Pairing as promised

 

 

This last one works, or is at least most straightforward. The strong lines compose the formal aspects. The others not so much. I will have to tile an assortment to try different pairings.

Anticipating Las Vegas

Readers will remember that a little over a month ago I wrote about a friend, Ben Kramer, who had passed. Ben organized the Poker Academy Rendezvous in Las Vegas for a couple years. we missed having oe this last year, the economy being what it is and such. yet, with Ben's death, there was talk that we needed to do one one trip as a group to LV in his memory.

I have taken it upon myself to organize this trip. While none of the details have been worked out, we have enough interest in the event to say that it is "a go." Right now it looks like it will happen toward the end of March.

While six months may seem like a long time, as I look back upon the same period of time, I know March will be here sooner than I think, especially given my organizational skills. I am already excited.

I also know that I would not be able to do the excellent job Ben did, but there may not be a need to. Poker Academy is waning, and so is our need to engage in PA-related activities while in LV. What remains, at least for me, is a group of people I call friends whom share a game in common. And memories that include Ben. We share those as well.

I know I have a few readers who no longer play at PA. If interested in this meet-up. please contact me. And those bloggers/readers who have found their way to my blog and live in LV, if possible, I would love to meet all of you.

I just want to hug him

Found this in my daily search for gigs:

I (a 76 year-old geezer on his last legs) need a person whose education is based in journalism (with strong emphasis on correct grammar and proper sentence construction) to review, correct, edit, suggest changes and generally assist in preparing a large number of short stories (typical word count...3 to 7 thousand) for a possible "self-publishing." I have self-published 4 times before and lost money on 3 (the fourth, although moderately successful, did not come anywhere close to making up for the first 3 losses). I mention this to introduce a modicum of reality to a work prospect early on, so there can be no misunderstanding as related to the probable ultimate value of the program to me in terms of my ultimate cash reward. I will most likely again lose money on the project, but it is something I would like to do as a "parting shot." All that being said, I have limited funds, so the amount I will pay (per short story) is also limited. If your qualifications are adequate to the task, you will be requested to do one story on a trial basis (assuming we can agree on price per story at the outset). I work in "Word for Windows," "Photoshop" and Adobe Sytems "Indesign" programs. It is mandatory that you be intimate with Word for Windows and most desirable that you also be coversant with "Indesign," although, if you are computer savvy enough and malleable in your desires, I might consider breaking you in on Indesign. If you do not know what the programs Indesign and "Quark Express" are, then it may well be that you are not the right person for the job. I perfer to engage a person who is not on the verge of starvation at this time.

We had wondered for some time. Was the old woman who lived in the woods across the street still alive? We hadn’t seen her in the passenger seat of her daughter’s car, not that we kept an eye out for such things. And although we saw an ambulance pull in there several months ago,  that did not necessarily bode bad. For it was common knowledge that the woman had abused the emergency system on a regular basis. If she couldn’t get a doctor appointment in what she thought a timely manner, a call complaining of shortness of breath would do the trick. So, while we wondered, we didn’t care enough to go ask. We have our reasons.

We first met the woman a few months after moving here. DW had bonded with and rescued a barn cat from certain death, nursing it back to health just enough for it to claw its way through a window screen and escape. It didn’t run far, at least until we tried to recapture it, when it ran across the road into the woods. It was time to meet the neighbors.

There is a very nice, newer home directly across from us. It is back from the road about 100 feet and surrounded by stately firs. At the time, an older couple with a very young son lived there. Nice people; lonely child. They have since moved, and the people who live there now may enter into this tale. We’ll see.

To the east of the new house is contrast. Upon entering the drive, the first thing one sees is an old vacation trailer covered in moss. Across from it, hidden to the road by trees and undergrowth is a shack with double patio doors on the front. No one is inside, yet it looks inhabited. Beyond both of these shelters is a manufactured home (and a kennel, but that is another story), actually more of a single-wide, equally covered in moss as the trailer, but we can hear the sound of a television. We knock and are told that the door is open.

Across from the TV is a couch, and on the couch sit a younger man, perhaps thirty, and a woman who looks to be in her fifties. In front of them is a coffee table. There may have been a beverage on the table, but I keyed into the numerous pill containers, Tops tobacco and the required rolling papers and machine. They had the look of those who had lived with assistance for some time. They did not get up from the couch when we introduced ourselves and told them about the cat. Neither recollected seeing the cat but said they would keep an eye out and use the phone number we provided. They then suggested we pay a visit to the woman further up the lane, the mother of the woman we were speaking to, for the mother was known to feed stray cats, and if the cat was anywhere, it would be around the mother’s front porch.

So, off we went, whispering confidences and wondering what lay ahead.

The house was small, brown, and indeed had many bowls of cat food lying about. A woman in her late seventies yelled from inside that she would soon answer the door. Apparently she had to put a pink housecoat on over her pink nightgown. She apologized for not dressing for guests, and no, she had not seen the cat. We gave her the phone number and said good-bye.

Well, we found the cat the next day, returned to where we found it dying. DW took it back to the house and it has rarely left her side in six years. The mother, some two months after the initial meeting called to ask if we found the cat, and we heard nothing more for some time.

As we learned more about our neighborhood, and therefore our neighbors, we discovered that a house further east and on our side of the road, the one that had traffic coming and going at all hours and for short visits, was what we suspected, a popular seller of chicken eggs. No, a meth den. Having lived in more condensed city neighborhoods with gangs dealing drugs around the clock, neither DW or I were pleased with the discovery. We planned for an end to said activity, for tangential events occurred as well. While perhaps entertaining from a distance, a bald woman on one’s front porch in the rain at midnight screaming for one to call the sheriff because she is mad at someone down the road, loses its appeal the second time it happens.

DW, being the conscientious advocate she is, took on the task of organizing a Neighborhood Watch group. She gathered names and addresses of all within a mile’s radius and filled our house one Sunday afternoon with all of those concerned enough to attend. Neighbors across the way included.

As is often the case, I get ahead of myself in the telling. Before the meeting, we had an opportunity to spend time with the daughter, and met the new neighbors in the nice house.  And we became privy to certain things:

The young man sitting on the couch, the daughter’s son, had since gone to jail.

The daughter had met her son’s cellmate, fallen in love and gotten married to this man.

The daughter was bi-polar.

The gentleman who lived in the patio-doored shack the daughter had met while institutionalized.

All of the land on which the building sat was owned by the mother.

The mother had lived there since the mid-seventies.

The husband of the mother was buried on the property.

And the new neighbors, while communicative (the item immediately above this one) and engaging, were raging alcoholics. (I knew that the first time I laid eyes on them.) He abusive, she willing and both in denial has made it so we have nothing to do with them anymore.

Back to the Neighborhood Watch meeting. The mother showed up in vintage Channel, stating she had not been invited to another neighbor’s house in the forty years she had lived on our road. The daughter shared a story about a visit with a friend to the drug house. Needles, a naked quadriplegic. Lovely on all accounts.

I grow weary with the telling. Today is the third day of the sale. We have watched many cars pull in the drive, others slow and then continue down the road. The son is out of jail, and if my memory serves, the new husband due any time, if not already there. They have a new dog, judging from the bark, bigger than the others. We wonder where they buried Mother. 

Aint no denyin' brown

Tried something in Photoshop. I wanted to remove the non-paint color out of the photo. Somehow I see these as partnered with the previous photos in diptychs. I'll have to work on that and see what comes of it. The contrasts might be too obvious. Context can be a bitch sometimes.

Timing

The 8-Game was good again, how some won’t believe a telegram, hoping to get lucky when the news has already been delivered to their front door. Stop. Must sleep, for I can feel it, morning brings chaos. And to insure I get a full dose, ready myself with unreadiness, I watch a little TV.

DW says words from downstairs that filter through the closed door: “…are here.”

Last winter’s ice storm caused some concern about the power lines from the roadside poles to the house as they pass through some madrone and dogwood branches. We were not here to witness the event. A good neighbor who stood at the ready with the key to the shed that housed our portable generator told me after the fact. I called the tree guy.

We lost very little foliage during that storm. The same cannot be said for many others in the area. We were triaged for April. April came and went and I called again. “Give me a month and call again.” With no ice in the immediate forecast, I waited for another month to start with the letter ‘A’ before sending a reminder. Two more weeks pass before we have a look at all that needs done, for we have added more to the job to make it worthwhile. Tree guy assures me the next week has openings in his schedule. He stops by mid-September (a month which, if divided by two, has fifteen per part) to reassess and strategize portions of the task. The truck with cherry-picker has no reverse. Another week passes and I nudge his cell phone message. No response. I am nudged to reconsider his services and make a call to another guy.

Tree guy #2’s service says he will call me as soon as he gets in, which isn’t too long after the initial inquiry, and I take this to be a good sign. He tells me that he can come by Thursday to estimate, maybe Wednesday. Fine, just call. He doesn’t. I call Thursday to inquire and service apologizes. He will call. He does not.

Which brings us to this morning. Roused by the utterance, I look out the bedroom window to see that fog has settled in. In the driveway are two vehicles, one that I recognize as tree guy #1’s rig, the second I have a good guess. My phone rings. Tree guy #2 informs me of the conversation he has just had with tree guy #1, and that is that.

I pour a cup of coffee and go to have words. But not too many, for tree guy #1’s price is very good.

Just how bad? Sometimes it doesn't matter.

Stan was killing the 8-Game last night.  (I wasn't doing to bad either, until Aces full took my 10s full down. Thank God it was Limit Hold 'em and I thought the pre-flop suggested Aces in the hole.) Not only are there soft spots, they keep showing up night after night.

He says he was going for implied odds if a Jack hit. I post this hand with Stan's blessing:

PokerStars Game #33494628204:  8-Game (Omaha Pot Limit, $0.05/$0.10 USD) - 2009/10/01 0:35:52 PT [2009/10/01 3:35:52 ET]
Table 'Velleda VII' 6-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: bastinptc ($17.16 in chips)
Seat 2: XstanlevX ($28.26 in chips)
Seat 3: PLEBINI ($5.20 in chips)
Seat 4: FireLakeJake ($10 in chips)
Seat 5: #1benficafan ($9.64 in chips)
Seat 6: XYZ ungelöst ($7.25 in chips)
XstanlevX: posts small blind $0.05
PLEBINI: posts big blind $0.10
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to bastinptc [Ks 9c 9d 6c]
FireLakeJake: calls $0.10
#1benficafan: folds
XYZ ungelöst: calls $0.10
bastinptc: folds
XstanlevX: raises $0.40 to $0.50
PLEBINI: folds
FireLakeJake: calls $0.40
XYZ ungelöst: calls $0.40
*** FLOP *** [5d 9s 8c]


Yeah, I know.

XstanlevX: checks
FireLakeJake: checks
XYZ ungelöst: bets $1.55
XstanlevX: calls $1.55
FireLakeJake: calls $1.55
*** TURN *** [5d 9s 8c] [Td]
XstanlevX: checks
FireLakeJake: bets $1
XYZ ungelöst: calls $1
XstanlevX: calls $1
*** RIVER *** [5d 9s 8c Td] [Kd]
XstanlevX: checks
FireLakeJake: checks
XYZ ungelöst: checks
*** SHOW DOWN ***
XstanlevX: shows [Th Ad Kc Qh] (two pair, Kings and Tens)
FireLakeJake: mucks hand
XYZ ungelöst: mucks hand
XstanlevX collected $8.85 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $9.25 | Rake $0.40
Board [5d 9s 8c Td Kd]
Seat 1: bastinptc (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: XstanlevX (small blind) showed [Th Ad Kc Qh] and won ($8.85) with two pair, Kings and Tens
Seat 3: PLEBINI (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 4: FireLakeJake mucked [Tc Jc As 6h]
Seat 5: #1benficafan folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: XYZ ungelöst mucked [8s 7c 7d 9h]