Can't read my, can't read my, can't read my poker face

I'm going to a bachelor party this weekend, and we're going to be playing Texas Hold 'Em.  If you've never played this game,

1. I recommend it.
2. What hole have you been living in for the last 8 years?

Anyway, in anticipation of losing money, my mind has begun to toss around some phrases from the game as I go about everyday tasks and conversations.  It got me to thinking that Texas Hold 'Em has a lot of great phrases that can carry over into non-poker life.  Here are some of the most prominent/cool examples:


Already used outside poker

All in
Meaning in poker:  Having put all one's chips into the pot for the current round.
Meaning outside poker:  Having put all one's hope or trust into something.
Examples: 
(in football)
The Bengals went all in on that blitz, allowing Mike Wallace to burn the single coverage deep.
(in dating)
My heart was broken because I was all in on that relationship.

Bad beat
Meaning in poker:  When a player has bet well, but loses the hand anyway, often because the river card is one of the very few cards that would cause the opponent to win.
Meaning outside poker:  When a person does something well, but loses anyway due to an unlikely scenario playing out that causes the defeat.

• [Tangent-within-a-tangent: Game Theory is a branch of mathematics that I know very little about, but it's so fascinating that I talk a lot about it anyway.  One of the central statements of this field is that games with "perfect knowledge" always have a winning strategy (or, if a tie is possible, a non-losing strategy).  Perfect knowledge means that each player can see all the factors influencing the game (pieces, cards, dice rolls, etc.); so in chess, Connect Four, and tic-tac-toe, players have perfect knowledge, but in Stratego, Risk, poker, and Monopoly, players do not.  Using our poker terminology, this statement could be rephrased to "Games with perfect knowledge do not have bad beats."  This is probably clear if you've been able to follow this embedded tangent; if the game features a winning strategy, you can't blame a "bad beat" for your loss... just your inferior strategy.]

Examples: 
(football)
We won the field position battle and got into position for a game-winning field goal when a torrential downpour suddenly overtook the field.  What a bad beat.
(dating)
Despite all my charm, humor, and rugged good looks, and the fact that what Juliet and I shared was real and beautiful, it turned out to be a bad beat as Romeo opened up a bottle of Love Potion Number 9.


Ready to crack into the real world

Pay to see the flop
Meaning in poker:  To match the bet of the player in the "big blind" seat in order to be a part of the hand.
Meaning outside poker:  To satisfy one's curiosity by paying some price to be a part of something that's about to happen.
Examples:
(football)
"Yeah, so why did the Lions draft 3 WRs in the first round in a 4-year span?"  "Great question.  They always pay to see the flop."
(futility)
After being badgered so long by my neighbor to go out with her single female friend, I finally paid to see the flop and gave her a call.


I'm sure I've forgotten some great ones, since the game seems to be filled with awesome jargon.  Let me know your ideas!

Jon



The worst smell in the world

Dudes,

There are a lot of bad smells in the world.  Among them, some have attained "legendary status": skunk, any kind of crap, limburger cheese (seriously, how could anyone eat that stuff?)...

But I've smelled something far worse.  No matter how many sewage plants or dead animals I drive by, there will always be one odorous memory that haunts me more than any other.  I could give you 1,000 guesses, and there's no way you'd get it (unless you glanced down and saw the picture below).

Yeah, the worst smell in the world is an orange peel.

You are probably in squinting your eyes, shaking your head, thinking, "Jon is an idiot."  And that last part may be true, but I assure you, the picture above represents one of the worst smells, nay experiences, of my life.  Here's the story:

I spent some time in "East Asia" (pardon the secrecy) about 5 years ago.  My roommate while there was an old friend of mine, Greg Del Moro.

• [Tangent-within-a-tangent: As you might have already realized, the name Greg Del Moro is extremely similar to the name Gregor Mendel.  So we usually called Greg by the name Gregor Mendel-moro or just "the father of genetics".]

The first day that Gregor and I entered our dorm room was the worst day of our lives.  We unpacked and were checking out the facilities, which included a mini-fridge in our room.  We opened the fridge door and were physically knocked back by a freight train of stench.  Putrid, invisible coils of decayed citrus death punched me in the stomach and clawed at my neck.

Apparently the people of that part of the world find that orange peels help keep a fridge or room fresh and pleasant?  And while this might be true of a peel that's one or two days old (I wouldn't know, I've never dared experiment with such a monstrous power), the one in our fridge must have been rotting for months.

If you google "orange peel uses" or "orange peel scent", you will actually find tips for how orange peels can freshen the air -- while they're being boiled.  And I can attest to this, as just tonight my roomate boiled some orange peels while making cider.  Yeah, my roommate makes cider.

Questions for you to ponder/answer:

1. Do you have any stories of something that smelled surprisingly awful?
2. Do you have any friends with sweet nicknames like "the father of genetics"? 

Yours,
Jon