Hunh? Coffee? What the hell?
August 11th, 2005 @ 20:32 by NormMonkey
From the drain-the-main-brain department:
I made a silly promise to myself that I’d come over here and write about something every day or so, just to keep my brain in the practise of generating creativity. Nothing terribly exciting has happened today, so I’m just going to dump a stream of consciousness on you.
This is your fair warning that the rest of this entry is going to suck. Hard. (and not in a good way, you gutter-minded freak)
I was talking to a special friend on IM a few days ago and I came up with a philosophy. I remember that it had “B”s in it. How did that go again? There was a trio… Brains, beer, biceps? No, wait: it was “bikes, banks and muscles1“.
The original statement was, “Confidence is like muscles.” You have to keep using it if you want it to grow, and if you don’t it’ll atrophy and you have to start building it up all over again. Some things are like muscles; others are like bikes, or banks.
Luck is like a bank, where everybody’s welfare cheque is a different size. You can only withdraw from your personal luck account so much before you run out and then you’re screwed. Oh, yeah, and you can’t read the account balance. Hrm, balance… that’s a much better word than bank. Life finds a balance of good luck and bad. OK, screw that bank analogy; it’s “bikes, balance, muscles” all the way.
I need a membership at the gym of confidence.
The part of my brain that keeps track of completely random threads whispers, “Psst! The title.” I remember that I originally came here to write about something completely random because I had nothing better to write about. Coffee was the thing I had chosen.
Coffee is like beer. OK, it looks, smells, tastes, feels, and hell it even SOUNDS totally *un*like beer3. But it *is* like beer. Why? Beer, when you first try it, tastes horrible. You remember the very first time you took a swig of beer; you know what I mean. Coffee is the same way. Both are drinks you grow accustomed to. On the other hand, both beer and coffee have their station in life. After a hard day’s work re-roofing your cottage, *nothing* tastes better than a cold bottle of beer. By the same token, after a very nice meal, nothing beats a coffee afterward, especially with some sort of dessert. Both drinks have many varieties. You can find versions of both drinks that suck horribly, and some that are to die for. You can find hardcore proponents who only drink “their” variety of either beverage. Both make a great morning drink that last throughout the work day4.
Holy crap this entry is lame. I just reread it and I’m convinced that I’m going to make somebody in the world cry if I post it. This is living proof of why thoughts should always remain private forever. If people knew that this was the sort of crap running around in my addled brain they’d run me outta town.
And then where would I be?
Playing group solitaire by myself, online in an internet cafe with a coffee nearby, that’s where I’d be.
The sun shines brightly outside as the horde of people walk past the busy street outside the cafe, but inside the patrons are calm and quiet, except for the get-a-room couple in the corner booth with their moaning and smooches, and the geeks across the room playing a MMORPG who yelp whenever one of them takes a hit from an orc. How I wish I were them (the couple, not the geeks). The smell of coffee and fresh pastries drifts through the cafe, floating on the breeze. The gorgeous brunette sitting three tables over with the iBook takes a sip from her porcelain mug.
I get up to go for an iced coffee and a danish, using my laptop5 as a tray to carry it all back to the table. I decide to leave the online solitaire game and instead join a very strange game of online texas hold’em. The rules are odd: instead of playing for money, you play for favours. Each favour is worth $500 of chips in the game.
Favours usually end up being something like, “write a perl script that does X for me”, “fix my broken webpage” or “link to my site for the next month”. In some cases where the participants are local to each other I’ve heard of one person washing the others’ car or mowing their lawn or something. The online system has forms that allow for both parties to agree to whatever the thing is. Both parties eventually mark the favour as complete. There are rules about what happens if you don’t “pay” (you can’t get more chips) or you don’t acknowledge “payment” in a timely manner (you forfeit if you wait too long).
I’m pretty good at writing little scripts and helping people fix stuff. This is the kind of thing I like to do anyways so this is always fun for me. I sign up for a “favour” and get my $500. Then I click the button for a random table.
I’m sitting at a table with “knoppix_lover”, “sweetie314159265″ and “evil_bill”. So far Knoppix is down to $200, Sweetie is doing pretty good at $700 and Bill has a real stack of chips, $1666 in total. The next hand is dealt by Sweetie.
I get a pair of 7s. Right off the bat! Awesome! I’m the big blind so I check, not wanting to give anything away. Knoppix and Sweetie call. Big Bill raises $10, and we all call. The flop is Th, Qs and 4d.
Bill is in for $20. I call. So does Knoppix, and Sweetie folds. The turn is Ks. Bill tosses in $50. I’m worried that he’s working on a straight, but I’ve got good position and I want to see that next card. I call. Knoppix calls, too. The little bell over the door of the cafe jangles as a patron leaves.
A sweet 7 comes up the river! I take an excited bite of my danish and a quick sip. Bill puts in another $50. Both Knoppix and I call. Knoppix has a pair of aces! What a great hand; too bad it wasn’t worth much this time. Bill has two pair, 4s and 7s. He was bluffing the whole time on a measly pair of 4s! My three sevens take the pot.
Bill signs off. I guess his usual style isn’t working with this crowd. I smell the sweet smell of a fresh batch of doughnuts on the rack. Four patrons make a casual rush to the cashier.
I deal myself Td and Ks. Knoppix and I call. Sweetie raises $5. Knoppix and I call again. The flop is Ah, Jc, Th. Knoppix checks. Sweetie raises $10 and we call again. The turn is 5h.
I hear a little suppressed cough and I look up to see the gorgeous brunette quickly wipe her chin and take another sip from her mug. Knoppix raises $5. Sweetie sees the $5 and raises $50. I look at my pair with a possible straight, see the $55 and raise another $10. Knoppix folds. Sweetie sees the $10 and raises another $200. I sigh and shuffle my now empty iced coffee glass and danish dish over to the edge of the table. I look up to see gorgeous brunette quickly turn her head back to her iBook, her hair flipping itself casually over her shoulder.
I’ve got a decent hand with its pair and what I fervently hope will be a straight as I see the $200 and raise another $100. I cross fingers and try my best to tip the luck scale my way as I call the $100, wishing hard for a queen.
The river is a Kd. I sigh again. No straight, but two pair. I can feel the scales of luck shift as if my plate suddenly had two pair of feathers. I hear a cute snicker from the direction of the hot brunette. This is where I make my tragic mistake. I look up. This stunning, hot brunette is *totally* looking over at me. I do a nervous sort of double-take. A slow smile spreads across her lips. Her eyes twinkle. She was gorgeous when she was working at her iBook; she was really hot when she looked over. With the smile, though, she transforms into incredible warmth and cuteness. My heart skips a beat. If I had only looked closer, longer, her eyes would have betrayed a certain I-know-something-you-don’t-know attitude.
I look back at the screen. What if…? Nah. Couldn’t be.
On with the game. Sweetie raises another $200. I’m already in for around $400. I didn’t get my straight but I’ve got two pair which is pretty good for a one-on-one hand. I go all in. My heart stops as I hear hot brunette shuffle in her seat. Sweetie has called. I look over at hot brunette, who’s blushing madly as she takes a sip from her mug. On the side of the mug I see a “PokerStars” logo. I take a deep breath. I know what comes next:
Sweetie has 2h and 8h. I. am. toast. I’m out of the game, and I owe “sweetie314159265″ a favour. I hear some quick typing over on the iBook. In a second, a popup window lets me know that “sweetie314159265″ has just filled out the Favour Request form. I look up. Hot brunette has that stunning, incredibly cute smile on her face as she turns to look my way.
I click to open my account to the favours page. I read the description. My heart starts pumping faster. A slow smile spreads on my face. I can *feel* my eyes twinkling. I pack up my laptop and head for the door, meeting up with the gorgeous brunette on the way out. The scale of life now has two hearts that balance in harmony.
Later the next day, a computer in the basement server room of the online gaming company happily notes that both NormMonkey and Sweetie314159265 have acknowledged their favour and closes the folder, even as another folder opens somewhere in the computer of life.
1 Yeah, I know the allusion is incomplete. That challenge is left to the reader2.
2 Yes*, this is a lame excuse for not finding a b-word for muscles myself.
* Yes, it IS weird to put footnotes within a footnote. And this one isn’t even a number!
3 OK, maybe not that last one.
4 See footnote 3. Personally, I can’t stand coffee in the morning. The burning acid. The coffee breath. Makes me think of cigarettes. I like to get my work caffeine from tea.
5 Not only does it make a good tray, it also prevents it from being stolen while you leave to get a coffee. Unless you have one of those cable locks. But then you have to worry about where your key is.
