No really, it is. Follow my logic here.

I woke up Saturday morning at 7 am, as I do when left to my own devices. I like to snuggle under the covers for a few minutes and think about the day ahead, and whether I can afford to lollygag in bed for a while longer drifting into daydreams and dozing. But Saturday morning I remembered that there was live poker that night at PokerTart and Bankwell's place and the anticipation was like a shot of caffeine, making any further sleep impossible.

But as I lay there I remembered that I was down to the granny panties, my laundry early warning system. Trust me, it's hard to feel fabulous and confident and strong in granny panties; one needs the leopard print thong for that (and yes, they do make them this big). So I hauled my butt out of bed to hit the laundry room by 7:30. After 8:30, the place gets crazy busy for the rest of the day and I run the risk of either 1) having someone remove my stuff from the dryer when I didn't get back down there quickly enough (I HATE other people toughing my clothes) and/or 2) having some unmentionable or another fall on the floor in front the the only guy down there, "Here, you dropped this". Both options put me off.

Anyway, As I'm back in my apartment waiting for the wash cycle to finish, knitting and sipping my coffee, I was thinking about PokerTart's announcement (congrats again, you two!), and how happy they must be. Then I remembered the shirt hanging in the back of my closet that I need to get rid of, since the last time I wore it someone asked me, very innocently, when I was due. I looked down at my pear shape and thought that it might be a good idea to see if I am becoming somewhat less of a pear now that I am watching what I eat, and remembered the scale that is also somewhere in the back of the closet and perhaps I should dig that out while going through my closet for the shirt and other items to jettison.

Well the whole thing turned out to be far more of an archaeological dig than anticipated. I found the shirt and I found the scale. I also found a lot of other stuff, like my grandmothers baking pans, a cake tin, 3 board games I never play, a bag of old punk/concert tees that I still can't bear to get rid of so have stashed behind my cedar chest, 2 knitting UFO's that I'd forgotten I had, gifts from students (please by all that's holy, no more candles, notepaper or cheap, smelly body wash! a donation to a charity or a coffee shop gift card is much more appreciated), 12 purses (7 of which I never use), sealed boxes of software utilities for Windows 95, a Harley Davidson logo'd picture frame that someone gave to me not realizing that HD is anathema to non-HD riders, and clothes that will never again be worn by me, yet are taking up far too much valuable real estate.

Five hours later the closet is cleaned and I was knee deep in donations to be taken to Goodwill. Literally, knee-deep; 9 garbage bags full to be exact. From a space 5' x 6'. Jesus, what a pack rat I've become.

I was also sneezing uncontrollably, as I am highly allergic to dust and I have broken my treaty with it - if I let it lie where it wants to, it will leave me alone.

So I looked for some allergy meds, and all I have is the non-drowsy kind. I took it, wanting relief from the sneezing and and the eyes so itchy I could tear them out. However I forget the 6-hour part of the non-drowsy, ensuring that my afternoon nap (something I needed as I only got about 4 hours sleep Friday night) was nigh on impossible.

I killed part of the afternoon with some SnG's on Stars and Tilt, and ITM in all of them (w00t). The time comes to head to PokerTart and Bankwell's place for some poker. I don my leopard print thong underneath some comfortable sitting-around-for-a-few-hours clothes and head out.

I'm a bit late, and we're pretty much starting as soon as I come in. I'm ready to rock n roll!

Or at least I thought I was...but after the first few blinds go past, it's apparent to me that no, I was not ready for rock n roll, but rather for some nice mellow easy listening. I was zoning out during hands and not really thinking about cards or position or aggression.

It's hard to be the new player among a group of folk who have played each other before, many times before in some cases judging by the banter. There are private jokes, and they all know each other's range of starting hands and aggression level. And unfortunately, I was just too tired to pay attention, to be as aggressive as I should have been and to read the nuances of the players.

Don't get me wrong, I had fun! There was a lot of laughter around the table, and the story about lifting the balls absolutely cracked me up. But I went with two goals, to have fun and to play good poker and the second goal completely eluded me both in the tourney (second one out) and in the cash game (presto is no fucking good, ever, I don't care what some say about it). I left down $100 (60 for the tourney and 40 in the cash game), which is as it should be after a night of passive-defensive poker rather than aggressive-offensive poker.

"But Kat, how the hell is any of this PokerTart's fault?", I hear you ask.

Here's the chick/Kat logic in a nutshell: bad in poker because of being tired.Tired because no nap. No nap because of allergy meds. Allergy meds because of dust. Dust because of cleaning. Cleaning because of shirt and scale. Shirt and scale because of thinking about PokerTart. Also, tired because of waking up early to do laundry because need clothes for Pokertart and Bankwell's poker night.

Yes I'm perfectly aware that I should have done laundry around Wednesday, and that the closet has needed to be gutted for at least six months. Hell, I never said I was really capable of higher level logical thinking; you've all played against me, you know that already *grin.

Thanks so much to PokerTart and Bankwell for hosting! I hope you'll invite me to come and contribute again ;-)