Master Dilettante

I spent the past weekend in Vegas for my buddy’s fortieth — yes, fortieth! — birthday. I never get tired of the city of lights, the ultimate playground for adults. Among the many memorable, disclosable highlights of the weekend:

• Cirque du Soleil’s “Love.” Thoroughly engaging, highly enjoyable show. Cirque’s latest production is set to the music of the Beatles, and is more dance performance and lip-sync musical than Cirque’s usual acrobatics and performance art. Enjoyment of Love might vary based on fondness for the Beatles; a twenty-six year-old friend thought the show was “just okay.” I listened to all the Beatles’ albums growing up and was captivated from the opening of the performance. I loved Love. Catch it at the Mirage.
• Dinner at Michael Mina. This was my second time to Michael Mina at the Bellagio and equally fantastic. This time, I had the foie gras and the lobster pot pie. I asked for two mini root beer floats — again, like last time. It’s a special occasion restaurant with special occasion prices. (If you have to ask, you probably can’t afford it . . . .) For more detail, see my Yelp review.
• Hugh Hefner and the Girls Next Door. That’s right. Hef and his trio of girlfriends, Holly, Bridget & Kendra. They were making appearances at the Palms hotel all weekend, and we saw them at Moon /the Playboy Club.

Hope you had a great birthday weekend Jorge!

I must have too much free time on my hands (don’t tell my boss), because lately I’ve been doing a bit more business reading and checking out Web sites I’ve wanted to explore. Yelp isn’t new news, but two of my former eBay colleagues are leading operations and marketing there, so it’s long past time I demonstrate my support.

Here are a few reasons why I love it, particularly for restaurant reviews:

• Breadth. While Zagat’s is now expanding beyond restaurants to hotels, nightclubs and attractions, Yelp already features reviews in 22 categories, and I would expect further expansion. I use Yelp predominantly for restaurant reviews, but I’m starting to look at the shopping reviews and won’t stop there.
• Depth. Instead of the brief squib that sites like Zagat’s or Citysearch might feature, Yelp’s user-generated content is unlimited. This means plenty of reviews for general accuracy but also sufficient detail.
• Community. Add friends, send compliments. Yelpers band together to celebrate places and even arrange to meet to check out new restaurants. The social networking element is real.
• Cost. Yelp is free for users.
• Personalization. I can add photos. I can write reviews and make lists. I can email my reviews to friends. And I get my own URL. I’m a fledgling reviewer, but you can check out my reviews and add me as a friend on my Yelp page.

Yelp’s tag line says it all: “Real People. Real Reviews.”

My buddy, who turns 40 tomorrow, has decided that he now needs a fancy watch. I approve. He has a colleague-horologist in London who is going to help him select an appropriate timepiece.

For the record, I’ve been obsessed with the Blancpain Aqua Lung ever since my brother pointed it out to me. A great pictorial is on the TimeZone Web site. Anyone is welcome to gift an Aqua Lung to me. Please help, before I inevitably get it for myself.

Two poker buddies and I played the Shooting Star $2000 buy-in no-limit hold ‘em tournament at Bay 101 last Sunday. I don’t play many tournaments, and, in the three years I’ve played poker, this was only the third tournament with a buy-in of $1500 or more I’ve entered.

Two key differences exist between these sorts of tournaments and the ~$200-300 buy-in regular, local tournaments at Bay 101 and Lucky Chances. First, low buy-in tournaments generally feature a rapidly-increasing blind bet structure (blinds might increase every 10 or 15 minutes); in higher buy-in tournaments, blinds might increase anywhere from every 30 minutes to every two hours. (For this event, the blinds increased every 40 minutes). Second, in general, the quality of players tends to be higher in higher buy-in tournaments.

Despite my relative lack of tournament experience, I am quite comfortable playing in events like this and was very much at ease (except for the expected tension of competition) for the seven hours I was in play. I was focused and played as intelligently as possible. I made a few small mistakes here and there, but I made even more good, aggressive plays to win pots. Overall, I was entirely pleased with my play, finishing around 60th out of 250, around 10-15 spots out of the money. Even my last hand, pushing all-in with AKo and getting beaten by 88, was the right play given the point in the tournament, my chip stack size, the position of the aggressor opponent, etc.

One silver lining: In the break immediately before the round in which I was knocked out, I made a $100 “last-longer” bet with a buddy. A few minutes into play after the break, he tapped me on the shoulder to let me know he’d just been knocked out of the tournament. Right at that moment, the cutoff raised, I looked down to see AKo and pushed. When my opponent’s 88 held up, I had lasted longer than him for about 1 minute — good enough for $100.

Did I write too soon? To my list of Jawbone drawbacks, add questionable durability and unresponsive customer support.

Having had difficulties with the fit of the Jawbone, I foolishly dispensed with the ear loop; the Jawbone remained attached to my ear only through the snugness of the ear bud in my ear canal. Alas, while juggling five bottles of wine on the way to the checkout counter at Beverages & More, I felt the Jawbone wriggling its way out of my ear. Despite a feeble attempt to set down the bottles and rescue my three-day-old, $120 headset, it plummeted to the ground from a height of about four feet. I promptly picked it up, re-inserted it in my ear, made a call and was relieved to hear a voice on the other end. But, once I started speaking, I heard, “Hello? Hello? Hello? I can’t hear you, dude.” Click. Day three and my Jawbone got broke.

I attempted to use it three other times, to the frustration of a friend and my brother, and then I re-charged it overnight. To my chagrin, spontaneous healing, apparently, is not one of the Jawbone’s features.

Fortunately, because I had purchased two additional Jawbones for my friend in London, I co-opted one of these and plan to exchange the defective unit for a new one next week. Shhh, please don’t tell Cingular. (If you do, the recovering lawyer in me will argue that a fall from four feet constitutes normal usage, and the unit should be designed to withstand such duress).

As for customer support, I contacted Jawbone via the email support form on the Web site, to ask both about the durability of the headset and about how to improve the fit for my ear. It’s been 24 hours, and I haven’t heard from anyone.

Does any of this change my overall assessment of the Jawbone? Sadly, it does not. The transmitting sound quality is still so vastly superior to other headsets and this consideration is so important to me, that I’m going to stick with this device – at least until it breaks again. In fact, when I exchange the defective unit, I’ll pick up any additional units for my friend in Europe.

Addendum, 28 March 2007: Over a week later, a Jawbone representative replied by email with this response:

Dear Joon-Soo,

Unfortunately, the long loop that was provided is the longest loop we currently offer. Have you tried using other buds? This may help keep the jawbone in place. I do not recommend not using a loop - while the jawbone can withstand a fall, not using a loop will not give you the proper fit required for the white sensor to rest on your cheek. This contact is what allows the jawbone to sense the vibrations in your jawbone, thereby canceling out the background noise.

If the other ear buds do not work, you can return your headset at the place of purchase within the 30 days allotted. We will be offering different sized loops and buds in the coming months. If you’d like to be put on a list, please let us know.

I hope this helps!

The Support Team

I’ve been wondering how to get feedback on my poker “table image” – the perception other players have of me at the poker table – in other words, my poker reputation.

At the most basic level, players typically characterize each other along a spectrum in two dimensions: (1) loose or tight and (2) aggressive or passive. “Loose or tight” refers to the percentage frequency with which a player chooses to play hands; a loose player plays relatively many hands, while a tight player plays relatively few hands. “Aggressive or passive” refers to the percentage frequency with which a player bets or raises; an aggressive player bets and raises bets often, while a passive player tends to call bets reactively or check.

In addition to these dimensions, table image consists of various perceptions of a player regarding consistency of play, composure, intelligence, risk aversion, trickiness, general strength or weakness, win rate, etc. Table image can change over a period of time or even within a particular playing session and might vary by location or game or any number of other environmental factors.

Why does this matter? In poker, in which it is said that playing the people is at least if not more important than playing the cards, table image can help or hurt your success. A savvy player understanding his own table image and the images of others uses that information to make good decisions and manipulate opponents into making mistakes. For one simple example, if I know I have a tight table image, I know that when I bet players will be more inclined to believe I have a strong hand. And if I understand that a player is tight too, I know that I may be able to bluff that player into folding decent cards by betting.

I most frequently play $20/$40 limit Texas hold ‘em at Bay 101 in San Jose and don’t have a good sense of my image at the poker table. I can think of three ways to self-gauge table image.

1. Maintain awareness of your actions and behavior

I’ve made what I believe to be significant improvements over the past four months to understand my state of mind and control my play and have been a winning player over that period of time. My poker buddies know that I’m prone to “blow up” a la poker professional Mike Matasow. I’ll lose concentration or lose a big pot and then this catalytic event will sometimes cause me to play poorly and thereby lose most or all of the remainder of my chips. I’ve substantially “plugged” this “leak” in my poker game. But I can only imagine that opposing players have witnessed this behavior in the past. If they are smart enough – and they are more likely not to be given the skill of the players at the limits at which I play – they will use this knowledge to look for signs that I will “blow up” (also known as “going on tilt”) and take advantage at those moments.

Of what awareness should be maintained might vary by individual. I try to be mindful of my overall emotional state and energy level (engaged or bored, calm or frustrated, focused or distracted, energetic or tired, etc.); how frequently I have been playing hands and calling, betting or raising; whether I’ve been bluffing; whether the other players are paying attention, etc.

2. Glean insight from opponent comments

On a few occasions, players I respect– they play few hands, they play the hands they do play aggressively, they make intelligent bets, raises and folds – has folded bets to me and made statements such as, “I folded AQ against you.” I laugh inside and think, “Well, you should have three-bet, donkey, because I’ll raise on crap.” However, I can infer from the behavior and comment that this opponent perceived me as a “tight” player and use this information to attempt judicious bluffs.

3. Ask other players whom you trust (and I, myself, count no one in this category)

I haven’t figure out how to get reliable information yet from people I don’t know or trust. I’ve wondered whether the floor people at the card room have any insight, at least into whether I or others are winning players. Because the floor people frequently are selling chips to players and observing the players at a table, an astute floor person would develop a sense of whether a person is a winning or a losing player.

All of this leads to the catalyst for this post, that I heard something last week that still has me laughing today. A floor person was talking to a friend of mine playing a bigger game, $100/$200 limit hold ‘em. Noting that I always seem to have a huge stack of chips in front of me and assuming that I was a huge player, she commented, “I don’t understand how JK can afford not to play here everyday.” Fortunately, my friend set the record straight. But the comment entertains me nonetheless every time I think of it.

Apparently, I am on a geek gadget spending spree. Enter Research in Motion’s Blackberry 8100c Pearl. The Pearl has been reviewed by others ad nauseam, so I will provide only brief (for me) impressions here.

• The size and form factor finally bring a Blackberry device on par with other mobile phones. The marketing collateral refers to the Pearl as the “Smallest, Smartest, Most Stylish Blackberry Ever,” and I have to agree. Specifically, its dimensions are 4.0″ x 2.0″ x 0.6″. Yummy. I am determined to carry only one handheld communications device, and the Pearl makes this easier than ever.
• The Pearl uses the SureType word recognition feature employed by other Blackberry candy-bar-shaped devices, so if you hated SureType on those, you’ll hate it on the Pearl, too. I’ve become adept at it and more than willingly to trade off small size over a full keyboard.
• Yes, it takes time to get accustomed to using the trackball. As with any mouse or trackball or other pointing device, precision usage is difficult. I’m now used to it. The one permanent drawback: With the trackwheel on the 7100c or the 7130g, I could select text or multiple emails with one hand (by depressing the <alt> key and then turning the trackwheel); with the trackball, I now need to use two.
• The camera is of mediocre quality. The primary deficiency I find is that it takes effort to stabilize the camera for a non-blurry image. Also, on the few occasions I don’t lock the phone, I’ve taken pictures inadvertently due to the placement of the camera button on the side. I have some great shots of the inside of my pocket. Despite these drawbacks, I’m just happy it has a working camera.
• Last, I love that I can now assign pictures and ringtones to each of my family members and friends. My friends thought this was ridiculous to want at first but now are titillated when their songs play when they call.

Overall, despite any drawbacks, I love the Pearl and hope you don’t get one, so I’ll feel that more special.

I should have known by the 1983 initial publication date, but when I first picked up A. Alvarez’s The Biggest Game in Town, I mistakenly thought it was about the “Big Game,” the high-stakes, typically $4000/$8000 bet limit poker game that takes place semi-regularly among the best players in the world in Bobby’s Room of the poker room of the Bellagio Hotel & Casino. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the book’s title is not a reference to “The Big Game” but a more generic reference to poker, the biggest game, according to the author, in Las Vegas.

The book has diverting appeal. For those familiar with the big veteran names in poker — Doyle Brunson, Chip Reese, Bobby Baldwin, etc. — the book is a biography of the beginnings and escapades of these early poker mavericks. For those following or engaged in the recent popularity of tournament poker, the book provides historical insight into how poker took root in Las Vegas and the formation of the World Series of Poker. Most interesting to me, however, were the numerous stories depicting the gambling nature of the poker players, bringing to mind this quote by S.W. Erdnase:

The passion for play is probably as old, and will be as enduring, as the race of man. Some of us are too timid to risk a dollar, but the percentage of people in this feverish nation who would not enjoy winning one is very small. The passion culminates in the professional. He would rather play than eat. Winning is not his sole delight. Some one has remarked that there is but one pleasure in life greater than winning, that is, in making the hazard.

The Expert at the Card Table, S.W. Erdnase (.html edition) (2000) (Jose Antonio Gonzalez).

The Biggest Game in Town affirmed my (possibly delusional) belief that I am only moderately a gambler — at least when compared to the poker players in the book and many of my degenerate poker buddies (you know who you are). I know that poker is predominantly a game of skill that involves elements of luck. I enjoy the occasional risks or wagers. But, ultimately, my distate for losing, and particularly for losing money, are far too great to take unnecessary risks where I believe I’m more likely than not to lose, regardless of the amounts or odds. I love action, just judicious amounts of it.

This year, I approach a significant life milestone – I’m not saying precisely which birthday – still a bachelor. As I’ve waited patiently at home for Mrs. Right to come knocking at my door, several “friends” have been badgering me (for years now it seems) to try the online dating thing. Alas, I’ve been utterly incapable of overcoming the two biggest hurdles for me: (1) writing a profile and (2) selecting suitable photographs.

In an act of inspired brilliance, a good friend suggested that I enlist help. In an act of utter foolishness, I agreed and jumped at this opportunity to take the easy way out. I promptly created a Match.com account and made a temporary user name and password available to a dozen friends, with the request that they craft a profile for me, wiki-style.

My expectation was that my “friends” together would write a humorous, wry profile that captured the essence of my personality, which, clearly, would be enough to attract interest. Well, the profile was certainly humorous and wry – but perhaps a bit too wry. I haven’t added photographs yet (more on that later), but I’m fairly certain that any eligible woman reading the existing profile will run not walk away from the surely psychotic person it depicts.

For example, I’m not so sure the prefatory tagline, “I’m 39 and need someone other than my poker buddies to plan my 40^th bday party,” is likely to attract women. Even if an unsuspecting lady were to find that tagline funny and continue reading, I’m not sure the current introductory “About me and who I’m looking for” summary puts my best foot forward:

I have been beaten down to a shadow of my former self. In the last 39 years, it has become apparent to me that I need a strong woman to guide me in my latter years. Despite being successful professionally and having a wide set of friends (though questionable in their quality), I have yet to find my soul mate.

My perfect match is a lady who will order me around, tolerate my fussiness and grudgingly accept my excessive and too-soon gifts from Tiffany’s, Louis Vuitton and Gucci. No gift is too expensive or too over the top for me. My AMEX lives for your needs.

Okay, not the best start. Grudgingly, I had to admit this was quite funny, however. But would any reader agree – and agree enough to respond?

The Match profile page also includes additional, shorter, “In my own words” sections on “for fun,” “my job,” “my ethnicity,” “my education,” “favorite hot spots,” “favorite things” and “last read.”

These started off somewhat amusing. For example:

my job: I move up the corporate ladder three rungs at a time, occasionally slipping back four or five rungs. My friends say that I got to where I am by brown-nosing; I would argue, but they’re really smart, and are usually correct in their assessments.

my ethnicity: I am Korean but not really. E.g., if you are looking for the stereotypical Korean man, you can stop here. You’re the boss in the relationship, not me.

However, with the best of intentions, my brother, finding all of this horribly mean-spirited, whipped out his lawyer’s pen and began revising.

Before (my friends’ version):

for fun: I enjoy inviting myself to my “girlfriends’” parties. Note, these are not “girlfriends” but “friends” that are girls with whom I tag along. I’m considered the know-it-all who has to provide an unwanted opinion on how to cook and clean.

my education: I have been educated in my life and despite having a JD and an MBA, I never scored at school. Hence I am on Match looking for my soulmate [sic]. Luckily, this is cheaper than the $200K I spent in the ivy [sic] leagues.

favorite hot spots: I go to lots of cool foreign places and put pictures of these places on my office cubicle wall. My objective is to convince unsuspecting passersby that I am more interesting than I really am.

favorite things: My two cats (one is dead and in a box in my living room), my overpriced jeans and my high maintenance travel headset. I also like reading business books that I can quote to my boss.

After (my brother’s version):

for fun: Hanging out with my friends, cooking up a great meal, and drinking good wine. I love games of all sorts — poker, monopoly, Pictionary, you name it. And watching movies on opening night — why wait for a better seat and miss the excitement?

my education: I have a JD and an MBA.

favorite hot spots: I’ve traveled to a lot of places — Thailand, England, Nepal, India, Australia, Korea — and I still haven’t gotten rid of the travel bug.

favorite things: My niece Alexandra! She just turned 3 months old.

You be the judge. Both versions are essentially accurate. However, where the collective profile at first was abhorrently interesting, now it is an odd assortment of bland and weird.

My brother makes the excellent point that the brash, odd profile previously written might, if at all, attract an audience not actually suitable for me, but the current pastiche profile is now internally dissonant. In theory, the combination of humor and sincerity should work, but the execution is imperfect at this point. I’m back to the drawing board and might actually have to do some of my own dirty work here.

(My brother has also proposed that he and my friends write competing profiles and we A/B test them. We’ll see.)

Oh, one additional note. Match allows you to attach searchable “MatchWords” to your profile. One of my poker buddies kindly added “introverted,” “lonely,” “sad,” and desperate.” Now, if anyone searches for these terms, they will find me. Winner! Compelling, don’t you think, ladies?

With friends like these, who needs enemies?

As for photographs, SmugMug hosts over 2,000 of my photographs. Of course, only a fraction of these are of me. I culled through my albums and identified 30 photographs with which I had some relative comfort and asked friends to select the ones they liked. Now, what would you think when two friends effectively responded with, “Uh, yeah, I think you need to take some more photos. I’ll help, really.” The photos are relatively accurate images of me, so I was a bit concerned with what they must think of my appearance. Back-peddling, both friends independently explained that the sample of pictures did not accurately represent my personality, and my ego forces me to accept this explanation.

I’ve published the profile on Match, so what are the results so far? My portrait has been viewed 86 times as of this writing, but I haven’t been contacted by anyone yet. To be fair, all female friends I know on Match uniformly say that they screen based on photographs first and spend perhaps 2 seconds doing so. I’m unlikely, then, to attract any responses until I add photos. Yeah, that’s it, that’s the ticket.

I plan to solicit and make further edits to the profile, add some photographs and see what happens. Stay tuned.

While I was in Australia on a recent business trip, a colleague and friend instant messaged me on Skype and, upon learning where I was and why, pronounced me “king of the boondoggle.” He’s not the first to comment – either admiringly or disparagingly – on my business travels. In the past 15 months, I’ve been to Sydney twice, Mumbai, Berlin twice, Singapore, Hong Kong and Korea. Is that really all that much?

Because so many have asked me, I feel compelled to set the record straight here and provide a few words of advice.

Proper discussion begins with definition of the term “boondoggle.” Alas, the entry on “Boondoggle” in Wikipedia refers to the “North American arts and crafts activity in which you use flat strings.” For example, see this key chain:

This is not what I mean.

Dictionary.com provides a definition that more closely resembles modern usage in the workplace:

Work of little or no value done merely to keep or look busy
Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Random House, Inc. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/boondoggle (accessed: February 22, 2007)

I think this is still a bit off, so I propose an operational definition that is more colloquially accurate in the context of today’s modern office:

A boondoggle is any business trip in which the amount of entertainment appears to be greater than the amount of actual work.

Please comment! Assuming for a few moments the relative sufficiency of this definition, I’ll now opine on boondoggle best practices.

Basic Skills:

1. Eliminate your desire to go. In the feature film, The Tao of Steve, Steve, a moderately successful womanizer, explains that the first step in seduction is the elimination of desire and, thereby, the inevitable accompanying behavioral perversions that will preclude one from seducing. Similarly, if you overtly ask your boss to fly you to Tahiti, your boss surely will resist this blatantly frivolous request. Instead, tell your boss that you couldn’t possibly go and that’s it’s a waste of time, but allow circumstances and others to put forth the inexorable argument that your presence absolutely is necessary on that island.
2. Have a legitimate business purpose. Once a potential travel opportunity has been identified, you must have an actual business objective to achieve once there. Good examples: conferences, meetings, research – in which you have a role to play. Bad examples: golf, sunning, gambling, boating, carousing, drinking, etc. Without this business purpose, you are on vacation.
3. Do your job. A common misperception among boondoggle novitiates is that once at the destination work can be dispensed with entirely. Witness the numerous individuals “let go” by companies after flying to exotic locations to attend conferences they did not, ultimately, attend. Do not fall into this trap. Do your job. Show up to meetings on time, engage, get the work you are paid to be doing accomplished.
4. Do not abuse your expense account. Nothing will get you in trouble with the powers-that-be faster. Expense actual, reasonable, work-related costs. Pay for anything personal yourself.

Advanced Techniques:

1. Go with your boss. Some may think that a boss on a trip will cramp one’s style. On the contrary, so long as you have a collegial relationship with your boss, his or her presence on the trip will both (a) provide immunity for any malfeasance occurring in which you are both engaged and (b) get you nicer, more expensive meals.
2. Manage post-trip impressions. The trip isn’t over once you return. Once you return, meet with your boss and review all that was accomplished. Explain how tiring the travel was and how much you have to catch up on now that you’re back. Demonstrate that you added value, because you did. Really.
3. Be careful with photographs. Photographs of you with colleagues inside meeting halls, posing outside of offices, presenting to large audiences – these are all acceptable. Photographs of you drunkenly dancing in a Chinese dragon mask in Singapore – these are not. (Believe me, I know). Video, in particular, is to be avoided. When distributing photos post-trip, take the time to create two separate albums, one for work colleagues and one for friends. Be sure to send the appropriate album to each group.

This is what I have learned that I pass on to you, dear reader. Please leave me comments on your own best practices.