Stand in solidarity with Oakland today. Instead of watching another rerun of Keeping Up With Kim Kardashian's Divorces, take action against the banksters and corporate goons. Unless you're closing your account and moving it to a credit union, don't go to the bank. Don't hit up the ATM and eat another exorbitant transaction fee. Instead, use the powers of social media...

Thank you, Los Angeles. You've been a great audience. Don't forget to tip your waitress.

It hasn't fully sunk in that I'm moving out of Los Angeles one week from today. On a practical level, I've certainly taken the necessary steps to prepare, spending the better part of my downtime since the end of the WSOP divesting myself of a sizable percentage of my physical possessions. 14 bags of corporately-produced clothing that I wore to slave for a corporation...

For two weeks, I had to drive through the intersection at least four times a day. Sometimes more. What used to be the windshield of my Mazda was still sprinkled across the center divider, growing more granulated by the day. It sparkled as the sun hit it in the mornings, twinkled a cruel reminder as the headlights of my rental car shone across it when I made my way home in the depths...

When the WSOP schedule was released I was confronted with a decision-- play the Ladies' Event or travel to upstate New York to attend a three-day Phish concert. If the Ladies' Event fell on any other weekend during the WSOP, there was about an 80% chance I would have played. Despite the score I had earlier this year, it still would not have been sound bankroll (or liferoll...

With Pauly out of town on his first Phishing adventure of the summer, I filled in this weekend with a guest post on the Tao of Poker. Head on over and check out Apocalypse Now. Heading back over to the featured table now, where Maria Ho is about to go heads-up with Allen Bari for the $5k NLHE bracelet. Head over to WSOP.com for chip counts and updates, because my badge is off for this one.

Some of you may have figured it out by now, but I'll make it formal here. In addition to writing dispatches on the Tao of Poker, I'm also part of the team behind the RISE Poker blog. A partnership between Poker Royalty, RISE clothing and Zen Gaming, RISE Poker is a subscription-based online poker site that is 100% legal in U.S. America. We have a sick lineup writing and doing...

I'm seated on a camping chair in the cement-and-gravel backyard of my seventh Las Vegas residence in six summers. It's so perfectly clear and pleasant outside I could almost weep. I hear a bird chirp and it reminds me of the dead one Pauly found next to the back wall only minutes after we arrived. I know that there's another bird carcass around the corner beyond the padlocked...

What does the title mean? Read it to find out.Who publishes two books in a year? Pauly, that's who! I'm all at once flabbergasted, inspired, and proud of my beloved. While Lost Vegas covered his real-life experiences over four years at the World Series of Poker, Jack Tripper Stole My Dog is (thankfully) a work of fiction. You'll understand why I said "thankfully...

I was told on more than one occasion that the "jail sentence" metaphor I conjured up in this post led to my eventual sacking from a certain media outlet more than two years later (can you concieve of a more ******** excuse?). Nevertheless, I believe it speaks honestly to what we all feel around this time each year as we prepare to bunker down for seven weeks in Las Vegas...

Dear Juniors,It this were any other restaurant, I probably wouldn't be writing this letter. But the fact is, I grew up around the corner from here and have been a customer since I could walk. I blew out candles on birthday cakes from your bakery. My parents used to bring home your chicken soup where I was sick. I've never, ever sent a plate back at Junior's and as my...

Via a tweet from Lee "@Chingster23" Davy it leaked out this morning that an "unwritten" WSOP rule forbids credentialed members of the media from playing WSOP bracelet events."Just been informed by WSOP that I cannot play in a WSOP event if I am also going to carry out Media work. Just saved myself a lot of money," he wrote.I guess the year of the poker...

I had some more fun poking around Open Secrets last night, searching out where online poker dollars landed in Washington. Again, this isn't breaking news or intended to be any sort of dramabomb-- it's all publicly available information. Over the last two years, PokerStars spent $1.26 million on lobbying. They were the seventh-largest donor in the casino/gambling sector in...

It's lunchtime in Los Angeles and I'm ready to pour a cocktail since I was just able to cash out my life savings PokerStars account. Although perhaps I should put down the shaker until the check clears. Now that the reality of Black Friday has sunk in for me and future plans are being hastily assembled, one other stream of fallout is beginning to come to light for me. I miss...

So much money...where did it get us? Back when I worked in the film industry, a favorite pastime among junior D-people was to play around on OpenSecrets.org, running names of producers, directors, executives, and A-list actors to see where they were spending their political dollars. In the wake of Black Friday, I pulled up the site over my morning coffee and decided to check out...

Pauly impresses and inspires me to no end. Less than a year after putting out his first book, he's back with another. Get ready for Jack Tripper Stole My Dog, hitting the shelves in May! Support independent writers!

Happy 4/20 America! Smoke 'em if you've got 'em! Last night I recorded an episode of Pregame.com's Today in Sports Betting with RJ Bell discussing online poker's "Black Friday" from a media perspective. Lord knows poker players love themselves some sports betting (look who I live with)and the reverse is certainly true. RJ himself plays some $5/$10 NL...

Hollywood Week has come and gone and at last, we're left with our Top 24-- 12 guys and 12 girls who will be at the mercy of the American voting public next week. On the whole, I think it's a pretty impressive crop of talent this year and thankfully devoid of the over-population of white guys with guitars that were forced on us last season (now we get white guys on piano and...

Grrrr. I'm a lil' tilty at the moment after having my wallet assaulted at the DFW currency exchange counter. I'm used to getting screwed when it comes to changing USD for foreign money, but this particular transaction cost me nearly 20% in juice. That's got to be a new record when it comes to my global travels for poker, and it's not exactly an expense that can...

It's been an excruciating four weeks of audition episodes on American Idol and thankfully, tonight the show moves in to Hollywood Week (and the ensuing cattiness, tears, mental breakdowns, and forgotten lyrics). Before the drama kicks off, I thought I'd take a look back and share with you who I'll be watching closely during the next round. All five (well, actually six...

Our salaries may be falling and our jobs disappearing, but four of us donks-with-notebooks have managed to score life-changing money in tournament poker over the last couple of months. The latest member of the poker media to accomplish this feat is Remko "happyfreaked" Rinkema, a writer/reporter for PokerNews.nl. Early this morning, Remko finished in fourth place at the...

As close to a lock as you're gonna get this SundayI taped a guest spot on the quickest gambling podcast on the internet, the Tao of Pokerati. Filling in for Michalski, I sat down with Pauly to discuss my one and only Super Bowl wager. 2011 Super Bowl: Exotic Betting on the Super Bowl with Change100 (4:19) - Pauly and Change100 chat about "exotic" proposition wagering...

I try to live my life with few regrets, but if I have one it's that Showcase and I never got our **** together and auditioned for American Idol while we were still eligible. It's not like I was a lock to make Hollywood Week or anything-- on my best day Simon Cowell would have labeled my musical theater-trained belt "too cabaret"-- but it still would have been a...

Last July, only a few days before the start of the 2010 WSOP Main Event, I wrote these words for a piece on the Tao of Poker called Everything All of the Time:"The World Series of Poker is in the midst of an identity crisis. The WSOP needs to decide what it is. Is it the most prestigious festival of poker in the world? Or is it a poker fantasy camp marketed to the masses?"...

I feel responsible that my boyfriend is addicted to coconut rum and well on his way to becoming a raging alcoholic. After all, I was the one who took him to the islands and got him hooked on the sweet pink nectar that is a Bahama Mama. Pauly makes them just as well as any Atlantis bartender after practicing relentlessly in our kitchen this weekend as the NFL's "final four...