Time Warner Cable--Worse Company Ever?

We interrupt this serious poker blog to bring you the following rant.  Sorry for the inconvenience.  Our blog content provider has demanded an outrageous increase in the fees charged us, and we are trying to keep our costs down as a service to you, our customers.  We hope you will enjoy this alternate content that we are providing in the meantime, until an agreement can be reached.


Time Warner Cable sucks.  I’m pretty sure they’re the worst company on planet Earth.  They may even be the worst company on Earth II, for that matter.

I hope that every TWC customer who reads this, and even those who don’t, will do what I am going to do this month and just not pay your cable bill this month.  I know they have buckets of cash.  But if every single subscriber just skipped paying their bill for one month, surely they would notice that right?

As I’m sure you all know, TWC, the retched company I happen to get both my cable TV and my internet from, is currently in a fee dispute with CBS, the formerly proud network that once gave us the classic Mary Tyler Moore Show and now foists dreck like Big Brother upon us.  What that means is, I haven’t been able to watch a thing that CBS has broadcast since the beginning of August.

So, for me, and all of TWC’s other gazillion subscribers, “CBS” stands for “Can’t Be Seen.”

At first, that wasn’t a problem because, really, who the hell watches any of the crap that CBS airs?

But now it’s getting to be extremely inconvenient.

You see this week the US Open Tennis Championships started this week.  And while a lot of the preliminary stuff is on ESPN2, which TWC hasn’t seen fit to block yet, the finals, the semi-finals— in fact, all the big, important matches—will air exclusively on CBS.  That’s next weekend.  And on this weekend, Labor Day Weekend, most of the tennis will also be on CBS, not ESPN2.

I probably haven’t mentioned it before, but I am a big tennis fan.  Tennis is my second favorite spectator sport, right after basketball.  And unlike the previous grand slam tennis events this year, I’m home, not in Vegas for the US Open, and was looking forward to watching a lot of tennis these two weeks.

Furthermore, we are getting close to the start of the Fall TV season, and my favorite show—in fact, pretty much the only regular “entertainment” show I make a point of watching these days—is The Big Bang Theory (see here), which happens to air on CBS.  It isn’t a problem yet because they’ve been in reruns and I’ve seen them all.  But come late September, I will be screwed once again if TWC and CBS don’t settle this silly dispute.

I don’t know what the dispute is about and I really don’t care.  OK, I do know what it’s about.  Money.  Of course.  Both companies want more of it.  Duh.

Now, as it happens, both companies make shitloads of money every year, and I guess they need to make even bigger shitloads of money.  And you know what?  That doesn’t bother me at all.  I believe in capitalism.  I think each one of those companies has every right to make as much money as they possibly can. In fact, their stockholders demand just that.

I’m just pissed that I’m stuck in the middle of this dispute.  Now, without sitting down and having all the facts and figures in front of me, without being privy to the negotiations, it would be hard for me to say who is right and who is wrong in this fight.

Except for one thing that makes me think that Time Warner is wrong.  And that is, every other single television content provider in the country is still providing CBS as part of their service.  Every single one.  Only TWC is balking at providing CBS.  So either every other single TV provider is making a huge mistake, or….TWC has its head up its ass.

Guess which of those I think is true?

All I know for sure is that I am paying a ridiculous amount of money every month to TWC for their service, and they are not providing me all the service I am paying for.

The other day, I called their billing department to dispute my latest bill, telling them that they were not providing me the service they were billing me for.  I expected them to make some kind of tiny, dinky adjustment in my bill for the time they haven’t been providing CBS.

I was prepared to laugh at their ridiculously tiny adjustment.

What I wasn’t prepared for was that they offered me no adjustment whatsoever.

Yeah, that’s right.  They expect me to pay the same this month as last even though they are no longer providing me with one of the four major broadcast networks!  They won’t let me take even a penny off my bill.

Now do you see why I think they’re the worst company on several Earths?

OK, to be fair to these goniffs, they did say that with my next month’s bill, they were going to include a coupon good for $5.99 towards watching an On Demand Movie.  One coupon.  Just one.

Be still my heart.

I admit I had underestimated just how bad they are.

I told the poor schlub who took my call that I wasn’t going to send them one penny until they put CBS back on.

That will mean nothing to them, I know.  But if every single subscriber refused to pay their bill this month?  Like I said, that might get their attention.

I know some of you might be asking why I don’t switch service providers.  Well, it’s not that simple.  For one thing, it’s a major inconvenience.  Also, my homeowners association doesn’t allow satellite dishes on our roofs, so that’s another issue.  And then, if I did switch, I’d have to make sure that the new provider carried all the channels I want.  Last season, the Lakers switched networks, and some of the local providers didn’t pick up their channel.  Oh, and by the way, the new Lakers channel happens to be….are you ready….Time Warner Cable Sports!

When I called TWC, they offered me a free indoor, rabbit ears antenna so I could pick up CBS over the airways.  Trouble with that is, I live in an area where I can’t receive an over the air signal.  Even with a roof antenna (which I wouldn’t be allowed to put up anyway).

And because I also get my internet through TWC, CBS.com is not allowing their programs to be streamed to TWC customers via the internet.

Anyway you look at it, I’m screwed.

So, F.U. Time Warner Cable.  You suck.  You can kiss my ass if you expect me to pay you for this past month’s (lack of) service.

I urge TWC subscribers everywhere to stop paying your bill.  They can’t cut off service for all of us, can they?

And if they do….what service?

Edited to add:  reader Jon pointed out (below) that Kaley Cuoco, star of the Big Bang Theory, and depicted above, was once a nationally ranked tennis player in your youth, so there is a tie-in with her and the tennis that I am missing.  Thanks, Jon.  Here's a pic of Kaley playing tennis.  Looks like she has a couple of Aces already.

((Edited again to add....dispute over, CBS back on my cable.  Lesson to those mega corporations....don't mess with me.  See here))

"I Spent So Much Time in That Men's Room"

I just returned from a short (for me), last minute visit to Vegas.  Which means I now have five Vegas trips to blog about.  Yeah, I’m pretty sure I’m not out of material from any of the four previous trips, going back to March.

And I’ll be back in Vegas mid-September, for the next AVP Tournament & Meet-Up (see here).  It’s a $125 tournament with a $20K starting stack at the Aria, so I hope all of you who can make it do so.  Should be a good one.

My first night in town, I was reminded that there are people who read my blog and know me who actually want appear in it.  And are even offended that they haven’t been written about yet.

Case in point, a fairly new blog reader I’m gonna call “Abe.”  I’m hoping that the graphic I’m including in this post will clue Abe in as to how I came up with his pseudonym.

Abe is one of the most regular regulars in the poker room and as far as I can tell, he started reading the blog a few months ago.  I think his intro to my blog may have been the post about Doogie Howser being a cheap bastard (see here), based on the fact that he tweeted about that post and had heard the story himself from the waitress who was stiffed. 

We traded tweets for awhile and then we figured out who were in person. Then one night, while he was playing at the next table over from where I was, he turned around and shouted to me, “Hey Rob, I’m reading you latest blog post.  It’s hilarious.”  So, among other things, Abe has exquisite taste.  I believe the post he was reading was the Slut Parade post (see here), and of course, Abe had witnessed the Slut Parade first hand, so he knew how accurate the post was.

As a direct result of his good taste, and the fact that he’s a heckuva nice guy, Abe and I have become pals.  Like me, he has also become pals with many of the dealers in the room.

The last time I was in town, Abe and I were sitting at the same table and out of the blue, he said to me, “So Rob, when am I going to get an entry on that spreadsheet of yours.”

I knew exactly what he meant.  Abe obviously read my blog carefully enough to know that I actually use an Excel spreadsheet to keep track of all the pseudonyms I use. It appeared Abe was eager to become immortalized on this very blog.  It was kind of flattering.

Sitting between Abe and I was another player who was, I guess, kind of a regular in the room, at least by the way he was talking to the dealers.  I didn’t recognize him.  He heard Abe’s question and my response (not sure if I said, “I dunno” or  “we’ll see”) and asked what he had to do get on my spreadsheet.  He asked this even though he had, I’m sure, absolutely no idea what Abe was talking about.

So I answered pretty honestly.  “The easiest way is to either double me up, or stack me.”  He said, “Oh, well I know which one of those I prefer.”  In fact, he did neither, and will not be getting an entry on the spreadsheet.  At least for now.

But Abe is another matter altogether.  Actually, he was not the first person who had expressed a desire to have a secret identity on the blog.  Recall that Prudence’s pal Adolf wanted a blog identity even before he had ever read a single blog post—and didn’t change his mind once he had.  That story is told here, when I finally came up with the name “Adolf” for him and a story to match.

As I’ve mentioned recently, I’m still kind of getting used to this (see here).  When I started this blog, I came up with the idea of using fake names to protect identities.  I never imagined that people would actually want to be blogged about here!  Even people who never asked to become “entries on the spreadsheet” (because, mostly, they had no idea I even had a blog), never seem to mind when they find themselves “exposed” here.  I guess the best example would be Denise, who I feared would not be happy about the way I first described her.  But as I explained here, she was actually thrilled about the way I “tooted her horn.”  She found my seemingly ungentlemanly comments flattering.  And for reasons I can’t reveal, she is actually very glad that I did blog about her that first time.

Fast forward to my first night in town this month.  Abe greeted me and expressed dismay that he hadn’t made it into my blog by now.  He was sure that something that happened late in my last visit would make it into the blog.

Now, since I had last seen him, I’d posted my most recent story about the woman I call “Didi,” (see here).  Abe and I don’t see eye-to-eye about her. Most notably, he does not appreciate her antics the way I do.  I think the phrase he once used was, “I don’t like obnoxious people.”  It’s not that Abe is a too-serious guy—he’s not at all.  I’ve seen him laughing it up at the poker table many a time.  He just isn’t amused by Didi’s brand of outrageousness.  But hey, one man’s obnoxiousness is another man’s blogging fodder.

Every time Didi showed up in the room, he would express his dismay.  Of course, if he actually got stuck at her table, he could ask for a table change.  Near the end of my last trip, she was in the room and poor Abe got stuck at her table.

As it was taking too long to get that table change, Abe came over to me, sitting at another table, and suggested I switch tables with him.  Surely I would welcome the opportunity for more blogging material.  But I declined, as I was quite comfortable at the table I was at.

When I said no, he reached for his wallet and offered me $20 to switch games with him.  I laughed, I wasn’t sure if he was serious, but there’s no way I would accept money from him to switch seats.  He was disappointed.  But somehow, Didi herself moved to another table, and then left. 

Still, Abe complained that his offer of a twenty to get away from Didi didn’t make it into the blog.  I said I was sorry, and tried to figure out why I hadn’t mentioned it.  I guess the reason is that the day he made that offer hasn’t been blogged about yet, meaning I hadn’t replayed my voice notes.  So when I did the last Didi post, it had slipped my mind.  Sorry Abe.  I hope this makes up for it.

Almost as soon as he saw me, he made a reference that indicated he had picked up on a joke I had put in a previous post mostly for his benefit.  After reading about my bad spell last time (see here and here), he offered to lend me a poker book he had that seemed to address some of the issues I was blogging about.  It was Ed Miller’s “Professional No Limit Hold’em,” and was one of the few Ed Miller books that wasn’t already in my poker library.  Indeed, he brought it in and lent it to me the very next night.

So in the post about the Crazy Pineapple tournament I played at Binion’s (see here), I joked about having studied Ed Miller’s “Professional No Limit Crazy Pineapple”—a book that doesn’t actually exist.  But one of the first things he said to me this night was to ask me if I had finished reading that very (non-existent) book. 

Not long after that, Mike, the dealer who starred in this recent post here, saw me for the first time since I had posted that tale about his birthday poker game.  Somewhat to my surprise, he had read the post and had a bone to pick with me.  Without even saying hi, he leaned into me and said, “You know, I read your blog.  You’re way too sensitive.  I wasn’t really mad at you.  I was just giving you a hard time.  I was kidding.” 

I said , “I knew that, and I was just kidding back.  It was all in good fun.”  He said it didn’t seem like that. 

Apparently Mike doesn’t understand my writing style.  Probably because he’s one of those guys who doesn’t read my blog very often because—can you believe this?—my posts are “too long.”  I know he read the post where I introduced “Adolf” to the blogosphere because that too was his event, and he was eager to see what I wrote about it.  His main reaction was disappointment with the name I gave him—“Mike.”  He thought that was king of boring.  I guess it was, as opposed to, well, “Adolf”, and, of course, “Prudence”—whose pseudonym he knew about before ever reading the blog.  Admittedly, coming up with the name Prudence was perhaps my best bit of inspiration ever.  Sorry Mike. If I ever have to give you another fake name, I’ll come up with something more interesting….like “Modell.”

I was just impressed that Mike had read it.  It took me a long time to get that story posted, many months after the event took place.  He told me once, before it was posted, that he had looked for it on the blog and hadn’t seen it.  I figured he would give up looking through my too-long posts. But no, it turned out Mike was another person who wanted to appear on the blog.

Abe agreed with me that Mike was being too sensitive himself, and so I asked Abe if he had been the one who had alerted Mike to the story being posted, and he said no. To his surprise, it was actually Mike who brought it up to him.  I teased Mike about being surprised he had read it since I sometimes use words with more than one syllable.  And he said that he might have actually gotten through that entire post, for a change! 

I took a dinner break at one point and was surprised to see that they had taken out the restrooms over by the deli.  These were the “poker room restrooms” before they had to move the poker room to make room for sluttily dressed females.  The point being that I actually felt oddly nostalgic about that Men’s Room, having used it so many times over the past many years to rid myself of all the Diet Coke the waitresses were bringing me while I played.  And one of my earliest blog posts took place in that very Men’s Room, and actually took place long before I started the blog (see here).

I mentioned this to Brent, who was dealing when I returned to the game.  Apparently, the restrooms had closed down very recently, and he was still going by there out of habit, forgetting they no longer existed.  I thought about mentioning the fact that I had actually been kissed (by a girl, I assure you) in that now closed Men’s Room (see the post I just linked to, above) but decided that might be hard to explain.

So I made an even bigger faux pas instead.  I said, “I kind of feel sad about it.  I mean, I’ve spent so much time in that Men’s Room.”  That got everyone at the table laughing and I realized it didn’t exactly come out the way I meant it.  Abe said, “And did the time increase when the hot girls showed up?”

No, no, no…that’s not what I meant at all.  And I didn’t mean I ever suffered legendary gastric distress in that Men’s Room, either.  “No, you know, one minute at a time.  Just a lot of visits one minute at a time.”  Seriously, that’s what I meant.

One finally note from this session.  While Brent was dealing, I took out my infamous notebook and started writing some notes about a hand.  Abe, who knew exactly what I was doing, decided to comment on this.  “What are you doing, Rob?  Are you taking notes about my play?  Are you keeping a book on me so you’ll know what to do against me?”

Brent picked right up on this.  “Yeah, wouldn’t that be great?  You make a bet and then he says, ‘Excuse me’ and pulls out his notebook, starts paging through it (and he pantomimed doing this as he spoke) and then finally finds the exact info he needs, and says, ‘I call.’”

In hindsight, there wasn’t any actual poker in this session to talk about it, so I won’t.   But as it turned out, even if Abe hadn’t expressed his disappointment about not being an entry in a spreadsheet, he would have earned his blog name on the very next night anyway, in a session that we shared. That blog post will have a whole lot of poker.  But it will have to wait for another time.

And Then—The Oral Sex!

First a straight flush.  And then—the oral sex.  Sounds like a nice evening, right?

I had been playing for just a little while and I’d already caught a straight with a gut shot.  Limped pot, I had King-Jack in the blind.  Q-9-3 rainbow flop.  I bet the pot just to steal it, since no one had raised preflop.  I got two callers.  Ten on the turn gave me the straight.  Bet the pot, one guy called.  Another Queen on the river, and I got a bit scared, so I just checked, he checked behind me.  My straight was good.

But a few hands later, it was a lot better.  I limped in with 10-9 of diamonds, nobody raised.  Three of us saw the flop, which was Q-8-4.  Both the Queen and the 8 were diamonds, so I had the gutshot straight flush draw.  I’m pretty sure I’m supposed to bet there, but for some reason I just checked.  This was well over a month ago as I write this, and my notes don’t give me a hint of why I didn’t bet.  I seem to have a vague recollection of checking at the time, and then thinking, even before the next card was dealt, “Jerk, what the hell are you doing checking? You’ve got a zillion outs.” 

Turned out to be ok.  As I got over not betting, I started thinking, “Boy, the Jack of diamonds would be pretty nice right now.”  And so, the dealer did indeed put out the Jack of diamonds.  It’s only the fourth or fifth time ever that I’ve gotten a straight flush. The pot was very small and a guy bet a whole $5.  I just called, figuring if you can’t slow play a straight flush, what can you slow play?  The other player folded.

The river card was 10, putting four cards to the straight on the board.  The guy bet $10.  I bet $25 praying he would call—or even better, raise.  But no, he folded.  I dunno if he was going for the steal or had a weak flush, maybe a straight and he was worried about the flush.  So it was pathetically small pot for such a monster.  I showed my hand, because, if you have a straight flush, I think you really have to show it, right?  I think if I had bet the flop, I would have taken it down right there and never seen my straight flush, but I know that’s not the way to look at it.

 Early in the session a couple came to the table.  They were from the Southern California area.  At one point the woman said they had been together for 20 years, which seemed about right.  The guy didn’t say much but the woman was a non-stop talker.  I never learned either one of their names but I’m going to call the woman “Zoot” for reasons which will become clear later.

She seemed to be a little uncomfortable playing poker in a casino.  I think she knew a little poker but probably had mostly played home games with her husband, who was a much more experienced player.

One early hand she clearly meant to call a raise but put out the amount of the bet without taking back her blind, and since it had been a small raise in the first place, it actually counted as a raise, albeit an accidental one.  Here’s the thing….her hand was the dreaded Pocket Kings,  and raising was the right play anyway.  She won the hand, and I’m 100% sure she raised by mistake, and that she was not just pretending to not know what she was doing.

Her husband helped her a little with the blinds and the betting lines and one time even gave some advice, which of course was not allowed and they were warned by the dealer.  He didn’t do it again.

She got into a very lengthy conversation with a player at the other end of the table, a Swedish fellow who was now living in England.  It seems Zoot, although American, had grown up in Denmark.  Her non-stop chatter started to wear on me, as they were comparing Sweden to America and even discussing our different health care systems.  This is not even remotely what I want to hear a discussion of at the poker table!

She also was telling us pretty much her whole life story, which I mostly managed to shut out.  In addition to the Swedish Brit, she was talking a lot to her husband and the guy next to her, but not me.  Not me at all.  I was two seats away from her and she was ignoring me and that was fine with me.

Then, while I was either texting, tweeting, or writing something in my infamous notebook.  I heard her finish a sentence with the words, “oral sex.”

Huh?  All of a sudden I was interested.  The male dealer said, “Yeah, that’s  good.”  I was really pissed because I had no idea what she was talking about.  All I heard was, “blah, blah, blah.  Blah, blah, blah, oral sex.”

Damn.  Doesn’t she know I have a blog that specializes in just this type of thing?  A woman starts throwing the phrase, “oral sex” around at a poker table and I’ve got a blog post.

Sigh.  I had no choice but to ask.  “Excuse me, but what was the context of that?”  She had been in a hand with the Swedish Brit.  So she said, “That was the only way he could get me to lay down my hand—oral sex.”

Really!

Actually, at the time it wasn’t clear to me who was going to give oral sex to whom in order to get whomever to lay down their hand.  But I’m pretty sure it was him on her, otherwise, she would be offering him oral sex, and I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t have done that—even as a joke—with her husband not two feet from her.

All I could say was, “O.K.”

About two hands later, I got into a hand with Zoot.  At this point, the only words the two of us had shared were about her mentioning oral sex.  That was it 

So I had Ace-King in early position and raised to $8.  Zoot called, as did two others. The flop was 9-4-4.  I made a continuation bet of $25 and only Zoot called.  Damn.  But the turn was a King.  I bet $60 and she called.  I just couldn’t put her on a 4. By this time she had gotten more comfortable with the game and I’d seen her make reasonable raises when she should.  I was sure she would have raised if she had a 4.

The river was a four, giving me a boat, and I’m losing to two hands, Aces or a four.  I really was pretty sure I was good there.  Now I should point out, that when I made the turn bet and she called, she said, rather loudly and emphatically, “I want to beat you!”  It really sounded more like she had something against me, more than just a player expressing the normal desire to win.  I couldn’t figure out where that had come from, since, as I said, we hadn’t had much contact up to that point. I even expressed some surprise, like “why me?”

So I shoved and she called quickly.  Had I fallen into a trap?  We both had a bit over $100 at that point and neither one of us had put our money out over the line, it was all verbal. She showed her hand, pocket 10’s.  My King was good, although when the dealer started counting my chips she got confused and asked what was going on, perhaps thinking that she might have actually won!  Turned out I had her covered by a little bit.

Once she realized that she had lost and the dealer was taking all her chips away, I started debating about making a really risqué comment that I would never in a million years have said to a stranger just a year or two ago.  But hell, she was the one brought up oral sex.

Seriously, I dunno where I got the balls to say this to her, especially with her husband right there, but sure enough, I found myself saying to her,  “You know, if he (pointing to her husband) wasn’t here, I might suggest we do that oral sex thing instead of you having to pay me off.”

Her husband just sort of chuckled and she said, “Oh no, no, no.  That’s way too complicated.”

Really, that’s all she said.  She clearly wasn’t offended.  And neither was her husband.  I guess he’s pretty used to his wife’s personality.  A few of the other players laughed but that was it.

I'm not sure if it was before or after her first bringing up oral sex that she started talking about the porn industry being centered in a certain area of the San Fernando Valley in the Los Angeles area.  I did ask her how she knew so much about that subject and she just said, "Oh, I know a lot of things."

In case you couldn't guess, she was not a shy woman.

The husband busted out soon after, and they went to dinner.  As far as I know, they never returned to the poker room.

There were no especially interesting hands after that.  I was up and down all night, finishing slightly in the plus column.  And I only got paid in chips, not in favors, of course.

Two Vegas Poker Rooms Open, Another Closes

My new column for Ante Up is now online and can be found here.

Should be appearing in poker rooms around the country soon, if not already. I never know.

Kings of March Madness

March Madness?  That was a long time ago, I know.  But yes, I still have material from the March Madness trip (as well as all the ones since).  And this one, it turns out, has a lot to do with my favorite hand, the oh-so dreaded pocket Kings. 

And since this post will be so K-K oriented, it gives me a chance to tell a more recent story from an otherwise forgettable session from the Bike here in L.A.  I had only just gotten to the table and played a few hands.  There was some seat changing going on, players coming from a broken table, etc, and as the cards were being dealt the guy who was supposed to be the big blind complained that he wasn’t, or somebody said he shouldn’t have to post to come in (at this room, at this level of game, you have to post to come in, so it’s just like the Bellagio).  As someone  was complaining, the cards had been dealt and the action had started.  One guy threw his cards back because he was told to post and he didn’t’ want to (or think he should have), and the dealer said hold up, hold up.  He just wanted to recreate things to determine if the guy had to post or not, I think.  Meanwhile, the guy UTG to my right, raised to $15, first in.  I looked at my hand and saw, of course, KK.  I waited for the dealer to figure out if the hand was a misdeal or not.

But before he figured it out, almost everyone but the guy who raised and me had tossed in their cards.  The dealer was upset, “No, I didn’t say throw them in, I said wait.”  But now it was too late, and so he called all the rest of the cards back, which basically were mine and the guy in front of me who had raised.  He just slid them in face down but I showed everyone my cowboys.  A few people on the other side of the table expressed their sympathy.  I asked the guy who raised if he had Aces.  He didn’t say anything at first, then finally said, “Let’s just say I liked my chances.”

I don’t think for a minute he Aces, he would have showed them, I believe.  He was a young, fairly aggressive, solid player.  He raised big a lot and we didn’t often see his hand, but a few times we did he didn’t have a premium hand.  I’m sure I was way ahead of him.  I’m also sure he would have called my three-bet and sucked out on me.  So that has to go down in the books as a good result with pocket Kings for me.

Back to Vegas.  The rest of this post takes place on the very first night of March Madness.  One of my first hands, on the button, I had Ace-Jack suited.  One limper and I made it $10.  The blinds folded but the limper, an older gentleman, called.  And when he called, he said, “I’ll check it down.” 

Huh?  Where did I agree to that?  Well there was an Ace on the flop and he checked and I bet and he folded face up.  What did he have?  The dreaded pocket Kings!  Really. I didn’t say anything but I think I must have given off a physical tell giving away my surprise that he played his hand so badly.  And so he said, “I knew you had an Ace.”

Yes, sir, I’m sure you did.  Did you also know an Ace was gonna come on the flop, because you were way ahead of me before then.  He was kinda short stacked too, having less than $50 in front of him.  I dunno how he doesn’t raise preflop there, or even better, after he limped and I raised, why not just shove back?  I wouldn’t have called a shove with my Ace-Jack that would have been a much better play than what he did.  Even I don’t play K-K that badly.

A few hands later he lost another hand with K-K.  I don’t recall the details but I do know for a fact that he didn’t raise preflop with them again!

Much later, the KK guy rebought and changed seats.   He limped into a hand and a guy in middle position made a standard raise.  The guy to my right re-raised.  Back to the KK guy and he shoved for over $100.  The ol’ limp/raise maneuver.  The original raiser thought for awhile and said, “I can’t believe I’m gonna fold this hand,” but he did.  The other guy called for less. 

Turns out the KK guy had Aces this time, and the guy to my right had the KK.  The original raiser said he had pocket Queens.  The guy with the Kings busted out, not getting any help from the board.  The guy with the Queens said when he sees that move, an older guy limp/raise, it is always, 100% of the time, pocket Aces.  He said he would have folded pocket Kings there too.

The funny thing was, the hands I described where the guy didn’t raise with KK happened before he had gotten to the table.  He didn’t see that old guy limp twice with Kings.  That would have made it even more obvious the guy would only raise (limp/raise) with Aces. 

I still think it was very risky move, there hadn’t been the kind of action at this table where you could be fairly certain a raise was coming preflop.  There had been plenty of limped pots.  But he got lucky this time.  But you know, if he had raised, I think the guy who raised first would have three-bet, the KK guy would have shoved, and he would have won more money when he shoved.

I flopped a set of Jacks and won a small pot.  Then it was my turn get pocket Kings.  I raised, two callers.  Lo and behold, a King hit the flop, along with two diamonds.  I had to bet and got no callers.  I dunno why I wasn’t celebrating there; for me, to win any hand with KK is a miracle.  But I was disappointed I didn’t win a bigger pot with a set of Kings.

My best hand of the night came against a New York cop who was in town for golfing trip with his buddy.  He was a really nice guy too.  I called his normal raise with pocket 3’s.  King high flop, but the low card was a three.  I bet out three times, he called three times.  My river bet was $100, which was actually a little more than he had left, and he called.  He saw my set and just mucked.  It was a nice pot, almost a double up for me.  He was nice about it, and said, “Every time I flop a monster I run into a bigger monster.”  So I asked him what he had and he said, “a pair of Kings.”  Huh?  That’s a monster?  Assuming he had Ace-King, he flopped top pair/top kicker and calls that a monster? 

He didn’t rebuy.  The dealer said to me, “Didn’t that guy say he was a New York cop?”  I confirmed that he did.  “Better be careful walking to your car.”  Nah, he was fine, but I guess he figures this is a bad beat story for him.

I raised with Ace-Jack suited and flopped a flush draw.  I made a continuation-bet and was called.  I made the flush on the turn and this time my opponent, who was the guy who folded Queens earlier, led out.  Lucky me.  I don’t think it’s a good idea to just smooth call there, or am I wrong?  I’m not inclined to slow play.  I bet 2.5x his bet and he mucked.  A smaller flush?  I don’t know.

The guy to my right had been replaced by a rather good looking woman, who played short-stacked the entire time she was there.  She was the only woman at the table the entire time I was there.  It was a welcome to sight to see her join our group of ugly mugs.  Then the guy who folded Queens busted her out.  She went all in on a board with two Queens and he called.  Turned out neither one of them had a Queen.  She had pocket Jacks and he had the dreaded pocket Kings.  She didn’t rebuy.

As soon as she left the table, the male dealer, said to the guy who busted her, “Thanks a lot, Mike.”  He seemed to a regular even though I didn’t recognize him.  Everyone knew what he meant and we all laughed.  “What was I supposed to do, lay it down there?”  All the guys at the table, and the dealer, pretty much in unison said, “Yes!”

In early position I bet $10 with QQ.  I was not happy about getting four callers.  I was not happy about an Ace high flop (no Queen).  I made a continuation bet of $25, first to act.  If I had gotten raised, I would have likely folded.  If I had gotten called, I’d probably would check/fold the turn.  Surely someone had an Ace, right?

One by one, the players folded.  The last guy took his sweet time.  I was sure he was going to at least call, maybe he was thinking about raising.  But no, eventually he folded.  I considered that a minor miracle.

Not long after, I got those same Queens again and this time only one caller.  The flop was 7-6-5 rainbow.  This time my bet was called.  The turn card only made it worse, a 4.  So I checked, the player bet, and I reluctantly folded.  What else was I supposed to do there?  From the other side of the table, Willie, a regular I’ve mentioned quite a few times before, said to me, “Didn’t like the turn card, huh?”  No Willie, I didn’t.  Didn’t like the flop much either.

I got pocket Kings two other times this nite.  One time, no one called my preflop raise.  Yes!  The other time, it wasn’t so good.  I raised and only the old guy who had misplayed the KK early—and had limp/shoved with Aces—called.  There wasn’t just one Ace on the board, there were two.  Before I could even figure out what to do, he led out.  It didn’t take me long to muck.  There is no way that guy did not have an Ace.

Not longer after, I decided to call it a night.  I had made a nice a little profit for the first night of March Madness and was glad that, seeing pocket Kings as many times as I did, I never once got stacked with them.  A good night.

"We'll Give You $1,000 if You Take Your Top Off to Deal"

To quote that famous poker blogger, Charles Dickens, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”  Well, Dickens never could make up his mind.

But the poker tournament up for discussion was basically a Tale of Two Cities.  Or two tournaments, at least for me.  There was the tournament before the first break, and the one after that break.  Very different indeed.

Also, there was a big ruckus over whether a guy had folded, and as usual, there was a woman talking about dealing poker with her shirt off.  Ho hum.

This was my last day of the trip that started in May and ended in June.  I decided to play in the Noon Mega Stack tournament at Caesars, $130 buy-in.  And for the first four levels I was running like god, as they say. 

First level, with King-Jack hearts, I raised to $250 (blinds were 50/100) and only the big blind called.  Jack-10-5, two hearts on the flop.  I bet $500 and he called.  Ace of spades on the turn and I bet $700.  He made it $2K.  I called.  Heart on the river gave me the flush.  I bet $4k and he called.  He had King-Queen for the straight on the turn and I sucked out on him.

An aggro raised to $550 and I made it $1500 with pocket Jacks.  He folded pocket 10’s face up.  A few hands later I had pocket Queens and faced a raise and a call.  I three-bet and they both folded.

Third level, the blinds were 150/300.  I raised to $1000 with Ace-Queen off.  One caller, a short stack.  Jack high flop, I made a $1500 c-bet.  He called.  Queen on the turn, I bet $2K, he shoved for $6100 more.  I think about it and realize I would still have a decent stack if I called and lost, so I called.  He flipped over Ace-Queen for a chopped pot.

I raised with Ace-10 and had one caller.   Queen-10-x on the flop and I bet out.  He shoved for not much more than my bet.  I snap called.  He had pocket 9’s.  The turn was a Jack, the river was a King, giving us both straights but I had the bigger straight and he was done.

Towards the end of this run, a new dealer pushed in, a woman who was probably approaching middle-age  Rather ordinary looking lady.  She corrected the older guy to my right about betting out of turn or putting out his blind out at the wrong time, something like that.  He apologized and she said, “It’s ok this time, but next time we’re gonna take you in the back and beat you.”

The guy said, “At my age, that’s actually a good offer.  I’ll take that offer.”

She said, “Oh, they don’t let me do that anymore.  They don’t let me do anything. They don’t let me beat people.  They don’t let me take my top off.”

That got my attention, though it seemed like a total non- sequitur to me.  Nobody asked her about it but that didn’t stop her from telling us what she was talking about.

It seems that when they were filming the movie The Hangover at Caesars, the cast and crew would regularly play poker after shooting, late into the night.  And during one graveyard shift, around 4AM, there was only one table going, and everyone at the table was with the film.  So they offered her $1,000 if she would take her top off and deal to them with her top off.  She said, “$1,000?” and she looked around, no one was there, so she said, “Why not?” and took her top off.

I think we were all wondering if she meant she had truly gotten topless when she added, “Why not?  I was a bra model for 15 years.  So it was no big deal and I got $1,000 for it.” 

After not too long, a supervisor came along and insisted she put her shirt back on and told her not to do that again.

(Edited to add: actually, considering how I started out this blog post, with the reference to Charles Dickens's most famous work, you will see that we are now talking about, "A Sale of Two Titties").  Thanks to my pal Norm who came up with this--see the very first comment to this post below).

I want to make it clear, I had nothing to do with her telling that story.  I didn’t say anything to her to prompt it, I hadn’t said a word to her when she started telling us this.  As I’ve said, these women just seem to find me. 

After the break, my cards and my luck totally changed.  I couldn’t get a hand to save my life.  I tried to make a few moves with weak hands, and usually only ended up losing chips.  Nothing too dramatic, just a steady drip drip drip.  Combined with blinds and antes creeping up and suddenly I was no longer playing with a full deck, I mean a big stack.  When our table broke and I was moved, I was struggling with a tournament “M” of around 10, usually the place where I start thinking of making shoves instead of raises. 

The last good hand I hand was with pocket 6’s.  I put out a big raise, one lady called.  A-10-3 flop.  She checked, and I nervously put out about half my stack.  She tanked for awhile and then folded.  I figure she either had a 10 or a weak Ace.  Phew.

The new table I was at had a decidedly European flavor.  There was a Brit, an Irishman and a German.  The German got into quit a snit with an ugly American.  I kind of mean that literally.  He was a big, mean looking dude, and extremely unfriendly.  He also had a massive amount of chips.

So he got into a hand with the German and by the river, there was both a straight and a flush possible.  The German bet $15K.  I didn’t note the size of the pot, but I remember thinking it was a pretty small bet for that pot.  The big guy didn’t say a word and just flipped over his hand. Note, he didn’t push his cards forward, he flipped the cards over right in front of his stack.  But the German and the dealer both thought that was a fold.  The dealer went to grab his cards and the German started sliding his hand toward the dealer (he was sitting right next to the dealer).

Now I should point out that during these summer series all over town, including the WSOP, you see a lot of less than experienced dealers.  I had already figured out that this particular dealer wasn’t a regular dealer, he had difficulty making change and keeping the antes straight.  But he clearly thought the guy had folded as did the other player.

Before the dealer touched the exposed cards, the player who flipped them over grabbed them and said, “No, no, I’m not folding.  I’ve got two pair.  I call.”

The German says, “No, that’s a muck.”  The other guy insisted it was not a muck.  “Why would I fold, I have two pair.”  Well, here’s a thought: both a straight and a flush look very possible, sir.

While they were arguing, he put out chips to call the bet.  The dealer seemed to think it was a fold, and I think he even said that to the player, who said, “No, that’s not a fold, I just turned my cards over to see his reaction.”

Either the German or the dealer said, “Well, you’re not supposed to do that.”

He said, “Fine, penalize me but don’t kill the hand.”

So they called the floor over and explained it to him.  The floor ruled it wasn’t a fold, the cards never touched the muck.  His cards were live.

That really infuriated the German who just mucked his cards without showing.  He said, “Anywhere in the world that’s a muck, you turn over your cards like that.”  But the ruling stood.

As an aside, I already noted that his bet on the river was small compared to the pot.  If he wanted to pull off a bluff there, he needed to make a bigger bet, in my opinion.

Meanwhile, the Irishman at the table had started criticizing the guy who turned his cards over.  That got the other guy really pissed and he told him, in a loud, nasty voice, to shut the f up.  “This has nothing to do with you, stay out of it.”  I wondered if fisticuffs were about to break out.

This turned out to be the last hand before the break, and during the break the floor did penalize the player for exposing his cards.  I thought he’d have to sit an orbit, but no, it was only three hands.  And since he had been the small blind on that hand, all he lost were three antes.

With Queen-10 clubs in early position, at 200/800/1600 I made it $5K.  I had around $32K in chips.   I think I should have just shoved instead.  One guy called.  Flop was Jack-10-4.  So with middle pair, my continuation bet was a shove.  The other player had me well covered and snap called.  He had Ace-Queen for the gut shot.  He picked up a flush draw on the turn and then got a King on the river for a straight.  And I was done. 

What had started so promisingly ended rather early.  No big disaster hands, either.  Just the way tournaments run sometimes.

At least I got to meet a dealer who claimed she’d been paid a grand to deal poker with shirt off.

The Famous Robvegaspoker

I’m famous.

OK, I’m not really famous famous, but in the poker world, I am starting to get a name for myself, and I don’t mean “boob Rob.” Between this here blog and my Ante Up columns, people know me and/or know of me.  Not a lot of people maybe, but more than I ever would have expected.

This post is going to be quite a bit self-indulgent.  Even more than usual.  Sorry.

I found that out during my late May/early June visit to Vegas.  Even before then, I would sometimes get tweets from people I didn’t know telling me about how they lost a hand with the dreaded pocket Kings.  And yes, they would always refer to them as the “dreaded pocket Kings.”  Damn, I so do wish I had thought to copyright that term.  Last Christmas, a reader of mine all the way from Australia was visiting Vegas and recognized me in the poker room, saying he was able to Google my picture and that I was “internet famous” (story is buried in this post here).

But it was trip I timed to coincide with the beginning of the WSOP (and two AVP events, and Memorial Day Weekend) that really illustrated it for me.

First there was the first event in the annual Binion’s Poker Classic.  I talked a bit about this tournament back in this post here, explaining that I wouldn’t have time to do a complete write up on it then.  So I guess now is the time to report on the rest of it.

This was a $160 buy in NL tournament with a $25K guarantee.  Paul, the TD director at Binion’s, was tweeting about it, and I tweeted back that I was going to play.  I got a tweet back from one “MDGPoker” saying, “Cool I have a shot to be lambasted in my fav blog besides mine. GL!”  That was very flattering, especially since I didn’t even know who he was.  I was following him and twitter (and vice versa) but that didn’t mean he reads my blog.  I had never heard from him before.  As far as I knew, I had never met him.  So that was pretty nice.

I tweeted back, “Ty! Just crack my KK and you're guaranteed to get your whole blog post.”  And he replied, “OBV! and it will be with 5 high lol.”  I told him I would be wearing my Ante Up shirt and to be sure to stop by and say hello.

In fact, when I got to Binion’s, before the tournament started, I actually recognized him from his Twitter pic.  I said hello and he was surprised, he said I didn’t look like he expected to me to look.  I guess he just didn’t anticipate me being quite so good looking!  We never ended up at the same table that day, but he will return never-the-less.

Apparently I have this habit of being seated next to dealers who read my blog.  Remember, at the Venetian I was seated immediately to left of Audrey, a dealer at Binion’s who I thus found out read my blog (see here).  Well, this time, I was seated to the left of Ron, who not only deals at Bally’s but is a blogger himself (see his blog here and my recent post where we played poker together here).  That was a nice surprise and I’m glad I at least had position on him; he’s a much better player than I am.  But I don’t think we really got into any pots together.

One of the dealers at the table was a fellow AVP’er, Bubba Sparks.  We’d met a few times before since he frequently deals the Binion’s weekend tourneys these days.  He started discussing TBC with me.  That led to a discussion of my ol’ nemesis, “Poker Genius” who I haven’t run into in some time.  In fact, last time I saw him, it was at the Bike in Southern Californa.  I expected to see him at the WSOP venue trying to bumming stakes off people, but I never saw him.  And I found out why.  It seems the poor guy has been banned from all Caesars Entertainment properties!  Wow, that is major, he used to always hang out at Bally’s or Planet Ho.  I actually thought he lived at Bally’s, and by that I mean slept in his car in the Bally’s parking lot (that’s just conjecture).  Anyway, he is supposedly living in Florida now.

The discussion of TBC sort of outted me to a player at the table who is also an AVP’er, 24fanatics.  He overheard us talking about Tony and on a break, introduced himself even though we had been playing at the same table the whole time.  He introduced me to another AVP’er, phantom309, who it turns out is a fellow columnist for Ante Up!  He covers the Oklahoma area and was visiting Vegas.

I do want to flesh out (so-to-speak) a story I just gave the punch line to in the earlier post where I mentioned this tournament (again, the post here).  When the lovely and vivacious Denise came to the table to deal, she noticed there was something amiss with the chip rack at our table.  Since it only had a few tournament chips in it anyway, I’m not really sure what could have been wrong with it, but it was bothering her.  Finally, she said, “Look at this.  The rack is a mess.”

This guy she’d be bantering with, obviously a regular well known to her, said, “You’re what is a mess?”

With a hint of exasperation, she said, “The rack.  This rack,” pointing down to the chip rack.  And then, “My rack is perfect……since you asked.”  And as she said it, she looked straight at me and winked.  The guy protested, “I didn’t ask,” but everyone was too busy laughing to pay him much attention.

When I told that story in the previous post, I wasn’t certain whether that wink and nod was specifically directed at me or it was more of a factor of my being directly across from her.  But subsequent events have led me to believe with much certainty that it was definitely directed at me purposefully. It was Denise's comments about my blog and my very first mention of her on the blog that convinced me.  See the post here and you'll see what I mean. There’s no question in my mind she did that because she knew I had blogged about her—and, ahem,the part of her that she had told us all was perfect. But at the time, all I knew was that I always wanted to be on my best behavior around Denise, even if she had called me a gentleman on the same day she told everyone at the table that I had a blog (see here).  So I tried to stifle my laugh as much as I could and kept otherwise silent.

Speaking of “gentleman”, some other guy at the table referred to himself as such, another one of the regs that she was bickering with.  She said, “Yeah, you’re a gentleman.  You take the dishes out of the sink before you pee in it.”

Later when somebody said something risqué that I didn’t quite catch, she said to the guy, “This isn’t a strip club sir.  This is a family place.”  The guy said at a strip club, “they just bust your balls.”

Since I didn’t survive all that long into the tournament, I won’t discuss more than a couple of hands.  In that prior post, I mentioned the two best hands, flopping a set of Jacks and then, flopping another set of Jacks that turned into quads.  The guy who I hit the quads against actually called my river bet, as I noted in that post.  He was a very nice, older gentleman.  During the break, he came over to me and discussed his bad luck and told me another story of the time he bet into quads in a tournament.  Then he said to me, “You look very familiar, I feel like I should know you.”

I said my name was Rob but that didn’t help him.  Then I told him I play at Binion’s all the time on the weekends, but he said he had never been to Vegas before on a weekend, only during weekdays (he’s from the Midwest).  That couldn’t be it.   So then I said I write a column for Ante Up and that my picture’s in there.  He said that must have been it.  Yes, he recognized me from the little picture they run of my every month!  See, I am famous!

A few days later, he posted on the Binion’s Poker Room Facebook page that he had a great time playing in the Binion’s classic even if he did lose to quads—and mentioned me by name!

One funny hand worth mentioning was Ace-7 off in the big blind.  Nobody raised, three of us saw the flop, which was all low cards, something like 5-4-4.  I checked and so did everybody else.  Another low card, so this time I figured, what the hell, I can steal this.  I led out with a pot-sized bet.  One guy, who was kind of short-stacked, called.  Another blank on river.  The only way I’m gonna win this pot, I thought, was to get him to fold, so I bet out again, slightly less than the pot.  He called. I had no choice but to show my bluff, Ace high.  He said, “Oh, I didn’t think you had an Ace.  I knew you were just trying to steal it, I figured my King was good.”  Yes, yes, he tried to catch my bluff with only King-high!  “I didn’t think you were that strong.”  I just shook my head, I thought that was pretty funny that I got caught bluffing and won anyway.  I think you should have better than King-high to catch a bluff.

My last hand, desperate, I had Ace-6 in the big blind.  An aggro guy raised in front of me and I felt I had no choice but to shove.  I thought he could have been raising with a wide range of hands, but he snap called and showed two Aces.  I got half as many 6’s on the board as I needed and I was done.  The good news was that I found out the next day that Ron had chopped first place, but it took him until 6 AM to do it.  The tournament started at 2PM the day before.

That brings me to one of my only two sessions at this year’s WSOP, less than a week later.  I thought I’d play in a few of the $235 3PM Deepstacks, but it turned out this was the only one I played.  I should mention that this took place a little more than a week after my infamous Slut Parade post appeared (see here) , and it was already well on its way to becoming the second most popular post I’ve ever done.  My readers, apparently, like sluts.  Or prim and proper ladies who enjoy dressing like sluts.  Before the tournament began, I ran into Alaskagal, who had retweeted my the tweet I had sent out with the link when I first posted The Slut Parade.  This was the first time I’d seen her since I’d gotten back to Vegas.  She reiterated how much she liked that post.  “I was laughing out loud.”  I said, “Well, I had some great material…..of course, the girls weren’t wearing much material.”  And she said, “Yeah, that’s Vegas.  It’s like Halloween every day.”

She introduced me to a friend who was with her (can’t remember his name) and he said he also read the blog.

And at the table I was assigned to, who did I see a few seats away, but the aforementioned MDGPoker, who I had met at the Binion’s Classic.  So we were playing at the same table, giving him a chance to do something to me so he could be “lambasted” in a blog post.  Sadly, I don’t think we even got into a major hand together.  So I can only say that he seems to be a really nice guy.  But what would you expect from someone who calls this his favorite blog?  I mean, we know for sure he has excellent taste.

Before the tournament began, we were talking a little about the blog and making jokes about the dreaded pocket Kings.  He recognized another player at the table, someone I’ll call Sean because I think that might actually be his name.  Sean had been on some televised poker, he is a really good player and also had once had a deep run a WSOP main event not too many years ago.  If I heard right, they had both worked behind the scenes in televised poker so they had much to chat about.

Then the weirdest thing happened.  I was sitting there playing the first or second level of the tournament. A guy came over, not a young man by any means, and I guess he was playing the same tournament at another table.  He said to me, “Are you Rob?”  I said yes.  “Oh man, I just gotta tell you, I love your blog.  It’s great.”  He started to walk away as I thanked him and I yelled after him, “What’s your name?’  He said it was Larry and went on to say he never comments on the blog, he just reads it.  “I just read yours and TBC’s, that’s all I read.”  And then he left.  But a minute or two later he came back over and said, “Oh, and congratulations on the Ante Up gig.”

Well that was pretty cool, I have to admit.  Suddenly everyone at my end of the table, not just MDGPoker, knew I had a blog.  The guy to my immediate left said, “What’s your blog about?”

“Well…..”  He wouldn’t let me finish, “Come on, come on, tell us.”  I said, “Well, it’s sorta about poker but other stuff too.”  At this point Sean, if indeed that was his name, asked, “So you do a blog, huh?  What’s the name of it?”  I told him it’s Rob’s Vegas & Poker Blog and gave him the URL.  If it registered with him, he didn’t indicate it.

He didn’t say another word to me for the next two hours.  Meanwhile, the guy to my left started calling me “Famous Guy.”  And when I ordered a Diet Pepsi, he said, “Oh, Famous Guy drinks Diet Pepsi.”  Yeah, that was kinda weird.

And then, two hours later, Sean finally spoke to me again.  “Did you write that blog about New York New York?

I said, “No, I don’t think I’ve ever mentioned New York, New York.”

But he continued.  “About the club there?  About the girls dressing sexy?”

Aha.  “Oh, you mean the MGM, Hakkasan?”

“Yeah, yeah, I thought it was New York, New York.  I did see that!  I liked that.”

That was pretty cool too.  Even if he did confuse the names of the casinos.   

As for the poker, I’ll only mention a few hands, I think I didn’t quite make it to the second break. I was doing ok for awhile, no dramatic hands, just slowly chipping up, when I got into trouble with Ace-King.  I raised, the guy who kept calling me “Famous Guy” shoved.  He was short-stacked, had about half my stack, maybe a little less.  I called. He had pocket 6’s but I didn’t get any help and lost a bunch of chips.

After that, nothing panned out until I was in fold-or-shove mode.  I hadn’t seen an Ace for a long time, so I shoved with Ace-6 and a big stack called me with Ace-Queen.  The flop and the turn were blanks but I caught a 6 on the river to prolong my life a little.  I guess now I had enough chips so a shove might get someone to fold.

Our table finally broke and I saw about two or three hands at my new table and then a guy with a big stack raised in front of me.  I had Ace-Queen and so it was an easy shove for me.  The guy asked for a chip count, which he got, and then called.  And then…..the putz flipped over two Aces.

Huh?  Why did he ask for a chip count?  There were no other players in the hand.  Exactly what did my chip count have to be for him not to call me there???  Kinda pissed me off because his asking for a chip count gave me some small hope.  Maybe he had Ace-Jack, King-Queen, Ace-10?  Maybe he has a pocket pair and I win the race?  But no, he had me absolutely crushed.

No help on the board and I was done.  Two tournaments in this post and in both cases I was busted by pocket Aces.  At least I didn’t get sucked out on!  Or lose to the dreaded you-know-what.

Oh, and yes, I’m famous.  A little bit, anyway.