Die Hard Three

Hello from sunny Las Vegas Nevada – I didn’t bring a hat from home and now I’m totally regretting it.

I’m in town for a few days to play in the World Series of Poker. I should disclose up front that calling it THE World Series is a bit of a misnomer. In reality it’s MANY different events. A “series” of tournaments if you will, some of which happen in parallel. And if all of this sounds super elite I’m here to tell you that the only thing one needs to participate is $600 USD and some airline and hotel coupons.

I elected to play in this thing called Event #11: The $600 No-Limit Hold’em Deep Stack with one Re-Entry. I selected this one because it was by far the cheapest and I am not a very experienced poker player.

It was a 10 AM start yesterday. I registered online the day before which was very convenient. The in-person registration accepted only cash and the nearest Scotiabank ABM was somewhere in Mexico. The cost was $860 CDN.

I could not believe the size of the poker rooms. The one I played in felt like it was straight out of some movie starring Jonathan Pryce.

I got a single image of me playing at the table from one of the security drones that were hovering about. This is what the table looked like.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with how poker tournaments work – it’s a fixed cost to enter and if you get eliminated before some hours you can re-enter. This tournament allowed this only once per player. With tournament style games, there’s no going all-in on four aces with your daughter’s violin against Marion’s straight flush.

I stayed at the same table/seat the whole time I was there. This was a huge advantage because it takes time to get to know the players at the table and every time you get moved you have to brain up and learn your new opponents.

I was in seat number one to the immediate left of the dealer. This position had its advantages and disadvantages. It was easier to shield my private cards from the other players with the dealer blocking seats 8 and 9 but I had to stick my head out past the dealer to see when player 9 made his move. I could only act after he did and it took some orbits to get that working.

As this was only my fifth casino tournament ever I was not much familiar with table etiquette. How to fold your cards is one thing that varies from player to player. Some people would toss them which seems insane to me as the risk of one or both cards flipping over increases greatly vs just sliding them to the dealer (what I would do).

Before we started I asked the table if we could switch the chips to ones that are the same colours from the set I have at home because it was confusing to have to learn a new colour scheme. They all said no and one player got really upset when I tried to check with the pit boss.

I was the only masked player at the table. The ventilation must have been insane. With thousands of people in there it should have been roasting but it stayed t-shirt comfortable the whole time.

I did not have any pre-Vegas opportunities to practice. As early as last year all the online poker games used to be global – you could play against players from anywhere. Now governments have forced the online casinos to geolocate their players and are taking a cut of the revenues. This means that if you live in Ontario you can only play against other Ontarians. So on any given Saturday PokerStarz.com used to have tens of thousands of players and now they have a couple of hundred and it’s really hard to get a proper tournament started. And since the pandemic started I haven’t played an in-person 9-player (ring) game.

So the day before Event #11, I played in a small local tournament which was useful to get the feel for being at a table with other players. Oh, and the week before I watched about three hours of the final day of the WSOP Europe 2022 €25,000 NLH Platinum High Roller on YouTube. This was actually quite helpful.

My goals were to first have fun and stay in as long as I could. Second was to try and make the money. So in a tournament like this one there’d be about 6,000 entries and the top 912 players would get paid. The first 150 people in the money to get eliminated would get $960 USD and it would increase from there.

The day progressed like this. I had enough chips to make it to Level 17 but I gambled trying a double up and I lost.

Now some technical stuff for any poker players who made it this far. Probably not a good idea to reveal the secrets to my game, but as they say in Vegas “What!?! $15 US for a can of beer?”

Played a pretty tight game. Folded all the garbage save maybe once or twice. And there was a lot of garbage. Folded hands that were borderline playable: QTo, medium unsuited ace, TJo, etc. I learned this from watching the poker on YouTube the week before. The pros would fold cards I would normally consider playable.

My main range was pocket pairs or strong aces or face cards. If someone raised pre, I found it very easy to fold QJo. So most players assumed I wasn’t bluffing when I was in the pot. Helped out on a couple hands.

Two of the borderline hands I played I flopped a flush and a straight and got paid for both.

I made some good folds. I was on QKs with two people all-in. I had them both covered but I folded. I would have ended up with second best flush.

My first all-in I was on KK. Flop was 696 rainbow and when the other guy said he was on the 9 my mind thought the worst (I assumed he had trips). I got up to leave thinking I needed a king and everyone was like, no, you won.

Then maybe two hands later I was on AJo and I called a 3x pre flop bet. Heads up, board came AAK, he checks. I check. Turn gives me the boat. He makes a smallish bet. I call. We end up all in. I have him covered. He shows KK. Dude flopped a boat and I turned a bigger boat. Which is kind of insane.

Then final hand before the break I was on 55. Two small stacks go all in and I flop trips and then river a boat. My fives were heart and diamond so any time after that when I’d get those same cards I’d say to myself “Red Fives standing by” and then I’d chuckle to myself at my cleverness. I think my N95 may have served two purposes.

Guy siting across from me was getting insane hands. He goes all in with AKs against another player on AA. He goes runner runner to make his flush. The whole table couldn’t believe it. When I got eliminated we were the only two players from the original nine.

I made one or two mistakes. Once I raised the flop on 55 after the other player checked and then he basically put me all in and I had to fold. This was later in the day so it hurt me. Didn’t see aces at all.

Another time I was in for 4k. Guys shoves with 13k. There was one caller (big stack) and I was on QKo. I should have stayed in. I would have rivered a K. I don’t think the big stack would have raised post flop as he was on a small pocket pair and there were overs.

Final hand I had about 12 bigs. On the small. Guy raises pre, and I jam. He shows AJ to my KJ.

Some players who came across as real pros ended up not doing so great. I was trying to ID the good players and sometimes I ended up wrong.

All in all it was lots of fun. I won’t be back next year but I think I would like to try in 2025.

The End.

The real final chapter

Last day at the cottage was on Wednesday but on Thursday I had to return to help take the dock out of the water.

My cousin and landlord (they’re the same person) were both SHOCKED at the sheer volume of the porcupine poop covering the deck. Which I found surprising because I provided her a GREAT amount of detail in my descriptions of the situation including photographic evidence and scientific analysis. It’s almost like she didn’t WANT to believe me.

Anyway my new camera phone arrived while I was at the cottage and my return to the cottage allowed me to use it to capture some proper images of Bernadette.

Also Bernadette is adorable.

I also got some GREAT video and I pay like a hundred bucks a year to WordPress so I can upload videos but when I tried they downgraded the video to 240P – I didn’t even know they went that low. Anyway, here’s a link to the video on Youtube.

and if you are curious, here is what the video looks like using the native WordPress upload.

.

EDIT: so when I looked at the published video, it seemed ok so that’s that.

Battle Final!

On the weekend I had a couple friends over to play some poker and eat some food and drink some beer. Saturday afternoon we were sitting out on the dock having a grand olde time, talking and singing and laughing about memories past.

But I couldn’t enjoy myself. Not with the Bernadette situation remaining firmly unsolved. After a few days of observation it became clear how she operated. She would come home sometime between the hours of 4 AM and 9 AM where she would park her butt on a low tree branch where she would sleep until 4 PM. Then she would climb to close to the top of the tree and feast on the delicious bark that can be found only at the top (ask any giraffe). When it got dark she’d climb down and go do her business.

The problem kept scratching at me like some sort of animal digging or climbing somewhere. What was I going to do? If my cousin found out I was harbouring a fugitive (animal) at the cottage, she might never hire me again!

And then, as the sun was beginning to set over the water, and our conversation experienced a pause, it was during that moment of silence we heard sound of twenty or so porcupine turds falling 60 ft (20 m) on to the deck below.

And it was then that I realized: porcupines pooping on random people from up in the trees is not anyone’s problem, it’s just really, really funny. The turds don’t just go straight down, they ricochet off branches and land in people’s drinks and food. And maybe, just maybe, if the victim looks up – at just the right moment – he could get one right in the face.

So later that evening when she made her way down to the forrest floor, I stood by and watched. We made eye contact and exchanged a look of understanding.

I’m going to miss you, Bernadette. Hopefully we’ll both be invited back next year. And I’ll be sure to bring some little umbrellas for my food and drink.

The end.

Very rare!

The vast majority of decisions in life are simple binary provisions – Option A or Option B. Do we get a dog or a cat? Do we go see the new Marvel movie or do we watch an older Marvel on streaming? Wake up or go back to bed?

Regarding Operation Make Porcupine Go Away Now, with options Baffle and Sleeve firmly in the toilet, it was time to start thinking outside the cottage. So I went down to the dock to do some ideaing and after a few hours the best I could come up with was to wake up BEFORE Bernadette returns home from whatever it is she does at night (no judgement!)

The new option I came up with was: to be sitting and waiting for her at the base of the tree with a disapproving look on my face. When she came home in the morning, she’d see me and move to another tree (porcupines are non-confrontational creatures).

But there were a few problems. The main one being I had no idea what time she comes home every day. So I could wake up at 4 AM and she could already be up in the tree. Also, what would prevent her from coming back the next day? I’d have to get up super early and sit outside in the rain for the remainder of my holiday? No thank you.

A porcupine don’t take a dump without a plan.

On my first day alone at the cottage I woke up invigorated with a new sense of purpose. I was going to solve this porcupine dilemma once and for all. But there was a lot of work to be done. First up I had to decide on which approach I would take.

Option A: Baffle

This design is attractive in its simplicity but complicated in its execution. At home if I had a problem like this I would simply cut a hole in the centre of an old trash can lid and then slice it from the centre to the edge and then put it around the tree.

But all the trash can lids here belong to my cousin and she HATES it when I destroy her things. Also as you can see from the photos the tree is HUGE. At the base it’s bigger than your average residential trash can.

Option B: Sleeve

This design also had some limiting factors. The main one being – what material do I use? Again if I were at home, I’d simply drive up to the Home Depot and pick up a thing of sheet metal (in the duct section). The circumference of the tree is about 36” (1 m) so I’d just need a couple (this tree has two trunks for some reason) of 24” x 36” pieces and some duct tape and we’re done!

But the problem is the car is back in Ottawa and the only sheet metal here, well, I’d have to make myself. FORTUNATELY my guests and I drank a lot of beer this week so I have plenty of cans from which I could stitch together a makeshift aluminium sleeve.

So if the tree is 36” (91 CM) around the outside and the sleeve should be about 24” (61 CM) tall and the useable cans area is 5” x 5” (12 cm x 12 cm) with some overlap I’ll need 6 cans high and maybe 8 or 9 cans wide – so that’s 48 beer cans times two trees and I am sad to report that my friends and I did NOT drink a hundred beers in the past week.

Boo!

Design Time!

I decided to use my new porcupine expertise to devise a system to help keep the deck (porcupine) poop-free. Here’s what I came up with – make it so that when Bernadette returns from wherever it is she goes at night she has climb up a different tree that’s only a few feet away.

Here’s what I was thinking – the best way to keep her out of the tree is to prevent her from climbing it. There are two traditional ways one does this.

The first is to create a “baffle” that’s like an umbrella where the tree trunk is the umbrella handle. The rodent climbs up and when they encounter the baffle they have to turn around.

The second is to wrap part of the tree trunk with a “sleeve” made from a material that makes it hard to climb. Bernadette’s claws easily grip the rough bark of the tree. She wouldn’t be able to climb a smooth-surfaced tree.

Which one should I do?

The Next Morning: Part 2

On Wednesday we woke up after a wonderful night’s sleep and the first thing we did was check in the tree. Well that was the second thing, the real first thing we did was we noticed some fresh porcupine poops on the patio. And sure enough there she was, twenty feet (six metres) off the deck. Just sitting there.

I naturally assumed I was a porcupine expert but I realized I hardly knew anything about the creatures. In twenty-four hours I discovered that they can climb (and live in) trees, they’re huge, they’re herbivores, they’re only active at night, they’re not very fast, and they sport a good set of claws and they will return to their favourite tree on the second night.

And all of that had got me thinking: maybe there are other subjects that I’m not an expert on. I mean, is that even possible? I’m an expert on knowledge so… probably not.

What happened next?

I decided I should gently relocate our new friend to a different tree (you know, with the raining poops and all). How did I do this? Well, that is the subject of another, future blog post.

Yes. Yes it was.

I’m at Foxbay cottage for a week of well earned rest and relaxation. Last Tuesday Sarah and I were sitting around the gas campfire and I noticed a small turd-shaped turd on the side table and I immediately contacted the cottage owner to get more information.

At first glance I thought it was an animal turd but also that it was the same size and shape (but not appearance) of the seeds of the tree above us. So when I heard one fall I just assumed it was from the tree. Even though when I broke it up with a stick it was all fibrous I thought there’s no way this is an animal poop. It’s probably just a baby-seed from the tree that has yet to turn into a proper seed. 

After we saw a squirrel jump from the tree we Google-image-searched “squirrel poop” and whilst the shape a colour were both good, the size was way off – these were way too big. 

I should qualify, one of the reasons we were so concerned about this is that Pepper ate one of the poops. And I read once that raccoon’s can spread terrible diseases in their leavings (raccoon was our first guess as to the source)

While I’ve never seen raccoon poop I assume it’s horrible and gross because racoons eat trash all day and you know the old saying – garbage in, garbage out – so I was leaning towards this not being a raccoon. 

I should also mention that at one point I felt some “rain” fall from the cloudless sky. Which was also unusual. At that point we started scanning the tree and we didn’t see any animals up there. 

Then like five minutes later we saw what appeared to be a rather large raccoon lumbering down the side of the tree.

It was starting to get dark and she noticed us so then she just parked herself on a branch. We moved in to take some photos and that’s when we discovered… 

It was NOT a raccoon at all. It was GIANT porcupine. 

After we snapped some pics I showered the porcupine pee off me and then started the BBQ. As I was cooking up the burgers I heard a noise in the bushes and I watched our new spiky neighbour walking towards the next cottages, never to be seen again…

Or was she… 

Until tonight the only time I’d seen Dance Me Outside (1995) was at the Ottawa theatrical premier on March 8 of that year. Indie/Canadian cinema was not really my thing at the time so the only reason I ever saw this movie was because I’d scored a pass to see it for free. And the experience was strange because I didn’t care for the first 70 minutes of the film but the final 10 minutes erased all that because the ending was so fucking good.

Because of this, any time in the past 25 years when I’d think about this movie it always generated those hits of endorphins you get when your mind wanders to a wonderful experience from your past.

So tonight I decided to revisit it. I was worried that it hadn’t aged well – a movie about the experiences of First Nations’ people that was written, directed, and produced by white guys – could be a perfect storm of cringe.

But I didn’t find that at all. The social commentaries felt as relevant today as they would have been then and the casting (and performances) were great – most of the actors were hired locally in Parry Sound Ontario. The subplots were full of surprises that I’d forgotten, and the ending remained perfect.

So to summarize: Dance Me Outside (1995) – 8.5/10 – available on Apple’s movie service for $5 CDN (and it’s only 80 minutes so you should really give it a try.)

.

and it hasn’t been for some time.

I’ve been meaning to write about this for a while now – it’s something I’ve revealed only to close friends and family. At the beginning I needed a shared secret that could be used to verify the identity of the person I was texting with. In a crisis situation I would ask some variant of “what’s my favourite movie?” and the kidnappers (having done some background research on me) would respond, “Die Hard.”

I would then abruptly end the chat, turn to my partner and tell him, “Your foster parents are dead” – the real answer eluding the villains and giving me (and my lovable but naive partner) the upper hand!

But as the years have passed my reasons for needing a secret passphrase have slowly evaporated, like unfrozen water in the sun. So I have chosen today to share with you what I have come to discover is my one true cinematic love – because it was thirty years ago today, on March 2, 1990, The Hunt for Red October (1990) was released in theatres.

I’m not going write about why HFRO is objectively the perfect film and current pinnacle of human achievement, I have another project lined up to explain all that. And I’m not going to go into why Die Hard (1988) has fallen from the top spot – it’s a great film, near-perfect and genre defining. Today is not about knocking things down, it’s about building them up.

So let us all enjoy Hunt for Red October Day as we celebrate with our friends and family. This business is under control.

And we’re lucky to have lived with it.

.