February 20, 2007

Something I forgot to mention...

Mynym is back. Finally. (And I thought I was gone for too long.)

In a related note: Mynym is brilliant. This is not hearsay, nor am I being paid to endorse his intelligence-ness. I really believe what I here propound, that Mynym is brilliant. And although he is sometimes a 'smarty-pants,' I can neither confirm nor deny the intelligence of said pantaloons.

Posted by Carl at 11:35 PM | TrackBack

January 04, 2007

Cool.

Posted by Carl at 03:42 PM | TrackBack

May 31, 2006

What would you do?

To give up would be cowardly. Certainly it is justifiable, in light of circumstances. I merely contend that it is cowardly. But to those with better minds than mine, I leave the finer shades of a debate which attempts to distinguish between what is justifiable and what is not. If I were to try hard enough, I could justify nearly anything. Lord knows that for nearly thirty-two years I have. I’m through with that now. No more. What is done cannot be change; what is to come may. Beautiful cliché’s those. True nonetheless.

My dilemma is this: I will not give up, but how shall I continue? To borrow from a game that exceedingly great men have called a vice, You are holding pocket Aces and the flop just came Ace, King, King. Would you bet? No. You’d check. You’d check to the river. But what if the three players who are still in decide to bet? Would you then raise them? No. You’d check. You’d only call to the river. Why? Why in God’s name would you merely check with such a magnificent hand? Such a strong, nearly invincible hand. Why would you check? Because chances are one in one-thousand that your sister’s cousin, who she invited on a whim and who has been playing poorly all night, the chances, I say, are one in one-thousand that he’s holding pocket Kings. You are certain that the other two players are not.

The turn is a five of clubs. Some rube who has pocket fives nearly wets himself with glee. He bets forty dollars. You, and every other cautiously alert player call. He chuckles expectantly. The turn is a four of clubs. Now all of the four remaining players have hand. So what do you do?! Being the first to act, ‘by God’—you intention is purely theological—you check.

The muscles which surround your fingers writhe spasmodically. They seem to anticipate the check-raise with which you are about to destroy your opponents. Time slows down. You take note of each players expression as they call or bet in turn. The two players before your dullard of a cousin—you’ve already divined that one is holding a flush, the other his miniscule full house—sit with nervous apprehension written on their faces. They see the nut full house. They believe that someone is holding it. You smile benignantly upon them. In your god-like generosity, you pity them.

Your sister’s cousin—hence, yours by marriage—bets ten dollars. As he bets you wonder how one whose lolling tongue and vacant eyes so much resemble that of the deranged neighborhood dog could, himself, be in possession of anything which remotely resembles intelligence. Just last hand he called your thirty dollar bet with two, three; unsuited! All night he has played in like manner.

After seeing the previous bets, you fairly throw your remaining seventy-three dollars in, raising the poor saps; as you think. Everyone folds but your cousin. Why is it that he hesitates?

“Call.”

The sound waves are not millimeters from his lips when two Kings hit the table.

Your tournament life is over.

Oh it is true that you have three dollars left; he didn’t have quite enough to call. Sure, someone, somewhere, has come back against such terrific odds. And if someone else can do it, so can you. Whatever you do, you mustn’t quit. For this is precisely of what I am writing. To quit would be cowardly. In light of what has transpired: justifiable; but cowardly.

Posted by Carl at 02:07 AM | TrackBack

May 08, 2006

Unnecessarily Long.

What does ‘unnecessarily long’ mean?

I have a computer program which is designed to detect problems with written words. A phrase which I constantly see is, ‘unnecessarily long.’ But what troubles me at night; what causes dismay to my reason; what acts upon my sanity in such a way that I fear for my mental health; what stabs my intellect, as if by conviction; yea, what tortures my frail and feeble cognitive faculties is this. What is meant by ‘unnecessarily long?’

As I lay tossing and turning upon my bed at night, my body drenched with the sweat of anxiety, I envision some ancient grammarian council, whose powers of acquiring information exceed that even of the IRS, peering with disdain through dusty spectacles at my secretly abstracted manuscripts; published and unpublished.

I can see their stooped shoulders and mouldy figures prostrated in front of a table which is covered over with various papers of mine, hitherto unknown. I tremble with terror as a decrepit hand, protruding from an primordial robe, glides slowly forth and rends a piece of paper which contains words that I have written. Mind you, the terror comes not from the mere fact that I have written the words—for there are works by other authors present; though I scarcely pretend to that title.

Just last week, while lying in that state of half-consciousness which occurs between the hours of five and seven a.m., I started abruptly from my nightmares upon hearing repeated this phrase. “unnecessarily long…” “Unnecessarily long.” “UNNECESSARILY LONG!”

But, God help me! Unnecessarily long by whose standards?

Posted by Carl at 12:08 AM | TrackBack