Calistri's Corner

“On a misguided hysteria-driven journey, Chicken Little’s supportive and well meaning friends get eaten by Foxy Loxy. The moral of that story, and ours, is that hysteria isn’t an action plan and we must defend against real, not imagined, risk.”

Losing Neteller ain’t good and it will definitely take a chunk out of online poker until people figure out a way to reconstruct the online poker funding food chain. But Chicken Little, the sky is not falling…yet.Â

However, it is, undeniably, another wake up call and I doubt the online poker industry can afford to hit the collective snooze button one more time.Â

It’s ugly, but hysteria never helped anyone.  Here is my (not particularly optimistic - but not dire) piece in PokerNews about why this may not mark the end of our online poker universe. I suspect people will read this and think I dis’ed the PPA. I know they are out there doing what they can do, but they can’t be the only ones on front line. They don’t have the money and they don’t have a unified industry association behind them. The NFL didn’t sit back and let an NFL Fan Association do their legislative bidding. They put themselves (and a lot of cash and an experienced connected lobbyist) behind their successful lobbying efforts. Rant out.   Â

On a more optimistic front, the five day Austin ice storm finally subsided today. It was a lucky thing too. One more day and this place would have looked like the Donner party. But a quick run to the grocery story this afternoon insured that the cats wouldn’t have to draw straws tonight.

I set up camp last night next to Stella, in front of the fireplace, to play the Mookie. It was a total gas as expected. I ended up with Waffles on my right. I had Waffles on my left during the WPBT Winter Classic. And after both experiences, I’m not sure where I want Waffles. Any suggestions? I also had the charming company of Mr. Speaker at my table. And while the lovely and mysterious Change 100 Gigli’d out, she was cruisin’ the tables.   Â

Not that it would have changed my dead money outcome any, but I lost my wifi at a rather critical juncture. My wifi has been very unreliable and quirky the last few days.  It says I’m connected - but when I probe deeper it says it can’t find any wireless signal in my range. Everything works again on a reboot - but within an hour or so, I have to go through the cycle again. I suspect the router.  This will keep me from playing CC’s tonight. But hopefully it is something I can straighten out in the next couple of days. And I definitely am hoping to straighten it out before Al and Mookie’s Hammer Day.        Â

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 18th, 2007 at 9:07 pm and is filed under Uncategorized.