The script / a final table

We turned in the first draft of Eden's Bluff on Tuesday. We had to scramble a little bit to meet the deadline (not shocking to anyone that knows me), but that is due in part to the fact that our filthy little nudist colony comedy clocked in at a robust 121 pages. Yes, that's long for a comedy script, but our mindset was simply that we wouldn't throw anything out of the first draft--instead, we'll let the producer make those decisions for us. There's definitely too much in there for the rumored budget number that we have heard but, again, we can deal with that later. We really just wanted to make it as funny and as good as possible for this draft and we really feel that we succeeded. There are parts that still make each of us laugh out loud when we read it, and that's a great sign.

I made the final table of a $5 tournament on Full Tilt the other night (265 players) and it's my first strong showing in a while. I was actually the chip leader a couple of hours into the tourney after winning a huge pot like this: I had pocket queens and raised three times the big blind before the flop and got two callers. Flop came down with two clubs, including a queen. All the money ended up going in the middle right there for all three of us--I had the top set, the guy to my left had a set of 8s, and the third player had A-Q of clubs for top pair and the nut flush draw. The turn and river were bricks and bingo, my stack was gigantic. Quite a hand. Then I went card dead for the last hour and got knocked out in 8th place.

No such luck last night. Experts say that all you can do in poker is make correct decisions, but that is little solace when you do it and it still doesn't work--especially twice in half an hour. Case in point: I'm in the same $5 tourney last night, looking for back-to-back cashes. I've got pocket jacks, only to see my raise re-raised and re-raised again. I know that one of them has me beat so I lay it down. I was right--one of them had pocket kings...but the flop would have given me a set of jacks and a monster pot. Later, with a somewhat dwindling stack, I was faced with a big decision on the turn--I had top two pair and I knew my hand was winning at that point in the heads-up pot. I just knew it. There was a flush draw on the board, so I pushed it all in...and the guy called me with a K-8 off suit, and only the 8 to the flush draw! Naturally, he caught it on the river and I was out before the first break. Two correct decisions...and neither one helped me at all. That's poker.