Saturday, June 17, 2006

Darwin Tried: Chicken Fried Donk

Ahh, summer time, the season of heat, outdoors, home improvement projects, and donks trying to blow themselves up. Huh? Allow me…

We need a new patio door. Ours is pretty old and due to some wood repairs, there’s no screen door. We started talking to friends of my wife and found that Ed runs his own contracting business, specializing in windows and roofing. Ed quoted us a very good price for installing a new door, and in talking further with him, we discussed a new layer of shingles on the roof as well.

As any homeowner knows, there’s no such thing as a simple project. Home projects seem to start a horrible money sucking domino-like effect that can very quickly spiral completely out of control. This one, apparently, is no exception. What started out as a patio door installation quickly tripled in price as we added the new roof layer, a window casing, and quite a bit of miscellaneous caulk work.

Ed started on the roof last week, and the dominoes kept falling. Apparently the siding on the upper half of the house was coming apart, and in order to properly flash the roofing project, something needed to be done. Double the previously already tripled cost, add in 3 days to pick the “right” color siding (you married guys know why), and we’re ready to get new siding. Fast forward to 5 minutes into removing the existing siding, and add $300 because the moron who built the house never put insulation under the previous siding.

I knew Ed and “his roofing guy” were going to be doing the work, but what I didn’t know is that Ed has two of the biggest fucking morons to have ever walked the planet working for him. As I would come to find later, these donks decided that whatever tools they had weren’t good enough to remove siding with, and instead they somehow borrowed a pitch fork from one of my neighbors down the block. I wish I would have taken pictures so I have some way to show what a donk on a ladder removing siding with a pitch fork looks like, but since I didn’t, you’ll have to use your imagination.

So here is where we are. The wife and kids are gone, and I’m sitting here with one working arm and feeling sorry for myself because I’m out of pain killers. I have the laptop in my lap, am playing in a cash game online and chatting with friends. TV is playing something useless and generally things are nice and calm, with the exception of banging and ripping sounds of donks removing siding.

Until…BANG…lights flicker a bunch…BANG… lights flicker and all power goes off, and I hear what sounds like machine gun fire from the back of the house. I immediately unplug the laptop, put it down, and rush to the door where I’m greeted by donk #1 who is knocking on the door and furiously trying to dial 911 by first entering the area code. Donk #2, who bears a striking resemblance to Joe Dirt, is also there with a look on his face that means he’s either trying long division in his head, or he just shit his pants.

The house is on fire, they tell me. I run around, see smoke everywhere, and see sparks and flames shooting out of the pipe coming up from the power meter. Donk #1 and donk #2 are running around like, well, donks, and I’m trying to see through the smoke and sparks to see if the house is on fire. Only a few seconds later the sparks stop completely, and I see the only thing still burning is a small pile of board on the ground. Both donks fall all over each other putting out the fire while I go inside to grab my cell phone and the card for the power company. I call the power company while making sure that the fires are out, and then try to figure out just how in the hell these morons did this.

So in talking to them over the course of the next few hours, here’s what we were able to figure out. The (old) pipe came out of the meter, goes straight up to just over a window on the 2nd floor, then takes a turn left to the top corner of the house where it connects with the power service. Instead of loosening up one section of pipe at a time from the house then removing the siding and putting the pipe back, these specimens of supreme human intelligence had another idea. They completely removed all of the brackets holding the pipe to the house. I wish I was there to see what happened next. From their descriptions and what I could piece together translating moron to English, they were both on the same ladder, donk #1 removing siding while donk #2 rested the pipe on his back, also removing siding. It is unknown whether or not the pitch fork played part in this act. Donk #1 claims that the pipe touched his arm and electrocuted him, but apparently that didn’t stop them from continuing down their path of Darwin induced donktivites.

Sure enough, that new phenomenon called gravity kicked in, and the 20 foot long pipe fell and bent in half. At the bending point, the electrical wires crimped, started on fire, and melted themselves and most of the pipe that surrounded them. The fire continued down the pipe towards the meter, melting wire and pipe along the way. Our only saving grace was that by this time the two donks fell/jumped off the ladder, let go of the pipe, and the power disconnected from the house, leaving live wires on the ground. Amazingly, no one was hurt.

Within 30 minutes the power company arrived. They had service connected shortly after. We had to call an electrician, and for anyone who is wondering, the cost to reconnect electrical service at 5:30pm on a Friday is $600. No way in hell we’re paying for it though. You bet the cost is coming out of the rest of the work that they are doing. I also know that the last work these idiots will do is clean up the mess they made, and comb the yard for nails and razor blades that were thrown about with no regard to anyone else around them.

So there it is…donks and electricity. Always an interesting combination. Also, somehow, none of our household electronics were harmed. The moral of this story? Stupid people are funny.

Yours Donkily,

Morphy

Thursday, June 15, 2006

Dot Dot Dot Donk Donk Donk Dot Dot Dot

Hello Manifestites, and welcome to the world of one handed typing. As you know from my last entry, I had elbow surgery to relocate a major nerve. They had to release and reattach a major muscle in my arm, so I’m 2 weeks into a very long, 12+ week recovery. I’m getting better at one handed typing every day, and have messed a bit with some speech recognition software. I’m planning a blog entry to detail all of this, but a situation came up yesterday that is too good to pass up.

So I’m playing in a SnG on Bodog yesterday (SnG = 1 table poker tournament). The blinds start out very low at 5/10, and I typically see some strange things betting-wise during the first few orbits. Sure enough, some guy raises to 115 and shows AsQs when the table folds. The next hand he makes it 80, gets one caller, sees a flop of A84, jams 900+ into a pot of 180, and shows AA when his opponent folds. Well, I can’t let that go unnoticed, so I feel I need to compliment him. Forgive my lack of capitalization or punctuation in my chat here: it’s times like these I wish I had 2 good hands to type with!

XaQ Morphy: i see you've mastered betting in nl holdem, very nice
Clovus: ty
Clovus: last tow hands i show back to no chat When I clean the board no offense guys

So I’m sitting here trying to decipher just what in the hell that is supposed to mean, when this shows up, filling the entire chat window:

Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -

I didn’t know what to make of that, but it would soon become painfully obvious that I wasn’t dealing with your ordinary every day dimwit. A few hands later, right in the middle of someone else’s chat, here it is again:

Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -

Well, you know me, any time I see the opportunity to mess with someone, I jump at it.

XaQ Morphy: wtf is your issue?
eisezu: i think he's just clearing the chat board
XaQ Morphy: why?
Clovus: cleaning the chat and your on iggy
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
XaQ Morphy: what language is that?

Not 3 seconds later he does it again. I mean, I guess I can see doing it once and a while, seeing as on Bodog there’s no timestamp on the chat, so you really don’t know when a certain message was written, but ffs, this was getting absurd. So, I decided to have a little fun.

Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
XaQ Morphy: quit it

XaQ Morphy: '
XaQ Morphy: '
XaQ Morphy: '
XaQ Morphy: '
XaQ Morphy: '
XaQ Morphy: '
XaQ Morphy: '
XaQ Morphy: '
XaQ Morphy: '
XaQ Morphy: '
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
XaQ Morphy: assmonkey

Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
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Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
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XaQ Morphy: cut it out assburglar

Clovus: put me on ignore then you dont see it like i dont see you
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
XaQ Morphy: i'm going to report you for spamming you pathetic loser
eisezu: why does it bother you so much morphy?
XaQ Morphy: because, he's breaking violations of the site
eisezu: he's not really
XaQ Morphy: if he can't deal with it, why doesn't he just close the chat down
XaQ Morphy: instead he has to ruin the chat experience for the rest of us

Ok, so I may be embellishing a little here. But others also see that I seem to be very bothered by it and may think I’m on tilt. Not that I need any help loosening up the play of the mass idiot-supreme that is the average Bodog player, but who knows. What this donkey doesn’t understand is that even if I block his chat, his ridiculous “chat clearing” is still making it impossible for others to chat. Some more:

Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
XaQ Morphy: that's it, you're done sparky


Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
Clovus: -
XaQ Morphy: wait, I got it…it’s morse code. let me translate
XaQ Morphy: clovus…is…a…dumbass…

So right about now, he calls off most of his stack with Ac6c and beats AK with a straight. Then this gem:

Clovus: suited hands win more often even though I got the st8 more outs
Clovus: 52 48 odds in his favor


Blink blink, what? For those that don’t know, while suited (or s0000000000ted, as known in the secret jargon of online poker) cards are more valuable than their non-suited counterparts, the suitedness is typically only worth 3-4%. In the hand above, the AK was a 70:30 favorite over his A6 of clubs. We were down to 3 now, “in the money” and thanks to the supreme donkey and his suited cards, he has the chip lead. I was going to comment on his vast knowledge of poker, but I was dealt a hand I had to move in with on his big blind. I showed of course. I’ll let you guess what I had based on this hint:

$1520.00 is not called, return back to XaQ Morphy
XaQ Morphy shows High Card, Three


A few hands later I was dealt an Ace in the same spot, jammed at him again, and he was all so happy to double me up with Q high, ensuring himself 3rd place.

Oh yeah, and I sent this email to Bodog’s support:

Hi, please remove the chat for user Clovus. He was spamming the chat window with dashes, which is extremely annoying, and disrupts the chat of anyone else that wishes to use it. He did not refrain when asked to stop. Thanks,

Sometimes you just have to step up and take matters into your own hands. Until next time!

Yours Donkily,

Morphy