The Bat Man! This is one of the silliest plot threads I've ever seen. A secret society devoted to fighting evil and corruption goes about destroying entire societies. Right. When they could just as easily kill/remove/reform the people who are contributing to decay of the city, given their near limitless amount of time and resources. It's kind of sad that the rest of the movie seems to well thought-out, and then to have this festering lump of dog shit sitting in the proverbial plot corner.

I seen him!

(Group) Hi Thurgood.
(Thurgood) Hi. I'm here today because I'm addicted...to marijuana.
(Addict) You in here for marijuana? Marijuana? Man, this is some bullshit!
(Bob Saget) Marijuana is not a drug! I used to suck dick for coke!
(Addict) I seen him!
(Bob Saget) Now that's an addiction, man. Have you ever sucked some dick for marijuana?
(Thurgood) No. No, I can't say I have.
(Bob Saget) I didn't think so.

I don't know what it takes to convince a police officer you aren't high on the reefer. Performing two hours of bizarre hand/eye coordination tests, a random car search, an even more random verbal grilling, a full-body patdown, a call-in to the local k9 unit followed by a lengthy rotweiller sniffing tour of my car... obviously these things just don't cut it! Near the end, *I* was ready to hall myself in on the single largest illegal drug bust in Nebraska history.

All attempts at confirming any of his many suspicions having failed, the officer finally let me go with a warning for the original infraction (4 mph over the speed limit), and a rather unconving apology and rationale for why I was made to suffer this monkey dance for the last several hours: (1) I reak of pot (2) my eyes are a "road-map" (OHHHH, bloodshot... clever osifer!) (3) dilated pupils (4) the tip of my tounge appears burnt (a common side effect of that hot roach action) (5) raised taste-buds (I don't know) (6) "Well... I just plain don't like you."

I didn't believe him about the smelling like pot thing, and spent the remainder of the drive home cussing and generally thinking ill of the highway patrol. Then I got home and actually smelled my clothes. He was right. I was driving back from Primos (David Primavera, remember?) b-day party, where I had spuilt some burning citronella from a citronella fueled tiki-torch onto my shirt, and can only imagine that through some kind of combination or addmixture, this lovely odor was yielded. And this was all clearly a gift from God, since I had helped polish off a keg of budlight only hours earlier, and was able to preoccupy the officer with my damned pot smoking hippy guise. I guess the moral of this story is to avoid citronella oil if you plan on being near a cop anytime soon.

It was nice to see some of my friends (miller, nubsbit and bridgette came down), and not so nice to see most of Primos. His friends remind me of my old friends, who as I've said I can do without ever seeing again for the most part. After a visit from the cops for public disturbance, and $80 missing from Primos little brother, I was ready to see them go.

Other than that, it's been pretty much same old for the last few weeks. Last Thursday my brother and I went to the local keno/sports bar to play in a freeroll poker tournament, and yes, smoke and drink (it feels weird smoking inside and not being in the hilltop :p). Seventy or so players, and my brother and I both made it to the final table. At that point the average stack size was three or four big-blinds (when it should be fifteen to twenty), so it became an all-in fest. My AK/o didn't hold up, and my brothers last few chips were blinded off with his K3/o, giving us ninth and eight place respectively. Everyone who makes it to the final table in one of these weekly tournaments gets a certain number of points, and all participating Nebraska keno bars host a yearly tournament for the point leaders, with a first place prize of a trip to Vegas and a buy-in to the world series. Not bad for nothing, but good luck getting there on skill.

My golf game is progressing nicely, and I'll hopefully be back at scratch in a few weeks. Poker is going well, I'm starting to get back into practicing my guitar, and even programming a little. Anything to fill up all this free time. I'm actually getting a little sick of not having any obligations or responsibilities.

yikes

I just saw this post on twoplustwo.com, and this has to be the biggest pot in the history of limit poker.


Preflop: Hero is MP1 with J, J.
UTG folds, UTG+1 calls, Hero raises, MP2 calls, MP3 3-bets, CO calls, Button calls, SB folds, BB caps, UTG+1 calls, Hero calls, MP2 calls, MP3 calls, CO calls, Button calls.

Flop: (28.50 SB) 8, 5, J (7 players)
BB bets, UTG+1 calls, Hero raises, MP2 calls, MP3 3-bets, CO calls, Button caps, BB calls, UTG+1 calls, Hero calls, MP2 calls, MP3 calls, CO calls.

Turn: (28.25 BB) 6 (7 players)
BB checks, UTG+1 checks, Hero bets, MP2 calls, MP3 raises, CO calls, Button 3-bets, BB calls, UTG+1 calls, Hero caps, MP2 calls, MP3 calls, CO calls, Button calls, BB calls, UTG+1 calls.

River: (56.25 BB) 8 (7 players)
BB checks, UTG+1 checks, Hero bets, MP2 calls, MP3 calls, CO folds, Button raises, BB calls, UTG+1 folds, Hero 3-bets, MP2 calls, MP3 calls, Button calls, BB calls.

Final Pot: 71.25 BB

Results below:
BB has Kh Ks (two pair, kings and eights).
Hero has Jd Jc (full house, jacks full of eights).
MP2 has Qh 8h (three of a kind, eights).
MP3 has Ah As (two pair, aces and eights).
Button has 9h Js (two pair, jacks and eights).
Outcome: Hero wins 71.25 BB.

Puts mine to shame..

various and sundry

Text based games are cool. I grew up on the old infocom text adventures on my Apple II, Zork etc. I found a neat remake of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/hitchhikers/game_andrew.shtml.

I also found out that I'm leaving about a grand a month on the poker table by not using rakeback affiliates. They basically make a deal with big online poker sites to get them more players, the poker sites offering them a small percentage of the new players rake. The affiliate then offers the player most of that rake back. So without any playing, they get 5-10% of the rake from their players, who get 20-30% of their own rake back. Since I generally pay about $3500 in rake a month playing low-limit, that turns out to be about $900. This is freaking sweet. If you can make 1.5BB/100 at 5/10 6max, and get in 30k hands a month, that's almost 2 grand a month in rakeback, and $4500 in winnings. That's over 6 grand a month playing low limit poker, or about 70 grand a year. Hot damn.

My cell phone charger should be getting in tomorrow from boxwave.com, so I can finally check my messages and see what I've been missing in the last few weeks. It's been nice being completely cut off, but I'm getting bored. I can't wait to get back to SoCal. Especially after watching the Iron Chef last night, in which Japan's leading sushi chef battled Iron Chef Sakai. I miss my sushi :(

Also, with regards to my heart thingy, I had an echo-cardiogram taken on Monday. I get the results tomorrow, but my doctor is telling me that he thinks I won't be able to drink alchohol or smoke ever again, as well as no red meats. Please let this be lies...

House of Flying Daggers

I just got done watching this movie. I'm always impressed with Japanese martial arts love stories, but more with the former aspect than the latter. While American action movies make gross attempts at depicting realistic violence, and fail completely to engage the belief and imagination of the viewer, movies such as HoFD and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon achieve an opposite effect. They blur distinction between dancing and fighting, and allow you to momentarily forget what limitations are placed on the motions of the human body. It's like ballet for men! I fail to appreciate the gracefulness and beauty involved in most forms of dancing, but I'm in awe at some of the choreography involved here. And yes, it does seem unbalanced to only find wonder in the movement of the human person when violent intent is presupposed.

The love stories are always disturbing too. I don't tend to engage myself with much interest in most Hollywood love stories, but these can be gut-wrenching. Zhang Ziyi is the central love interest in most of the movies I'm thinking of, which might be why I'm so effected (ahem). There's always some conflict involved, either between the two opposing lovers or the priority of some other obligation or desire. And there is never any resolution of the conflict at the end of the movies, which is what is most disturbing. I suppose asian audiences can appreciate this, but I end up pissed off at the seemingly nihilistic conclusion to the story I've just invested so much attention and emotion in. I also tend to think that it's hard to understand and appreciate things like this due to a culture gap. Eastern religion and philosophy does seem to contain something like nihilism, so westerners are probably missing something.

I was looking for a quick read the other night, and grabbed James and the Giant Peach from my old collection of kid's books. Rhold Dhal is one messed up guy. I love his imagery, but he's pretty sadistic. I can see why Tim Burton likes him so much. The flow and quality of writing also surprised me. I suppose when an author intends his work to be read aloud, it allows him to write more simply and naturally. I'm curious if great writers like Tolstoy and Dickens imagined what their prose would sound like as they wrote. I imagine they'd feel somewhat embarrased and stuffy reading their works to a group of children. Not to find fault, it's just a random thought.

Jackpot

This is the second biggest pot I've ever won.. pretty crazy:


Preflop: Hero is MP3 with Jc, Js. UTG+1 posts blind.
1 fold, UTG+1 (poster) raises, 2 folds, MP2 calls, Hero 3-bets, 1 fold, Button calls, 1 fold, BB calls, UTG+1 caps, MP2 calls, Hero calls, Button calls, BB calls.

Flop: (20.50 SB) 6s, Td, Jd (5 players)
BB checks, UTG+1 bets, MP2 raises, Hero 3-bets, Button calls, BB calls, UTG+1 calls, MP2 caps, Hero calls, Button calls, BB calls, UTG+1 calls.

Turn: (20.25 BB) 4h (5 players)
BB bets, UTG+1 calls, MP2 raises, Hero 3-bets, Button folds, BB caps, UTG+1 folds, MP2 calls, Hero calls.

River: (33.25 BB) 3c (3 players)
BB bets, MP2 raises, Hero 3-bets, BB caps, MP2 calls, Hero calls.


Final Pot: 45.25 BB

Results:

BB has 4s Ts (two pair, tens and fours).
MP2 has 9c 9s (one pair, nines).
Hero has Jc Js (three of a kind, jacks).

Outcome: Hero wins 45.25 BB.

Oops

I've seen and made a lot of weird mistakes playing poker online.. accidently clicking the fold button when I had the nuts in a $100 pot, accidentally calling a capped raise preflop in late position with 2/8o only to flop quads, etc. I think I just topped myself. Most serious players use PokerTracker and statistcal overlay programs like Playerview or GT+, which give you immediate information about every player at your table. I had played at a table earlier in the day, and went to play just now. I had GT+ load up the stats for the table after sitting for a few hands, and did my thing. In general you can get a pretty good idea of what kind of hands a player has from these stats, based on how many hands they've played and how aggressively they've played them. I'm able to isolate weak players at a glance, know who to value bet against and who not to bluff, etc.

Over several rounds I had layed down some good hands to what the stats claimed were tight, passive players. I finally went to showdown with one guy, only to see that he had rivered a full-house with J/2o from UTG. I've never met a player who played %20 of his hands play this hand in early position, catch a deuce on the flop, and continue against a raise to catch a runner-runner full house. Then I noticed he had my name and stats. Apparently I had sat down at the same exact table (out of hundreds) and was looking at the stats of that earlier table. That cost me a few.

In other news, I went to the doctor today for a physical. Based on some oddities in my bloodwork and some circulation problems I've been having, the physician decided to run an EKG on me. They place a bunch of little sticky tabs all over your upper body, and connect the tabs to a computer which registers the electrical activity or somesuch of your heart. I don't quite know what the problem is, but something weird registered. I've got to go to the hospital on Monday for another test. The doctor thought a heart condition known as haemocrhomatosis might explain all of my symptoms. Basically, the blood contains too much iron, which deposits in the heart and causes all kinds of problems. My bloodwork revealed that I have an excess of hemoglobin in my blood, and some kind of enzyme buildup in my liver, which apparently are symptoms. We'll see, but say a prayer (if anyone is reading this...)