Suitedjustice's Ongoing Mid-life Crisis

Insomnia multiposting continues: I am rescinding my recommendation of the Cobra Kai show, now that I'm halfway through the sixth and final season.

Da_Nit was right in that the show descends into high school soap opera, but it also strains at the seams every time the plot needs to once again force Johnny and Daniel to break with each other, or to reconcile after a break, a cycle that has occurred something like 27 times during the course of the series.

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great review and yes - it plays fast and loose with how things unfolded - ie if it's more cinematic to have certain people at certain events they were not at they'll be there, if it makes it easier to wrap things up with one battle, then we ignore that they didn't surrender after that and actually continued to fight another half dozen battles afterwards

someone has several powerful sons with armies, let's just make it one son and man we don't want to film more costly battles so let's just have him get stabbed when we're done with him etc etc

but man i love that show, been meaning to rewatch for some time

i strongly rec "I, Claudius" best tv ever made ainec but it's super slow and all conversation so it's like watching a play but man it's goated

i also loved "the cleopatras" which was super fun but a bit too campy so wasn't taken entirely seriously

Thanks, rickroll!

I second the I, Claudius recommendation. I liked Brian Blessed chewing up the scenery as a big, dumb St. Bernard dog version of Augustus, who believed that shouting at everyone in his scheming, backbiting brood would be enough to keep them in line, and finding that it worked for decades, until it didn't. He would go on to repeat that character in Blackadder, playing the very fictional King Richard IV.

I haven't seen The Cleopatras.

I never watched Rome, I might have to give a shot with the gf... Good to see you at the tables again Suited, and winning on top of that

Thanks Dubnjoy000! Rome is only 2 seasons, and unlike some shows it doesn't take several episodes to get going, so you'll probably know fairly quickly whether you like it or not.

Here's the state of play on the media bucket list, even though I should be watching and reading less and working more if I don't want to end up on the streets. The shows with *** are in current rotation. Shelved means that I've checked out the show, but taken it out of the rotation, but I still put on an episode from time to time. Dustbinned means that I'm done with the show, or that I couldn't make it all the way through the movie.

And yes, I dustbinned The Office, a show that a great many people love. The Michael Scott character annoyed the hell out of me, even though I like Steve Carrell, and even though I enjoyed Ricky Gervais's take on the character in the original British version.

I'm having trouble finding the classic sci-fi books. I know that I can order them online, but I'd rather patronize a bookstore or a library, and try to keep both of those institutions in business. There's a big used bookstore in Northampton that I'm going to try next.

TV Shows
12 Monkeys
Alice in Borderland
American Horror Story
Arrested Development
Baby Reindeer
Band of Brothers
Barry
The Beatles: Get Back
Bottom
The Civil War
***Cobra Kai (6) 6,7
Cosmos
Community
Dark
Dark Matter
Dark Winds
Devs
The Dirt
Doctor Who
Documentary Now!
Drunk History
Euphoria
Evil
**The Expanse 5,6
Extras
Falling Skies
Farscape
Fawlty Towers
Flashforward
Flight of the Conchords
The Franchise
***Freaks and Geeks (1) 1,18
Fringe
From
Gravity Falls
Hacks
Hit Monkey
Holey Moley
The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret
In The Know
Invincible
The John Larroquette Show
John Mulaney Presents: Everybody's in L.A.
Kaos
Killing Eve
Killjoys
Kingdom
Krapopolis
***The Larry Sanders Show (6) 5,5
Lazarus Project
Louie
Mad Men
Maniac
Mythic Quest
Nightmares and Dreamscapes: From the Stories of Stephen King
NOS4A2
Orange Is the New Black
Only Murders in the Building
Our Flag Means Death
Ozark
Planet Earth
Ren Faire
Reservation Dogs
Russian Doll
The Sarah Silverman Program
Santa Clarita Diet
Schitt's Creek
Secret Level
Seinfeld
Severance
Shogun
Silo
Slow Horses
Sons of Anarchy
Star Trek: Lower Decks
Station Eleven
Sweet Home
Stargate: SG-1
Tiger King
The Twilight Zone
Under the Dome
The Vietnam War
X-Files
***Watchmen (1) 1,2
***Westworld (4) 1,5
The Wire
The Witcher

The Next Batch of Shows
12 Monkeys
Bottom
Drunk History
Holey Moley
John Mulaney Presents: Everybody's in L.A.
Nightmares and Dreamscapes: From the Stories of Stephen King
The Sarah Silverman Program
Secret Level
Severance
Silo

Caught Up
3 Body Problem (2,1)
The Boys (5,1)
Conan O'Brien Must Go (2,1)
Delicious in Dungeon (2,1)
Fallout (2,1)
Foundation (3,1)
Good Omens (3,1)
The Handmaid's Tale (6,1)
The Last of Us (2,1)
Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (3,1)
Rick and Morty (8,1)
Shoresy (4,1) - returns in late February
Squid Game (3,1)
Ted (2,1)
Ted Lasso (4,1)
Wednesday (2,1)
The Wheel of Time (3,1) - returns in mid-March

Finished
11.22.63 (8)
30 Rock (139)
American Gods (26)
Archer (145)
Better Call Saul (63)
Blackadder (24)
Bojack Horseman (76)
Bupkis (8)
Castle Rock (20)
Chernobyl (5)
Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee (84)
Disenchantment (50)
Fleabag (12)
Game of Thrones (73)
The Good Place (53)
Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law (39)
History of the World Part II (8)
I, Claudius (12)
Letterkenny (81)
Mike Judge Presents: Tales From the Tour Bus (16)
Mr. McMahon (6)
M.O.D.O.K. (10)
Mr. Robot (45)
Rome (20)
The Orville (36)
The Queen's Gambit (7)
Red Dwarf (74)
The Sopranos (86)
Time Bandits (10)
w/Bob and David (4)
Wandavision (9)
What We Do in the Shadows (61)

Shelved
Andor (1,6)
Babylon 5 (1,5)
Fargo (4,2)
It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia (2,6)
The Man in the High Castle (1,5)
My Next Guest Needs No Introduction (2,4)
Parks & Recreation (2,8)
Stranger Things (3,7)
The Sandman (1,5)
Solar Opposites (1,5)
Trailer Park Boys (2,1)
Twin Peaks (2,13)
Veep (1,5)

Dustbinned
A Woman Under the Influence
Black Mirror
Curb Your Enthusiasm
I Think You Should Leave
The Office
The Searchers

Movies
Beyond the Valley of the Dolls
The Brothers Grimm
Chimes At Midnight
Fanny and Alexander
Five Easy Pieces
Fyre
Gladiator II
The Hateful Eight
Hollywood Shuffle
The Iron Giant
Henry V (1989)
JCVD
L.A. Confidential
Lawrence of Arabia
The Maltese Falcon
National Treasure
The People vs. Larry Flynt
Real Life
Sausage Party
Short Cuts
Three Colours: Blue
Sunset Boulevard
The Tin Drum

Books to Read
Hothouse, Brian Aldiss
Tiger Tiger, Alfred Bester
The Stars My Destination, Alfred Bester
The Sins of the Fathers, Lawrence Block
Arabian Nights, Richard Burton
The Dispossessed, Ursula Le Guin
A Fire Upon the Deep, Vernor Vinge
Blindsight, Peter Watts

Band to Check Out
Starcrawler

i was able to find them all on youtube when i watched it pre-covid

somewhat surprising because there's a good chunk of topless women in it

Two millennia of histories, portraits and sculptures have taught us to expect to see Cleopatra with her boobs out.

a fellow man of culture i see

Give me all the brows: high to low.

I Can Dodge Premiums, Baby.

Yesterday I played 5 hours at the most consistently tight passive table I've encountered since I sat with the old folks at the Silver Legacy in Reno. Everyone was sandbagging premium starting hands, and thereby killing their EV in order to hit an unlikely runout and make a high hand for the promo. There were no preflop 3-bets in the first 2 1/2 hours of my session. Zero.

Every time a tight passive player got up, a new one took their place. I had the field to myself. It seemed that no other regs wanted to transfer to a table full of nits.

Hand 1:

MP limps. I make it $10 in the CO with K♦T♦, as I'd been getting snap folds to my $12 and $15 opens. I was opening somewhat wider to pick up the blinds and the limps, but I still felt that I lacked the license to start opening every other hand, as we'd had one maniac at the table, briefly, who was opening 75% of his hands to $20 and $30, and the table had adjusted quickly, loosened up, and stacked him, before going back into lockdown mode.

BTN 3-bets to $30 out of his $100 stack. This was the first time anyone had 3-bet in 2 1/2 hours. MP folds and I turbo muck without showing and say "You got me, I was trying to steal it." BTN shows me A♠A♣.

Hand 2:

Folds to BTN, who limps. SB folds. I find A♣T♥ in the BB. I have not seen Villain play a single non-blind hand in hours. Curiosity gets the better of me and I complete, where I'd mostly raise in this spot.

Pot: ($5) - heads up. Effective stacks $88.

Flop - J♥K♦5♣

Check check.

Pot: ($5) - heads up

Turn - 2♠

Check check.

Pot: ($5) - heads up

River - Q♦

I bet $7 with the stone nuts. BTN raises to $17. I shove for his remaining $71. BTN calls with Q♠Q♣ for the rivered set.

Hand 3:

Folds to me in the CO, I make it $10 with K♦Q♦. BTN (a different guy than the Villain in Hand 1. He had moved into the spot) clicks to $20 with a stack of $150. I have seen Villain limp and flat for hours, but never raise, and now this? This is AA. Folds to me. It's $10 to see a flop. Let's go.

Pot ($43) - heads up. Effective stacks $130

Flop - K♣4♥J♠

I check, BTN bets $25. I actually tank for awhile. If I really want to go with my read, I should make a supernit fold with TPGK. But I don't; I can't. I call. I'm check/folding most turns here to any reasonable sizing from this particular player. Versus a reg, I would check/snap call turns that didn't improve me.

Pot ($93) - heads up

Turn - K♠

Interesting. Check check.

Pot ($93) - heads up

River 3♦

Bet. Bet. Bet. You have to bet here. Go with your AA read and bet. He capped himself on the turn. He doesn't have AK.

But what if he shoves it in my face? Can I bet/fold here? I probably should.

Damn it, he would have already bet the turn with AK. He doesn't have AK. You are bet/calling this river, especially when supernits get illogical about AA as an overpair on the river and spaz with it too often.

Yeah but if he was going to raise/shove AA on the river, he would have bet it on the turn, therefore a raise shove on the river is AK, therefore bet/fold river. One more thing; though, these supernits also like to play passive and trap until they hit the river. Maybe he's sandbagging AK and hoping I'll bite. How about I check/call the river? He's going to bet AA and AK every time, and he probably doesn't have AK.

Coward! You are such a nit. You belong with these damn people!

I check and BTN checks behind with AA. Ugh. That was a terrible choice. Italics me was right.

Hand 4:

Folds to me. I open 7♦7♥ on the BTN for $10. SB folds, BB, who hasn't 3-bet for 4 hours, clicks it to $20 with an $85 stack. Lol. Stacks are not deep enough for me to setmine properly. But I'm in position and I know his exact hand. I'm a freaking superuser here. I call.

Pot ($41) - heads up. Effective stacks $65.

Flop 7♣J♥2♥

Can he have JJ? Pssh. He's just calling pre with JJ. BB bets $25 and I shove for his remaining $40. He calls with A♠A♣ and my set holds.

I booked a $165 win in 5 hours at poker, and I lost $30 in 3 hours at the slots. I cut the day short before the freezing rain came in.

by suitedjustice k

Insomnia multiposting continues: I am rescinding my recommendation of the Cobra Kai show, now that I'm halfway through the sixth and final season.

Da_Nit was right in that the show descends into high school soap opera, but it also strains at the seams every time the plot needs to once again force Johnny and Daniel to break with each other, or to reconcile after a break, a cycle that has occurred something like 27 times during the course of the series.

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Yes! I also find it very bothersome that they need to make Daniel and Johnny split so many times. I liked the show initially but they didn’t have enough there for six seasons.

it seems the bbc never re-aired the cleopatras nor released on dvd and it's unavailable on any streaming services

i did find this via google not youtubes and found an unavailble playlist of all episodes which i watched when abroad, perhaps changing vpn to various different countries will get it to work?

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFR78Uf6Xh3jCCY3OrzpW46htIDvsF_hz

YouTube

The Cleopatras 1983

there are unofficial places which sell the dvd though but most people didn't like it so i wouldn't watch - you can find episode 1 and ep 1 only daily motion to get a taste of the forbidden fruit

i am seriously wanting to rewatch it now so will continue the search

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x35sa5m

Dailymotion

The Cleopatras Episode 1 - video Dailymotion

I caught the flu, or something like it, although I tested negative for Covid. Yesterday I slept for 20 hours, on and off, like a cat. I suffered dizziness and chills; freezing my ass off. Today, I'm better, but not well enough to play, which is a shame, as MGM for Valentine's Day is paying $1000 for heart straight flushes made with 2 cards, and $500 for those made with 1 card.

Still, it's hard to make a straight flush. Months and months tend to go by in between them. Last year, they were paying $100 for any winning heart flush, and that was definitely worth the trip, but they got rid of that for this year. I'm guessing that they paid out far too much for that aspect of the promo.

FYP.

Yep. It occurred to me to try to avoid getting hit with the full $9 rake, but then I thought about how much it would tilt me if I just called or minclicked and he showed up with two pair or a set.

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I was supposed to spend today with my friends Will and Octavia, visiting Will's elderly dad, who is super cool and kind of a genius, but the incoming snowstorm and my lingering flu symptoms put the kibosh on that.

I did feel well enough to go for a quick slot run before the snow and ice hit us. Lately, the Ultimate X machines have been in a deplorable state, and today was no exception; someone else has been checking them on the regular. I suppose it's to be expected.

I did, however, find a Hexbreak3r machine with 9028 lines on it that had somehow evaded the Asian Syndicate's baleful scrutiny. That's a big deal, seeing as how 4000 lines is considered to be a good play on that title. Alas, the play was only for the lowest, 80c denomination. Still, it gave me $120 fairly quickly, and made my trip worthwhile.

60 big blinds (or 40 if you're playing 1/3) ain't too shabby! 😀

Beats a kick in the ass.

Snow and freezing rain all day today. I miss Las Vegas.

For those of you who started reading this blog within the past few weeks, before that time, I was working on a project designed to (1) get more nonpoker content into the blog and (2) broaden my limited, hardening-with-age musical boundaries by forcing myself to listen to albums that I normally wouldn't hear, and to report my impressions of them.

The source for the music is Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list from 2022, starting with #500.

It's been a long time since I've done one of these, and at the rate I'm going, I'll be finished with the list sometime after the heat death of the universe. Nevertheless...

Rolling Stone's 466th Greatest Album of All Time: Red by Black Uhuru (1981)

Black Uhuru is a Jamaican reggae group formed in 1972 that, like many still-extant bands from the 70s, has seen dozens of different lineups in its long lifetime.

The band's only current original member is Derrick "Duckie" Simpson, about whom there is not even a Wikipedia bio listed in English*. This Internet obscurity is troubling, given that Black Uhuru is consistently ranked in the top 10 reggae bands of all time, and that Wikipedia has a bio for the Hawk Tuah girl, a person who you may not even remember if you're reading this post just a few years from now.

Fortunately, I found this succinct 11 minute gem of a bio on YouTube. Dude grew up literally foraging in the woods of Jamaica and the streets of the rough Waterhouse district of Kingston, until he somehow remade himself as a successful professional gambler, after which he taught himself how to sing and play guitar.

After that it was a slow grind of building and rebuilding a reggae lineup that would eventually bring itself international fame and acclaim, along with somehow mentoring Bono and U2 along the way.

Black Uhuru's most revered lineup had Duckie Simpson, fellow Waterhouse singer Michael Rose, and American Expat Sandra "Puma" Jones, who were the principals on Black Uhuru's celebrated 1981 album, Red.

Now for a review of that album with a disclaimer: I know essentially nothing about reggae music, and no amount of cramming about it online is going to change that. Somehow I didn't even go through a dormroom Bob Marley phase, as so many of my fellow Gen-X white male college partygoers experienced. I only know what I like on the album; so I'll go with that.

"Youth of Eglington" reminds me of Eddy Grant's "Electric Avenue", not in sound, but in theme. The beats are bright and catchy, and the lyrics are dark, violent and cynical. The contrast makes the song a standout.

"Sponji Reggae": I love the xylophone. I'm not sure if it's real or electronic, and I don't care. The way it plays around in between the lyrics and the base ties the song together in a perfect bow.

I like "Trodding" because it makes me uneasy. On its surface, it should be a kind of repetitive groove that I would normally find somewhat boring, but they keep throwing in a monkey wrench. The bass, the drums, something's offbeat. The tempo increases. But does it? If that were truly the case, they would be racing by the end of the song, but they're not. Where do they slow down again? How are they doing that? I don't know, but I appreciate it.

I liked the rest of the album just fine. It sounds like standard, solid, old-school reggae to me, nothing more or less. But how do I know that? Who am I to judge? People in the know say it's a masterpiece. These are the doubts that delayed me for so long in my review of this album. I did not resolve them; I figured I'd just write what I know, admit what I don't, and move on to the next album.

Rolling Stone Says: The results felt like the genre’s future — but it wasn’t. Turns out, few acts dared try to replicate Black Uhuru’s sound, and no other band ever came close to succeeding.

Then why does it sound so much like standard reggae, if nobody replicated it? Am I way off here? I certainly could be.

*There's a Duckie Simpson Wikipedia bio in Swedish, just not in English.

Good to see another album review. Let's hope you get some more crappy weather.

Long time lurker and I am a fan of your writings and reading your blog. As you seem to be quite knowledgeable regarding slot play I figured you’d be a good source for a dilemma I find myself in at the moment.

Long story short I won 750 dollars worth of free slot play at my local casino. I plan on going this week at some point.

I’ve never played a single slot before in my life (strictly go for poker). What should my strategy be, and what do you think would be a good return on my free play?

Thanks in advance!

As an ex reggae DJ and a (yesteryear) BIG fan of the genre, I must say that I agree with your assessment : Black Uhuru is fine, but I do not believe that they revolutionized the genre like others that preceded (Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Toots, Lee Perry, Burning Spear etc.) or succeeded them (Matisyahu, Eek-a-Mouse, Gentlemen, Buju Banton, Sizzla etc.). I in fact prefer remixes of Black Uhuru, as the ones found on Dubmission 2 ; here is a dub sample with Thievery Corporation : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8ndmEq4...

Disclaimer : I was obviously a big fan of Dub 25 odd years ago, as stated in my User name 🙄

Edit : couldn't help myself and had to add a recommendation for any Pink Floyd/reggae fan following this thread : The absolutely amazing reggae remix of Dark Side of the Moon 25th year anniversary, AKA Dub Side of the Moon : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3m37l1m...

Hi Perrone66. Thanks for reading! I appreciate you!

Back before I discovered advantage slots, I stayed away from slots for being -EV leaks. That said, the best -EV games to run your $750 through one time would be certain video poker variants, particularly the ones that return between 98-100%

[u]This site[/u] will locate the best, least losing machines at your local casino. Then you can google the game variant and the word strategy and find a strategy table that will fit on your phone. No one has ever bothered me for checking my phone while playing VP.

If you want to practice the game a bit, there are a lot of very good free VP emulators on the Play Store, and I would guess on the Apple Store as well.

Find the best-returning machine, run your $750 through once, checking your phone for strat, then cash out. That's the nit-approved way.

Or you can have fun and go play something like the Frankenstein slot machine, which is much more -EV but a blast.

Either way, good luck!

I'm listening to the Floyd dub right now...

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