I had hoped to go to Atlantic City this weekend to see the Arturo Gatti-Leonard Dorin fight. It wasn't in the cards. Instead, I found myself gambling with some DC-area bloggers last night in a Texas Hold 'em tournament. Knowing that the game had been promoted, I kept waiting for this guy to show up and take our money. He never did. But I had an early departure from the game anyhow. Under normal circumstances saying "I've never played before" serves as a good excuse for losing. Texas Hold 'em contests, however, bizarrely run on several cable channels, so the excuse doesn't hold here. Simply by pop-culture osmosis, everyone has some idea of how the game works. If that doesn't explain my defeat, what does? I didn't recognize it at the time, but I've come to suspect that the constant loop of songs from Cake that curiously played in the background of our game contained subliminal messages telling me to bet it all when I got dealt a two and a six. Yes, yes, of course. That's it. My lack of card-playing skills had absolutely nothing to do with my loss. At least that's the comforting myth I've invented to make myself feel better. Mike Krempasky came away the winner, host Tom Bridge the runner up, followed by Tony Rathbone and Ben Domenech. Other players included Tiffany, Chris Hynes, Mike Wasylik, and Chris O'Donnell.

Perhaps you should take lessons from Ben Affleck? I hear he is now the state champion in California (for poker) after having only taken up the game seriously one year ago (perhaps after JLo and he parted ways). My source on this is Matt Damon on Letterman or Conan (I can't recall which). Damon said he'd taken lessons from the female national champ.