Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

I think maybe the only thing more boring than listening to people gloat over all of their sports-betting success, was listening to people talk about their poker success back in the mid 2000s.

It was right after they first started televising the world poker tour on E! or Bravo or whatever, and then a bunch of other poker-playing shows came out, some with celebrities instead of the actual touring poker players, and the like.  And every Tom Dick and Harry actually started either playing online, or meeting in person to play Texas Hold 'em, and over work lunches and happy hours the only thing these jackwagons ever wanted to talk about was how they won this big hand the night before, and I got to hear about all of their brilliant decisions they made after the flop, or the turn, or the river.  Man it was so boring, I finally got to the point where I'd just stand up and walk away when the discussion turned to poker.  People finally got the hint and stopped telling me about their great flop or whatever.  Thank the Lord.

I have some fantastic stories about Hold'em I'll tell here ....


The wife found out last night that our local French restaurant has opened, so we went, dined on their patio which is a bit close to a busy street, but it was fantastic.  We had our favorite server.  I left two $50 bills as tip.  I topped the evening with a snifter of Hennessey XO, which might be my favorite distilled spirit I've ever had.

They were fairly busy, which is good to see, we were worried they would not come back, losing two months of prime season.  They said they had some repairs to do anyway, it's in an old house, and they had the tables split apart.  The weather was fantastic.  I had scallops, which they call Jack something something.  I didn't know Jack did anything about scallops.

Life is returning here, finally.  Numbers continue to be flat, which suggests to me R naught is right at unity.  I'm headed out this morning for a haircut using the wife's "stylist".  She said he was really taking a lot of time and care to ensure everything is safe, so I'm not using my usual Great Clips, which runs about $20 with tip.  This guy is $35 without tip, but he was struggling being out of work apparently.  My government money is going to tips for folks who needed it.

When I was 22, I kinda liked Vegas.

At 26, I was like, "Parts of this are OK, namely the going from place to place with a drink."

In my early 30s, I want no part of it.

When I was younger, I enjoyed the LV Strip, going from one casino to the next. As I got older, I really began to appreciate the downtown experience. Now that they have the Fremont Street Experience, I REALLY prefer downtown to the strip to the point where I rarely make it to the strip. My personal choice is to stay at the Golden Nugget and just hang around that area. However, the costs of food and beverage have begun to catch up to the prices charged on the strip, so now I find myself no longing to be there much anymore. 

I have some fantastic stories about Hold'em I'll tell here ....


The wife found out last night that our local French restaurant has opened, so we went, dined on their patio which is a bit close to a busy street, but it was fantastic.  We had our favorite server.  I left two $50 bills as tip.  I topped the evening with a snifter of Hennessey XO, which might be my favorite distilled spirit I've ever had.

They were fairly busy, which is good to see, we were worried they would not come back, losing two months of prime season.  They said they had some repairs to do anyway, it's in an old house, and they had the tables split apart.  The weather was fantastic.  I had scallops, which they call Jack something something.  I didn't know Jack did anything about scallops.

Life is returning here, finally.  Numbers continue to be flat, which suggests to me R naught is right at unity.  I'm headed out this morning for a haircut using the wife's "stylist".  She said he was really taking a lot of time and care to ensure everything is safe, so I'm not using my usual Great Clips, which runs about $20 with tip.  This guy is $35 without tip, but he was struggling being out of work apparently.  My government money is going to tips for folks who needed it.

My FIL once gave me a bottle of Hennessey XO that had been given to him as a gift from a client or something.  He didn't know what it was, never drank Cognac or any kind of brandy, and asked me if I wanted it.  I said..."uhhh, yeah, sure!"

It is indeed delicious.  I can enjoy and do fine with VSOP and even VS varieties of certain Cognac, but that XO was on a different level.

Oh and yes, the French call scallops Saint Jacques.  I once learned the reason when I first visited France 25 years ago, but I've since forgotten.  I suppose google would help but I'm feeling lazy.

I order them often in France or whilst dining at French restaurants.  Coquilles Saint Jacques is a famous preparation for them, served in creamy sauce and covered in a crust of bread crumbs and cheese, and it's delicious.  But I like them just as well, or even better, seared with a little butter over them.

A look at the curves by country:

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/05/28/863944333/antibody-tests-point-to-lower-death-rate-for-the-coronavirus-than-first-thought

Estimated mortality rate around 0.5%.

Correction... The estimated mortality rate is not 0.5% per that article. 0.5% is the lower bound, with 1% being the upper bound. 

They quote an Indiana study that suggested 0.58%, and somewhat misquote the NY study which showed 0.5% but didn't include any of the "probable" COVID-19 deaths, only the confirmed. Including the "probable category" pushed it to 0.74%. 

"The current best estimates for the infection fatality risk are between 0.5% and 1%," says Caitlin Rivers, an epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security.
That's in contrast with death rates of 5% or more based on calculations that included only people who got sick enough to be diagnosed with tests that detect the presence of virus in a person's body.
And the revised estimates support an early prediction by Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and a leading member of the White House coronavirus task force. In an editorial published in late March in The New England Journal of Medicine, Fauci and colleagues wrote that the case fatality rate for COVID-19 "may be considerably less than 1%."
But even a virus with a fatality rate less than 1% presents a formidable threat, Rivers says. "That is many times more deadly than seasonal influenza," she says.

I do find it strange that news sources are quoting the fact that the actual IFR is well below the "5% or more" as if it's a surprise... Seems to me that's been known since we all started talking about this in March.