Blame It On Rio

I’m back home, at least for a (hopefully) short while.  My March Madness Vegas trip went well and I came back with much to write about.  I’m gonna start with a (relatively) short post that will give me some time to write some of the longer posts that I know you all crave.  Fear not, Poker Meister, I will be posting about the great session we had soon.

This took place on the Monday night after the first weekend of March Madness. I had had a really nice dinner with some friends over at the Gold Coast.  BTW, if you’re looking for a really quality meal that will cost you a lot less than the $100 per person the fancy joints on the Strip will, I can heartily recommend the Cortez Room.

It was close to 10 PM when we broke up, and I considered not playing poker at all.  I did have to work the next day.  But since I am addicted to poker, I rejected the idea of just returning to my room for the evening.  But the thought of schlepping over to the Strip and then making the long walk to the poker room at a place like BSC didn’t appeal to me.  By the time I got seated, it would be almost time to leave.

The Gold Coast closed its poker room a long time ago, but I was across the street from two poker rooms—those at the Palms and the Rio.  I checked my Bravo app and the Palms didn’t have a game or even a waiting list.  But the Rio showed three games going, all 1/3 NL.   So I made the very short drive over to the Rio and was at the poker room in minutes.  The poker room is conveniently located on the Gold Coast side of the Rio.

Oddly enough, the Rio poker room is one of the few rooms in Vegas I had never played in.  Oh, I played at the WSOP venue during the series, but never in the actual Rio poker room. 

I got seated right away at a table that wasn’t full and the first thing I noticed was that the room uses the hated $2 chips!  Ugh.  It was somewhat ironic, because I had only very recently posted my rant against the $2 chip (see here), even though that story had taken place almost a year earlier, around the time of last year’s March Madness.  Apparently there’s something about March Madness that brings out the $2 chips.

The only thing positive I can say about the two buck chips at Rio is that they are a very different color from the $1 chips.  One is white and one is blue I think (I didn’t make a note of it), and I’ll be damned if I can remember which is which.

It was almost an incredibly short session, as after a few minutes there, a couple of players left the game and there were walkers missing as well.  We dealt a couple of hands five-handed, and I really was not interested in playing such a short-handed game.  But it didn’t take long for new players to show up and soon our game was full, as were the other two games.  In fact, before I left, they even had to open another table.  Not bad for a Monday night.

I bought in for $300.  I won a small pot too insignificant to remember, then I lost a few bucks missing flops.  On the button with King-5 of spades, I went ahead and limped in after three players limped in front of me.  The blinds both called and 6 of us saw the flop.  That was pretty typical of the table, lots of limping, not much raising preflop. I suppose I should have raised instead, but I was still trying to get a feel for the players so I was playing nitty conservatively.

The flop was Jack or 10 high, but had two spades.  I called a $15 bet, as did one other player.  There was a red Queen on the turn and everyone checked.  The river was a red King. The guy who bet the flop now put out $30.  The other guy folded.  I took my time before acting.

My read was that he had flopped top pair, and was perhaps scared of the overcard on the turn.  Did the King give him a pair?  If so, he likely had a better kicker than I did.  But I also thought he maybe was trying to steal the pot, perhaps with middle pair or less.  And the size of his bet was too small to get me to fold.  With his bet, there was now $90 in the pot and I thought there was a decent chance I was good.  So I called.

I had gotten lucky.  He didn’t have a pair at all.  He had Ace-x of spades.  He was drawing to the same flush I was, except his was bigger.  If that third spade had come, I would have lost quite a few chips to him.  But I was right in that he was trying to steal.  As I scooped up the pot, I said the obvious.  “Boy, I’m glad you didn’t get your flush.”

A little later. in late position, I limped in with 7-6 hearts.  One of the blinds raised to $10 so I called.  Four of us saw the flop, which was 9-6-5, two diamonds, one heart.  I called a $20 bet and we were down to three players.  No one bet the turn, which was a black Queen.  The river was a very nice 8 of spades, giving me the straight.  It checked to me and I bet $45.  No one called.

That put me up over $100 and I’d be playing pretty close to an hour.  I thought about staying longer.  I thought the table was pretty soft.  I dunno if that’s typical of the room or not, hard to tell with such a small sample size.  But I’d seen some really poor calls in hands I wasn’t in.  I didn’t really see anyone at the table who seemed to have any game at all. The trouble was, there wasn’t very much money at the table.  After I’d won that K-5 hand, my stack was by far the biggest there.  I figured if I stayed a few hours, I could clean up—except that it would take me forever to win a couple of more hundred with the small stacks available.

Instead, I decided to call it quits.  I was on my last orbit when I woke up with pocket Aces.  I raised to $12 and only had one caller.  The flop was low, two hearts (I didn’t have the Ace of hearts).  I bet $18 and he called.  Another blank on the turn (non-heart) and I bet $25, again, he called.  The third heart on the river slowed me down and I checked, as did my opponent.  He mucked when he saw my Aces.

And that was it.  I was up over $150 up for about an hour’s play.  Not bad for my first try at the Rio poker room.  Overall, I the room seemed quite nice for a small room.  Well run. Just wish the stacks were bigger—though that might have meant better players.  Possibly.

I’ll be back, though next time it will likely be at the WSOP venue this summer

Golden Nugget Grand Poker Series Offers Variety Starting June 4

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

The issue is available in poker rooms around the country right this very minute.

You might be interested in seeing me pontificate about Open Face Chinese in the "WSOP" section!

I Hate Funbags!

I know you all come here to read a serious poker blog, but sometimes important, non-poker related subjects need to be addressed.  I have a serious, important topic to vent about.  Something I just have to get off my chest.

I hate funbags.

No, actually, what I meant to say is, I hate “funbags.”

The word “funbags.”  As in a slang term for a woman’s breasts.

I really hate that one.

Now, the part of the female anatomy that “funbags” is a slang term for? Well, I think you all know how I feel about that.

There are approximately one billion euphemisms and slang terms for mammary glands.  There are probably more ways to say “breasts” in the English language than any other word.  Sure, there are also plenty of slang terms for those nasty bits each gender has below the waist, but I bet there are more terms for breasts. 

I’m sure we all have our own preferences as to choice of terms.  As I explained here, I’m partial to your basic “tits.”  But although I think some terms are better than others, I don’t really mind almost any of the common terms.

And honestly, even ones that seldom seem appropriate can have their place.  I mean, who among us hasn’t seen a woman pass by with extremely bodacious ta-ta’s and exclaimed to his buddy, “Holy shit! Did you see the gazongas on that girl???”  But there’s a time and a place, right?  I sure hope that no man has ever said to his wife/girlfriend/hooker-he-just-picked-up-in-a-bar, “You’ve got beautiful gazongas, honey.”

And let’s face it.  You can take almost any noun, put an “s” at the end of it and use it to refer to breasts under the right circumstances.  How else can you explain how words such as “guns,” “headlights,” “hooters,” and “cans” became substitutes for “breasts?”  “Cans” is especially odd to me.  In my day, “can” was a slang term for ass.  As in, “Get off your can and do some work.”  But when you but an “s” at the end of it, it suddenly moves from down there to up here?  Really?

Which brings us to “funbags.”  Now that’s a term I really hate.  It actually offends me, and I don’t get offended easily.

The first thing is, I actually finding it demeaning.  I mean to women.  It implies that a woman’s breasts exist solely as a play-thing for men.  That they are there on a woman’s chest only for some guy (or many guys) to have fun with.  Now it’s true that having breasts can be fun for women (so I’ve been told), but seriously now, it’s pretty obvious that the term was coined by some disgusting guy who thinks women were put on this earth solely for his sexual pleasure.

So basically, the term is degrading to women.  And that offends me.  Bet you didn’t peg me as a feminist, huh?

But there’s something beyond that.  I find the term a major turnoff.  It’s not sexy.  It’s not even remotely sexy.  There’s nothing sexy about “bags.”  Nothing with the word “bag” as part of it can ever possibly be sexy.  At best, “bag” can be utilitarian.  But it can’t be sexy.  And there’s no way to make it sexy.  Putting “fun” in front of the word “bag” doesn’t make it sexy.  It’s still a bag.

I suppose you could pack your bags for a trip and put all your toys and gizmos in one bag, and that would make it a “fun bag.”  But it still wouldn’t be sexy.

And by the way, the image just doesn't work.  I've never seen any bags that look anything like breasts.  I've never seen breasts that look anything like bags (thank goodness).

So as soon as I hear or see a guy refer to “funbags,” he’s lost me. I’m taken out of the mood, and instead of thinking about a nice pair of ta-ta’s, I’m thinking about a bag of groceries.  Boobs can be beautiful.  Bags cannot. If there’s one thing that can make me lose interest in casabas, it’s calling them “funbags.” 

Almost.

But it does make it much harder for me to appreciate the melons that the person calling them “funbags” is pointing out.  Really.

Furthermore, I find the term so off-putting that whoever utters (as opposed to “udders”) the term in my presence is immediately lowered in my estimation.  It’s just so uncouth.  To me it shows a lack of class in the utterer of that word.  Really, fella?  You couldn’t think of a classier way to refer to those beautiful breasts?  You know, like “juggs”?

Feeling the way I do about this noxious term, I took to the internet to see if I could find others who agree.  Perhaps someone else had already written the essay that I was forming in my mind decrying “funbags.”  I used Google and I can’t remember exactly how I phrased my search, because I can’t duplicate it now and get the same result.  But when I first tried it, I immediately came across an article from Jezebel entitled, “What Do You Call Your Funbags?” (see here).

I was horrified.  Jezebel is a website aimed at women.  It says right on the masthead, “Celebrity, Sex, Fashion for Women. Without Airbrushing.”  The author of the column was a woman (presumably).  And they were asking their readers—all women—what they call their breasts. 

And they referred to them as “funbags” right in the title of the article?  Are you kidding me?

Don’t they know how degrading that term is to them?

Hmmph.  If they won't do it, I guess it's up to me to stand up for the female gender.

Anyway, the piece is a couple of years old, and readers voted on their favorite word or term.  There was a list of choices (some of them totally bizarre) and of course, “boobs” came in first, beating “tits” by a big margin.  I knew women would choose “boobs.”  Strangely enough, “funbags” wasn’t even one of the choices.  Because they knew no woman would prefer that.  No woman on this or any other planet.  But somehow, they chose that word for the title?  Huh?

Anyway, there’s a gazillion comments in response, some of which are funny and/or interesting.  I haven’t read them all because, let’s face it, it’s a lot longer than any of my blog posts. If you skim it you will likely find some amusing comments. 

But the point is, I couldn’t even find a chick women’s website to take up the cause.  Clearly it was up to me to rant about the awfulness of this yucky term for such a wonderful gift from Mother Nature.

And there you have it.  Now, I could easily stop there, but I fear this post is way too short.  Those of you like shorter posts, or those of you who feel I have exhausted the subject, or have been totally bored to this point, are welcome to stop reading.  Go ahead, click on the next webpage that is calling you. You have my permission.

Still here?  OK, for those of you who haven’t had enough talk about boobies yet, you might be wondering what bought this up.  Why now, after all this time, did I decide to write about funbags?  I can tell you, but I warn you, it’s a long story.

But here goes.  You see, I recently discovered something interesting.  There are websites out there that have pictures of naked and sem-naked celebrities.  Who knew?  Most of these celebrities are of the female variety, but there are some males. 

One such website I discovered totally by accident when I was researching nuclear fusion is called “Egotastic.” (note, link NSFW) And by some incredible fluke, that morning I accidentally came upon that website, their front page had a feature on one Alexandra Daddario.  It seems that Ms. Daddario had recently appeared completely naked in the HBO series, True Detective.  Although pics and videos of her performance had already been plastered all over the web, Egotastic was now promoting “Enhanced Technicolor” versions of said performance.

This did prick my interest, I confess.  Although I don’t get HBO, I had seen the pics and the video.  The internet is a wonderful thing.  And I have to admit that Ms. Daddario, an actress heretofore most famous for the “Percy Jackson” films, looks rather impressive in her birthday suit.

How impressive?  Well, this site here (NSFW) calls it “the single greatest 20 seconds of TV ever made.”  It’s certainly possible.  Very likely, in fact.  But I would argue about it only lasting “20 seconds.”  If you stick around long enough, the lovely Alex DD turns around and takes off her shorts.  She not only has great cans, she has a great can. 

And this website here (again, NSFW) titles its post, “Introducing possibly the greatest boobs of all time.”  Again, they present very strong visual evidence making their case.

Getting back to Egotastic, the writer of the post, enthusiastic over Alexandra’s assets, wonders if they are the equal of those belonging to Emily Ratajkowski.  The guy’s got good eyes.  I’ve mentioned Emily a few times already (here and here).  I would agree that in this particular area (and a lot of others), Ms. Ratajkowski sets the standard.

Let me put it this way, for those of you who are basketball fans.  Alexandra and Emily are the LeBron James and Kevin Durant of tits.

And I certainly would have enjoyed the mental image of comparing the four two.  It was a lovely thought. 

Except for one thing.  Instead of using any other totally acceptable word to denote their racks, this clown had to call them “funbags.”  It was right there in the title of the post (see here, and of course NSFW), “Alexandra Daddario Topless Redux in Enhanced Technicolor (How Do Her Funbags Match Up to Emily Ratajkowski?)”

Ok, first of all, a point of grammar.  It should have an apostrophe “s” at the end of Ratajkowski.  You can’t compare one woman’s puppies to an actual person.  You can compare two people or two bosoms but not one of each.  It makes no sense.

But that headline was what got me going on this rant.  Here he was, comparing two stunningly beautiful women, two sensational figures, and he freakin’ ruins it by using that awful word “funbags.”

My god man, have you no class?  You really know how to kill the mood. Instead of thinking of those awesome yabbos, I’m thinking of how much I hate that word.

Hmmmph.

It was then that I felt compelled to pen this serious essay.

If you read the text (where he once again uses the dreaded f-word), he actually asks the readers to decide between the assets of Ms. Daddario and Ms. Ratajkowski.  I admit I did vote, but I will not reveal my choice.  Besides, the “loser” would be good enough for me.

Now since this still isn’t long enough, I will mention that Alexandra has a great sense of humor, in addition to everything else she has going for her.  Word got out recently that the President of the United States had requested advanced copies from HBO of some of their shows, including True Detective.  Since her awesome nude appearance had already been aired, Ms. D put two and two together and sent out this tweet, with a clip of that news story and a pic of the President:  “The president has seen my boobs.”  

Please note, she said “boobs.”  Not “funbags.”

Oh and by the way, Alex, thanks to the internet, pretty much every male on the planet has seen your boobs.  Or to put it another way, there are two categories of men in this world.  Men who have seen your boobs.  And men who are lying about never having seen your boobs.  There are a lot of perks to being President, but you don't have to be the President to have seen your boobs.

So show your boobs anytime you want.  But keep your funbags in the closet until your next vacation.