The Poker Project (playing and writing about poker in the U.S.)
01-28-2021
, 01:35 PM
January Recap
Aside from the near-collapse of LOLmerican democracy, this was a great month. I spent most of it in AZ and even "enjoyed" some snow, as you can see above. On the poker front, I enjoyed dipping my toe back into online action. I've also been following the Polk-Deenegs battle. Rooting against Deenegs obviously, but both have come off a bit juvenile imo, especially after Polk started limping and Deenegs countered by tanking. Overall, though, I respect both guys for battling over a longish stretch of hands.
I've also been watching the latest High Stakes Poker. Gabe is such a fantastic commentator. Always nice to see Durrr in the mix. The BIG question: Is Rick Solomon the GOAT or the WOAT?
Bob's Books [6/52]
Tea Obreht, The Tiger's Wife. A good read if you like animals and magical realism and Eastern Europe.
Tony Hoagland, Donkey Gospel. A completely random find that I scooped up when I was scouring the bookshelf in my coworking space. Hoagland is a celebrated and controversial poet who writes about pretty much everything in an uncomfortably unflinching way. In honor of our Great Nation:
Claudia Rankine, Just Us: A LOLmerican Conversation. Rankine is a poet who writes about race and identity. This book is mainly about whiteness and white privilege. This white guy found it exhausting to read, and I'm guessing that's part of the point.
Jill Lepore, These Truths. Any readable one-volume history of the US should be considered a triumph in its own right imo, and Lepore manages to pull it off. Lots of highlights and lowlights, but learning about Benjamin Lay, a four-foot-tall cave-dwelling abolitionist, was probably tops.
Ross Gay, Be Holding. I'll read anything Ross writes. This is a 100 page poem about Dr. J's superhuman baseline scoop move + lots of other stuff
Samantha Schweblin, Fever Dream. This little novel is probably my favorite of the month, if I had to pick. I haven't read anything this gripping in a long time. The book is one long conversation between a dying woman in a hospital and a young boy who may or may not be real.
buhbye AZ! See you soon
Aside from the near-collapse of LOLmerican democracy, this was a great month. I spent most of it in AZ and even "enjoyed" some snow, as you can see above. On the poker front, I enjoyed dipping my toe back into online action. I've also been following the Polk-Deenegs battle. Rooting against Deenegs obviously, but both have come off a bit juvenile imo, especially after Polk started limping and Deenegs countered by tanking. Overall, though, I respect both guys for battling over a longish stretch of hands.
I've also been watching the latest High Stakes Poker. Gabe is such a fantastic commentator. Always nice to see Durrr in the mix. The BIG question: Is Rick Solomon the GOAT or the WOAT?
Bob's Books [6/52]
Tea Obreht, The Tiger's Wife. A good read if you like animals and magical realism and Eastern Europe.
Quote:
Originally Posted by TO
Finally, up through the sleepless neighborhoods of the lower city, with the sound of the second river in his ears, the tiger began to climb the trail into the king's forest. I like to think that he went along our old carriage trail. I like to imagine his big-cat paw prints in the gravel, his exhausted, square-shouldered walk along my childhood paths, years before I was even born—but in reality, the way through the undergrowth was faster, the moss easier on paws he had shredded on city rubble. The cooling feel of the trees bending down to him as he pushed up the hill, until at last he reached the top, the burning city far behind him
Quote:
Originally Posted by TH
America
Then one of the students with blue hair and a tongue stud
Says that America is for him a maximum-security prison
Whose walls are made of RadioShacks and Burger Kings, and MTV episodes
Where you can’t tell the show from the commercials,
And as I consider how to express how full of **** I think he is,
He says that even when he’s driving to the mall in his Isuzu
Trooper with a gang of his friends, letting rap music pour over them
Like a boiling Jacuzzi full of ball-peen hammers, even then he feels
Buried alive, captured and suffocated in the folds
Of the thick satin quilt of America
And I wonder if this is a legitimate category of pain,
Or whether he is just spin-doctoring a better grade,
And then I remember that when I stabbed my father in the dream last night,
It was not blood but money
That gushed out of him, bright green hundred-dollar bills
Spilling from his wounds, and — this is the weird part —,
He gasped, “Thank God — those Ben Franklins were
Clogging up my heart —
And so I perish happily,
Freed from that which kept me from my liberty” —
Which is when I knew it was a dream, since my dad
Would never speak in rhymed couplets,
And I look at the student with his acne and cellphone and phony ghetto clothes
And I think, “I am asleep in America too,
And I don’t know how to wake myself either,”
And I remember what Marx said near the end of his life:
“I was listening to the cries of the past,
When I should have been listening to the cries of the future.”
But how could he have imagined 100 channels of 24-hour cable
Or what kind of nightmare it might be
When each day you watch rivers of bright merchandise run past you
And you are floating in your pleasure boat upon this river
Even while others are drowning underneath you
And you see their faces twisting in the surface of the waters
And yet it seems to be your own hand
Which turns the volume higher?
Then one of the students with blue hair and a tongue stud
Says that America is for him a maximum-security prison
Whose walls are made of RadioShacks and Burger Kings, and MTV episodes
Where you can’t tell the show from the commercials,
And as I consider how to express how full of **** I think he is,
He says that even when he’s driving to the mall in his Isuzu
Trooper with a gang of his friends, letting rap music pour over them
Like a boiling Jacuzzi full of ball-peen hammers, even then he feels
Buried alive, captured and suffocated in the folds
Of the thick satin quilt of America
And I wonder if this is a legitimate category of pain,
Or whether he is just spin-doctoring a better grade,
And then I remember that when I stabbed my father in the dream last night,
It was not blood but money
That gushed out of him, bright green hundred-dollar bills
Spilling from his wounds, and — this is the weird part —,
He gasped, “Thank God — those Ben Franklins were
Clogging up my heart —
And so I perish happily,
Freed from that which kept me from my liberty” —
Which is when I knew it was a dream, since my dad
Would never speak in rhymed couplets,
And I look at the student with his acne and cellphone and phony ghetto clothes
And I think, “I am asleep in America too,
And I don’t know how to wake myself either,”
And I remember what Marx said near the end of his life:
“I was listening to the cries of the past,
When I should have been listening to the cries of the future.”
But how could he have imagined 100 channels of 24-hour cable
Or what kind of nightmare it might be
When each day you watch rivers of bright merchandise run past you
And you are floating in your pleasure boat upon this river
Even while others are drowning underneath you
And you see their faces twisting in the surface of the waters
And yet it seems to be your own hand
Which turns the volume higher?
Quote:
Originally Posted by CR
Knowing that my silence is active in the room, I stay silent because I want to make a point of that silence. Among white people, black people are allowed to talk about their precarious lives, but they are not allowed to implicate the present company in that precariousness. They are not allowed to point out its causes. In "Sexism—a Problem with a Name," Sara Ahmed writes that 'if you name the problem you become the problem." To create discomfort by pointing out facts is seen as socially unacceptable. Let's get over ourselves, it's structural not personal, I want to shout at everyone, including myself.
Quote:
Originally Posted by JL
He traveled from town to town and from colony to colony, only ever one foot—he would not spur a horse—to denounce slavery before governors and ministers and merchants. "What a Parcel of Hypocrites and Deceivers we are," he said. His arguments fell on deaf ears. After his wife died, he lost his last restraint. In 1738, he went to a Quaker meeting in New Jersey carrying a Bible whose pages he'd removed; he'd placed inside the book a pig's bladder filled with pokeberry juice, crimson red. "Oh all you negro masters who are contentedly holding your fellow creatures in a state of slavery," he cried, entering the meetinghouse, "you who profess 'to do unto all men as ye would they should do unto you,'" you shall see justice "in the sight of the Almighty, who beholds and respects all nations and colours of men with an equal regard." Then, taking his Bible from his coat and a sword from his belt, he pierced the Bible with the sword. To the stunned parishioners, it appeared to burst with blood, as if by a miracle, spattering their heads and staining their clothes, as Lay thundered, from his tiny frame: "Thus shall God shed the blood of those persons who enslave their fellow creatures."
Quote:
Originally Posted by RG
as Erving went higher
and now began
to extend his right hand in a precise arc
beginning precisely above his head,
painting a broad and precise circle
not unlike Leonardo’s Vitruvian Man
in his hula hoop
of perfect proportions
(if that little naked man wasn’t little
or naked and was palming a basketball
and was flying
through the trees)
and I find myself again and again with my arm
making the perfectly impossible circle
again and again
as I watch this clip on YouTube
frame by frame clumsily
on a computer with gummy keys
and a Post-it note
covering the eyehole scrawled
DISCIPLINE
on April 5, 2015,
at 1:48 a.m., again
and again, thinking
what am I looking at,
what am I seeing
and now began
to extend his right hand in a precise arc
beginning precisely above his head,
painting a broad and precise circle
not unlike Leonardo’s Vitruvian Man
in his hula hoop
of perfect proportions
(if that little naked man wasn’t little
or naked and was palming a basketball
and was flying
through the trees)
and I find myself again and again with my arm
making the perfectly impossible circle
again and again
as I watch this clip on YouTube
frame by frame clumsily
on a computer with gummy keys
and a Post-it note
covering the eyehole scrawled
DISCIPLINE
on April 5, 2015,
at 1:48 a.m., again
and again, thinking
what am I looking at,
what am I seeing
Quote:
Originally Posted by SS
I'm wondering what happened to Carla could happen to me. I always imagine the worst-case scenario. Right now, for instance, I'm calculating how long it would take me to jump out of the car and reach Nina if she suddenly ran and leapt into the pool. I call it the "rescue distance": that's what I've named the variable distance separating me from my daughter, and I spend half the day calculating it, though I always risk more than I should.
Spoiler:
02-15-2021
, 02:23 PM
It came out on PokerGo as part a 6-episode doc called Legends of the Game. The one I'm in is called The Poker Trail. FWIW I think the series is quite good (I've watched 2 or 3eps).
Last edited by bob_124; 02-15-2021 at 02:28 PM.
02-15-2021
, 02:43 PM
Quote:
If you routinely show up at 7am on weekday mornings, as I did intermittently for a long while, then you'll encounter things that you can't unsee. That can be good, if your goal is to gather stories, but it can also be damaging from a spiritual perspective. Finding a proper balance is something I've struggled to do for a long time. Fortunately, thanks to the pandemic, I've been gifted a year or so or live pokerless bliss.
At this point, I remain of the side of more positive then negative - and this is not coming from strictly a pro/made a ton money POV, but also from recs who have gained a ton from poker (and who also had extra money to discard). I think it was Maria Konnikova that stated that poker (notably through charity events) was more of a net positive for society then a net negative... Anyhow, again, just spewing a few random thoughts
02-16-2021
, 12:04 PM
Quote:
Just spewing a few thoughts here, but it would be interesting once we have played our final hand of poker at a more mature age in our life, look back and if we were to make an ethical statement on if the game of poker is more positive or negative in the scheme of things... Of course, this would be if we were forced into a strictly binary stance, which is kind of juvenile and absence of nuances, me thinks...
At this point, I remain of the side of more positive then negative - and this is not coming from strictly a pro/made a ton money POV, but also from recs who have gained a ton from poker (and who also had extra money to discard). I think it was Maria Konnikova that stated that poker (notably through charity events) was more of a net positive for society then a net negative... Anyhow, again, just spewing a few random thoughts
At this point, I remain of the side of more positive then negative - and this is not coming from strictly a pro/made a ton money POV, but also from recs who have gained a ton from poker (and who also had extra money to discard). I think it was Maria Konnikova that stated that poker (notably through charity events) was more of a net positive for society then a net negative... Anyhow, again, just spewing a few random thoughts
Is poker a net negative for society? Yes
It's too reductive to come down fully on one side or the other, in other words, as you said. What makes things esp tricky is how poker is nested within systems--casinos, capitalism, media--that are inherently exploitative. How do you talk about poker without talking about society? Probably can't be done. I find these questions interesting, of course, but at the end of the day I'm not trying to find answers. At best, I can keep revising my sense of poker's worth within my own life.
02-16-2021
, 01:55 PM
02-18-2021
, 11:05 AM
The Biggest Bluff
I finally got around to reading Maria Konnikova’s The Biggest Bluff: How I Learned to Pay Attention, Master Myself, and Win. I'd say that this is the best nonfiction narrative since James McManus’s Positively Fifth Street. Konnikova is a very good writer—as the story goes, she left her post at The New Yorker to immerse herself in the poker world under Eric Seidel’s tutelage—and also a psychology Ph.D. She's a smart A+ explainer, in other words, who's well-equipped to describe the beautiful shitshow of the poker world. Following in the footsteps of the polymathic ubergenius John von Neumann, she aims to use poker as a window into life. “This book,” she writes, “is not an exhaustive exploration of the game, how to play it, how to win at it, how to excel. It is no guide. That has been covered by experts far greater than I. It is a picking up of von Neumann’s challenge: poker as a lens into the most difficult and important life decisions we have to make, an exploration of chance and skill in life—and an attempt to learn to navigate it and optimize it to the best of our potential.”
The Biggest Bluff is essentially a braided narrative: on the one side, her journey from knowing literally nothing about poker (not even how many cards are in a deck!) to logging some impressive donkament cashes and getting closer to self-mastery; and, on the other, fairly accessible research about psychology (the Dunning-Kruger effect, unconscious bias, a bunch of Fallacies, etc etc) and quotes about poker and gambling. Some parts of the book feel overwritten; the heady psychology research sometimes clogs the narrative. Then again, other, more cerebral readers might appreciate these expositions more than I did.
The most impressive part of the book, to me, is Konnikova’s willingness to put herself squarely at the center of the narrative, warts and all, and confronts her flaws and vulnerabilities in order to improve. There are good insights about the experience of being a woman in poker and how internalized gender expectations can hinder optimal play. There are also lots of discussions about “the mental game” featuring not only Seidel but also Dan Harrington, Phil Galfond, Jason Koon, Ike Haxton, Luckychewy, Scott Seiver, and other crushers. I found it odd and a bit disappointing that the company Konnikova keeps (as they appear in the pages of the story, at least) is 100% male and elite. Vanessa Selbst and Liv Boeree are briefly mentioned, but there’s no inclusion of their stories or someone's like, say, Kristen Bicknell. What we get is a ridiculously narrow portrait of the poker world: the high-performing super high-rolling 1% of the 1%, a kind of Tools of Titans-meets-GTO.
What’s also ridiculous is how much Konnikova accomplished in such a short three yearish span. The Biggest Bluff isn’t as good as the GOAT poker books imo
but it’s a must-read.
Oh, and what's "the biggest bluff"? The idea that skill is enough. There's an interesting, and uneven, discussion of meritocracy in these pages that I might return to. But for now, I'll end with one of my favorite quotes from the book, from EB White: "Luck is not something that you can mention in the presence of self-made men. The Society of Movers and Doers is a very pompous society, indeed, whose members solemnly accept all responsibility for their eminence and success."
I finally got around to reading Maria Konnikova’s The Biggest Bluff: How I Learned to Pay Attention, Master Myself, and Win. I'd say that this is the best nonfiction narrative since James McManus’s Positively Fifth Street. Konnikova is a very good writer—as the story goes, she left her post at The New Yorker to immerse herself in the poker world under Eric Seidel’s tutelage—and also a psychology Ph.D. She's a smart A+ explainer, in other words, who's well-equipped to describe the beautiful shitshow of the poker world. Following in the footsteps of the polymathic ubergenius John von Neumann, she aims to use poker as a window into life. “This book,” she writes, “is not an exhaustive exploration of the game, how to play it, how to win at it, how to excel. It is no guide. That has been covered by experts far greater than I. It is a picking up of von Neumann’s challenge: poker as a lens into the most difficult and important life decisions we have to make, an exploration of chance and skill in life—and an attempt to learn to navigate it and optimize it to the best of our potential.”
The Biggest Bluff is essentially a braided narrative: on the one side, her journey from knowing literally nothing about poker (not even how many cards are in a deck!) to logging some impressive donkament cashes and getting closer to self-mastery; and, on the other, fairly accessible research about psychology (the Dunning-Kruger effect, unconscious bias, a bunch of Fallacies, etc etc) and quotes about poker and gambling. Some parts of the book feel overwritten; the heady psychology research sometimes clogs the narrative. Then again, other, more cerebral readers might appreciate these expositions more than I did.
The most impressive part of the book, to me, is Konnikova’s willingness to put herself squarely at the center of the narrative, warts and all, and confronts her flaws and vulnerabilities in order to improve. There are good insights about the experience of being a woman in poker and how internalized gender expectations can hinder optimal play. There are also lots of discussions about “the mental game” featuring not only Seidel but also Dan Harrington, Phil Galfond, Jason Koon, Ike Haxton, Luckychewy, Scott Seiver, and other crushers. I found it odd and a bit disappointing that the company Konnikova keeps (as they appear in the pages of the story, at least) is 100% male and elite. Vanessa Selbst and Liv Boeree are briefly mentioned, but there’s no inclusion of their stories or someone's like, say, Kristen Bicknell. What we get is a ridiculously narrow portrait of the poker world: the high-performing super high-rolling 1% of the 1%, a kind of Tools of Titans-meets-GTO.
What’s also ridiculous is how much Konnikova accomplished in such a short three yearish span. The Biggest Bluff isn’t as good as the GOAT poker books imo
Spoiler:
Oh, and what's "the biggest bluff"? The idea that skill is enough. There's an interesting, and uneven, discussion of meritocracy in these pages that I might return to. But for now, I'll end with one of my favorite quotes from the book, from EB White: "Luck is not something that you can mention in the presence of self-made men. The Society of Movers and Doers is a very pompous society, indeed, whose members solemnly accept all responsibility for their eminence and success."
02-28-2021
, 02:25 PM
February Recap
Well, this was a Mardi Gras to remember—or to forget, depending on your point of view. No parades, French Quarter in lockdown, minimal debauchery. Even so, somebody had the cool idea that New Orleanians should decorate their houses, and the Krewe of House was born. Pretty cool stuff.
Bob's Books [9/52]
In addition to The Biggest Bluff, I read American Predator: The Hunt for the Most Meticulous Serial Killer of the 21st Century. I would never have picked this up but we read it in my book club and it's impressive on a number of levels. The writing is good, not great. Very gripping narrative, stupendously well-researched, and offers just the right amount of context (of Israel Keyes's backstory, the town of Anchorage, where much of the action takes place, and the psychology of psychopaths). Unlike the GOAT true crime book In Cold Blood, this book is less about getting inside the head of a murderer and more about the FBI's/law enforcement's efforts to bring him in. Overall, would recommend.
I also read (and am teaching) The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime, a wildly popular book narrated by a teenager with a learning disability, probably Asperger's. From the first paragraph, we're transported inside a strikingly distinctive consciousness.
The book is superficially a murder mystery—who killed the dog?—but more deeply about human relationships and how we use logic to structure and understand our experiences. And also, at the end of the day, LOL logic.
Moar house floats!
nighttime cuddling
Well, this was a Mardi Gras to remember—or to forget, depending on your point of view. No parades, French Quarter in lockdown, minimal debauchery. Even so, somebody had the cool idea that New Orleanians should decorate their houses, and the Krewe of House was born. Pretty cool stuff.
Bob's Books [9/52]
In addition to The Biggest Bluff, I read American Predator: The Hunt for the Most Meticulous Serial Killer of the 21st Century. I would never have picked this up but we read it in my book club and it's impressive on a number of levels. The writing is good, not great. Very gripping narrative, stupendously well-researched, and offers just the right amount of context (of Israel Keyes's backstory, the town of Anchorage, where much of the action takes place, and the psychology of psychopaths). Unlike the GOAT true crime book In Cold Blood, this book is less about getting inside the head of a murderer and more about the FBI's/law enforcement's efforts to bring him in. Overall, would recommend.
I also read (and am teaching) The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime, a wildly popular book narrated by a teenager with a learning disability, probably Asperger's. From the first paragraph, we're transported inside a strikingly distinctive consciousness.
Quote:
IT WAS 7 minutes after midnight. The dog was lying on the grass in the middle of the lawn in front of Mrs Shears’ house. Its eyes were closed. It looked as if it was running on its side, the way dogs run when they think they are chasing a cat in a dream. But the dog was not running or asleep. The dog was dead. There was a garden fork sticking out of the dog. The points of the fork must have gone all the way through the dog and into the ground because the fork had not fallen over. I decided that the dog was probably killed with the fork because I could not see any other wounds in the dog and I do not think you would stick a garden fork into a dog after it had died for some other reason, like cancer for example, or a road accident. But I could not be certain about this.
Moar house floats!
Spoiler:
Spoiler:
nighttime cuddling
Spoiler:
03-02-2021
, 02:31 PM
Sad story. 
I keep stuff very superficial/light at most tables and thus don't know a whole heckuva lot about the people I play with (even ones I've been playing with for a decade+). Not that I wouldn't be super interested to know the background of everyone's life and where they are currently at and how they got there. But not asking either, cuz just assuming things have likely gone sideways for most of them.
Gluckyonthefelt,butevenluckieroffG
I keep stuff very superficial/light at most tables and thus don't know a whole heckuva lot about the people I play with (even ones I've been playing with for a decade+). Not that I wouldn't be super interested to know the background of everyone's life and where they are currently at and how they got there. But not asking either, cuz just assuming things have likely gone sideways for most of them.
Gluckyonthefelt,butevenluckieroffG
03-02-2021
, 05:56 PM
Powerful story Ben, it gave me shivers. And a great insight into the grinders that never fully make it... Never rise the ranks, always make a little but never enough...
I remember this fellow back in Western Canada, being backed to play the 2-5 game even though he was a top crusher, but anytime he got his hands on significant money (or a live MTT decent score), he would live-it-up balla style, spend all his money, and then grind once again. This fellow was actually an example of the top 1% that have (somewhat) made it. And yet, he was a miserable human being and insufferable at the table
I remember this fellow back in Western Canada, being backed to play the 2-5 game even though he was a top crusher, but anytime he got his hands on significant money (or a live MTT decent score), he would live-it-up balla style, spend all his money, and then grind once again. This fellow was actually an example of the top 1% that have (somewhat) made it. And yet, he was a miserable human being and insufferable at the table
03-09-2021
, 03:09 PM
Quote:
Sad story.
I keep stuff very superficial/light at most tables and thus don't know a whole heckuva lot about the people I play with (even ones I've been playing with for a decade+). Not that I wouldn't be super interested to know the background of everyone's life and where they are currently at and how they got there. But not asking either, cuz just assuming things have likely gone sideways for most of them.
Gluckyonthefelt,butevenluckieroffG
I keep stuff very superficial/light at most tables and thus don't know a whole heckuva lot about the people I play with (even ones I've been playing with for a decade+). Not that I wouldn't be super interested to know the background of everyone's life and where they are currently at and how they got there. But not asking either, cuz just assuming things have likely gone sideways for most of them.
Gluckyonthefelt,butevenluckieroffG
Quote:
Powerful story Ben, it gave me shivers. And a great insight into the grinders that never fully make it... Never rise the ranks, always make a little but never enough...
I remember this fellow back in Western Canada, being backed to play the 2-5 game even though he was a top crusher, but anytime he got his hands on significant money (or a live MTT decent score), he would live-it-up balla style, spend all his money, and then grind once again. This fellow was actually an example of the top 1% that have (somewhat) made it. And yet, he was a miserable human being and insufferable at the table
I remember this fellow back in Western Canada, being backed to play the 2-5 game even though he was a top crusher, but anytime he got his hands on significant money (or a live MTT decent score), he would live-it-up balla style, spend all his money, and then grind once again. This fellow was actually an example of the top 1% that have (somewhat) made it. And yet, he was a miserable human being and insufferable at the table
Hope the writing is going well. Thanks for the feedback!
Quote:
Great work there with ‘Minh the Mechanic’, Ben. But, yes, very sad. There was this ongoing, badjoke at my poker room, which always left me somewhat compromised, because I didn’t know how to respond. It went something like: ‘Where’s Joe? Oh got stacked. (Pause.) He’s probably jumping off the Westgate right now. (Laugh.)’ The Westgate is a bridge a few minutes away. A story such as yours is “probably” the best kind of response to that uncomfortable laugh, I’d say. I mean, I’ve always thought about writing something similar.
04-02-2021
, 12:38 PM
March Recap
Saw live music for the first time in over a year, at a friend's bday party. Felt good.
Still no LOLive poker, although I'm still spending some time every week playing online, studying, watching HU grudges. Really, was there a better finish to the DeeNegs-Hellmuth match?
In case yall didn't see, the WSOP will be BACK in the fall. Pretty much guarantees that I won't be able to go, but I'm happy to see this development, nothing like it of course. Will be interesting to see if they stick to a fall schedule or return to the summer.
Bob's Books [11/52]
I read Kerry Howley's Thrown, a darkly funny literary nonfiction account of MMA fighters; she focuses on a young prodigy named Erik Koch and an aging journeyman whose name escapes me. Her narrator is a heavily stylized philosophy snob who's attracted to the brutal world of cage fighting as a phenomenological experiment in pure experience. This persona mirrors Howley's own background as an MFA student at the Iowa Writers Workshop looking for a good story. The whole thing works—really well imo—and I doubt there will ever be a better-written book about that weird world (I don't consider myself a "fan" of MMA but have a sordid attraction to the brutality, as I guess many others do)
I also read Eula Biss's Having and Being Had, a kind memoir-history in which she traces the roots of our assumptions about wealth, work, and property. All of her observations are grounded in her own experiences, in the house she recently bought and the conversations with her friends and the books they recommend (an example, she says, of her privileged access to social capital). She shows how capitalism is instilled and internalized – how we've have been saturated in it for so long we no longer feel it, in the way that fish don’t know that water is wet.
Time and money, one of her friends says: that’s how you know what matters most to someone.
"As I wrote this book," Biss writes,
One of the short chapters that jumped out to me was about Monopoly and its hidden history.
Has anybody read Ted Chiang? I just listened to this podcast with him and he seems really smart/interesting. I'm not much into sci-fi but plan to check him out.
This was a pretty busy month so I didn't book-read much, preferring instead to watch NBA or movies at night. Which led to a recent come-to-Jesus moment:
Or I should say my come-to-Ozu moment! I had never seen or even heard of this Japanese filmmaker, but thanks to Shuffle's thread I watched Tokyo Story and haven't looked back. Fortunately he was prolific so there's plenty of content (all on the Criterion Collection) and I've made it through 6 or so. What makes his stuff interesting on the metafictional level is his repeated use of the same actors (kinda like Tarantino, though I'm sure others do this as well—I'm pretty naive when it comes to film). I adore two of them.
The "poet of sighs," Chishū Ryū
The "eternal virgin," Setsuko Hara
Here they are together in Late Spring (1947ish...Ozu's heyday was 1940s-1960)
Also, lest we forget the purpose of this thread
Saw live music for the first time in over a year, at a friend's bday party. Felt good.
Still no LOLive poker, although I'm still spending some time every week playing online, studying, watching HU grudges. Really, was there a better finish to the DeeNegs-Hellmuth match?
Spoiler:
In case yall didn't see, the WSOP will be BACK in the fall. Pretty much guarantees that I won't be able to go, but I'm happy to see this development, nothing like it of course. Will be interesting to see if they stick to a fall schedule or return to the summer.
Bob's Books [11/52]
I read Kerry Howley's Thrown, a darkly funny literary nonfiction account of MMA fighters; she focuses on a young prodigy named Erik Koch and an aging journeyman whose name escapes me. Her narrator is a heavily stylized philosophy snob who's attracted to the brutal world of cage fighting as a phenomenological experiment in pure experience. This persona mirrors Howley's own background as an MFA student at the Iowa Writers Workshop looking for a good story. The whole thing works—really well imo—and I doubt there will ever be a better-written book about that weird world (I don't consider myself a "fan" of MMA but have a sordid attraction to the brutality, as I guess many others do)
Quote:
Originally Posted by KH
Inside the room the lights were dim but for a great spotlight lofted above an octagonal dais, lined on all sides with a six-foot chain-link fence. A hundred male Iowans gathered in the dark on benches. Through the fence I saw that one man was beneath another like a mechanic under a truck, and the man on top had a full set of angel’s wings tattooed down the length of his back. Inked feathers rippled as he punched the face of the man lodged under his stomach. A red stream dribbled down the other man’s forehead, onto the canvas, where their conjoined writhings smeared the blood like the stroke of a brush. Seconds later a single hand fluttered out from beneath the wing. His fingertips touched the canvas with extreme delicacy, as if to tap a bell and summon a concierge. There was no one to inform me that this meant he had given up, so I assumed some sort of grotesque exhibition had merely run its course.
Time and money, one of her friends says: that’s how you know what matters most to someone.
"As I wrote this book," Biss writes,
Quote:
I established a set of rules for my writing. One of the first rules was that I had to name specific sums whenever I talked about money. Another rule was that I had to talk about money. These rules were a direct refusal of what I understood to be the rules of polite conversation around money 1)Don’t talk about it. 2) If you do talk about it, don’t be specific. 3) Minimize what you have. 4) Emphasize that you’ve earned it. 5) Never forget that work is the story we tell ourselves about money.
Has anybody read Ted Chiang? I just listened to this podcast with him and he seems really smart/interesting. I'm not much into sci-fi but plan to check him out.
This was a pretty busy month so I didn't book-read much, preferring instead to watch NBA or movies at night. Which led to a recent come-to-Jesus moment:
Spoiler:
Or I should say my come-to-Ozu moment! I had never seen or even heard of this Japanese filmmaker, but thanks to Shuffle's thread I watched Tokyo Story and haven't looked back. Fortunately he was prolific so there's plenty of content (all on the Criterion Collection) and I've made it through 6 or so. What makes his stuff interesting on the metafictional level is his repeated use of the same actors (kinda like Tarantino, though I'm sure others do this as well—I'm pretty naive when it comes to film). I adore two of them.
The "poet of sighs," Chishū Ryū
Spoiler:
The "eternal virgin," Setsuko Hara
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Here they are together in Late Spring (1947ish...Ozu's heyday was 1940s-1960)
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Also, lest we forget the purpose of this thread
Spoiler:
Last edited by bob_124; 04-02-2021 at 12:48 PM.