My car blew up but I am still smiling! Why?

Well, for the very few of you that read my blog and know me, you probably are aware that I have gone through the toughest 3.5 years of my life.  Once you go through a bunch of shit, you either thrive and survive or die.  Also, you learn what really matters in life, and your perspective hopefully changes for the better.

What all this means is that if you are by nature an optimistic glass half full type of person, which I am, you don’t let things to get to you as much as they used to.  Now I am not special and I do have my ups and downs, but I am just so much more even keeled now that I have been through a few shit storms.

Recently I started playing small Poker tournaments again, because I often make more playing than I do in my regular job.  So I had won a few bucks, nothing to make me rich or anything, but enough so that I could pay my bills current and even have a little left over to still play some small tournaments.

Last week my breaks were going out on my 1999 Pontiac Sunfire.  Now this car was nothing fancy but after going 6 months without a car for the first time since I was 16, it felt like I had the fanciest ride ever!  Besides the breaks, I also had two flat tires, so I limped the car over to a shop and had to replace the front breaks completely and had to get 1 new tire and the other repaired.

If it were not for Poker,  would not have been able to afford to make the repairs, but I had recently won some money so I dumped $350 in to the car and it ran better and I thought I was out of the woods for awhile.  I was feeling great and even went to another tournament, alas for the first time in 3 weeks I did not cash.

All was okay though because I had paid ALL my bills for the first time in I don’t know how long.  My mobile phones were paid for, yes I pay for mine, my son, my daughter, my estranged wife, AND my former girlfriend.  Don’t ask it is very complicated.

Here is the real kicker, I paid of my car insurance and didn’t owe again until August!  Yay!!!

Life was good.

Then yesterday I am coming back from running some errands and I hear a loud pop, my power steering goes out, the charging light comes on, and the car starts to badly overheat.  Before I can get to where I can tow the car, just as I am exiting near my home she decides to have a heart attack at the bottom of the off-ramp.

I call AAA and they tow me to the same place I spent $350 the previous week and I get the good news that the engine has seized up.

So I am back to having no car.

But hey, look on the bright side, my insurance is paid up until August.  Oh well, I still have a positive attitude and know that things will eventually improve.

Bad timing though because there are several Poker tournaments coming up where I could make life changing money for small buy-ins , but now have no way to get there.

Until next time dear readers!

Carpe Diem,

 

Mauricio

Poker – Getting away from a flopped set over set, can you?

Okay, I am 100% sincere when I say that I would greatly appreciate any and all feedback on this situation.  I welcome any input but would really be appreciative if I could get some responses from professional players, and especially any or all of my instructors from Deep Stacks Live.  You all know who you are.

I will give a little background regarding the other player and the situation.  This was a player that was pretty aggressive and at least my impression/read on him was that he put little to no thought in to what his opponent might be holding and would just push pretty recklessly.  This hand was at the final table of the Harrah’s Rincon 2 day ring event last Sunday/Monday.

There were 138 entrants and 28 of us made it to the final day.  There were a few hands I was aware of with this player that indicate to me that at least in most hands I saw, I believe luck played a much bigger part than skill in his getting as far as he did.  One I was involved in and survived and another hand he got very lucky late in the tourney to survive.

Hand against me I had limped in early position with K,K and he raised, I re-raised and then he went all in.  After I called he flipped over A,Jo and my hand held.  Against another player he called all in against A,K with Q,10 off on an A high flop and hit running 10’s.

So finally here is the hand I busted on and I would like honest opinions of whether I should have been able to get away from this hand.   I would like to know both from a perspective of if I had no knowledge at all of how my opponent plays, and also knowing what I did know about him.

I am in the small blind with 2,2 blinds were 2,500/5,000 with a 500 ante.  Opponent in late position raised to $11k, and I called.  Flop:

J,2,Q rainbow.  I check he bets 15k, I make it 45k he moves all in, I call and he turns over J,J and I am out in 8th.

Regardless I am very happy with my play as I started the day with 17,200 second shortest stack with a chip average of 47k and at the end of the first 40 minute level I was over 100k in chips. 

I really thought I would win this thing.

Should I have been able to fold my set the way the hand went down? 

I thank all of you in advance for any input.

Carpe Diem,

Mauricio

Creating a Robust Password

Since many of us rely on the internet for so many functions today it is critical to create a robust password that is very difficult to crack.
But…… How do you do this and still remember it, without going insane?  Suprisingly it is very easy to do this once you have the key and follow a couple of very basic rules.  I have passwords that contain 14 characters and I have no problem remembering them.  So how do I do this?  Read on my friend.
Well I learned a great tip, now I did not think of this and cannot remember exactly where I read it since I read so much, but here it is:
1.  You want to create a password that is at least 10 characters long and contains a combination of upper and lower case letters, numerals, and whenever possible special characters, i.e. ?, & etc.  (now please note that not all websites will allow for special characters, and ironically enough I have found that banks, which you would think should and would want you to create the MOST robust passwords do not allow for special characters, go figure)  In the event that you find a website that does not allow for special characters or in some other way limits the type of password you are allowed to create, then you will have to modify these instructions accordingly.
2.  You take the alphabet and break it in half to determine which letters you will use as lower case and which you will use as upper case.  Very simple, A-M=lower case N-Z=upper case.  So when creating your password all you have to do is remember this simple formula.
3.  Find some special characters that you will remember, now I like to use no less than one and no more than 3 in my passwords, so for example you could use exclamation points and in order to remember them without going insane I like to bracket my password with the special characters.  At the end of my explanation I will create a sample password to you can visualize exactly what you are going to want to create.
4.  Choose some numerals that are easy for you to remember but not too easy.  I would suggest no less than two numbers and no more than 4 numbers.  You can choose something significant like your anniversary month or a combination of your children’s birthday’s or birth months.  You get the idea just pick a few numbers that you will remember.  Now you need to make sure you remember where you put them in the password.  I place my numerals in the middle of my password directly after a double letter, so it’s very easy for me to remember.
5.  Here is the last piece of the puzzle.  What you want to do is think of a phrase that is important and significant to you and you alone, and this in combination with the special characters, numerals and use of both upper and lower case letters will create a password that is easy for you to remember but nearly impossible for someone else to crack.
6.  Example of exactly how this works.  Let’s put this all together, shall we?
a.  Create your special phrase:  “My Dog Always Gets And Eats My Newspaper”
b.  Create your special characters:  &,!
c.  Create your special numbers: 12 (Your Dog’s Birth Month)
d.  Your new password is:  &mda12gaemN!
Now you see you just created a 12 character password that I would challenge even the best password cracker to crack!!
In summary you have a robust password that is long and contains numerals, upper and lower case letters, and special characters.

Poker – When is a guarantee not a guarantee?

I enjoy playing Poker and started playing about 7 years ago.  Like most or all players I was horrible when I started playing and have gradually and steadily improved.  While in a perfect world I would play in larger events my very meager bankroll only allows me to play very low buy-ins.

Okay, who am I kidding my bankroll is not just meager but pretty much non-existent.  I play though because very often even playing very cheap tournaments I can and do make more money in a 4-8 hour period than I do working 40 hours in a week.  I study and analyze the game and also am very selective regarding the type of tournament I choose and try and select solid structures and whenever possible guarantee tournaments.

As an example of how I can make more money in a few hours than I do in one week, on Monday I played a tournament at Commerce Casino in LA and won more in just over 4 and half hours than I make in one full week.  In 2008 after I went through the most devastating layoff I had ever experienced and I have gone through more than I care to remember, I booked my largest single win, placing 3rd and winning over $12,000.

In fact I was still not very good as a player, and yes some might argue I still am not very good, but I would of course beg to differ, I made a really, really bad mistake and actually gave a pro named Matt Stout a gift of about $11k.  It was so bad a mistake that it literally was like I said hey Matt you seem like a really nice guy and despite the fact that I recently lost my job and need this money I am going to hand you $11k.

Sadly he was really rude and nasty to me, which made no sense to me since he should have been grateful that my poor play benefited him greatly.  But that wasn’t really the topic for today.  I mention all of this just as background.

So we fast forward to the present.  I am a solid player but have no bankroll, so when I do play I have to be very selective to ensure that I am maximizing my potential and the few dollars I can afford. 

I have played at Morongo Casino in the past and a couple of days per week they have a very good structure that is very affordable.  I had not played there in months and noticed on their website that they were now offering a guarantee of $3,000 for their Tuesday tournament.

Now for those of you that do not play Poker, let me briefly explain what that means.  A guarantee means that regardless of how many players show up for the tournament the casino will guarantee that there is at least $3,000 total in the prize pool to be divided amongst all the players.  Now usually there is some stipulation that you must have a minimum amount of players, and generally it would be about 9 players to at least make up 1 table.

Occasionally in a tournament there will be what is known as an overlay, which is great for a poker player.  What that means is that there are fewer players than needed to meet the guarantee.  So if the buy in for the tournament that goes in to the prize pool is $85 as an example then there would need to be 35 or more players to ensure that there was $3,000 in the prize pool.

Since the casino advertised and agreed to a guarantee than that means that if there are only 20 people that show up, there would only be $1,700 in the prize pool and the casino would have to make up and eat the $1,300 difference.

Well, that is what is supposed to happen, but Morongo almost cancelled the tournament because they didn’t want to lose money.  What happened was this, I showed up very early for the tournament and paid for my seat.  They moved to a much smaller Poker room a few months ago and the tournaments used to fill up quickly so I wanted to make sure and get a seat.

I came back ten minutes prior to the scheduled start time and they only had 18 people registered and they said they would not run the tournament if they didn’t get at least 27-30 people.  I was NOT happy about this at all, and I asked them how they could do this when their website and printed material had no disclaimer and they just mumbled that they were not about to lose so much money.

They said that in the past they had lost money and still ran the tournament but this was too much for them to lose.  I told them fine then remove the word guarantee moving forward and they said we are not going to do that.  So here was a large casino that brings in hundreds of millions of dollars per year and they were worried about having to dig in to their gold and silver lined pockets for about $1,500.

Are you fucking kidding me?  What kind of a Mickey Mouse operation are they running?  I have NEVER seen a casino anywhere not honor a guarantee.  I have played in many places in the US and remember when I was back east the Borgata which is one of the best places to play Poker in my opinion have to eat tens of thousands of dollars in meeting a guarantee. 

Did they cry and whine?  No, what they did was adjust for the economy and lower the guarantee in future tournaments.  This is good business folks, period! 

They started advertising the tournament in the room and they finally got enough players and started the tournament but the fact that had they not gotten more players they even considered telling 18 players that showed up to play sorry we are not going to run this thing I found to be disgusting and deplorable.

This has left a really nasty taste in my mouth for Morongo and I really don’t know if I will go back.  Quite frankly if I had a proper bankroll I wouldn’t even screw around with these little tournaments.

Carpe Diem,

Mauricio

Who is the real Bully MPAA or @Bullymovie? Part 2

Well, I want to begin by saying that I have agonized over whether I should even bother writing this post or not, but I care so here it is.  I care not only about this very important issue of bullying but also about fairness.  Let me say unequivocally that I am in 100% support of the Bully movie and what Lee Hirsch and Weinstein films are doing.

A little background, I am not a celebrity or a rich person, I am just a Dad of 2 kids, 1 is 15 the other is 21.  My 21 year old daughter I just found out was bullied as a teen and contemplated and apparently attempted suicide.  I clearly was out of touch and didn’t see the signs.  I thank god that somehow she got through this and is better now.  She gave me permission to say these things and in fact has posted her own video on her YouTube channel.  Anyone interested in seeing it can contact me for the link.  I may also do a video version of this issue on my YouTube channel.

I signed the petition to have the rating for Bully changed from R to PG13 along with hundreds of thousands of others, prior to doing my homework.  Although I have no doubt that Lee Hirsch and Harvey Weinstein’s motives are pure, I to a certain extent feel manipulated. 

I was and still am so passionate about this subject and was upset that the MPAA wouldn’t give it a PG13 rating, thinking like many people that signed the petition, that the MPAA and Joan Graves were the bad guys and they could simply change the rating but wouldn’t.

This is NOT the case, and the film makers and the media are NOT being candid or fair to either the MPAA or Joan Graves.  Ms. Graves and the MPAA have in my opinion been unfairly vilified in the media.

Because I was so upset about this issue in thinking that the MPAA was being the bad guy I called them and asked to speak to Ms. Graves.  This was last Friday March, 9.  At the time I was told she was in screenings most of the day and that they would pass my message to her.  Quite frankly I did not expect to hear from her at all, let alone the same day! 

I have no doubt that she is a very busy woman so I have to give her credit, not only for calling me back very quickly but for being sincere, candid, patient and listening to everything I had to say.  Not only did she take the time to explain the issue and how the MPAA and the appeals process works, but she gave me as much time as I needed.  At NO point during our 22 minute conversation did I ever feel rushed.  I love movies and the whole process and was fascinated by what I was learning and I could have easily kept talking to her, but I was sensitive to the fact that she is busy and must have lots of people wanting her attention, especially right now because of Bully so I ended the conversation.

Again I have to say how impressed I was that she took the time, she did not have to but she did. 

I then started using social media particularly Twitter in an attempt to reach somebody, ANYBODY, associated with Bully.  I was not so naive as to expect Lee Hirsch or Harvey Weinstein themselves to contact me, although that would have been very cool, but I just hoped I could get somebody on their team to talk to me to make sure that I had my facts straight before I wrote part 2. I gave them 1 full week to talk with me.

I realize that the team behind Bully is very busy, especially right now, but if Joan Graves from the MPAA/CARA could give me 22 minutes of her valuable time then, in my opinion there is NO excuse that somebody from Bully couldn’t give me some time.

Unfortunately, nobody would take the time to speak to me, so I am moving forward and I believe I have my facts straight.  If I do not then I am sure somebody will correct me.

The folks behind Bully are being disingenous at best and hypocritical at worst!  Harsh criticism I realize, but fair is fair.  Why do I say this?  I will get back to why after I explain the way the system works.  Please keep in mind that none of this changes the fact that I like what they are doing with the message of the movie and they should be commended for making this film.  But they need to work within the system and not expect the rules to be changed because of the importance of this film.  I agree the film should be rated PG13 but there is a system in place of which the filmmakers were fully aware of and now that they didn’t get their way they are being “bullies” themselves by using the media and enlisting congress and movie stars many/most of which are too busy to do the due diligence that I did, and therefore they assume that it’s as simple as just changing the rating.

It’s NOT that easy and Lee Hirsch and Harvey Weinstein know better!  They also were fully aware of how the system works when they submitted their film for a rating.  They knew it would garner an R rating under the current MPAA guidelines.

Keep in mind that I have ZERO connections to Hollywood.  I am a huge entertainment buff, but I am a complete Hollywood outsider.  Everything I learned and am about to describe is from doing my homework and speaking with Ms. Graves.

What I state next is what I believe to be accurate.  Keep in mind that I only have the MPAA’s side of this but feel pretty confident that what I state is correct.  Here is how the system works and what happened in the case of Bully and the other two movies that have been discussed recently and cited as reasons why Bully should have a ratings change, a 2004 movie called “Gunner Palace” that had an R rating and appealed and received a PG13 and a yet to be released movie entitled “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” that recently successfully won their appeal and are now receiving a PG13 from the original R rating.  I won’t go in to more detail regarding the other two movies listed above other than to say that they went through the same appeals process that Bully went through and they won.  Should Bully have won their appeal?

In my opinion yes they should have, but…… they didn’t so instead of doing what they need to do to get a PG13 rating they went on the media blitz and blinded people with emotion without explaining the truth of the matter, which is what I hope to do here.  I will cover what I would do if I were the director and what I hope he does do later.

First let’s describe the process as I understand it:

1.  A film is submitted to the MPAA for a rating.  The issue with Bully is that they have 6 instances of the F-Bomb.  Now the MPAA rules are that if a movie receives 2 or more F-Bombs or 1 instance that is used in a sexual connotation then it gets an R rating.

2.  If a film gets a rating that the filmmaker finds unfavorable they have essentially 2 choices, one is they edit the movie and resubmit or they leave the film alone and they appeal.  Bully did the latter, which I agree with, it is important IF possible to leave the language in as is and IF possible get a PG13 rating to ensure the widest possible audience.  Unfortunately Bully lost their appeal.

Keep in mind that the appeals board is a different group of people then on the original ratings board and in fact Ms. Graves is NOT in the room when the appeals board votes.

I do agree with Lee Hirsch and others wanting to change the rating, that our current system is inadequate, antiquated and needs to be and should be changed, but for now we have to accept the system as it is, and then work towards future change.  Harvey Weinstein agreed to bleep “The King’s Speech” while it was still in theaters in order to get a PG13 rating.  In my opinion of course here, it was all about the Benjamins!

While I loved that film I argue that this movie is much, much more important and the same should be done here.  Instead of doing so they are waging a war with the MPAA that is unfair and quite frankly they should lose.

So while I applaud their passion it would really be a shame if the MPAA were to bow down to all the pressure that is being exerted upon them by caving and making a special case for Bully.  If they bow to pressure for Bully then we may as well throw the ratings system out the window.  Yeah, I know some would say that’s not such a bad thing, but again that’s not how you make changes.

While I agree with the producer that we should not talk down to kids, and that they hear this language all the time, at the same time then we should give them credit for knowing what word is being bleeped.

If I read this sentence to the Bully audience I am confident that the majority will understand the missing word:

“I am going to ________ you up”  Tell me can you think of any other expletive that fits properly in to that sentence?  Probably not!

So what does that mean?  It means that while in a perfect world we should leave the F-bomb’s in and give the film a PG13 rating, but the reality is that bleeping it will not severely damage this movie or the impact it will have.

So what would I do and should Lee do?  Edit the movie, bleep the F-Bombs, and resubmit to the MPAA and hopefully receive the PG13 rating to ensure a wide audience.  Then if he wants he can release both versions of the movie on the DVD and Blu-Ray.

In just watching the trailer I was moved to tears and I wanted to reach out and give the children in the film a hug and tell them that they are worthwhile and to hang in there.  I then wanted to storm in to the schools and chastise the educators for not being attentive and dealing with this epidemic.  The fact that I viewed a short trailer for this movie that had ZERO expletives in it and I was moved to tears, I believe proves that the impact of this movie remains the same whether you bleep the F-Bombs or not.

So in my mind there are two issues at play here.

The first is that bullying is an epidemic in this country and needs to have a large spotlight placed upon it, so we can begin to deal with this issue.  I also applaud Katy Butler for starting her petition drive, but the second issue has to do with the way that the film makers have gone about the ratings issue and the way that most of the media has portrayed this issue.

You have many stars, politicians and athletes including Anderson Cooper, Ellen DeGeneres, Olivia Munn, Johhny Depp, Meryl Streep, Drew Brees Justin Bieber, Roger Ebert and now congress rallying behind the effort to “bully” the MPAA in to changing the rating for this movie.  Prior to my doing my homework I also signed the petition. 

Do I regret having signed it?  No.  Would I sign it today knowing what I know?  Not sure, maybe.

What is truly amazing to me is so many of these movie stars and esteemed critic Roger Ebert, should be fully aware of how the MPAA works and yet they are jumping on the band wagon seemingly ignoring the rules for the industry that feeds them.

We can’t change the rules just because we don’t like them.  It’s a very slippery slope if we do.

One thing that all bullies have in common:

They believe the rules do not apply to them.

So Lee, Harvey and the rest of the Bully crew:

Don’t be a BULLY!  Play by the rules, you lost fair and square. 

Edit the film, let’s get the rating it should have and save kids lives!

Peace,

Concerned Dad Mauricio

Bully Movie issue complicated Part 1

On March 9, 2012 I had a very productive conversation with Joan Graves who is the head of the Classification and Rating Administration (CARA) division of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA).

As a father of a 15 year old boy who is the target demographic for this movie I feel very passionate about this subject.  I have read quite a bit of information on this subject from both sides and feel comfortable that as a Hollywood outsider I am probably one of the most knowledgeable on this subject but I know that I still have more to learn about it.

I intend to discuss my conversation with Joan Graves in greater detail as well as give my opinion on the entire subject, but in all fairness to the director of Bully Lee Hirsch and to Harvey and Bob Weinstein I would like to speak to anyone associated with the Bully movie who was at the appeals board so I can get their perspective as well.

I will wait until the end of next week to do part 2 of this blog post, in order to allow someone from the Bully movie to speak to me.  I can be reached via direct message on Twitter @mpolack.

I want to be very fair in my blog post, since I feel so strongly about this subject and felt one way prior to speaking with Joan Graves, but now have been exposed to a different perspective and after having spoken to her and listened to what she had to say I believe the issue is much more complicated than has been portrayed in the media.

This is a very emotional issue, and as such it is easy to get caught up in the emotion and not think and act clearly.  Certainly I initially acted mostly out of emotion without doing enough homework.  I will make my best effort in the future to do my due diligence before acting or worse reacting.  I hope to bring both sides of this issue in a clear and thoughtful manner to continue the debate and conversation.

The bottom line is that I care deeply for my son and for all children of the target demographic and hope to affect change.

Carpe Diem,

 

Mauricio

The Changing Face of Video Games

One recent debate that has been raging is how the proliferation of mobile phones, iPod Touches, iPads, and tablets are going to take over gaming, therefore making dedicated hand held game systems in particular obsolete.  They both can and in my opinion will co-exist for a variety of reasons. 

The recent release of the Sony Vita as well as last years launch of the Nintendo 3DS stirred up this debate quite a bit. I have been a video game fanatic even before I ended up in the industry.  I have been playing games even before the Atari 2600, on a system that only ancient people like myself and hardcore video game fans will remember, the Magnavox Odyssey system by Phillips the large Dutch company.

For you young folks that have only known modern technology, here is a cool fact for you.  Television sets used to produce static electricity from their screens, and the graphics were so primitive with the Magnavox Odyssey that the graphics were actually acetate overlays that stuck on to the television by static electricity with just a few white blocks underneath to drive the game play.

And you know what?   Some of these games were an absolute blast to play, even though the graphics were not just bad, they were literally non-existent.  Over the years I have seen the industry go through so many changes and for several years there was a sort of arms race to see who could produce the best graphics and sound, but especially graphics.

I believe to a certain extent the industry lost it’s way during that period and forgot about the most important aspect of video games, which is that games MUST be fun.  I don’t care how great the graphics are if the game isn’t fun then it serves no purpose.  My 21 year old daughter still plays Tetris on a Game Boy Advance SP and loves it.  Some games are just timeless.

I am very much platform agnostic and have/had many systems.  I used to have a PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Wii along with many older systems including Super Nintendo, N64, GameCube to name a few.  At this point I am pretty much down to the older systems, but will again purchase the current systems when I am able to.  My Xbox 360 mysteriously vanished, and I am convinced that I may have gremlins in the boxes I had packed.

I also play games on the iPad, my Android phone and the iPod Touch.  While I like some games on these devices the reality is that with the notable exception of a few games that were created specifically with these platforms in mind, most games do not play well on these devices.  So far there has not been a great replacement for using a standard controller to play a game.

There have been several games that I have downloaded on to one of these portable devices and then not played them much because they ended up being to difficult to control and they quickly lost their appeal. 

While I do believe that these mobile devices will eat in to the sales of dedicated portable game systems to a certain extent, I think that the dedicated devices will still have a place and will continue to sell.  The expectations will simply need to be different than they were years ago with much less competition.

Another reason I believe that these dedicated game systems will continue to thrive is the fact that they are just that, dedicated to games.  Over the years I have seen many devices attempt to have what I like to call a “Swiss Army Knife” approach. 

Most often if you try and be all things to all people you end up being just okay at a bunch of different things versus being great at one thing.  I much prefer a system that is a great game system first.  Then and only then if it adds other functionality, that’s great so long as it never loses sight of its primary purpose which is to play great games.

I love this industry and feel really privileged to have seen so many changes and growth in a business that for many people was a waste of time.  Most gratifying for me was the fact that my dad who always thought video games were a waste of time, lived long enough to see me succeed in this business.  I know that while he may not have said it often he was proud of me.

Till next time!

Carpe Diem,

Mauricio