Shabbir's Diary

September Poker Totals

I'm pleased with my results for September. Despite my adventures in Atlantic City, I made money this month again. And my other wins at live poker games around the area gave me enough buffer to offset my losses in AC.

I hate being sick.

I'm stuck at home infecting Sarah.

It's nice having your sister over for lunch.

Atlantic City Day Three: You have a very short memory, don’t you?

The Borgata, Noon
Sunday is a day of renewed cockiness. We eat the Vegas-quality buffett at the Borgata and head to the tables for our last poker session of the trip. After my success yesterday I sign up for a $3/$6 game. I sit down with $295 and play for about 2 ½ hours. I sit next to a guy who looks a lot like Kevin Smith (“Clerks”). In case you don’t know, Smith plays “Silent Bob” in his own movies.

Atlantic City Day Two: Humility and Cappucino Reward the Patient

Saturday Morning, 9am: Quality Inn Atlantic City
I feel humbled by my losses last night. Like Icarus I flew too high and had to drag myself out of the ocean this morning. I resolve to play a more appropriate game today. After a quick shower, we head down to the lobby and the desk manager calls us a cab, since we don’t have a car.

Atlantic City Day One: The Fish Goes to Atlantic City

I lost a big bet playing Halo with my friend V. At the first grudge match I suggested a trip to Atlantic City as the wager. I won the practice match, and then V cleaned up the floor with me when we played for the real thing. Turns out he's an incredible Halo player, and he had played me like a fiddle. Time to start booking rooms for a weekend in Atlantic City.

Putting up tomatoes and ammunition in rural Maryland

I asked my mother in law, “Why is it called canning, if there are no cans involved?”

“I don’t know”, she said, “That’s a good question.”

At that moment, I had perhaps gained just a little respect in her eyes. (Or she thought I was a smart-ass jerk, its hard to tell with her.)

Sarah’s family has had a farm for years up in the mountains of Western Maryland. If the country goes to hell and my fascination with a post-Apocalyptic Earth goes from film fandom to a reality, that’s where you'll find me with Sarah and the dogs.

Haiku for a friend's 30th birthday

Thirty brings wisdom
Smugness from mistakes not made.
Soon you'll break a hip.

Testing..testing...Is this thing on?

For the next few days you may see some broken links on my diary website, since I've just switched over to the new MovableType 3.1.  I've got most of the photos but I have to setup all the linkages to Amazon.

Most importantly I've got over 8,000 comments on my site that are mostly spammed ads for viagra and online casinos.  I'm going to be deleting these and trying to save the few comments that are real.

AT&T's Data Center

I just spoke to a partner who has their application hosted with AT&T. I was mentioning how I spent part of the hurricane up in the mountains, and he said, yeah, we were down for two hours. Really? Where is AT&T's data center?

"Orlando", he said.

Shit, I should have known.