You got to know when to hold em, know when to fold em

On Saturday I played probably the best game of poker I've ever played from a technical perspective. I got away from every hand I should have gotten away from, I raised when I should have, I played slow when I needed to.

And I still lost.

No matter how good you are, you will have some nights when the cards just don't like you. For example, I got dealt 2,3 seven times that night. Now, that isn't as bad as 2,7, but it isn't good. When I got them as a suited connector, out of frustration I decided to bet them. Lo and behold, I get 2 more 2's on the flop. I go ahead and keep betting them driving people out of the pot except on guy who would sometimes stay in longer than he should. It turns out I had him beat the whole time, until a 9 showed up on the last card giving him 3 9's to my 3 2's.

It was that kind of night. Still fun though.

Oh, and I forgot something from the last post, Pam's iPod's hard drive died as well in that 2 month period.

Gavin's reached a point where his conversations are much more complex, and his ability to draw conclusions has really improved. There was a book he was addicted too, "The Bunnies Are Not In Their Beds". He asked for it as the "Bad Bunny Book", but no where in the book does it say that the bunnies were bad (though they were). His social skills, while not perfect, have improved quite nicely as he usually plays well with others. He enjoys group play, though I've noticed that sometimes he will leave the group and just play by himself. He's really pushing to grow another inch or two so he can reach his pedals better on his tricycle. His friend J can pedal it and Gavin is determined to do it too, just legs just aren't cooperating.

My favorite Gavin moment had to be when I was sick in Chicago. He was downstairs watching Sesame Street (which is holy writ to him) when I had to sprint to the bathroom to be sick. I hear this "DADDY!" from downstairs, then the sound of little legs pumping up the stairs. Next thing he was behind me patting me on the back asking "You OK Daddy?", "Feel better Daddy". It was nice, even if being sick wasn't.

He's still the worst hide and go seek hider in the history of the game, we'll have to work on that...

...Pulls you down on your knees

So what was so screwed up about August & September?

First, our camera broke. It wasn't completely unexpected since M&K have the same exact one and it broke 3 months earlier in the same way. Basically your pictures were colored snow. For someone who takes as many pictures as I do this was a major issue.

Second, as was blogged before, the new computer I had purchased and put together had some major issues. Let me be clear, I will still be putting my next computer together from scratch like this one. I have built all my previous computers from scratch and they've been perfect long term performers. However, something strange was happening with this one. I ended up shipping the motherboard back twice to ASUS, then shipping my processor back to Intel. Since processors are not supposed to be defective, what we believe happened is the 1st motherboard was defective and fried the processor. The 2nd one was probably OK, but ASUS never tested it. The 3rd motherboard was tested, which led us to realize the processor was fried.

Third, my car. They did an oil change and rotated the tires, and afterwards when I hit 40 MPH the steering wheel started shaking. I took it back in, and they said the back wheels were not balanced correctly which they fixed. But that didn't solve the problem. So I took it back in, and they re-rotated the tires back to their original position. That fixed the problem, and I guess I can't rotate my tires anymore until I get 4 new ones.

Fourth, we had a nice visit to Kansas City to see some friends. When we came back home, we found the refrigerator had broke. After getting a guy to look at it, the culprit was the compressor. Unfortunately to fix that costs $800, so we just bought a new fridge (which is why I'm hoarding money right now).

Finally, the night before we went to Chicago, Gavin got a stomach bug which delayed and almost canceled our trip. He gave it to me, and I was sick on the day we came back which left all the driving duties to my wife.

My old roommate found nothing weird about all these things happening in the same timespan, because he's used to this stuff. When I've mentioned MacDonald's law of luck, people think its something I came up with. The actual law was discovered by my old roommate, who found that there was some relationship to Murphy's law, frankly it wasn't as consistent, and had that taste of spite. He then came up with I believe 3 corollaries to the law, the only one I remember though is the one of distance. "MacDonald's law will not touch those close to Scott MacDonald as it would draw attention away from the spite and suffering when the unfortunate instances occur from the main target, therefore, those close to Scott MacDonald will have a greater concentration of good luck not only to keep them safe to witness the events, but to act as a foil to the shit that happens to him". I'll have to remember to ask him what the other two were, but they were of no help to me :)

Now we are in October, all my issues have been resolved, I have a working computer, car, camera, and fridge. So next is the house blows up I guess.....

More posts coming soon :)

Where the honey flows and takes you by the hand

OK, I know I was going to give an account of the many woes of the last month, but I figured I'd delay that with something good that went on. I saw Genesis live, and it was good. And oh my god they played Ripples!!!!!!

You don't know what song Ripples is do you. Fine, go to iTunes, download it from the Trick of the Tail album, I'll wait.

OK, we all good now, fine, OH MY GOD THEY PLAYED RIPPLES!!! (See, you're on board now).

We had to travel to Chicago to see them, because no one good comes to play concerts in St. Louis anymore (besides Rush). I don't know what we've done to piss good shows off, but whatever it is, we as a city are sorry. We had nosebleed seats, but we had a good angle on the stage, and we could hear everything perfectly.

I'd like to digress on that for a second, so many concerts I go too you get lots of sound, but you can't understand a word of the lyrics, or even when they talk to the audience. I usually blame the over reliance on the bass levels. Whatever it is, I usually am annoyed with the sound crew. I had NO complaints that night, it had a great full sound that reached the rafters, yet it was clear & clean. OK, digression over.

It was a great set, combining old stuff with new stuff. From the set list you could tell it was a lot of band favorites with a lot of energy. Collins spent a good amount of time behind the drums and there was a good selection of instrumental movements. They did some interesting things, like opening with Duke's End transitioning to Turn It On Again, then later did the middle part of Duke's Travels (right before Duke's End starts) in the middle of an instrumental medley piece.

Sigh, just go buy the Duke album then re-read the last paragraph. If you like creative music you won't be disappointed, its a very solid album with strong instrumentals.

Another good point was that my wife experienced a Genesis concert with me, and hasn't divorced me, so that's a good sign. She says she understands my obsession more now, which could be just her humoring me, but I'll take it in the positive light :)

Next Genesis surround sound box set due out in November, can't wait!