Decision time

I'm just home from my favorite football-Sunday hangout, Mandalay Bay. I thought one hand was worthy of a blog post. As usual in this occasional game I play with readers, I'll set up the decision point as thoroughly as I can, lay out my options and the arguments for them, then give you 24 hours to register with comments about what you would do, before a second post reveals what I decided to do and what, if anything, I know about the ultimate outcome.

I was in Seat 10. We had a new player in Seat 1. He had been there maybe 15 minutes. He played a lot of hands, mostly passively, but had not been involved in any big pots. If he had shown any hands, I had either missed it or they didn't register as giving me any useful information about his play.

The most potentially useful intelligence I had on him had come a couple of hours earlier. He was hanging around our table, chatting with the players in Seat 7 and Seat 8. Apparently all three of them had been in a game together at M.B. Saturday. Our villain had cashed out for a remarkable $2200. After the three of them chuckled over a few stories from yesterday, he walked away. As soon as he was out of earshot, the two players with whom he had been chatting began telling us all what an awful player he was. Both of them were somewhat above-average tourist-level players, and they had no particular reason (as far as I could tell) to be spreading disinformation about him, so I tended to credit their accounts as reasonably reliable. They said that he was having the lucky night of his life--calling raises with garbage and hitting every board. Because this Allegedly Bad Player (I'll refer to him as ABP here) had walked away, I assumed that this insight was not going to be useful. But then, as I mentioned, a couple of hours later he showed up again and took the seat to my left.

So to the hand of the day: I had 9h-10h under the gun. I limped in. This was not an aggressive table, and I thought it likely that I would trigger a cascade of limpers, which it did. Five of us went to the flop, which came Kc-3h-6h. I bet $6 and got two callers--ABP and Seat 4, a timid player with a short stack. I didn't much like getting two calls, because the most likely scenario seemed to be that one of them had a king that he was unsure of, and the other had a flush draw, which was most likely going to be higher than mine.

Fourth street was the 8h. This completed my flush and even gave me a one-card shot at a straight flush. But I sure wasn't going to count on the latter coming in, and I had to doubt whether the former was good.

As I was pondering (though only briefly) what to do, I looked left and noticed both of my opponents rechecking their hole cards. This gave me more confidence than I would otherwise have had, because most amateur players will recheck the suits of their cards on the flop if they think they might have flopped a flush draw. After that, they don't need to check again when and if it hits. (I discussed the operation of this tell in some detail here.) I had not noticed either of these guys checking their cards on the flop, but it's possible that they did and I missed it.

Based largely on the inference that neither of them had just made a higher flush than mine, I bet again--$16. ABP quickly raised to $50. Third guy folded, and action was back to me. I had another $125 left, and ABP had me covered, having bought in for the $300 max.

My $16 had been something of a probe bet. If both opponents had a weakish king, I would expect both to fold. A nut flush might either call or raise, depending on propensity to trappy play. If one of them made a non-nut flush I would expect a raise to prevent the agony of a river draw-out to somebody who had just the Ah.

Basically, I had asked a question, and I had received an answer in the form of a raise, so I should fold, right?

Maybe, but not necessarily. It all depended on how bad a player ABP was. He might think a smaller flush was good. He might not be used to seeing people bet flush draws (especially from out of position), and on that basis conclude that I probably had just a top-pair kind of hand. If so, then a raise here would make sense, since he would fear me having the king of hearts, which might bink a higher flush on the river if he didn't guard against it. With similar reasoning, he could well raise with any set or two-pair hand. Heck, I suppose he might even raise with something like Kh-Qx.

So I had a genuinely difficult decision to make. Folding was a perfectly reasonable option, given the good probability that I was facing a bigger flush and had just one out (to the straight flush). Raising was a real consideration, because if he did, in fact, have anything other than a flush (top pair and a flush draw, two pair, or a set), I would want to get all the money in now if I could. Calling was not seriously on my mind, since it would just suck me deeper into the hand with no more information about where I stood. Furthermore, basically every river card except the 7h would force me into an even more difficult decision to make from out of position, a situation I try to avoid. So I'll give you this much of a hint: I did not call.

Put yourself in my shoes (my spiffy new shoes). As Karl Malden used to ask on behalf of American Express traveler's checks, "What will you do? What will you do?"

More bike stuff (no poker content)

Clark County has been aggressively expanding the number and reach of what they called "shared-use" paths; they're for walking, running, biking, dog-walking, horse-riding--basically anything non-motorized. (For an overview of the projects completed and underway, see here.) I've explored the ones that I can reach on my bike from home. Today I took a big step forward by throwing the bike in the back of the new car and heading out to what is probably the best urban trail the city has to offer.

It's the West Beltway Trail, which runs from across the street from Red Rock Casino to Tropicana Avenue. From there, you can ride on the sidewalks for a mile or so, then hop on to the Tropicana/Flamingo Wash Trail. Together these stretch about 12.3 miles end to end. There are also some branches off of them, which I did not explore. There's a nice review of the ride (plus directions on how to bridge the gaps in it--one big fault is that the county does not post good signs to guide people across the gaps) on Yelp, just posted a couple of weeks ago, with the route highlighted on a Google map.

Here's a sign from the trail that shows the whole system of which it is the backbone:

I started at the northwest end. I think that was a mistake, in retrospect, because it gave me the downhill half first, and the uphill half last. The grades aren't daunting, but you definitely feel them. I dropped, then rose, about 1100 feet over the course of about 9.4 miles each way. I stopped a couple miles short of the end because I was having a really great time and didn't want to spoil it by having the return half be so long and onerous that I'd be miserable by the time I got back to where I had parked the car. In retrospect, I could have made it and been only a little more sore than I am now, but I don't mind having erred on the conservative side. I rode 18.8 miles, which is a substantial increase over my previous longest ride of 14.8 miles. So I am stretching my legs, both literally and metaphorically. (Incidentally, if you're wondering why I'm sitting at home in front of my computer, writing about bike trails on a Friday night instead of out playing poker, it's because I'm stiff and sore enough not to want to take any more steps than necessary for basic life functions. I'll be fine in the morning, though, judging from past experience.)

One of the highlights of the journey is the recently completed bridge over Town Center Drive. I wish I had taken pictures of it. I assumed I would be able to find them online, but there isn't much. Too new, I guess. This one is from the county's web site linked above:

But it doesn't show you the best parts, which are the beautifully graded S-shaped ramps. They're gentle enough that you can climb them without killing yourself, but still steep enough that you can let loose and really get flying by the end on the way down. Great fun!

Here's an overhead shot from Google Maps, taken (it appears) when the north half was completed but not the south end:

You also pass what must be one of the largest holding basins for regional floodwaters, with an enormous concrete spillway controlling the gradual release of the water. Again from Google Maps (the spillway is that odd zigzag structure in the upper right, which looks tiny here, but is really impressive from the distance of the trail):

I had perfect weather for today's ride--about 80 degrees, clear, sunny. For the stretch that parallels 215, you get a mostly uninterrupted view of the bluffs to the west, and glimpses of Red Rock Canyon to the northwest.

This whole thing was far, far nicer than the mixed-use trails accessible from downtown. While it's nice to have those, their aesthetic qualities and utility are both severely marred by terrible maintenance. In particular, they are strewn with dirt, sand, and rocks washed over them by recent rains, and really uglified by all the junk that thoughtless people dump there. Worst of all, there is shattered glass everywhere. I don't know how often crews go through and clean them, but it's not often enough. By contrast, the trail system I rode today was almost entirely pristine, and I even saw a crew picking up debris between the trail and the wash. Does this have to do with the difference in wealth (and, hence, political influence) between people who live in the inner city versus those in Summerlin? The question is left as an exercise for the reader.

Here's my route mapped out on RideWithGPS.com, showing the gradual elevation changes in the graphic along the bottom:

It's really as lovely a path as you're likely to find in this city. I see on Yelp some gripes that there are no public restroom facilities, water fountains, trees, shade shelters, and other amenities. Which is true. But I guess my standards got set by those first city trails I rode, compared to which this West Beltway/Flamingo Wash trail is a luxurious upgrade, one I'm eager to experience again.

I wish I could say that my bicycle was as pleasing as the trails. The damn thing keeps needing trips to bike shops to fix problems. Remember that clunking sound from the cranks I mentioned? It turned out to be a bottom bracket (the thing that connects the pedals to the front chainring) in need of adjustment. I've ridden less than 25 miles since that was done, and that cursed clunking started up again today toward the end of this ride! I've also had it in twice for adjustment of the rear derailleur. Basically, I get to go for a nice ride, have a problem develop along the way, and take it in to the shop. I get it back, go for another ride, find another problem, take it back in. Four trips to the shop in less than two months of owning it, and a total of well under 100 miles of riding. That's just appallingly bad reliability for a brand-new bicycle, even if it is a cheap one. I don't know if I just got a lemon, or if all of Schwinn's mass-market retail bikes are this poorly built, but I have already decided that I will never, ever buy one from them again--especially given the unconscionable warranty policy they have (as I mentioned in that previous post).

But I'm trying not to let that deter me from having fun, enjoying exploring parts of the city I've never seen before, and getting my first taste of semi-regular exercise in decades. Today's ride was absolutely delightful in just about every way. If you live around here and have a bicycle, you really owe it to yourself to take it for a spin along these trails that a big chunk of our tax dollars have built.

Deuce-four has not forgotten me

It's been several weeks since I played online. Josie was kind enough to indulge me in some joint play tonight. We did three single-table sit-and-go tournaments. I cashed in all three, TYVM (2nd, 3rd, and 2nd).

I guess the Mighty Deuce-Four has been patiently waiting for my return all this time. First I cracked the AK (top pair/top kicker):

Later I caught runner-runner for a straight: 

While not nearly as exciting, I also manage to wrangle something worthwhile out of a measly ol' A-A:

Under Vegas

24-minute documentary on the tunnels underneath the Strip casinos and the people who live there, plus exploring the abandoned Fontainbleu hotel on the north Strip:

http://www.vice.com/uneven-terrain/undercity-las-vegas

Hat tip: Bryan Micon.

Poker shirts

I saw this full-page ad in the latest issue of Bluff magazine:

At first I thought it was some sort of parody of poker-themed clothing. I expected the copy to be something like, "Don't want to look dorky like this? Turn the page for what today's fashion-conscious poker players are wearing." 

But no. They seem to be serious about selling these get-ups. 

Remember the great 1983 movie "Trading Places"? Two ultra-wealthy business tycoon brothers make a $1 bet with each other as to whether they can reduce their most successful commodities broker to abject poverty, while simultaneously getting a homeless criminal to take his place in the firm. 

Well, I imagine that Randolph and Mortimer Duke were at it again, and that's how we got the company producing the ad seen above. Here's how I think it must have gone down: 

Randolph: I so much prefer our home poker games to playing in the casinos. When you let just anybody in to play, they wear the most appalling clothing.  

Mortimer: Oh, come now. You're exaggerating. They may dress casually, but they're no worse than the average riff-raff that inhabit the city.  

Randolph: You are sadly mistaken, brother. Poker players will wear anything marketed to them as "poker clothes." They have no taste, no discernment whatsoever.  

Mortimer: Randolph, are you willing to back up that assertion with a little wager?  

Randolph: What do you have in mind?  

Mortimer: You think that it is impossible to design a poker-themed shirt so ugly that poker players won't buy it, right?  

Randolph: That is correct.  

Mortimer: All right, then. I'll bet you that I can design poker shirts so hideous that even when promoted with a full-page ad in a nationally distributed poker magazine, not a single person will order one.  

Randolph: What you propose cannot be done.  

Mortimer: We'll see about that. You can't imagine the horror I have in mind.  

Randolph: Do tell!  

Mortimer: Very well. You know how when the rodeo is in town, it seems that everybody is wearing the same goofy-looking clothes? They all have "cowboy" shirts with this curvy yoke, spangly decorations, contrasting-color piping, pearly buttons, and so on, right?  

Randolph: Yes. So?  

Mortimer: I'm going to have a designer put together a line of shirts following that same general pattern, except with poker-themed appliques. I think I can even get her to include a patch on the inside of a sleeve, so that the wearer would be able to roll it up a bit to reveal--wait for it--an ace up his sleeve! You might as well just give me my dollar now. Nobody would ever buy such sartorial monstrosities!  

Randolph: Bring on your seamstress. Make your shirts. Place your ad. Your dollar is mine. Poker players will buy anything!  

Mortimer: So say you. But you still haven't heard my coup de grace. My ad will feature only models who look like they came directly from a 1970s gay porn shoot. Ha! Take that, loser!  

Randolph: Oh, my poor deluded brother. You think a little thing like that will stand in the way of poker players rushing to order whatever idiotic-looking mess you throw together? You have much to learn.  

Mortimer: We shall see.The usual amount?  

Mortimer: Of course--one dollar.  

Randolph: One dollar it is. I can't wait to see your face when the orders start rolling in. 

Is there really any other possible explanation? 

I voted today

An absentee ballot by mail, as I always do:

More life updates

1. New car got 31 mpg around town on its first tank of gas. I know you've all been on pins and needles waiting for that number, so I'm putting it as the first item here, to avoid further suspense.

2. I got new shoes today:

They're Eckos. $50 at the downtown outlet store. That's probably the most I've paid for a pair of shoes in, oh, at least 15 years. Quite a splurge, eh?

The last time I got new shoes (see post here) was three days before I met Cardgrrl. Obviously good things happen when I buy new shoes. What life-changing event will it be this time?

3. More progress on learning how to take care of my bike. Last night I took apart and put back together my front brake mechanism, then adjusted the position and tension. Neither of my two books was as helpful as I needed for this task, but I found a guy who does extremely helpful YouTube videos on bicycle maintenance and repair. His channel is here.

4. While out riding the other day I spotted a place on the sidewalk where somebody had etched "Bicycle Bob." I swear it wasn't me!

5. I've had some cars and, worse, trucks zoom past me with barely a hair's width of space between us. If I had wobbled a bit or deviated just a few inches to the left as these vehicles were passing, I'd have been hit. It seems that many Nevada drivers don't know that they are required to give bicyclists the full lane if there are two or more lanes available to them, or a minimum of three feet of clearance if there is only one lane. Here's the actual statute:

NRS 484B.270 Vehicles, bicycles and electric bicycles: Driver’s duty of due care; additional penalty if driver is proximate cause of collision with person riding bicycle.

1. The driver of a motor vehicle shall not intentionally interfere with the movement of a person lawfully riding a bicycle or an electric bicycle. 

2. When overtaking or passing a bicycle or electric bicycle proceeding in the same direction, the driver of a motor vehicle shall exercise due care and: (a) If there is more than one lane for traffic proceeding in the same direction, move the vehicle to the lane to the immediate left, if the lane is available and moving into the lane is reasonably safe; or (b) If there is only one lane for traffic proceeding in the same direction, pass to the left of the bicycle or electric bicycle at a safe distance, which must be not less than 3 feet between any portion of the vehicle and the bicycle or electric bicycle, and shall not move again to the right side of the highway until the vehicle is safely clear of the overtaken bicycle or electric bicycle. 

6. I had a long ride planned for this morning, but it was raining. Plans foiled. While out on errands this afternoon, I parked near one of the washes that has a riding trail next to it and watched the water flowing in the wash:




This is after roughly 12 hours of a steady drizzle, not one of the fast downpours that sometimes hit us. I'd really like to see what these washes look like after one of those. It's something I've never done in six years of living here. Next time it happens, I'm going.

7. In the morning I'm off to Salt Lake City for a family visit weekend.

Who ya gonna believe--Bluff magazine or, um, Bluff magazine?

I have been paying very little attention to the November October Nine this year. I recognize a couple of the names from watching the weekly ESPN broadcasts, but that's about it. I couldn't tell you who's in the lead, who's a good or bad player, or anything about their lives or personalities.

This week I started reading the October issue of Bluff magazine. One of the first things I read was on page 28, "By the Numbers...October Nine," by Ryan Lucchesi. He writes:

6
Number of professional poker players among the October Nine. Russell Thomas (insurance actuary with Aetna Insurance), Michael Esposito (commodity broker), and Jacob Balsiger (student at Arizona State University), are the three non-pros at the final table. 

Then a couple of days later I got to page 65 and the cover feature, which is titled "October Nine: A Look at the Contenders," with no byline. (I don't know if all of the player profiles were written by one person, each by a different person, or distributed in some other way among Bluff's staff.)

We start with Russell Thomas:

Russell Thomas is one of only three professional players at the 2012 World Series of Poker Main Event final table, though the other two have a bracelet to show for it.... He's primarily a cash game player, though he also has a full-time career working for an insurance company. 

So now we're being told that there are three professional players among the final nine, whereas the earlier article said there were six. Now we're being told that Thomas is among the three pros, but Ryan Lucchesi said Thomas was among the three amateurs.

Confused yet? Hang on, there's more.

The second profile is that of Jacob Balsiger. He is explicitly labeled as an amateur, with a decision to make as to whether to go pro after the WSOP ends. That concurs with the label given him by both Lucchesi and the writer of the Thomas profile.

Next up is the profile of Jeremy Ausmus:

Ausmus, a Bellagio cash game regular, was considered by some to be one of the best cap game players in the world on Full Tilt Poker before Black Friday hit.... In 2005, he moved to Las Vegas to play poker professionally. 

It lists no job for Ausmus other than poker, and that description certainly sounds like they're considering him a professional player (as does everything else I can find about him), and he is one of the six that Lucchesi is calling a pro. But at the same time he must not be one of the three being dubbed a pro by the anonymous author of the Thomas profile, because he specified that the two professionals other than Thomas both had bracelets, and Ausmus has no WSOP wins to his credit.

Next up is Steven Gee. No controversy here. He is explicitly labeled as a professional player and is also one of the two bracelet winners.

Same story for Greg Merson--his profile dubs him a pro, and there seems to be no argument about this designation. He is the other bracelet holder, having won the last tournament before the start of the Main Event.

Here's Jesse Sylvia's profile:

The 24-year-old pro who originally hails from Massachusetts is having his first real taste of success in live tournament poker.... Sylvia is a cash game specialist who's had a lot of success online. 

Sylvia, therefore, is deemed a pro by his profile writer (no other job is listed for him) and by Lucchesi, but definitely not by the author of the Thomas profile.

Robert Salaburu:

Twenty-seven-year-old Robert Salaburu primarily makes his living as a professional poker player who predominantly focuses on cash games, and if you think you're starting to see a pattern among the October nine, you might be onto something. 

Again we read nothing about any other job. He is considered a pro by his profile writer and by Lucchesi, but not by the writer of the Thomas profile.

Andras Koroknai:

Koroknai is a 30-year-old professional poker player from Debrecen, Hungary.... Koroknai has been playing professionally for the past six years and he is proud to represent his home country at the final table. He attended the University of Debrecen and worked as a computer engineer before turning to poker. 

Again we have agreement between this profile writer and Lucchesi. But the author of the Thomas profile deems Koroknai an amateur, not a professional. On what basis? I do not know.

Michael Esposito:

Michael Esposito is a 44-year-old from Seaford, New York, who has two kids and works as a commodity broker in New York City. Esposito plays just a few times a year as a hobby. 

Here we appear to have agreement among the three different viewpoints I've been exploring: Esposito is one of the amateurs.

To sum up: Lucchesi says that there are six professional players: Ausmus, Gee, Merson, Sylvia, Salaburu, and Koroknai. The author of the Thomas profile says that there are only three pros: Thomas, Gee, and Merson. And the nine profiles taken together judge seven of the nine to be professionals: Thomas, Ausmus, Gee, Merson, Sylvia, Salaburu, and Koroknai.

You can also look at it by the player. There is agreement across the board that Gee and Merson are pros and that Balsiger and Esposito are amateurs. Thomas is dubbed a pro by the author of his profile but an amateur by Lucchesi. Ausmus, Sylvia, Salaburu, and Koroknai are all called pros both by Lucchesi and by the author(s) of their individual profiles, but are all considered amateurs by the author of the Thomas profile.

Thanks for clearing that up for us, Bluff!

Vote hedgehog

Hat tip: Cardgrrl.

Canterbury Classic

An alert reader pointed me to this via Twitter--the winning hand of the ladies event of the Fall Poker Classic at Canterbury Park in Minnesota (where I used to play occasionally). See here.

Today's great political observation

From A. Barton Hinkle, writing in the Richmond Times-Dispatch:

Conservatives were so busy supporting Bush's expansion of war powers that they let him betray their small-government principles in domestic affairs. Liberals have been so happy to see Obama expand government's domestic scope that they have let him betray their values on civil liberties and war powers. In the process, each side has come off looking like a bunch of partisan cheerleaders who care about certain issues only when it's politically convenient. 

That's the thing about principles. If you don't try to apply them consistently, then people are apt to conclude you don't really have any.

Well said, sir.

(Countdown to cries for this blog to "stick to poker" in 3, 2, 1....)

Nightmare scenario

Saturday night I was playing at Hard Rock. I had bought in for $200 and was up to nearly $400 when a hand came up the likes of which I do not think I have experienced before.

I had 2d-2h in middle position. One of the several bad players at the table raised to $10 in early position. I called, basically set-mining. The guy two to my left also called. He was one of the only good players. He was rock solid, conservative, never bluffed that I could tell, never got his money in bad. The fact that I had observed this about him would prove to be crucial. 

The flop was 2s-8d-9d. Excellent! EP guy bet $45, an overbet of the pot. I estimated that he had about $80 left. I wanted to isolate him, so I raised to $125. But Seat 3 (I was in 1) called. Ruh-roh. I knew there was no way he would put that much money in with an overpair or with an ordinary draw. Two pair? Maybe, but he's not playing 8-2 or 9-2 after an early-position raise, so if it's two pair it's 8-9. Furthermore, I think he would reraise two pair here to defend against the obvious straight and flush draws. Or he might have a good enough read on me that he would fold two pair. So I was mostly discounting the two-pair possibility. I thought he either had a bigger set than mine, or he had a monster draw. I think the only draw big enough that he would call that much would be a straight flush draw. Specifically, Jd-Td, 7d-6d, or 10d-7d, in decreasing order of probability. Any of these would give him more than half the deck to make his hand. 

The original raiser also called. He actually had $84 left, so we had a $2 side pot. 

The turn was the Qs. Ugh. Tight guy's most likely draw just got there. If he didn't have me beat already on the flop, he probably did now. I checked. Seat 3 messed around with his chips for a while, stacking and counting and restacking and recounting. He finally settled on a bet of $250--basically about what I had left. I found it completely implausible that he would do this as a bluff or a semibluff. He had a made hand, period. And the only made hands he could have were a set higher than mine or a straight that had just been completed. If he had the former, I was dead to one out. If the latter, I would have ten outs to make a full house, but zero implied odds--there would be no more money to extract from him. 

It's painful to flop a set and see it go down in flames. It's even more painful to do so after investing $135 on it. But this was a clear fold. I thought the probability of him doing this with any hand that did not have me crushed (e.g., top two pair) was maybe 10% at best. With most other players, I would have to give this decision serious thought, because most others would stack off with enough lesser hands (e.g., pocket jacks) that I'd have to try to read whether they were as strong as they were representing. But with this particular guy, given all that I had observed about him over the course of a couple of hours, it took me less than five seconds to reach the conclusion that I had to fold. So I did. 

I was not a bit surprised to see him turn over 8-8. 

I was, however, surprised to see the original raiser turn over Q-Q. He had hit what he could not have known was a two-outer for top set, and won the pot. 

I don't think that I've ever been in a set-over-set-over-set situation. Heck, I'm not sure I've ever even seen one in live play. (I saw a flopped set/set/set in a televised tournament once.) It is a phenomenally rare occurrence. That I was able to figure out what was going on and therefore lose only $135 instead of my whole stack felt like the biggest win of the night. 

GlowRun

One of the reasons I went out playing early today was that I had been notified that the streets around my apartment building would be closed from 4 pm to 10 pm due to something called the "GlowRun." You can read about it here. I wanted to be back home before 4:00 so that I wouldn't be shut out for another six hours.

Anyway, I was mildly curious what this odd thing was, so a short time ago I stepped out onto the sidewalk to take a look at the people going by. As you can quickly tell, this isn't exactly the most serious bunch of runners ever to pound the pavement.

Grumps for Gary

Now wouldn't that be a great campaign slogan? 

OK, maybe not. 

I'm just home from a few hours playing at Mandalay Bay during the early football games. I noticed that another player at my table was wearing a Gary Johnson t-shirt. I showed him on my phone the post that I wrote last year about why I thought Johnson was the best presidential candidate. It turns out that he works for the Johnson campaign, and he offered me a t-shirt, which I gladly accepted. I promised him I would post a picture of me wearing it: 

Why do I like Johnson so much? Well, I answered that in a fair amount of detail in that previous post, so I'll refer you to it. But here's the Reader's Digest condensed version. 

The three issues I care most passionately about can broadly be described as follows: 

• Radical cuts in federal spending in order to put us on a path of fiscal responsibility, before we experience a catastrophic economic meltdown from what I believe is an imminently looming combination of crushing debt, hyperinflation, and soaring interest rates. 
• Maximizing individual liberties--especially, but not exclusively, those enumerated in the Bill of Rights. 
• Strictly limiting the size, scope, power, and responsibilities of all branches of the federal government to those spelled out in the Constitution. 

On all three of these general issues, both Barack Obama and Mitt Romney are just unspeakably awful--so bad that it's impossible for me to say which of them is marginally better or worse than the other. I could not cast a vote for either one of them in good conscience.

The differences between the two major-party candidates pale next to the fact that you can be absolutely certain that both of them would substantially worsen the nation's health on all three of my major points. Neither of them is even the least bit interested in cutting the federal deficit and debt. Neither of them gives two hoots about individual rights. And both of them explicitly tell us that they want to expand, not contract, the size and power of the federal government (though each in different areas). I won't stand for that--and I certainly won't vote for it.

Conversely, all three are areas on which Johnson and I see eye to eye, and I believe him when he says that he would make these things among the top priorities and guiding principles of his presidency.

It is an added bonus that Gary Johnson is the only candidate explicitly calling for full decriminalization of online poker (which, of course, I'm legally and morally obligated to point out in a poker blog). The others won't. Both Romney personally and the GOP platform are opposed to online gaming of any sort. If Obama is in favor of your right to play poker from home legally, he's too much of a political weenie to say so, which means you can't count on him.

There. I hope this mini-screed was worth the cost of a t-shirt to the campaign.


P.S. Confidential to the Johnson campaign people: Were I in charge of things over there, I would consider adopting as a campaign slogan that great phrase from Lincoln's Gettysburg Address: "A New Birth of Freedom." That is what this country most sorely needs right now, and your guy is the only one who is interested in bringing it about.

The results are in

Four months ago I told you that I was among the choices available for a reader survey by Ante Up magazine. I subsequently forgot all about it.

Yesterday afternoon I was at Caesars Palace waiting for a seat be available and started flipping through the October issue. When what to my wondering eyes should appear...


 

So there you have it.

Maybe there's another way to play it...

I was at the Stratosphere last night. I witnessed a hand that left me completely baffled.

Our contestants both look to me like celebrities. Seat 5 reminds me of Captain Kangaroo, while Seat 6 looks and sounds just like William H. Macy's character, Jerry Lundegaard, in "Fargo." So I'll refer to them as Captain and Jerry.

Those two plus both blinds (including me, big blind, in Seat 9) limp in. The flop is 5-5-x. It's checked all around. Turn is a king. Captain checks. Jerry makes a pot-sized bet. We blinds fold. Captain calls. I don't remember the river card, but Captain checks, Jerry checks. Captain shows 5-5 for flopped quads. Jerry shows a king and mucks. Captain wins the special $599 flopped-quad jackpot that the poker room has going this month.

Let's consider some of the possible reasons that Captain would play his hand this way.

1. He misread his hand, didn't know what he had. Nope. Even before he revealed it he called out, "High hand bonus!"

2. He misunderstood the rules and thought that if his opponent folded before the showdown he would lose out on the jackpot. This is fairly common among inexperienced players who hit a monster hand, and suddenly realize that they don't know how the promotion works, and can't stop in the middle of the hand to ask. But that's not this guy. He's a local whom I have played with several times before. He shuffles chips expertly. He knows how things work, no doubt about it.

3. He was out of position, so was going for a check-raise. Implausible. This was an incredibly passive table generally, and Jerry was no more likely to get out of line than anybody else. Anybody who tried to play a trapping game was misreading the table unbelievably badly.

4. He was hoping that giving free cards would help somebody make a big enough hand to pay him off. This is plausible for the flop and turn plays, but not for the river. After all, you can't get your monster hand paid off if you don't bet. In fact, as soon as the hand was over Captain explained that he was hoping that Jerry would make a hand that would qualify them for the bad-beat jackpot, which was at $18,000+. Frankly, I don't remember for sure whether a straight flush was possible on the final board, but I don't think so. It was not double-paired, so quads-over-quads was impossible. Worse, by not betting he risked the pot not being big enough to qualify for the $599 bonus. The pot was only $8 before and after the flop. If nothing else, he should have bet at least $2 at some point, hoping to get a call to get the pot to the minimum $10 required for the jackpot.

In short, I can't think of any sound reason why one would not bet out on the river, even if you can imagine a justification for passive play prior to that. Suppose that a straight flush were potentially out there when the board was complete. Are you really going to assume that your opponent has the exact two cards that make that hand, and check out of fear of losing your stack to the only hand that can beat you? That is "monsters under the bed" syndrome on steroids. There will be far more losing hands (straights, flushes, and full houses) that your opponent can have with which he will call a bet or even raise you than ones that can make a straight flush, even when a straight flush is possible (which I don't think it was). Besides, even if you lose your $200 stack to a rivered straight flush, you will win many times that from the bad-beat jackpot. So why not go for some value?

As I said, going for a river check-raise seems unwise, even given Jerry's bet on the turn, because a generally passive player like him will frequently take one stab at a pot, then not bet again. There is clearly more value in leading out with a river bet and hoping for a call or raise than checking with the fairly slim hope of a check-raise.

When I posted the bare bones of the story on Twitter and expressed my puzzlement, my friend Shamus quipped: "He's setting you all up for later when he checks with nothing."

It might be the best explanation anybody can come up with.


CODA: When Captain received his $599 in chips, he asked whether he had to keep them in play. This is a point on which house rules vary quite a bit. Some places require the chips to stay on the table, some require any that will put you over the buy-in cap to be pocketed, some let the player decide. Captain wanted to immediately cash out the whole $599, and just keep playing with what he already had in front of him, which the floor told him was fine. But then an argument broke out about what he would be allowed to do if he happened to want to keep all of that money in play--would he be allowed to? Note that this was not the situation--it was purely hypothetical. Nobody was objecting to Captain pocketing the money. The only question was if he could keep the bonus chips in play if he wanted to. Yet the argument droned on for ten minutes, with players vehemently insisting on one rule or another, claiming that it's done this way or that way everywhere else, blah, blah, blah. Good Lord, it was pointless. The only thing worse than an interminable argument at the poker table over an esoteric rule question is an interminable argument at the poker table over an esoteric rule when there is no possible resolution that will affect the current situation in any way.

Life update

I have some work I need to do here at home, but had a technical malfunction that is temporarily halting the process. I'm waiting for a fix that I hope will come through any minute, so thought I would kill a little time by telling you about some things that nobody could possibly care about.

1. Poker has been going great, though, unfortunately for the blog, without much good story material. August and September were two of my most profitable months in a long time. Which is nice, after having just made the biggest expenditure of my six years in Vegas....

2. I brought the new car home Friday and sold the old one Sunday. It was sad to say good-bye to the car that has taken me everywhere for the last 20 years, but overall I know that it's a change for the better. The new one doesn't have the speed or the handling of the old one--to say nothing of its character and memories--but it wins hands-down in economy, reliability, flexibility, and practicality. That's a trade that I finally not only became willing to make, but realized that I had to make.

Here it is, just before I drove it home from the dealership:

3. My bike rides have gradually been getting longer and more ambitious. Today, for instance, I went 13.3 miles, starting at--get this--7:29 a.m.! The old Honda could not carry a bicycle unless you first ran it through a metal shredder, but the new one accommodates it easily. This means that I will no longer be restricted to rides that start and end at my apartment building, which will allow me to branch out and explore more interesting rides than are accessible from downtown. This consideration was, in fact, one of the final things that pushed me off of a couple of years of teetering indecision and to the new-car purchase. I'm enjoying my rides, and don't want to be confined to what's immediately around where I live.

4. I found a great Android app for my phone: Velodroid. For $3.09 it elegantly handles GPS tracking of bicycle rides. With a couple of clicks, you can then upload the resulting data to the free RideWithGPS.com site, which spits out lovely, detailed graphic/numeric analyses like this:

That strip along the bottom doesn't need to look so cluttered; for this screen shot I had it overlay elevation, speed, and grade, which makes it too busy, but you can look at any one or two of those parameters at a time. Moreover, you can mouse along that strip and a blue dot retraces your route on the map while you get a read on the elevation, speed, and grade at that point. Very cool. Yes, there are free apps that do basically the same thing, but I tried a couple of them and found them unintuitive or maddening or unreliable or otherwise badly designed. Velodroid is easy to use. It does everything I want and basically has no extra complicating, cluttering features that I don't want. It's damn near perfect. 

5. I am a mechanical dunce. Nothing about the way things work comes easily to me. Nothing is obvious. I'm about as quick a study as you'll ever meet in nearly anything I put my mind to, but the workings of machines is a glaring exception. So when I tell you that I have now learned how to remove the wheels from my bike, remove and replace the tires, and get the wheels back on (including that tricky rear derailleur), you might think, "So what? Most 10-year-olds can manage that." But I'm telling you that for me this is a major accomplishment, which took way more hours and boneheaded mistakes and false starts than a supposedly smart person should require. I started with the most highly recommended guide book on bicycle maintenance and repair (this one), but found that even with its dumbed-down approach, it assumed more basic mechanical competence than I possessed. So I gritted my teeth at the insulting title and purchased this one, which has helped, though incredibly I still need some things spelled out in more painstaking detail than either book does. Sigh. It's hard being stupid. 

6. My friend PokerLawyer sent me a copy of Maus, which, I'm now embarrassed to say, I don't think I had ever heard of before. That's embarrassing because I have come to understand what an important piece of art/literature it is. I don't know how it escaped my attention all these years. Mine is a "complete" edition that P.L. bought while in Germany, and which does not appear to be available in the U.S., unless I'm overlooking something. I finished reading it night before last. It's terribly sad and painful, but at the same time amazing to see what horrors people can survive. The elder Spiegelman's resourcefulness is really astonishing. At various times, he only escaped being sent to the ovens because of being able to speak English, or translate between Polish and German, or mend shoes the way he had observed professional cobblers doing, or garner favors with police or guards, or because he had made previous social connections that he could exploit. It's a story that would be important to tell in any medium, but his son's choice of a graphic novel with the characters drawn as animals somehow makes it feel more universal, even though it's obviously a unique set of experiences. 

7. Remember this adorable little thing? It now hangs from the rear-view mirror of my new car. It's not like I really need googahs to make me think often of Cardgrrl, but it nevertheless gives me pleasure to have this tangible reminder of her affection in my field of vision.

8. I saw this license plate Sunday and liked it: 

9. For old times' sake, here a "Guess the Casino" picture for you from a session Saturday night: 

Well, the techno-fix I had hoped would come is not going to, so I'm throwing in the towel on any more work from home for the day. Off to the tables. I hope that I can bring home not only the mobneys, but a good tale or two to share. 

Who I look like--the latest suggestions

For some odd reason, I seem to remind random strangers of a bunch of different celebrities. No, I'm not hallucinating. It's true. People that I play poker with will tell me that I look like somebody famous. In the distant (as blogs go) past, I've mentioned that people have told me I resemble Bill Gates, Zeljko Ivanek, Robert Varkonyi, Scott Adams, Joe Pantoliano, and David Cross. (See posts here, here, here, and here.) I've also been told John Malkovich, though I don't think I ever blogged about that one. ("Mr. Son of a Bitch--let's play some cards!")

Well, in the last two days I've had two more names added to the list. While playing at the Hard Rock Saturday night, the guy sitting next to me out of the blue asked me if I read comic books. Not since I was a kid, I told him. He said that that very day there was some sort of gathering going on at the Hard Rock involving a comic book artist named Grant Morrison, and I looked a lot like him. I had never heard of him, but here's his Wikipedia entry, and here's the accompanying photo they display:

Then last night, while I was playing in a HORSE tournament at the Orleans, the player on my left was watching music videos on his phone. He paused one of them, showed me the frame it was stopped on, and asked me, "Recognize this guy?" He looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn't put a name to the face. He told me, "It's Moby. You look a lot like him." 

I suppose there's some truth in that, at least if you pick the right photo: 

Mind games

I was browsing YouTube for something else when the site suggested this clip. I watched it and liked it. I'm not sure the river raise alone would have won the hand, but the raise plus a well-conceived little speech did the trick.

Elizabeth Hille knows

See this clip from this week's installment of the World Series of Poker Main Event. (Thanks to Nerve Ending for the pointer.)

Won't you please donate now to help cure narcolepsy?

Two Sundays ago I played the evening HORSE tournament at the Orleans. Fairly deep into it, this woman got moved to my table, on my immediate left.

She fell asleep. All. The. Time.

If she wasn't in a hand, she'd fall asleep. If she was in a hand, she'd fall asleep while waiting for her turn.

I've seen people fall asleep at poker tables before, but never as many times as this woman did. And she had two additional characteristics that set her apart from other sleepers I've encountered in the past.

First, as soon as she woke up, she was able to perceive exactly what was going on. She didn't have to ask what game we were playing or how much the bet was. It's like this information sank into her consciousness by osmosis while she snoozed.

Second, she was winning nearly every pot she contested. She was one of the most astoundingly lucky card racks I've ever seen. She just could not lose. And since she fell asleep as soon as the dealer had pushed her a pot, she never had time to stack her chips, so they just kept accumulating in a ever-growing, ever-messier pile.

As far as I could tell, she was not drunk and she was not faking, though both possibilities seemed sufficiently plausible to me that I watched her carefully to see if I could detect signs of either one. I could not.

The dealers were annoyed with her, because--surprise--they don't consider it part of their job description to wake players up from naps. The floor guy did nothing more than occasionally ask her if she was OK, to which she would give an energetic "Yes, I'm fine." And then drop off again.

She eventually knocked me out, first one to bust at the final table, about three spots short of the money. In keeping with the rabbit's foot she must have had surgically implanted, we were playing stud, all in on 6th street, me ahead with a bigger two pair than hers, and she caught her four-outer to make a full house on 7th street.

This bizarre approach to the game worked so well for her that I'm tempted to take an Ambien right before my next tournament.

Old dog learns new trick

I was playing at the Orleans recently when a woman joined the table in the seat next to me. First thing she did when her chips came was jam one under the rail and hook the strap of her purse around it.

I've seen devices made for this same purpose--you anchor it under the rail and attach your purse to its hook--but I've never seen a poker chip put to use this way.

I tweeted this photo when it happened, and one follower suggested that this is actually fairly common, but I don't think I've ever seen it before.

...and in with the new

Arrangements are all made. Barring some unforeseen last-minute glitch, this will become the new Grumpmobile Friday morning.

Bunch more photos and full review from Edmunds.com here. And here's what Car & Driver magazine said of it when placing it on their annual "10 Best Cars" list--for the sixth year in a row.

Readers who have unusually keen memories may recall* that way back in 2008 I mentioned that a Honda Fit might be my next car--and so it shall be.

Those who have frighteningly keen memories may recall that on that occasion my buddy Shamus made a joke in the comments about "Fit or fold." I can now finally answer: Fit.



*Is it bad luck to use the word "recall" in a post about a new car?

Out with the old...

It has come time for me to part ways with my beloved old Honda and make room for its replacement (about which more soon). I bought it brand new 20 years ago almost to the day, and it has served me well. But all good things must come to an end.

So now it's for sale. I haven't listed it in any of the standard places yet, but as long as I have my own little forum here, I thought I might as well use it.

This is a 1992 Honda Prelude Si 2-door coupe, with the uncommon 2.3-liter engine and 5-speed manual transmission, 177,425 miles. It has some rust from my years of living in Minnesota, plus some passenger-side body damage from a collision with a deer about 10 years ago. I know of a couple of major repairs that will need to be done at some point, plus a host of minor problems that are part and parcel of having a car this old. I will spell all these out and supply many more detailed photos to anyone interested. But the drivetrain is fundamentally sound, interior in nearly perfect condition, new high-performance tires. Asking $1750.

Contact me at rakewell1 at yahoo. Dot com.

Good read

"Bill Rini," on Howard Lederer, Ray Bitar, and the Full Tilt Board of Directors:

At every major juncture someone has issued a press release or some other communication expressing their hurt and playing the martyr card. Ray is hurt people think he’s been removed. The board is hurt that Ivey said bad things about them. Howard is working so hard to get the money back. Ray has worked tirelessly.

Blah, blah, blah.

What were they expecting? A medal? A pat on the back?

Do they not realize that they so poorly managed the company that they basically took a business that was printing money and almost couldn’t fail and nose dived it into the ground? I mean, when you consider how badly you have to screw things up to ruin a company of Full Tilt’s size and with Full Tilt’s cash flow, it’s beyond mind boggling that they feel they should get credit for anything. This is the kind of screw up that ends up being a cautionary case study in an MBA course.

That’s the part that has so far been missing in all of this, humility. How about a sincere apology and accepting of their responsibility in all of this WITHOUT pissing and moaning about how hard they’ve been working or how hurt they are? They’re grown men and women. They need to quit acting like children. 

Read the whole thing here.

He had no chance

My friend Lightning foolishly shoved in his stack with a mere 9-9 against somebody with the Mighty Deuce-Four. In case you have any doubt how that worked out, see here.

Words of wisdom

"It doesn't seem really that the government is morally against gambling, it seems more like the government is morally against gambling that doesn't lead to direct revenues for the government."

That's Steven Levitt, co-author of the Freakonomics series of books, on the public radio program "Marketplace" yesterday. Listen to the whole thing here.

Opposite of Amazon.com

Today's example of horrible customer service:

On my ride this morning I noticed an alarming clunking noise with every pedal rotation. I think it is coming from the crank and probably indicates a bad bearing. I went to Schwinn's web site to find the nearest dealer authorized to do warranty work. Wanna know what I discovered?

There is none.

Not in Vegas.

Not in Nevada.

Not anywhere in the freaking United States.

Oh, there's a warranty, all right. But if I want to use it, I have to ship the bike back to Schwinn.

In Wisconsin.

At my own expense.

Think I'm making this up? See it in the company's own words here:

http://www.schwinnbikes.com/support/warranties#mass

Now, it's possible that they mean only that the defective part has to be shipped to them, not the whole bike. But it's ambiguous. And the difference does me little good, since I don't have any easy way of knowing whether my guess about the nature of the problem is correct, and I really don't feel like pitting my all-thumbs mechanical idiocy against something like packed bearings. Even if I somehow managed to dissect it correctly, what expertise do I have to know what a good versus a bad bearing looks like?

All of which means that I'll have to pay out of pocket for the repair--just as if there were no warranty to begin with.

Thanks for nothing, Schwinn.

Ego deflation

Out riding my bike this morning. (12.43 miles, with 629 feet down and back up in elevation, thank you very much.) Rode past an elementary school, where the kids were out on the playground for recess. A little girl, probably kindergarten or first grade age, waved at me exuberantly and cheerily called, "Hi, old man!"

Foucault knows

Andrew Brokos, a.k.a. Foucault, is a poker player/instructor/blogger. I was not aware until today that he was also a devotee of the Mighty Deuce-Four. Witness:

Look whose functionally illiterate

Enter the editor-in-chief of Bluff magazine (pictured above) into the Slow Learners' Olympics. I see a gold medal in his future.

The August issue is the third one in nine months that contains headlines with rudimentary errors of English--the kind that should have been shaken out of your system before high school graduation. (See here for the others.)

Guys, bookmark this great web site: Common Errors in English Usage. It might save you from further embarrassing blunders like this one. For the record, here is the entry on the who's/whose distinction:

This is one of those cases where it is important to remember that possessive pronouns never take apostrophes, even though possessive nouns do (see it’s/its). “Who’s” always and forever means only “who is,” as in “Who’s that guy with the droopy mustache?” or “who has,” as in “Who’s been eating my porridge?” “Whose” is the possessive form of “who” and is used as follows: “Whose dirty socks are these on the breakfast table?”

Please make a note of it.

Hard Rock

Last night I played at the Hard Rock for the first time in over three years. I was last there on May 23, 2009, to be exact. I never did particularly well in their "Poker Lounge." My experience was that they attracted too high a ratio of grinders to tourists. It's now been a couple of years since they shut that down and moved the room to a new wing of the casino, and this was my first time to try it out.

Why did I go? Well, I don't like there being poker rooms that I haven't seen--even ones that are merely remodeled or relocated within a casino. Also, I learned recently that an old friend from my Hilton poker room days, James Klosty, is now the Hard Rock poker room manager, and I hoped to see him. (He wasn't there, unfortunately.)

Finally, I am in the process of gradually liquidating my poker chip collection. The Hard Rock has probably issued more different commemorative chips than any other place in town. If not the absolute most, they are certainly in contention with the Tropicana, Rio, and Palms for top honors. Of course, I could just take the ones I don't want anymore to the cage and cash them in--but what fun is that? I wanted to play with them. I removed 26 ($130 worth) from my collection, leaving just six that I especially liked. (Two or three years ago I decided I had a completely ridiculous number of Hard Rock chips and that it was a Sisyphean task to try to acquire a complete collection, so the 30 that were left before last night's purge were already a culled set of favorites from a previous cashing-in event.)

As you might guess from the above photo, I pocketed another four to bring home. Which is not wholly within the spirit of the chip-reduction project. But it's still a net reduction of 22, so moving in the right direction. Besides, who could resist a poker chip featuring the Mona Lisa wearing Groucho Marx nose and glasses? Or Abe Lincoln in sunglasses? I love the elegant design of the Friday the Thirteenth chip. And surely everybody likes either Bob Seger, or the tailfins of the 1959 Cadillac, or both, right?

The Hard Rock parking garage is as maddening to negotiate as it ever was. But that actually worked out in my favor. I lost my first buy-in at around 11:20 p.m., and felt too tired to keep playing, so I tried to leave. But I couldn't. My car was on the 7th level, and there was a traffic jam all the way down to the exit. I had badly timed my bust-out to coincide with the end of the Fiona Apple concert. It was hopeless. If I got in my car, I would just sit in it, idling, inching forward, for probably an hour. I decided I'd be better off putting in another hour of poker. So I went back to the poker room, got in a different game, and in 90 minutes not only won back my lost buy-in, but an additional $195 on top of it.

The play was much softer than I remember it being in the Poker Lounge. The room is not as comfortable now, though. It's just a cordoned-off area of the casino floor, so there's a ton of noise and cigarette smoke, both of which annoy me no end. This means that I'm now going to be torn between remembering that the games seem easy to beat (if my one-night sample means anything, which it may not) and remembering the headache that the atmosphere gave me.

Will I go back again? I'm not sure yet.

Amazon (no poker content)

My friend Grrouchie just put up a post (if you go there, be sure to feed his fish) with a story about Amazon.com going above and beyond what they had to do to make up for failed promises that were not Amazon's fault.

This reminds me of my own encounter with Amazon's customer service yesterday. I have bought a bunch of ancillary items for my new bicycle. As my rides get longer, I'll need to be able to do simple repairs out on the road so that I'm not stuck walking home or waiting for somebody to come fetch me. To that end, I bought a book about bike repair, a small tool kit, a spare tire tube, a portable tire pump, and a tire gauge. I needed a bag to carry that stuff (except for the book). I picked one from Amazon. When it came, I found that it was just a tad too small to hold that assortment of stuff. So I picked another one that had slightly larger dimensions, and it proved to be just right.

I went to Amazon's web site to begin the process of returning the first bag. I filled out the form, relating the above story and assuring them that there was nothing wrong with the product, then clicked "submit," expecting to be taken to a page with shipping instructions. Instead, I got this message:

Just keep it, we'll refund your money anyway!

Who ever heard of such a thing???

Now, I realize that this is probably not, at root, a magnanimous personal gesture being extended to me because I'm an especially valued customer. Most likely, their accountants have crunched the numbers and found that for a $14 item it costs the company more to ship and process the return (i.e., inspect it for suitability for resale, get it back into the right spot in the warehouse, etc.) than they would make from being able to sell it to the next customer. If the item in question were, say, a $1000 camera, I don't think that same message would have popped up.

But even having that cognitive awareness, the feeling I got was one of warmth and generosity being directed my way. I'm pleased that for just the cost of the second bag, I have two similar products, and I can pass this other one on to Cardgrrl to use on her bike. And it absolutely does have the effect of making me even more inclined to use Amazon for future purchases.

Smart people are running that company.

When it rains it pours

The new bike survived its initial shake-down rides around the neighborhood without any problems, and I have acquired a few necessary accessories (water bottle mounting bracket, emergency tool kit, proper lights), so yesterday I took it on its first long ride. Well, it turned out to be 11.5 miles, which is long for me and my old, old bones, though just a warm-up for serious cyclists.

I have a map of the city's bike trails put out by the Regional Transportation Commission of Southern Nevada (available online here). A few miles due east of downtown is sort of an S-shaped trail, which then intersects near its southern end with another east-west trail. I set out to find these. Smoothly prepared paths with no motor vehicles to plow me down seems like a good way to put in some miles.

And I found them!

(Right-click and select "open link in new tab" to see the pictures full-size.)

Both of these two were opened in 2009 alongside some of the city's washes. A "wash," for those of you who have never lived in the desert, is a drainage area for floodwaters.

Here's the intersection of two washes. The bridge visible on the right is the connection between the two multi-use trails.

Tuesday we had a nasty downpour, the kind that always makes the news with shots of stupid people being rescued from their cars because they tried to drive through water without knowing how deep it was. It was only 1-2" of rain, depending on where in the valley one measured, but given the impenetrability of the soil and the amount of concrete, that's enough to cause all sorts of problems here that it would not in, say, the Midwest. Here's a news story about the resultant mess. Today we learned that at least one person drowned in the flooding.

Anyway, I was seeing these two washes about 48 hours after the rain had hit, and there was still water in them, though only a trickle. But what impressed me was that there was sand and debris up on the paths. It's possible that this has washed down from above, but I suspect that the water had risen to the level of the paths, which means that it would have reached as high as the bottom of the bridge in that photo. I wish I had seen it.

Floods around here are nasty problems, though very different from the ones that hit places like the Mississippi River. They hit fast and hard. I particularly remember news stories from the summer of 1984, one of the worst years for water in the valley. I had lived in Vegas from 1980 to 1982, so I was familiar with the streets that I saw on the national news--except that I was not used to seeing them as the rivers that they had become.

Since then, the county has established a flood control authority, which has spent billions of dollars on a still-unfinished 30-year construction project, building drainage channels and holding basins, so that these periodic floods don't cause the kind of property damage and loss of life that they have done in the past.

Here's a quick overview of a hundred years of Las Vegas floods, plus a sampling of news stories from the especially bad years of 1984 and 1999, and a ten-year retrospective on the 1999 floods.

If you're here when one of these things hits, don't mess around with it. The danger is almost always over within a couple of hours, so just wait it out where it's safe.