A moment with

Environmentalists Are Wrong. Again.

An excellent article on why we should be drilling in ANWR, and now, is here.

There has already been a test well drilled in ANWR and the oil drilling could be done from a concentrated small area, about the size of Dulles Airport. Compare this to the total size of ANWR, which is roughly equivalent to the size of South Carolina. Its reserves are estimated at 10 billion barrels by the U.S. Geological Survey, compared to 32 billion nationwide, almost a 33 percent increase. At full production, ANWR would add a million barrels per day to U.S. production. At $100 per barrel, this would equal over $36 billion per year that would not need to be spent on foreign oil. It would also create some 700,000 well-paying jobs, according to a Wharton Econometrics study [pdf].

700,000 jobs. Lower oil prices. Little to no impact on the envornment.

Congress should get their heads out of their asses and get this going.

(Note: One "but the poor polar bears" comment and you'll be ridiculed mercilessly.)

Thanks to the Prof. for the tip.

Photos

You may notice the new plate to the left:

 

It's basically a link to my Flickr page, which is a photo documentary of what is going on in my life.

Like today, we decided to hike three miles into Smith Rock State Park.  It's hard to believe that we live less than an hour from such geologic beauty.  Take that Red Rocks!

You can see the photos of the hike by clicking here.

At present, we're home drinking margaritas and preparing chicken taco salads.  Pokering later.

It's All About Meme

Gadzooks memed me, and who am I to say no to somebody I've never met.

1. What was I doing 10 years ago: I was courting my wife.
2. What are 5 things on my to-do list today: Work. Work. Work. Work. Go shopping at Wal-Mart. (It's all about the capitalism baby!
3. Snacks I enjoy: Lately, it's chewy gobstoppers. I just got a whole box of them for my birthday yesterday. That's 24 individual boxes.
4. Places I've lived:  California, Germany, Tennessee, Texas, England, Maryland, Tennessee, Washington State and Oregon, in that order.
5. Things I would do if I were a billionaire:  This is the toughest question. I would pay off all of my family's debts and set up every kid in the family with a college education.  Let's say there's $999 million left. Then, I'd give $500 million dollars to my buddy Byron, to set up the best cancer research center in the world. So I only have $499 million left.  I'd then create the International Poker Tour, and run it myself.  I'd put all of the other poker tours out of commission by using ad revenue to boost the prize pools beyond belief.  Let's say that there's $100 million left. I'd probably use that for fun.

I wonder what Byron would do if I passed this mem to him.

Boston Awaits!

Some fans want you to come to Boston, apparently.

(This photo was gratuitously lifted from BarStoolSports.com.)

Tao of Poker 5th Birthday Celebration

It's also a celebration of my 42nd year, but this is way better:

This week is Pauly's awesome tourney. He's celebrating the Tao of Poker's fifth birthday by throwing a private tournament on PokerStars with a special bonus to the winner.

The winner gets two nights at the Borgata Hotel & Spa in Atlantic City as well as an entry into the $5,000 buy-in NL tournament for the Borgata Poker Open on September 12th.

For specific details...click here.

Good luck everyone!

Thanks to Zeem, who swapped some money with me so I could get in it. If I win anything, he gets 10%.

The "Mega-Resort" Echelon put on hold

I hadn't seen this anywhere, but the resort that is under construction on the site of the old Stardust hotel is on hold.

Any Vegas bloggers have a local angle on this?

I did find this article on it:

The sagging economy takes its toll on a major construction project on the Strip. It was intended to be built on the former site of the Stardust, but now it just stands as a skeleton of a building.

News 3's Katherine Whaley reports that construction at the Echelon Resort in Las Vegas has been put on hold for eight months. Boyd Gaming announced during its second quarter meeting Friday that they are halting construction on their $3 billion Echelon project. Boyd Gaming President and CEO Keith Smith says they hope to resume construction within the next three to four quarters. The project will remain at a standstill until Spring of 2009, at the earliest.

Up until this point, Echelon was on schedule to open in 2010, but Boyd Gaming says the week economy is to blame for their shutdown. "It's not a reflection of the merits of the development, nor the accomplishments, but rather the challenges we and many other businesses face in today's uncertain business climate," says Boyd Gaming President and CEO Kevin Smith.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Looks like FlipChip was already all over the situation. That's what I get for going out of town over the weekend. Thanks to Pauly for pointing out my inadequacies my late reporting. From now on, before I post Las Vegas news from my chair in Oregon, I'll check out LasVegasVegas.com first. I should have known better.

Washington State Mash Up?

I'm going to be in Western Washington this weekend.  It's a little birthday celebration/visit with family and friends trip. We'll be in the Tacoma/Auburn/Issaquah area.

Here's the agenda:

Noonish Saturday - we'll be at Emerald Downs - I luvs to bet me some ponies

7pm Saturday Night - Jak's in Issaquah, dinner with the family. If you've never eaten here, you are missing out.

10pm-ish - late-night Pai-Gow at Muckleshoot, or maybe some pokering?

Anyone want to come out and join the Mrs. and I for a little whooping it ip?  I'm talking to you and you and you.

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A horse of note:

Race 3 - PP#6 - Run time: 3:17PM PST

The horse's name is "Shamus On Me".

Oh, it's already betted.

Old/New Desk

I have a new workstation at home. It's in the living room, so I can still be with the Mrs. when I'm online working.

The previous owner of the desk owns the business where the Mrs. works. The desk has been their family for 50+ years, and was the primary work desk of a Portland-area cannery as well as their current bath and body wholesale business. It is a typewriter desk, and as you can see by the following photos, the left side flips up to house a typewriter (or a laptop).

We saved it week ago from a warehouse sale they were having, and it was in horrible shape. It had nail polish of various colors dripped on it, random stickers, and it had was very dirty. We scored it for $40.

I cleaned it and sanded down the veneer top fairly carefully (I did get to wood in one corner).  I left much of the original patina, and did nothing to the sides.  A couple of coats of stain, and a couple of coats of poly and here's the end result:

Are You Overconnected?

I blog to Twitter. I tweet to my blog. I blog to Facebook and tweet from Facebook. I also post photos to Flickr from Facebook and my phone, which alerts me to new Tweets. Are you tired yet, because I am.

Catching Up With Slayre

Remember Slayre? I sure do. He was one of the early poker bloggers, having started in November 2004. I can't say I remember him on the tables, but I'm sure some of you do.

Somehow, I missed the fact that he had a stroke in February of last year (2007).  Apparently, he is still not 100% as half of him is pretty much paralyzed.

Facty just included a bit in her recent blog post and pointed in the direction of Slayre's new blog, which is documenting his life and dealing with his stroke.  Granted, he's not posting much; but he has a recent one up.

He's still trying to play poker, too. I sure hope that he does well in the future. I know that I'm hoping he is able to post more in the future.

If you have time for words of encouragement, please go say hi.