Observe & Report/European Vacation/Poker Update

OBSERVE & REPORT

Saw it a couple nights ago at the Coquitlam megaplex. I thought it was strange (and not entirely in a good way) but overall worth seeing. Spousal unit didn't agree so much, although that could have been affected by her sleeping through part of it.

The previews made it look like Paul Blart, Mall Cop Part II. It definitely wasn't that at all. It was much darker, although like Paul Blart it was only occasionally funny. There's a scene where Seth Rogen's mall cop and Ray Liotta's police officer (Rogen's nemesis in the film) are having an exchange in an office, and Liotta's partner is hiding in the closet to hear it go down. After a couple minutes, he steps out of the closet and leaves the office, saying something like "I thought this was going to be funny, but it's just kind of sad". It's not too much of a stretch to say that quote summarizes the whole movie. There's nary a redeemable character to be found (well, perhaps the gal who gives Rogen free coffee and for reasons unbeknownst to the viewer has a fondness for him).

As often is the case in movies of this ilk, the lead character is sufficiently pathetic and delusional that you feel kind of confused if we're rooting for him, or hoping he's locked up before he does any real damage. This isn't helped by the fact that Seth Rogen is a wholly unlikeable lead. I won't say his movies are funny in spite of him, because he is often involved in the writing so clearly he's a funny guy. But I definitely feel his movies are funny in spite of his acting. Which is a weird thing to say, I guess, given that I would consider myself a fan and would go see a movie just cause he's in it. But bottom line is I expect his movies to be good, and I expect him to suck in them.

EUROPEAN VACATION

I would go on and on about Observe & Report, but I've gotta keep this relatively short. The town car is do outside the building lobby in about seven hours to take us to the airport. A day of travel will get us to Rome, where we're renting a car and tolling about for a while. Eventually a flight down to Marrakesh and then a ferry across the Mediterranean for a week in Spain. I'm real excited, I'll let you know how it goes. The wife makes fun of me for my inclination towards ordering cars, as opposed to calling a cab. But I'll tell you, it's practically a negligible price difference and it's much better on a few different levels. No brainer, if you ask me. You should check it out.

POKER UPDATE

Good thing results don't matter, cause I've been getting positively kicked in the teeth the last few days. As a matter of fact, I hit my bench mark for dropping down to exclusively 100NL. Even though it'd be easy enough to reload, I really don't want to, so I'm sticking to those guidelines. I need to win ten buy-ins at 100NL before I mix in the 200NL again. That can happen super quick, but so far I'm down at the 100NL too. It does really drive home the results not mattering, thing, tho. Because I feel way better about my game then I did when I was on the 21-session winning streak. Especially towards the end of it, I felt a little out of control, compelled to play longer than I should (and to chase losses), and my game was slowly loosening up (which is a tell tale sign of trouble for me). The last few sessions I have focussed on playing my tightest game. I'm a full 5% lower in VPIP than I was last week. I don't necessarily think that's ideal, but I like the feeling of having a target range and then being right in that range.

It's odd how good I feel about the pokers right now. For some reason, I can accept the variance and the streaks easier when I'm losing then when I'm winning. Of course, if I had my druthers, I'd take more uncertainty and the ~$3k back in my roll. But for now I'll have to settle for the certainty.