Scalping, Cake and Misdemeanors
I found a nice 2 point arb yesterday (Wager Web vs BetAtlas, if you must know) on an NBA points totals. I got the under in at 198 and then saw that the line moved to 198.5 on the over at the other book. I was a little surprised since it was 5 hours until game time and I was not expecting any volatility in the lines. Nonetheless it happened.
The impact of this is that if I put the scalp bet in on the over at 198.5 I have a situation where if the total comes in at exactly 198 I am "middled". My bet on the under is a push and my bet on the over is a loss. Since I was only going to make a few bucks on the arb itself I was looking at a large, although improbable, financial risk (hitting exactly 198) for a very small reward.
If I let the bet on the under stand without a scalp I would be much more likely to lose, but at least the payoff would be much higher. I pondered this for a while and decided that it was very unlikely to land on 198 exactly and placed the scalp bet. I am not sure if I made the right choice, though. Still contemplating that.
December 23 I played in a Banana Slugs event with some buddies at ITH. Three of us did a 30-player bounty SNG at Cake Poker. Great fun. I was drinking a little bourbon that night and was probably paying more attention to IRC than I was to the tournament during the first few rounds. I did notice, though, that the play was generally terrible as too many players were playing bad hands for too long. I was going to have to wait for cards. Bluffing was not going to do much good against these silly folks.
I gimped onto the final table in last place, and one of my ITH buddies managed the same feat - being in second-to-last place. About an orbit or two into the final table I went on a great heater. I was getting big hands and getting called, and - MIRACLE OF MIRACLES - they were holding up. I busted 7 players (for 7 bounties) and my ITH buddy busted one also. We ended up HU, but I had an enormous chip lead. I also got QQ my first hand HU and he called me with A5. I boarded a full house and we finished 1/2. What great fun!
On Christmas Eve afternoon the Bull family went to a local park for a nice walk around the lake. We returned to our vehicle after about 40 minutes to see that the window had been smashed and Mrs Bull's purse stolen. No cash, but credit cards, keys, ID's containing both our social security numbers, cell phone, and iPod Nano. Ouch, baby, very ouch.
I was stunned that someone would pop that glass in broad daylight in a very busy area. We filed a police report and cancelled the credit cards from my cell phone in the parking lot. The police were nice, but I knew they were not going to go looking for a purse snatcher when they said if the credit card is used to file a separate report, because that is a felony. Apparently smashing the glass and stealing a purse is just a misdemeanor.
On Christmas Day we received a phone call from a woman saying that her sons found the purse in their yard - about 15 miles from where it had been stolen. We went to her house to retrieve it only to find that it was not my wife's purse, but it did contain some of her stuff. We brought the purse home and emptied it out. My wife recovered her IDs, her keys, her defunct credit cards and her cell phone. We also discovered some IDs and keys belonging to someone else. The name on the ID was in the phone book, so I notified them on Christmas night that we had some of their stuff. They are coming by today to retrieve it.
Have a Happy New year everyone!