All over the place

Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - Scott Ian

Usually my blogs will have some sort of narrative thread running through them. Less, bloggy, more story. This week’s entry is going to be a bit all over the place as it reflects where I am at which is all over the place. In the last month I’ve been from Los Angeles to NY to Vegas to Aruba to Japan and back to Los Angeles yesterday. Sitting on my couch I feel like someone pulled the emergency brake in a car going 100mph, spinning into a crash of jet lag and physical exhaustion. So before my brain melts out my ears for a day or two…

Aruba was a blast. What else could it be? UB throws the event of the year in my opinion. Ask anyone that was there and the smile on his or her face is all the answer you need.

This was my third Aruba trip and it was my best so far. What made it better/different? Having a much larger UB & AP pro team there for sure. There was a real sense of camaraderie amongst the pros and we were hanging out all the time. From instigating the chaos at the pool during the opening party (where Phil gave out 10K to basically skinny-dip!) to hand analysis and poker tips for the UB players to closing the casino most nights to once again making the closing party a blast, teams UB & AP were representing!!! I really felt an all for one, one for all spirit and it makes the brand that much stronger.

I also felt that having all of the UB senior mgmt there to oversee everything was important, especially to listen to the players in the focus groups. I expect you’ll see a lot of your opinions reflected on the site very soon. Seeing UB CEO Paul Leggett on a day to day basis, being a part of the event seemingly everywhere at once absorbing it all was a real treat as well. Paul’s hands on approach and attitude really made me feel a part of something strong and the excitement about the future of the brand was tangible.

Regarding poker, I finished 62nd, 17 from the money. Second year in a row I got so close to cashing. I am happy over all with how I played and I probably could’ve grinded my way past the bubble but I was playing to win it, not to just cash.

On day one I had a hand that I was stoked about. I had overheard the chip leader (who was at my table) after losing a few pots and dropping down to around 78K from over 90K say to the guy next to him that he was on a losing streak. I made a mental note and decided if I had the opportunity I was going to try and make a move on him. A few hands later I had A8 suited in the BB. Blinds were 150-300. The chip leader raised to 950 UTG and it folded to me. I popped it to 3100 and he calls. The flop comes QQ6 rainbow. I check, he checks. The turn comes a J to complete the rainbow. I bet 5100, he calls. At this point I commit to the bluff and when an 8 comes on the river I shove my final 12K. He stands up and tanks for three minutes and then he calls the clock on himself. He was really confused by my shove. He hadn’t seen me turn a hand over at all and didn’t know what to do. He asked the floor man if he could show his hand. The floor man said if he shows his hand to try and get a read he’d have to take a one round penalty. I was thinking, “go ahead and show, you’re not going to get a read off of me, I am Mt Rushmore!!” The floor man counts down the final ten seconds and he folds. Jason Gray who was on my left asked me to show the bluff. I showed the 8. Chip leader sighs and turns over pocket 10’s. Whew.

I had a lot of fun in the cash games in the casino. Especially the UB table one night where we were playing 1-2 and the first raise would come in at $35! Then my friend Enigma4U4ME would shove blind and get three callers. Basically your typical 1-2 game with an average pot of $700.

Crazy but fun.

After Aruba I was home in LA for 36 hours and then took off to play a festival with Anthrax in Japan. The show was amazing. Here’s a link to a clip from the show: http://www.twitvid.com/05F93

I’m home now for a couple of weeks and I’m looking forward to getting back on UB and playing. See you all this week at the tables.

Cheers,
Scott

Tags: Anthrax, AP, Aruba, japan, Los Angeles, New York, Paul Legget, Phil Hellmuth, Poker Tips, ub, UB Players, Vegas

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The Ultimate: Sashimi

Friday, April 3, 2009 - John Greene

As many of you know, the most elite of sashimi dishes is fugu, the poisonous pufferfish, with the torafugu

Sashimi chefs take great care and diligence to ensure that the fish they prepare doesn’t murder their people, frequently training for up to a decade before serving people the fish’s flesh. It’s not uncommon for a dish of fugu, thinly sliced, to cost ¥5,000 (around $50,) and a full-course meal that fully utilizes the edible parts of the fish easily reaching the ¥20,000 mark. Fugu is not cheap and the careful preparation and education it takes to take it on is one of the major factor it attracts a certain clientele.

For another group of consumers, cost is not a factor at all: they want the experience. Many professional chefs actually prepare fugu so that there is a minute amount of poison still on the flesh of the fish, leaving diners with a prickly feeling or numbness on their lips and tongue. It’s not often that you get to say that a meal knocked out your tastebuds and brought you a bit closer to death, hence its attraction among many gourmet diners.

The Fugu’s reputation may be much greater than its actual deathtoll. In fact, the Tokyo Bureau of Social Welfare and Public Health’s statistics indicate that there were only between 20 to 44 incidents of fugu poisoning per year between 1996 and 2006 in all of Japan, with a single incident frequently involving multiple diners. In each year, these incidents led to somewhere between 34 and 64 victims being hospitalized and zero to six deaths, for an average fatality rate of 6.8%. The most common deaths related to fugu either involve fishermen eating their catch without proper preparation, but there have been incidents such as kabuki icon Bandō Mitsugorō VIII’s death in 1975. The man, who was commonly thought of as a national treasure, requested four servings of fugu liver in a single meal. With the liver being the most toxic and most difficult to prepare of parts, he gambled a bit too much.

In recent years, Nagasaki University scientists have made an effort to bread a non-toxic variety of torafugu by limiting the fish’s diet to only certain items. They’ve raised over 5,000 of the fish so far, with none of the exhibiting the Tiger Blowfish’s trademark toxicity, but then a question is raised: if there’s no risk, where’s the reward?

Even if the chance of dying from the fish’s venom is minimal, there’s still that risk that attracts so many to fugu. With that risk, that chance eliminated, would the desire to eat the fish go up or down? Will there the number of people willing to try out the fish with its venom removed outweigh those who sought it out solely because of its risks?  Much like poker, the danger factor is a great deal of the reward a person gets from enjoying the fish.

Tags: fugu, japan, sushi

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The Ultimate Otaku Toy Bomb

Friday, February 20, 2009 - John Greene

Since I mentioned GOdzilla last week, here’s another Ultimate item for his resume: Morita Shouji is a Japanese Toy Company that’s selling a series based on the popular Japanese monster and his cinematic bretheren, including Mothra and King Ghidorah. Instead of plastic, however, these are all made of wood, are hand-carved, and are astoudingly expensive, starting at $3,000. The pictured King Ghidorah (who is, face it, freaking amazing) is over six feet tall and weighs 300 pounds. Sure, he’s $23,000, but you can make that in a weekend if you play your cards right with us.

Tags: action figures, godzilla, japan, king ghidora, mothra, toys

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