Sunday, March 13, 2005
North Dakota, poker and procrastinationI've been thinking about North Dakota a lot lately. See, every morning (afternoon!) I get up, pour myself a chug of Coke into my Miranda coffee mug (throwback to when I actually made and drank coffee, now it's only coffee-like frozen substances from *that place*) and sit down to read the news. And not the dad ignoring kids over breakfast, buried behind a newspaper news, but poker news. Poker news? WTF? I know this online poker craze is out of control, but poker news? Yes, really. I know, I thought it was going to be a nothing little part of the big picture job, more for my edification than any news I could actually report from the *world of poker* (subsequently referred to as WoP, just because I like acronyms)... but there really is a lot of interesting news out there. Like North Dakota. My politician stalking has been less Hillary than Rep. Jim Kasper ever since starting this job (but wow-o-wow does missus Clinton look good on her senate webpage!). This enterprising Fargo-ite has pushed thru a bill which would regulate online poker in North Dakota. (The House Bill 1509 that passed 49-43 earlier faces its turn of the screw in the state Senate on the 15th of this month is here-- pdf, don't say I didn't warn you!) NoDak would classify poker as a game of skill (rather than that of chance), to take it out of the seedy "gambling" lexicon and make it respectable (and taxable). Specifically, "internet live poker," which was interesting to me since well, wouldn't non-internet live poker be a game of skill as well? Or is it the internet which makes it skillful? :) 1,583 MMORPG players just popped half a one on that hypothesis. So, as it is a game of skill, Rep Kasper would like to earn a little sweat of the craze's back by creating an online poker regulatory and licensing commission to, well, license and regulate. $10 a head for each player who plays on a regulated site, and a tax on the proceeds of the online poker room... (I'm seeing the signup bonus now, free NoDak license and % bonus! If only yahoo hadn't filtered for spam!) So anyhow, back to the Coke and waking up in flannel pj bottoms to read the news string loop. I'm reading and reading about North Dakota (not to be confused with South Dakota of Mount Rushmore fame) and just thinking about a part of the country that really doesnt occupy much wavelength on a regular basis, at least in my little picket fence and 2.2 kids worth of grey matter. I had a really good girlfriend in college from North Dakota. She is Asian, which always surprised me since, well, I admit my low ethno-iq when I often assume all Asians come from California like me. Lynn was my feeding frenzy partner in procrastination. One nite we were "catching up" before finals, and where I hadn't read Hurston *or* Morrisson's novels and was attempting to do so both in one nite, Lynn had to read Moby Dick. She so rocked my world in how far she could put things off-- it's rare to meet your personality flaw hero so early and so obviously in life, and she is still an og rockstar to me for her crowning achievements in foot dragging. One of the best rows I had with my boyfriend at the time was about that book and Starbuck... I don't even remember now what it was about, but it got down to name calling, pishposhing at matricide and mothers in Shakespeare, and finally a jab at the fact that epic poetry was *not* coming back that left us screaming toe to toe in the dorm lobby at 2am (with the requisite two-for-tuesday drunk girl puking her way to her room making beautiful music in the background). Good stuff. Lynn told me that when he broke up with me, she was on my side. She said it all conspiratorily, since she was a mutual friend and all. But dammit if that little whisper didn't make me feel better, just for a little bit. It's been about eight years or so now since Lynn moved back to North Dakota. Sometimes I can't fathom how life keeps on keeping on. It's my terrible ptolemaic sense of myself that doesn't let me grasp that it goes on without me or not. But anyhow, here's to Kasper the friendly taxer who made me think about the good times, crashing on dorm room couches since I had the top bunk and the roomies got pissed when I'd stumble in after last call and forget which was the head of my bed (it was college, you know), and about Lynn-- maybe she voted for him? I wonder if, if HB1509 passes in two days, will she vote for putting some poker servers in her home state? Or does she give two farts to the wind about it since I'm the only one caring about "poker news" at 1141pm on a Sunday nite? What do you think? (About anything, really?) aK gamesgrid www.gamesgrid.com
11:34:01 PM |
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Asia K
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Last update: 4/3/2005; 3:00:09 AM .
