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All posts for the month October, 2007

Busted from the Mookie

Posted by stevet on October 31, 2007
Posted in: Poker.

Yeah, a cooler story. Deal with it.

AA in the cut-off, a 1BB raise in front of me by BornLate55. I pop to 7BB. He calls. Flop is a raggy QT4. He checks. I make it 7BB. He raises to near my stack (we are close to even). I push. He calls with QTo. Brick. Brick. and I am out in 105th. No Gigli award award though, there were 114 runners. I hope Born does well with my chips.

Right before that hand, GScottW flopped quads and got a little change from me when an ace hit on the turn and paired me.

At least I don’t have to stay up until 1AM to bubble 🙂

On a happier note I have finished One-One-Two in my last three Sit-n-Gos. One of which I came back from 120 chips to win.

I am not playing as much as I used to, but my dabbles in the last week have been kind of fun.

Westboro Baptist “Church” hit with judgement

Posted by stevet on October 31, 2007
Posted in: Random Rants.

It finally happened. The WBC was hit with a $2.9 million compensatory damages award today for protesting a soldier’s funeral in Maryland last year. [Story Here]

These are the same people who threatened to protest the funerals of the Virginia Tech shootings last April. Luckily (and scarily) they were offered free air-time on a national radio show and they canceled their protest.

Although I respect their right to free speech and free protest; hate speech and hate protest deserve no such respect. This is especially true at the funerals of soldiers and the innocent students and professors killed on April 16th of this year.

Hopefully this is the first judgment of many and they will recede into history books and wikipedia as a dark footnote.

Outlook 2007 Peeves

Posted by stevet on October 24, 2007
Posted in: Geek Out.

I was asked to upgrade/dogfood Office 2007 today. This annoys me for a lot of reasons; but I will limit my list of peeves to technical ones here.

  • Instant Search. I don’t give a flying leap though a rolling donut about Instant Search. But there is an very annoying flyover bar asking me to install it. If I click on the bar it, correctly, asks if I want to connect to Microsoft and download it. There is no checkbox for “don’t ask me again”. You have to go to Tools->Options->Other->Advanced Options and un-check “Show prompts to enable Instant Search”. Dumb. But at least it works.
  • I like the LookOut plugin. It indexes your mailbox and PSTs and allows for complex and quick searches. According to Microsoft: “Windows Desktop Search 3.0 disables the MSN Toolbar and LookOut in Outlook. LookOut and the MSN Toolbar are now considered to be old versions of Microsoft products. To offer users the clearest and most integrated search experience for Outlook 2007, Outlook disables these add-ins when Outlook starts.” F-That. So it leaves the toolbar there in Outlook- it is just empty.
  • My company has a plug-in for Outlook, that is part of the reason for this dogfood. I didn’t want to upgrade to 2007, but it is a good thing to do a responsible member of the development organization. However- Why do I need to upgrade *all* of Office. Outlook I get. But apparently Word 2003 does not work with Outlook 2007.

Not a big fan at all at this point. Total time of use: 20 minutes. I was never of a fan before, this pretty much seals the deal.

The next step is Lightning which integrates Thunderbird and Sunbird. Maybe I will be happier then. Doubt It.

Airlink101 gigabit PCI cards: $5

Posted by stevet on October 24, 2007
Posted in: Geek Out, Poker.

Fry’s has the Airlink101 AGIGA32PCI cards for $5 each (limit 2, normal $20). Offer expired tomorrow.

I am going to be building a linux based router at the house and wanted to go 1000Mbps for the network so I picked two up. They use a Realtek chipset and claim they are Linux 2.4.x and 2.6.x compatible along with the standard Windows versions.

I’ll let you know how well they work when I start building out my new router.

I also picked up a 10/100/1000Mbps 8 port switch, but that was not as good a deal.

Finally cashed in a SnG yesterday when I got hit with the deck early (and played smart- shocking I know). I ended up 3rd when my 8-9 could not out kick a 8-10 on a 8-8-x flop. I may play the Mookie tonight, depends how I feel. It is going to be huge with the BBTwo going on.

Reload on FullTilt

Posted by stevet on October 18, 2007
Posted in: Poker.

I was able to reload last night on FullTilt. This is the first time I have tried to move money since Neteller shut off US residents.

I used the Gator Pay method. Using this technique you buy a pre-paid phone card (with decent phone rates coincidently) using your Visa card- they only take Visa or bank transfers. The rate is 3% + $0.90; which is a bit high- but not too bad. From there you can initiate a transfer on FullTilt. Total time to do transfer, about 15 minutes. Not bad. Be Warned: There is a preemptive charge. Mine was just over a dollar. It is used to verify your card.

This morning, I had a call from my Visa card about two charges last night. They were both from Gator Pay and both expected. Nice to know the CC company is on top of it.

I payed in one of the $6 + .50 token frenzies which brought 205 runners. 47 tokens, 1 cash. I ended up in 68th when my TT ran into QQ with my M about 3 or 4. That hand hits I probably get my token.

The BBToo is upon us. See Al Can’t Hang’s page for details. An honest to goodness website should be up soon for it as well. Australia. That would rock.

Charitable Donations

Posted by stevet on October 17, 2007
Posted in: Random Rants.

I am making an effort this year to be more charitable. But I am generally a cynic, so I have to vet the charities I am considering donating to.

Here is a short list of who I contributed to (so far). Feel free to comment with thoughts or suggestions.

* KUT Radio, Austin’s local NPR affiliate
* Goodwill Austin
* BP MS 150 Bike Tour for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society
* ALS TDI
* Not On Our Watch: Darfur
* V Foundation for Cancer Research
* The Conservation Fund (hat tip: The Five Cent Nickel)

There are some thoughts that donations should not be spread out this way, but I prefer donating to multiple causes with good goals and hopefully quality operations. Sometimes it can be hard to tell. Two lookup methods are The Charity Navigator and The American Institute of Philanthropy.

The Enertia

Posted by stevet on October 9, 2007
Posted in: Random Rants.

This is a pretty cool idea. An electric motorcycle capable of 50 mile round trips and a top speed of about 50 miles per hour. It is called the Enertia Bike. It is about perfect for a non-highway commute. Read an MSN article about it that has some pretty cool photos.

Brammo is the same company bring the very cool Ariel Atom to the US. That is another very cool vehicle I am looking at.

The price point on both seems a bit high, but maybe in the next year or two they will get more reasonable. Or there is always the lotto.

National Do Not Call List is About to Expire

Posted by stevet on October 4, 2007
Posted in: Random Rants.

I ran across this blog article explaining how the Do Not Call List will expire for the very first people who signed up. When you sign up, it is good for 5 years. I checked mine and am good through June 2008.

You might want to go ahead and check your registration to make sure there is not a lapse. Telemarketers have to check the list every 30 days.

I also setup a Google Calendar event just before mine is about to expire so I can recheck and make sure I am on the list for another 5 years. FYI: I have both my house phone and my cell phone on the list. This is just to make sure I don’t get any un-expected calls if I can avoid it.