Bad Bets, pt. 1

Pushed in half my chips with JJ after the board was all undercards. I figured I had seen pocket aces only two hands prior and I could probably push someone out with the unlikely QQ or KK because they might think I hit trips and their pot odds were sort of crushed by my big, smart, play. Unfortunately he pushed all-in. I looked at him. He crouched in his chair and scrunched up his nose, strength was coming off him in waves BUT this is why I shouldn't play poker: I called. ACES!!! Not again! 

nothing doing....

Online poker should be made illegal. Or at the very least, as a friend put it, "we probably need some laws there." And how! It's a veritable license to steal. If someone set up a lab in Thailand with fifty employees all hunched over keyboards and crunching the numbers, they would probably make as much money as a small hedge fund. All it takes is patience, a knowledge of your opponent that can be catalogued and someone dumb enough to actually put money in play. It's not like playing scrabble online where you sort of come face to face with the other gamer A. because it's one-on-one B. you're both weird enough to be playing scrabble online that you probably will strike up a conversation. Online poker is serious business to the players and attracts the worst kind of grinders and stay-at-home dads with nothing better to do than sit at a $.25/$.50 table for six hours until their KK, AA, comes along and someone actually calls them. It's the worst. There needs to be some kind of skype-avatar-verification system in place because I'm convinced that some Russians are probably rigging up there systems to some Deep Blue type computer. I realize there is some controversy about the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act and keeping overseas gambling industries from doing online business in the U.S., but it's hardly the point. Not even U.S. companies should be running these lotteries for at least another technological generation in terms of cyber security. Ugh.

Wow.

Biden: 8/19/07

George Stephanopoulos: "You were asked is he ready and you said 'I think he can be ready but right now I don't believe he is. The presidency is not something that lends itself to on the job training.'"

Joe Biden: "I think that I stand by that statement."

With the sale of Anheuser-Busch to European tossers InBev and the recent buyout (2002) of American warhorse Miller Brewing to racist South Africans, Yanks who don’t want to line the pockets of folks who won’t contribute to the war on terror, and whose currency is outpacing our own for no good reason, can take arms against a sea of troubles with some still-American beers. Here are a few which deserve our red-blooded affection and which are still bottled with cool, clear, American water and glass.

1. Abita Beer – Along with a roast beef and gravy poboy at the Napolean House, the best way to slake your thirst. The standard New Orleans beer (other than Dixie)
2. Brooklyn Brewery – their brown ales are a perfect counterpoint to a giant burger and fries.
3. Goose Island – A great variety of delicious beers.
4. Red Hook – brewed in Seattle, but none the worse for it. Their ESB ale (extra-special bitters) has that yeasty, dark taste of the English isles. Probably goes well with fish and chips—not that I would know.
5. Pabst – king of late night, heavy-metal, listening sessions. The creamy, all-American king.
6. Yuengling—Pennsylvania yumbos.
Is it lunch time yet?

Funny Forum

Littlegreenfootballs has gotten into the act of trolling around the left-wing blogosphere to seek out anti-semitic rants by Obama supporters. Their effort is magnified by the Obama campaign's attempts to scrub their forums of such rubbish. Even so, things slip through. If I ever come across a truly hilarious comment I'll post it up here for you guys (all four of you). Here's one from aintitcool.

Pixar = Israelby HoboCode
Jun 27th, 200810:21:30 AM
It's become untouchable. This is what is scary about it people. Any criticism of Pixar, like criticism of Israeli policies, is now met with jeers and decries of anti-cinemism (read anti-semitism).

[ed. anti-cinemism=people who hate cinnamon]

Stuff I Hate -- Street Drummers

I hate when I'm walking through Manhattan and I happen upon a street drummer. His rhythmic playing is infectious and he makes everyone feel ridiculous. I could be wearing the most expensive suit on earth, I could be a Rabbi, I could be carrying the nuclear football, it wouldn't matter, when you hear the street drummer your body takes over like a spiritual ecstacy. A little voice in the back of my head always screams to stop, but it's impossible, your heels start popping up and down on the pavement and your shoulders get jivey. Once you're out of earshot you wonder what bewitched you. It was that damn street drummer.

innumeracy

Well I haven't blogged in a while because even I get tired of my cyclical personality. Movies/Politics/Patriotism/and golf--can't I stray to some new topics? It's hard. But I'm going to give it a shot. There was a little asian girl--a fan of the Peach Pitch (many are)--who's been asking for a blog post about the heart shaped emoticon you make when you put a < and a 3 next to each other. I'm a "digital immigrant," so it took me several weeks to figure out the formula, but I finally got it to work (<3). It was a math-heavy project. Which leads me to my next digression: MATH.

I've explained this recently but I've never been a friend of math. My German friends use this truth against me in their summation of my character (*cough Fischers*). Even so, I have been vaguely confused since advanced placement math in second grade when multi-colored toy bears were used to explain multiplication tables. It just was NOT clicking. I wasn't actually booted from the accelerated program until fifth grade when, after bumping my head against a packet of problems I slammed my hand down on my desk and bellowed "God DAMN!!! I HATE THIS HACK OF CRAP!!" in my best Sam Jackson from Jurassic Park voice. I thought the teacher was in the loo, but she was sitting at her desk. I was taken outside and reprimanded--then sent packing to the nose-picker, shit kicker, club. Welcome to the little leagues.

Stan Winston, RIP

There's a nice tribute going on for Stan Winston over at aintitcool. Cameron, Dante, KNB, Gillis, and others have chipped in and it wont be long before others add their voices. I thought I'd add my two cents as a movie geek. I vividly remember the first experience of Stan Winston's creatures watching the movie ALIENS on laser-disc in the late 80's. My parents took some convincing, but after much lobbying by a family friend and movie hound (Dr. B), I got to check it out. Mind-blowing. I saw Jurassic Park at a seasonal drive-in in Clermont, Indiana where you hook the speakers on the windows and watch Hoosiers lumber and snort drunkenly outside the car looking for popcorn. The creatures looked absolutely astounding on the big screen. Predator I caught on television. His latest work was Iron Man. But Terminator 2--dad brought that one home on video back in 1991 and let me watch it. He had to lock mom in a closet upstairs for all her screaming. When Stan's animatronic leg comes crushing down on a human skull--the note chills your spine the way the first three notes of Beethoven's Fifth do. Don't tell the Germans I said that....

I know this blog has been movie heavy lately--about to go back to domestic politics in a big way--stay tuned.

back to work.

p.s. I totally forgot that Winston also did work for Carpenter's The Thing, another traumatic experience I had at Dr. B's house. Good gravy was that movie creepy.

Spielberg and Geffen--like everyone--are looking for cash. And they're going to India for it. An interesting spin on what used to be Japanese corporations getting involved with huge stakes in major movie companies. We saw how that culture influenced films at Universal. It will be just as interesting to see how Indian sensibilities, corporate culture, and management etiquette, will influence the usual pap from DreamWorks.

This comes on the heels of Spielberg opting out of producing the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2008 games--very recently--because of what China has or hasn't done in Darfur. Spielberg didn't realize the regime in Beijing was evil before they ignored one of his celebrity vanity projects. Or, he may have been trying to sabotage the Chinese two months before the Games. That is hard to imagine. Something else may have intervened...

Back to the DreamWorks deal. Since India and China are enormous emerging markets, will we see Spielberg directing an all-Indian, Indian language film in the near future? Could this be a trend? Tarantino has already dipped in here, large parts of Kill Bill were in Japanese and Chinese and the American and Asian cuts were substantially different. Will we see more young filmmakers trying to break into showbusiness and get their work out there by appealing to a foreign audience? I'd like to see a three-hour David Fincher musical about marriage customs in New Delhi, called.....what?

I'm not feeling witty enough to think of a good title...but if you really want an anti-climax...I once heard a first-hand story about Salman Rushdie that will make you pull your hair out: Salman Rushdie was sitting at a table with another famous novelist, don't remember who, and a large group of journalists. They started making fun of the titles of Robert Ludlum's airport paperbacks. They couldn't get over how pretentious the titles were. Titles like The Jansen Directive, The Parsifal Mosaic, The Icarus Agenda--etc. Someone wondered aloud what Shakespeare's plays would be called if they were written by Ludlum. According to Legend, Rushdie rattled off in rapid succession alternate names for Macbeth, Hamlet, and Romeo and Juliet all of which brought the table to tears. But guess what, dear reader, I don't remember any of them. Sorry.

good morning.

for those who don't know......

Yes, that is clyde peach teeing off. Highland Golf Club champion from 200? More on this mysterious god later in the blog.

The Tiger Woods pt. 2

David Brooks has a lazy article about Tiger in the NYT. I think it's time for David to go back to doing movie reviews. His schtick is tired.

"In a period that has brought us instant messaging, multitasking, wireless distractions and attention deficit disorder, Woods has become the exemplar of mental discipline."

We know. We all saw the NIKE ad.

The Tiger Woods

The greatest player in golf, surely. But why doesn't anyone mention what The Machine doesn't get about the game: course conduct. Tiger is not a gentleman superstar. He is the greatest player who ever lived, of course, but there's something about Tiger's teething behavior--and ecstatic triumphalism--that I don't think is particularly good for the game, or in keeping with its character. When Tiger holed out the putt on 18 Sunday you could see he was elated. He screamed and pumped his fists and let out a resounding "FUCK YEAH," which any twelve year old could clearly see. I don't remember Nicklaus or Palmer ever dropping the F-bomb on the 18th hole--maybe Craig "The Walrus" Stadler. And Tiger does it all the time. On Sunday, on what may have been hole 14 or 15, he lagged a put just a few inches short and dropped his putter on the putting surface--again, a small thing, but a serious breach of etiquette which probably made the greens keeper’s eye twitch. It's also in the way he pouts about EVERYTHING that doesn't go his way--throws his clubs around two or three times a round--and generally just acts like a pampered, spoiled, ass. There's always been talk about how Tiger doesn't associate with other golfers, doesn't attend dinners, shies away from it all--and for a lot of people who are only engaged by Tiger because they identify with his transgressive political symbolism they think that's just great. But it's hardly what golf is all about. Or maybe it is now?





this is how it's done:

i just got it....

the opening shot of the new Indiana Jones flick--a George Lucas joke about expectations. Funny, but a very slim pomo joke. It's what amounted (heh) to an excuse. The first twenty minutes of Crystal Skull was a great atomic age comic book. The rest of the movie made it seem like The Cold War never happened. Indy in Soviet Russia, Sibera say, looking for a downed UFO--how much cooler?

remember what the paramount logo is?

Dear Reader: FOOD

Thanks for submitting to the caption contest. All of you.....Today I thought I'd talk about the restaurants in Park Slope. Fifth Avenue is a popular area right now--you've got medium priced Mexican restaurants that deliver the goods, upscale Italian feasting, and overpriced dreck. And of course, you have the Union Hall--where Tim the Bouncer greets Joey and I with: "you guys look like you're on the prowl tonight." Where I work, around 40th and Madison, there's absolutely nothing to eat--unless you want to pay $20. There's a tiny asian bistro across the street called...Asian Bistro...they specialize in 7$ tuna sandwichs and 4$ bagels (w. sausage). I eat there every day. They call me "boss." We're in the garment disctrict--or close to it--so there are always models crowding around the counter with me. The Asian Bistro sandwich artists never call them "boss." The only places to eat around midtown are chains like "Au Bon Pain," terrible delis, and extremely expensive pubs: fish and chips and a coke? $20. Or you can frequent the halal cart run by an Afghan Warlord. For $4.25 you can get a lamb feast...there's also an "authentic" Japanese deli a few blocks away where little asian girls crowd around a pastry counter like muppet-babies. The have excellent fish sandwiches and sushi--for a decent price. I was supposed to talk about Park Slope restaurants...but I got sidetracked--the grocery store is the only place in the Slope I've been eating at lately.

Caption Contest

entries:

"Why was he arrested for playing D"Artagnan in the drama club?"

"The Arab police thought it was a burqa; James was charged with cross-dressing and missed his graduation."

"Arrested for singing "You've Lost That Loving Feeling" on his MySpace page."

send entries to rpeach@weisergroup.com

Western Union

I have $19 and a stack of resumes going out to restaurants in Park Slope. Dad, send me some money so I can go to the Belmont Stakes tomorrow.

your son,

robert

Iran

attack dog says: Let's hope that when the Bush Administration lays out the case, there's enough patriotism and trust in govt. left in the red states to go along with it. Otherwise the Bush Doctrine is over and Israel is not a nation of 307 million. If the president does act, this should not be a democratization project, it should be a punishment. Pre-empt the nuclear program by all means, but don't forget about the camps in the West where Quds and Hezzbolah train insurgents to build EEPs and IEDs to kill American soldiers in Iraq. They should be annihilated without precision--as they should have been a long time ago.

If we're going to go, we need to go now. I wonder if the Sons of Iraq would be down. Amen.

movie club

Watched "Duck, You Sucker" last night with jabrams. Terrific movie with a great score by Ennio M. Coburn plays an IRA bandit, Steiger a reluctant Che Guevara--fun film.