I wrote a bit of a weekend recap, but apparently the blog gods didn't want you to read it, as it was eaten during the publishing process (though, to be fair, I was also doing something else in another window and may have caused the problem myself). So rather than try to write it all again, I'll mention two things I did not mention at the time:

1. Commiserations to the Bruce, who in the span of the weekend saw his A's lose both their closer Keith Foulke to the Sox and their MVP shortstop Miguel Tejada to the Orioles, of all teams.

Having said that, keep an eye on the O's. They're also after Vladi Guerrero and Ivan Rodriguez. Not sure if they have the scratch to land them both, but even one of them would be a big boost.

2. I've now seen two (which may be both that have aired) episodes of the Celebrity Poker Showdown on Bravo. One features a table of Ben Affleck, Don Cheadle, Willie Garson, Emily Procter, and David Schwimmer; the other five cast members from The West Wing (Timothy Busfield, Alison Janney, Richard Schiff, Martin Sheen, and John Spencer). There's some fairly atrocious card playing, but some good as well. Kevin Pollak hosts, dressed like a generic Vegas hipster doofus doing an impression of Kevin Pollak. Poker pro Phil Gordon provides expert commentary.

If you've watched either the World Poker Tour or ESPN's coverage of the World Series of Poker, the Bravo show will be hard to get used to. It's a lot more chummy, you can hear the crowd a lot more, and there's much less lingo. But it's not particularly bad, just more like watching your weekly game, but with famous people.

The game featuring West Wing cast members is doubly incestuous, as the show is appearing on Bravo in reruns and Josh Malina, who plays Will Bailey on the show, is executive producing the poker series. This all puts the Sports Night episode "Shoe Money Tonight" into perspective; sadly, Felicity Huffman isn't playing in the tournament. But Scott Stapp from Creed is. The Lord goes all in!