It probably doesn't mean a visit from Suzanne, but I was tired of the Nazi reference, despite its pedigree in the famous Seinfeld episode. So the rant for the day I posted over at poker after dark forum to a basically DARK (lights out, no one home) forum, so no one will read it. I don't know how to link it up neatly so here it is pasted for your edification and potential irritation. (sowwy about 'dat, doc)

. What's the most irritating thing about this show?

Watching poker being played on TV is worse than watching golf being played either on TV or in person. Even when there are six fairly good looking women playing (as they are now), the constant cutting and ECU shots are distracting in their obvious attempt to put spark into a basically dull process. Dull to spectators, that is. What stake do I have in the outcome?

As far as the production goes, it is also irritating to have the announcer (not a particularly witty or sonorous voiced commentator) mention the players by their first names and listed on screen by their last names. He's being better in this series about reciting full names than I remember from the first time I saw the show. And what is the purpose of Shawna (?) Hiatt? Oh, I know why she's there, but why is she needed? A one-question "interview" every 20 minutes is hardly enough justification for her presence. My guess is that she's a friend of the producer, eh?

At least the ladies in this show are not all sporting the full tilt game uniforms. Maybe they're not all affiliated with the site? It just reminds me of how tiresome the same string of tilted commercials being played at EVERY break is getting. Come play for free? Sure, folks, ever heard of the expression "there ain't no such thing as a free lunch?" It applies to poker websites as well.

But, by far, the most irritating thing is the constant claim that they are playing for $120,000 after having put up $20k of their own. That means that they are playing for $100k and have paid $20K for the privilege. You can be sure that the winner does not tell the IRS that they have won $120,000, even if they are scrupulously honest.

Why post this here? Good question. Maybe I'll just cut and paste into my blog instead. hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

So I thought I'd take a swing at the fan-art banner genre. I went to the prefs section and saw a graphic specification that mentioned 760x140 as the maximum size. I then found some Lauren pictures around and trimmed and squished them into that size for a banner. Upload the results to my gallery site. Imagine my surprise upon returning to the prefs page to learn that I'd made a picture of a size for the profile page, NOT a signature. Hmmmmmm

So i crammed it into my signature anyway only to find it's too long for there and generates an annoying scroll bar horizontally. At least I put the faces at the correct end. If you'd like to grab the thing, do so soon, 'cause I may tire of it.

But when the banner shows up on this page it's even more annoying to have the bottom 5th overlaid by the tabs graphics. So why tell me what size to make the profile banner and then cover over about twenty percent of it? What a slap, tv-cot-com! So you're leaving it to the members to figure out the actual dimensions that can be shown in the banner? The brits have a word for it - bollocks!

Off to find some Alexis' pix . . . . . . .

Last week I posted my list of level names as gleaned from forum meandering. I did that because I saw no official list. I still haven't found an official list, but there is another spot that has a much more complete and prettier list. Perhaps you've already found it yourself, but I'm sticking a link in here too, just in case I forget where I found it.

The forum bears the name of user to user help. Un-official commentary by wizened veterans of the site offer explanations in response to questions posted there. http://www.tv.com/user-to-user-help-hints-andamp-tips/unofficial-emblem-and-level-thread-update-10-5/topic/79303-421799/msgs.html
The link is too long to be shown in a blog window, but it is still clickable as it is. The base post has level names and the corresponding emblem as it appears on the profile segment for users of corresponding level.

There is also other base-level information in that forum. Apparently the high-level users of this system care more about describing it than the owners/staff.