Do Fear Based Drug Billboards Accomplish Anything Positive?

If you are not addicted to chemicals, do you really want to see billboards like this?

Unless you work for the, "Drug Enforcement Agency", and want to drum up business to keep your paycheck coming, what is their purpose?

These billboards are mostly pointless. These billboards are not educational, they serve no uplifting purpose. Do you really wish to see these billboards or can you get through your day live without seeing them?

Let's put our Tax Dollars to better use. Let you Legislatures know how you feel.

Tuna Salad Sandwich Hack

This is a simple little hack to help you make your next batch of Tuna Salad fast and easy.

If you are like me, when making Tuna Salad, you open a can of Tuna and dump it into a bowl. Then you take a fork, spoon, whatever your favorite utensil is and mash it up. Then add your favorite ingredients.

An easier way, to prepare the Tuna Fish is this:

1. Open and drain your favorite can of Tuna Fish.

2. Using a butter knife cut the Tuna Fish in the can as if you were slicing a small cake into many square pieces.

2. Use the the knife to scoop out the Tuna into a bowl. Almost all the Tuna has been cut and crumbled into small pieces, saving you time and frustration.

3. Add your favorite ingredients for the fastest and easiest Tuna Salad you have made all week. Enjoy!

Underfunded and Outgunned by the Bealer Boys

 It's hard playing poker against the Bealer Boys. I played against them for a second time this weekend. The game is $1 - $3 No Limit. The Small Blind is $1 and the Large Blind is $3. Buy-in is $100 - $300 or half the largest stack on the table. Easy Game.

Except when you sit down with the Bealer boys. The Brush calls you to a table and you realize if you took out all the hundred dollar bills in your wallet and both pockets, you still would not have enough to buy in at half the largest stack on the table for this game.

Tonight is a prime example. I sit down with John Bealer on my right. Now, I am not sure how long John Bealer was been playing today, but he has roughly $2,400 in $5 and $25 chips (red and green) in front of him. So much for the $300 max buy-in. So much for buying in for half the largest stack.

In the moment, I wonder if its even worth sitting down at the table. But these are the Bealer Boys, and it doesn't look and feel right to stand up and walk away. I may not have much of a poker image, but it is important to maintain what little image I do have as a poker player.

There is this extra natty little thing called the "Straddle", which at this table is done on the button by all players, except me. The Straddle is a Preflop raise on the button, effectively raising the first bet from $3 to $6, starting with the small blind.

To make matters worse, the smallest stack among the Bealer Boys is a little over $1,200. Preflop betting is generally $20 to $35, or roughly a little less than ten percent of my buy-in. This makes the price of poker pretty steep for me, just to see a flop.

One would expect with high $ Preflop betting, there would only be a few players in the pot. No, not when playing with the Bealer Boys. The game is loose. Except for me, everyone is loaded up and hunting for bear. Preflop pots were running $100 and over. Flop and turn bets are moderate considering, as the table is so loose.

Three rounds in and I have only paid my blinds, throwing away junk and playable hands (in a normal game) alike. I am wondering about the sanity of my judgment to sit at this table. This is a $1 - $3 table converted into $6 - $12 by the Bealer Boys, with their excessively large stacks. Any hand I may enter, any one of them could put me all in preflop, just for laughs.

After about ninety minutes of throwing away hands and watching pots dragged in by pitiful holdings, I finally get a hand. I have Q,Q in late position. When the play gets to me, it's $35 to see the flop; with three players in the pot before me, I call the $35.

Flop is Ks, 8d, 3h. Good flop for me. First player checks, second to act, Billy Bealer puts out $105. A strange bet I think. I've played with Billy Bealer before and he is generally a straight forward player with little bluffing in his bag of tricks. After contemplating a few seconds, I put Billy Bealer on K,K or better, which makes my Q,Q look smaller than it did a few seconds before the flop. I fold, last to act folds.

I'm down about 25% of my buy-in, or just a little over $100 now. I can see the end in sight and it's not pretty. I will be all in on my next hand, if there is a next hand on the way.

Enjoyment is turning into agony. I lament all the hands I would have played, if it was a normal $1 - $3 game and not a high stakes franken-game. I am in small blind and miracle of miracles, there was not a button straddle. I am second to last to act. By some freak of nature, it is only $20 to see the flop.

I have two red aces. It's decision time. I think if I raise preflop, it will be reraised, and I will be all in on the flop. If I call the $20 and the Big Blind doesn't raise, I am first to act on the flop. 

I call the $20 and Big Blind does not raise. Flop comes down 4, 4, 8, rainbow (all different suits). This is a pretty useless flop for anyone not holding a 4. I think for a few seconds and make a large almost pot size bet. Billy Bealer should be proud.

As it's one of a handful of hands I have bet with in two hours and one of the few I played beyond the flop, the Bealer Boys all fold to me. I play a few more hands and retired for the night.

In retrospect - which is more rational than 'in the moment', I never should have sat down in that game, when all I was willing to buy-in for was maybe less than 1/3 the smallest stack, and perhaps a large bet for the largest two stacks.

On a side note, John Bealer went up $2,400 in those few hours. It all came from three players with more cash and less common sense than I have. Billy Bealer went up about $700, and went back down. As for me, I made a two dollar profit. I think that was a 'gimme' by the Bealer Boys. Next Hand...

Poker, Craps, and Poker Stories For After Dark

Here are three Poker/Gambling stories I’ve either witnessed or heard about over the years. The last story is unsettling, and it makes me wonder if what Big Bob said to The Kid was true or not. It goes with out saying, no matter how many years you live, you have not seen or heard it all.

This first story happened years ago as I was sitting in a poker game at O’Sheas (now permanently closed) Casino in Las Vegas. What happened has probably been attempted in many Poker Rooms and Casino Table Games, but I am sure, it is very, very rare.

Poker has a term, ‘Angle Shooting’, which refers to players who are not quite outright cheating, but are as close to the cheating line as they can get. This player, Player X, took angle shooting to a whole new level, outright theft.

O’Sheas had one low limit ($1 - $3) Texas Hold em Poker Table setup that was open to the sidewalk. A few players at the table actually sat with their chairs on the sidewalk. This was most likely to attract Customers who were curious about poker, but never played poker. They could watch from the sidewalk. Player X sits down in an open chair with his back to the sidewalk.

Player X is playing conservatively (tight), folding every hand for a couple rounds. Now, on the flop, there is a raise and a re-raise in front of him. Player X calls, The original bettor goes all in on the turn, the next player calls the all in, and Player X goes all in.

The pot has over eight hundred dollars in $100.00 bills and cash. The dealer turns the river card. After the first two players show their hands, Player X stands up, grabs all the $100 bills in the pot, some of the chips too, turns, and runs down the street, getting away. Of course O’Sheas has his picture which I understand is shared with all other Casino’s on the strip. Player X’s short poker career in Las Vegas was officially over. I wonder if he lived another year?

I was playing Craps one evening, when a stumbling drunk Woman barely makes her way to the Craps table. She asks the dealer, “How do you play this game?”, inadvertently dropping a black ($100.00) chip onto the field. As the dealer is explaining the basics of Craps, the shooter rolls a twelve and the Drunk Woman wins $300.00 from the $100.00 bet she didn’t know she made. She now has $400.00 sitting in the field.

She tells the dealer she does not understand any of what he is saying. The next roll is thrown, a nine. The very drunk Woman wins again! The Woman is  oblivious to what is going on. The dealer tells her to pick up her chips from the field - $800.00 in black chips.

She says she does not understand anything, but picks up the chips the dealer is pointing to. She stumbles off presumably to the elevator, heading to her room. I wonder if she knew where the extra black chips came from the next morning?

This final story is so bizarre, I would not believe it if I had not heard it from three different Poker Players who were in the poker room at the time it happened. I have known them for decades, and never heard them tell a lie. I knew one of the players in the hand. I heard it happened, but not the details until recently.

This is a local No Limit Texas Hold em game. The two players remaining in the hand on the Turn each had over ten thousand dollars on the table in front of them before this hand was dealt. Pre Flop and Flop bets are large. The Turn brings a possible Straight Flush with three spades in sequence on the board. 9s, Ts, X, Js. X is a non spade card of no real help to either player.

The two players in the hand on the Turn are: Big Bob, a long time big money player. The second player, an upstart who thinks he is God’s gift to the Poker World; though a tough player in his own right. Let’s call him, The Kid. The Kid is first to act, and goes all in for his Turn play, pushing his remaining chips out in front of him. There is now well over fourteen thousand dollars in the pot.

It is Big Bob’s turn to act. Big Bob contemplates what he will do - call or fold. Big Bob asks The Kid, “Do you want me to call?”

The Kid says, “Hell yes, I want you to call”. Big Bob looks at the The Kid and says, “You know I sold my Soul to the Devil, don’t you? I’m going to win this hand!”

The Kid looks shocked, then scared, but tells Big Bob he wants him to call his all in. Big Bob declares he is all in.

There is a dramatic pause and the Dealer flips the Ks as the River card. The board is 9s, 10s, X, Js, Ks. The unnamed  card, X, is not a spade and no obvious help to either Player.

The Kid, turns over 8s, 7s, for 7s, 8s, 9s, Ts, Js, a beautiful Straight Flush! Big Bob smiles, and turns over the Qs for a Larger Straight Flush, 9s, Ts, Js, Qs, Ks, winning the pot! In the moment, I think I would have ran out of the Poker Room, never to return. For Big Bob, it was just another day at, ‘The Office’.

MX Linux Revives Old Computer

I have an eleven year old Samsung Laptop that used to run Windows 7, but would not upgrade. About three years ago, I put Linux Mint on it and gave it away. A few weeks ago I got it back. I thought I would install the latest version of Linux Mint and give it away again, but things were not quite that straight forward and obvious.

To begin with the battery will not charge, and the laptop was running ‘very’ slow. The dead battery was not unexpected, but the slowness was excruciating. It ran like my very first computer with cassette tape boot and storage. I would start it up, go make a sandwich, and come back, and it would be ready to use.

I did a web check for Linux distributions for old computers and Lubuntu Linux was in all of the articles, so I thought it was a good place to start. I downloaded the latest Lubuntu, put it on a USB stick, and nothing. I tried a different port and nothing. I went back to the bios, played with the boot settings and, nothing.

An interesting side note, I had to tell the bios each boot up where to boot from. The settings defaulted to the hard drive after each boot sequence. This Samsung Laptop has a CD-Rom built in, so I put Lubuntu on a DVD. It loaded to the desktop screen after about six minutes. I blamed this on the painfully slow CPU speed for which I had not discovered the bios setting for. Lubuntu installed, but that was about it. It was painful. Screens could not be resized for starters. Nor could they be relocated on the screen. Lubuntu was painful to use.

After pulling the laptop apart only to find nothing loose, I looked at the bios. The bios it turns out has a setting to slow the CPU speed when the battery falls below below twenty percent. A brilliant idea back in the day, but not practical having a dead battery. I turned the option off. It ran like the champ it is after that, well almost.

I thought I would try Xubuntu, it would not load Firefox web browser when running from the DVD. I did not try to install it. Linux Mint happily installed. Upon reboot however, all I got was a two tone flashing display, like a gray train crossing signal light. I checked around and found it is a sometime issue when a computer has two video cards. This Laptop has built in Intel graphics and a Radeon video Card. Even though I knew the problem, it would not boot so I could disable one of the video cards.

Next up was my daily driver, MX Linux. MX Linux bills itself as a middle weight Linux, so I did not hold out a lot of hope for it. Fortunately, the MX Linux Crew knows about issues with dual video cards. Pressing F4 on the Splash Screen and setting the video menu to on, let me disable a video card.

For the first attempt, I disabled the Intel Video, letting the system use the Radeon Graphics Card. I found the Radeon Graphics card had gone the was of the battery, so I reinstalled disabling the Radeon Video card. Installation went on without a hitch. The needed updates were almost 250 megabytes, and there was some auto building for a few items being installed. But everything was smooth and painless.

Upon reboot, this eleven year old Samsung laptop now can hold its own. It’s not blazingly fast,  but it’s not annoying slow either – coming from someone who has a eleventh generation i7 in his desktop. So all turned out well.

My end point is this, don’t throw away ‘old’ computers, they have a lot of life left. Check the bios before installing Linux, in case there are any surprises, like cpu throttling. Try a few different distributions, some work better on different hardware than others. Finally, enjoy the process, there is nothing expensive to ruin, and lots of potential for someone who can’t afford a computer.

Fit in 15 at 60+! - Short Overview

I rarely review books. I am writing about this book though. I have no relationship with the Author, and am receiving no compensation for this article. It is a valuable book if you are a Senior.

This book is a wise investment. On the surface, it is simplistic. The basis is the Author was over sixty and was having issues while trying to get in shape. Exercise was painful and was not producing results. How many people over 60 are not starting to have real issues with common tasks and simple exercise?

If you are over sixty, you and I both know exactly what the Author faced, and this is where his book shines! Are the books basic exercises simple? Yes they are. They start in a chair, it is difficult to get much simpler with exercise than sitting in a chair. 

I read complaints these exercises are too simplistic. I do them, and they are simple, yet effective. If you want to know how limber you are not, do some of the exercises. I found out I was not as limber as I thought I was. Now, I'm getting better and more limber. I now think, what else do I have to do, and what do I have to lose? Everything?

The fascinating thing about people over sixty is we are limber enough, most of the time to do those things we do every day. Completing new or rarely used movements more than a few times, and we know about it the next day, the day after, and the day after. I grew sick and tired of the muscle aches and the frustrations of exercising. There was pain and no gain.

This book is helping me to learn how to manage 'exercise' without waking up sore the next day, and bring satisfaction back to basic exercise. I hope the pep talks and the basic exercises in the book stick with me. They take little time and feel good, so I think they will. I am fairly limber, but if I do out of the usual type of yard work or my even preferred exercise routine, I wake up to spend a few days being very sore.

After modifying my exercise routine as Mr. Jenner suggests, most of my pain  and exercising frustration are now mostly in my past. I wake up knowing I used my muscles, but it is not painful as it used to be. I now look forward to exercising. I am happy to do the simple stretches as they help me feel even better.

The second fact I learned is what happens in our muscles when we get sore, and how to make it better. I scoffed at the suggestion that eating differently would make most of the pain of exercise go away. With nothing to lose I followed the authors suggestions. It is a miracle! I wonder how many years I thought I had Delayed Onset of Muscle Soreness (DOMS), only to realize some exercise pain is diet related.

After reading the book cover to cover, which is recommended before starting the exercises, I found these two insights about exercise and eating alone make the book worth it's asking price. I am sure Mr. Jenner, the author, experienced the exact same issues I have experienced. He dug around and researched until he found the answers. Exercise hurts more when you are over 60! But he found a fix!

His program is simple, it is intended for older adults, not twenty somethings. It is comprehensive. Give the simplest exercises a chance, what do you have to lose? I find the book is more than worth the asking price.

Almost Indestructible - My Echo Dot

 

We all have bought items that after purchase we found were under-engineered. That pretty 'cheap' bicycle that started falling apart before the summer was over. The greatest frying pan ever that started peeling after a few months. The 'budget' car that over time costs more to keep on the road than a luxury car would have. The list is unending.

I found what I think is the most over-engineered $20.00 (at the time) item on the planet! Welcome to my Echo Dot. When I first bought it, I heard the stories about how it spies on you and records everything it hears? I have a commercial router system in the house, and my Echo Dot used little bandwidth when I was using to to play music, etc. Bandwidth when idle was minimal. I wrote it off to updates, etc.

Then one week I received an email from my Internet service provider telling me, I was at the limit of my bandwidth for the week. How could that be? Our bandwidth usage is almost the same week to week, month to month. I was sure there was a mistake, what happened?

Checking my usage on an app that works with my router, I found our bandwidth usage was boringly normal. I was ready to get on the phone and find out what the problem was. Then I checked the usage specifically for my Echo Dot. Wow! It was like being hit with a water balloon! The bandwidth usage for four days  was higher than was used by all other devices in the house combined! And it sat mostly idle for these day as the thrill was gone.

I performed an instant unplug. The excessive bandwidth usage never returned.  Perhaps the Echo Dot thought it was told to play a silent radio channel, was somehow hacked, or was indeed listening and uploading conversation. It had been sitting in the corner for about a year, with me wondering what to do with it.

This afternoon, I decided to look inside the Echo Dot and see why it was so heavy. The Pictures are the result of about ten minutes attacking my Echo Dot with a pry bar and a sixteen ounce (one pound head) hammer. As you can see, I really did not do near the damage I would have with any other electronics I own. With the rest, one or two blows would have shattered the electronics.

There is no obvious reason for the beyond industrial strength build of my Echo Dot. As for why my Echo Dot is so over-engineered is left up to the imagination. However I can not think of any kid's toy or street legal vehicle built to the beyond tough standards of my Echo Dot.