I've been thinking about what car I want to get after Monique passes on. For some reason, I'm really digging badass looking cars. Cars with presence. The two cars that I've already got my eye on are the Mercury Marauder and the Infiniti M45. In addition to the blunt styling of both cars, I also like that they have bigass V-8s under the hood. I'm still two years away from a new car as Monique and I don't even have a year under our belt, but as is typical of me, I've already got my eyes open.
Virginia has been working disgusting hours on her pediatrics rotation this month. I think she logged about 98 hours this week (I wish I were exaggerating), and I'm pretty sure she was close to that last week as well. She goes get all of next weekend off, meaning she doesn't have to set foot inside the hospital at all. I imagine she will get drunk. I know I would. She was talking with one of her attendings and he told her that he remembered his pediatric surgery rotation very vividly. Driving to work one morning at some ungodly early hour, he had the thought that if he just wrecked his car he wouldn't have to go in that day. Virginia was like "I've had that thought twice now." They didn't laugh because it wasn't a joke. I didn't laugh when I heard the story because I've had that thought going to work before. I think nearly every job I've had since age eighteen, there's been one day where I thought that if I just jerked the wheel a little, I'd get a day off. So sad.
Poker has been going fairly even keel. On the one hand, I've been murdering Bugsy's Club. My bankroll there is at a nice fatty $461.29. I had a second place in a $2 MTT for $30. It was the same story as the first place I had a couple weeks ago. When we got to the final table I was about average. I was the chipleader with 13 left but I dropped a huge pot trying to bust a guy and was back to average when we hit 10. As blinds went up, so did the use of my raise button. I kept taking down the blinds which were big pots for our chip stacks and got myself back on top. I then busted a guy with Q4hh vs his A3 offsuit AIPF. He was pretty pissed, but I had open-raised from middle position and his all-in laid me 3:1 on what I figured was a 60/40 call, which turned out to be correct. I ran it from there and entered HU with a 10:1 chip lead which I promptly coughed up. I'm not that mad about it because in HU the other guy got killed by the deck. He had, in order, AT, AK, TT, 99, QQ, and AJ. I doubled him up on the first 3, pitched the next 3, and he was in the lead. The 7th hand brought my KQ vs his A8dd and I blanked it on out to give him the $45 first place prize money. Go him. Another big chunk o' cash found its way to my account when I decided to sit at a $.10/$.25 full ring NLHE table. I sat on the lists for a $15 and $20 HU match for about an hour and decided to just take $15 to the ring game and call it good. In 30 minutes I had racked up over $54 in profit so I called it quits. I kept getting paid off on good hands. The only lucky one was my AK vs T6 vs ?? on an AT6 flop. The dude who I don't know what he had had gone AIPF for like $4 more than my $3 raise, so I called as did the dude with T6. I led out at the flop for the pot which was around $21 and set the other guy all in. He called and the next two cards were 5's giving me aces up to beat his tens up. While things at Bugsy's are going so well, things at FTP are just crushing my soul. I had run my $5 freeroll winnings all the way to something like $18.30 before I went on a sickening losing streak. I started playing one guy who was just god awful, which is of course why I ended up something like -5 matches against him. In every match, I would be on the crush to start, driving him down to 900ish chips, then he would get in bad, hit, putting me on the short stack, and then get in bad and hit again. One particular match summed it up. I had about 2k in chips, leaving him with 1k. I was then dealt 44. The flop was AJ4. I bet, he shoved in, I called. He had J8. The turn was a J, the river an A. Go him. The next hand, I'm dealt KQ. Flop KQ6. I bet he calls. Turn 9. He checks, I bet, he calls again. River T. He checks and I check. He shows J2o and wins. Next hand, I'm down to about 500. I get AA. I raise, he calls. Flop A46 rainbow. I shove in. He calls with KQ. Turn J, river T. Much berating. I goad him into playing me again. I finally outlast his luck and peel off 3 in a row, so of course he quits. I hovered around $4 forever, losing one and winning one before I finally put a couple together to claw back up to $7. I then took my $7 to the $.02/$.05 table and ran it up to its current $11.05. I'm not sure how I'm going to proceed. I like the fact that the $2 HU matches are so small and give me a cushion against failure, but the garbage players and the big luck factor with the 1500 starting stack pushes me towards the ring games. I guess I'll play what I feel like. I might end up sending some of my Bugsy's cash over to FTP anyway since I can't get any of the decent sized HU matches going. Off to bed.
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Reading/Listening, Crash, VBDay, Poker
This will be quick. I'm still reading Miranda July and I haven't gotten a page further, and I'm also still listening to the new Coldplay CD. My tape adapter for my iPod needs cleaned but the recent oven-like temperatures in my car have caused the little bottle of cleaning solution for the tape adapter to cake shut in the little hole in the dispenser, so I need to get something stabby to open it back up.
I crashed a wedding this weekend. It wasn't like the movie. One of my best friends from high school got married in Omaha and I wasn't invited. I felt like I should be invited, and two of our other good friends from high school were invited, so I went. I took a date. The date was another friend of ours that I thought should be invited. Virginia was nervous at the idea so she met us after. It was very awkward. Not the crashing, that didn't bother me at all, and despite a stammering "H-H-H-H-Hey man!" from the groom, it didn't bother him too much either. What was awkward was knowing why I wasn't invited. Back in high school, we had a group of friends. Five of us to be exact. Within our group of friends, we all had our roles. I was sort of the outsider. I came late to the group, and I wasn't a guaranteed addition to any group activity. I had other friends. Not that they didn't, but I was a degree shadier and thus disappeared from time to time to engage in shadiness that they didn't want a part of. That was my role. Caleb was the jock. Ryan was the smartass. Kip was the whiner (dubbed "Bitch"), and Greg was the fat one. Not because he was actually fat, but because he was fatter than anybody else in the group. We called him Gurg, a sort of shortened version of Gargantuan. Both Greg and Kip (real name Zach) absolutely fell off the map in college. Greg and I talked and hung out a couple of times our freshman year and never again after that unless by happenstance. I saw Kip once in college and tried to hang out with him and his friends but it was so terrible that I seriously considered stealing a car to get away from awfulness. What I gathered from these experiences in college was that they took our joking to heart. They really felt like second class friends rather than an integral part of our group. Caleb, Ryan, and I remain good friends because we took it for what it was for; high school insecurities playing themselves out verbally. Make fun of the trait that you wish you had that you see in others to devalue it. So it hurts less. In college, I grew to embrace my own perceptions of my shortcomings. I realized that to be the person that I thought I wanted to be, I had to sacrifice things that I really like and I didn't want to do that. I matured. These two guys didn't. Or they did in a different way. I hope they realize that they really were good and dear friends back then and not just a way for me to feel better about myself. They will both be invited to my wedding someday. Greg will get two or three invitations in the mail so he gets the point, but he will still be invited. Of course, by the end of the night, I fell into old habits; I was the drunkest one there. They cut off the bar pretty early so I was forced to sniper drinks that people set on tables to dance. The nature of this activity is that you have to drink very quickly so as not to get busted. Mission accomplished. Virginia made the executive decision that I in fact did not need to meet up with Caleb, Ryan, and Dave after we closed down the wedding and the bar next door and took me home and put me in bed. It was a good decision.
Speaking of my lovely girlfriend (no, I'm not kissing ass, she doesn't read my blog; doesn't even know the address), it was her birthday yesterday. I took her to see her secret present (which I will divulge at a later date) and then we went to Blue where I had the most delicious fare that I've had in a long time. I had JUMBO shrimp that was fried with glass noodles and drizzled with sweet chili sauce that was stunningly good, and Virginia ordered a Vegas roll, a Hawaii roll, and salmon sashimi. Both rolls were amazing, and she said the salmon sashimi was the best that she's ever had. Keep in mind that she spent two years in Vegas, a place known for its world class cuisine. She was so thoroughly impressed with the food that she instantly discredited the chance that the owners were Nebraskan. The only way that her birthday could have gone better would have been if she hadn't gotten off early so I could've taken her flowers to her at the hospital, but as it stood I got to spend more time with her. I'll take that tradeoff.
Poker has been going very well. Sunday sucked, but still not badly. I've been running perfectly with odds lately which has been a big positive for my bankroll. I've been hitting the $10 and $15 HU matches at Bugsy's and the $2 HU matches at FTP. Sunday I played a few matches at Bugsy's and got dealt with. I only ended the night -1 on matches, but it was a struggle to get there. I kept getting in with the best hand and the other person on a draw and it just kept hitting. Flushes, straights, etc, wham wham wham. To end the night, I sat at a 3-handed $.25/$.50 NLHE table and won back the -$15 or so I was down. This was too high for my bankroll, but I decided to buy in for $15, ditch the match if I lost just as I would an HU match, and also to bail on the table if it filled up. It was never more than 4 handed, and that only lasted for a couple of hands, so I'm pretty happy with the self control. At FTP, I've worked my $5 freeroll winnings up to something north of $11. I went on a little run to start, which was nice because I'm very shallow there right now. I was as high as $13+, but I caught a bad one to end my night. I don't like that the rake is $.15 per tourney this low because it means that I have to come up +3 on every 20 matches just to break even. I can still accomplish this, but it's nice to have as big of a cushion as possible seeing as how I don't have the bankroll for 20 matches right now. I've made FTP my focus right now, because that is where I stand to make big money. You simply can't get big dollar games going at Bugsy's. As it stands, I have to wait about ten minutes on average to get a $15 game and it's only going to get worse as I go up. Further, FTP has much higher dollar tourneys for me to cash in on. I'm not ready to just transfer all my cash yet as I need to adjust my game to the lower starting chips at FTP, but I've been doing pretty well so far. Hopefully I can keep this going and avoid a bad patch until I have the cash to weather it. Bugsy's roll is at $363.69, FTP is around $11.25 (approx., can't connect now for some reason).
I crashed a wedding this weekend. It wasn't like the movie. One of my best friends from high school got married in Omaha and I wasn't invited. I felt like I should be invited, and two of our other good friends from high school were invited, so I went. I took a date. The date was another friend of ours that I thought should be invited. Virginia was nervous at the idea so she met us after. It was very awkward. Not the crashing, that didn't bother me at all, and despite a stammering "H-H-H-H-Hey man!" from the groom, it didn't bother him too much either. What was awkward was knowing why I wasn't invited. Back in high school, we had a group of friends. Five of us to be exact. Within our group of friends, we all had our roles. I was sort of the outsider. I came late to the group, and I wasn't a guaranteed addition to any group activity. I had other friends. Not that they didn't, but I was a degree shadier and thus disappeared from time to time to engage in shadiness that they didn't want a part of. That was my role. Caleb was the jock. Ryan was the smartass. Kip was the whiner (dubbed "Bitch"), and Greg was the fat one. Not because he was actually fat, but because he was fatter than anybody else in the group. We called him Gurg, a sort of shortened version of Gargantuan. Both Greg and Kip (real name Zach) absolutely fell off the map in college. Greg and I talked and hung out a couple of times our freshman year and never again after that unless by happenstance. I saw Kip once in college and tried to hang out with him and his friends but it was so terrible that I seriously considered stealing a car to get away from awfulness. What I gathered from these experiences in college was that they took our joking to heart. They really felt like second class friends rather than an integral part of our group. Caleb, Ryan, and I remain good friends because we took it for what it was for; high school insecurities playing themselves out verbally. Make fun of the trait that you wish you had that you see in others to devalue it. So it hurts less. In college, I grew to embrace my own perceptions of my shortcomings. I realized that to be the person that I thought I wanted to be, I had to sacrifice things that I really like and I didn't want to do that. I matured. These two guys didn't. Or they did in a different way. I hope they realize that they really were good and dear friends back then and not just a way for me to feel better about myself. They will both be invited to my wedding someday. Greg will get two or three invitations in the mail so he gets the point, but he will still be invited. Of course, by the end of the night, I fell into old habits; I was the drunkest one there. They cut off the bar pretty early so I was forced to sniper drinks that people set on tables to dance. The nature of this activity is that you have to drink very quickly so as not to get busted. Mission accomplished. Virginia made the executive decision that I in fact did not need to meet up with Caleb, Ryan, and Dave after we closed down the wedding and the bar next door and took me home and put me in bed. It was a good decision.
Speaking of my lovely girlfriend (no, I'm not kissing ass, she doesn't read my blog; doesn't even know the address), it was her birthday yesterday. I took her to see her secret present (which I will divulge at a later date) and then we went to Blue where I had the most delicious fare that I've had in a long time. I had JUMBO shrimp that was fried with glass noodles and drizzled with sweet chili sauce that was stunningly good, and Virginia ordered a Vegas roll, a Hawaii roll, and salmon sashimi. Both rolls were amazing, and she said the salmon sashimi was the best that she's ever had. Keep in mind that she spent two years in Vegas, a place known for its world class cuisine. She was so thoroughly impressed with the food that she instantly discredited the chance that the owners were Nebraskan. The only way that her birthday could have gone better would have been if she hadn't gotten off early so I could've taken her flowers to her at the hospital, but as it stood I got to spend more time with her. I'll take that tradeoff.
Poker has been going very well. Sunday sucked, but still not badly. I've been running perfectly with odds lately which has been a big positive for my bankroll. I've been hitting the $10 and $15 HU matches at Bugsy's and the $2 HU matches at FTP. Sunday I played a few matches at Bugsy's and got dealt with. I only ended the night -1 on matches, but it was a struggle to get there. I kept getting in with the best hand and the other person on a draw and it just kept hitting. Flushes, straights, etc, wham wham wham. To end the night, I sat at a 3-handed $.25/$.50 NLHE table and won back the -$15 or so I was down. This was too high for my bankroll, but I decided to buy in for $15, ditch the match if I lost just as I would an HU match, and also to bail on the table if it filled up. It was never more than 4 handed, and that only lasted for a couple of hands, so I'm pretty happy with the self control. At FTP, I've worked my $5 freeroll winnings up to something north of $11. I went on a little run to start, which was nice because I'm very shallow there right now. I was as high as $13+, but I caught a bad one to end my night. I don't like that the rake is $.15 per tourney this low because it means that I have to come up +3 on every 20 matches just to break even. I can still accomplish this, but it's nice to have as big of a cushion as possible seeing as how I don't have the bankroll for 20 matches right now. I've made FTP my focus right now, because that is where I stand to make big money. You simply can't get big dollar games going at Bugsy's. As it stands, I have to wait about ten minutes on average to get a $15 game and it's only going to get worse as I go up. Further, FTP has much higher dollar tourneys for me to cash in on. I'm not ready to just transfer all my cash yet as I need to adjust my game to the lower starting chips at FTP, but I've been doing pretty well so far. Hopefully I can keep this going and avoid a bad patch until I have the cash to weather it. Bugsy's roll is at $363.69, FTP is around $11.25 (approx., can't connect now for some reason).
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Reading/Listening, Stuff, Poker
Reading: No One Belongs Here More Than You by Miranda July. It's not bad. I've been reading it off and on for a month or so now. A lot of the stories seem very bland. Not bland in the sense of boring, because her subject matter is very interesting, but most of the stories just seem to miss the greatness they could achieve. The story "Swim Team" is brilliant. The narrator spends a summer in a pool-less small town and teaches three very elderly citizens how to swim on the floor of her apartment. But the story isn't that great because it's framed by the narrator telling her ex-boyfriend about it. The muddiness created by the pointless and dull dialog with the ex-boyfriend doesn't need to be there. Another story I just finished, "The Boy from Lam Kien" was more of the same. It started out like the last shot of a fireworks finale. The shell streaming into the air, building anticipation in the crowd as it trails a glorious tail on its ascent. And then nothing. July has this quirky lady that is intensely interesting and she creates a scene with tons of potential and then she has the lady go to sleep. It's as if she's trying too hard to subvert the expectation, which makes sense. If you click on her name above, you'll find out that not only is she an author, she's also a singer, a songwriter, and a movie maker. She tries to wring art out of everything, and this urgent desire comes through in her writing. The problem is that she's wringing her stories dry. If she didn't try so hard to have an epiphanic moment in each story, the book would be a lot better. Maybe it will be. I'm on page 119 of 201. Let's hope it improves.
Listening: Viva La Vida by Coldplay. It's awesome. I think it's about war. I haven't read anything about it (other than the lyrics to the title track), but just listening to it makes me think it's about war. I think it's because it is epic in effort. If you plan on catching them on tour for this album, expect to see a full orchestra performing along with them. Every track is richly layered and most have split personalities, ie the first half of the song is different from the last half. This is probably related to the Rocky and Bullwinkle nature of the CD title (Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends). I don't have the case with me now and I'm too lazy to go back to my desktop computer and look at track names, but there are several songs that I can't stop listening to. Go buy this CD because it's important. It's about war for God's sake. I think. I swear it's about war.
So mortgages are stressing me out. I don't like the fact that I have to run around to get fifty different pieces of information just so I can owe somebody a large chunk of money. It seems like they should have to do this. Things are going more smoothly with the house now. Our walk-through is tomorrow afternoon, so the inspector will let us know if everything is kosher. Virginia and I had a half-assed fight about the whole thing this evening though. My primary concern right now is getting the mortgage squared away because I'm tired of dealing with it. She has moved past the mortgage thoughts and has moved onto the various projects that we'll be doing once we move in. We were on the phone. I was asking her about copies of her contract. She was asking me about fence posts. Then I got snippy. Then she needled me. This is our way. When I get upset or frustrated, I just need a minute or two of peace and calm to tangle with things inside my head and wrestle them back into their cages. When Virginia senses that I'm upset or frustrated, she tries to act goofy to cheer me up. She does so by annoying the ever loving shit out of me. Misunderstanding things that I say, talking in funny voices, etc. I love her for trying to make me smile. I'd love her more if she'd just let me be surly for a few minutes. Anyway, we sorted out both the mortgage AND the fence once I got my moment of respite, so my day off today is going to be pretty busy. This whole process of buying a house really needs some improvement. It should be fun and exciting. If you drop over one hundred thousand dollars on something, you should have a perma-grin on your face for awhile. I've just got extra frown wrinkles so far.
Poker was pretty good tonight. I had a ridiculously frustrating experience in HU matches tonight against a guy named M. deSad. We played 7 matches and I ended up at 4-3. Things did not go my way. Three matches ended in coinflips. Guess who came out on top in all 3? His playing style is very easy to beat but very irritating. He raises and bets everything. Except there's no variety. Only 1 time in nearly 3 hours did I actually have to wonder what he had. When done right, this technique is incredibly difficult to combat. This was not one of those times. What was so irritating was my frigidly cold deck. I had another ridiculous string of unpaired flops. I stopped counting at 18. So I just waited. Periodically I would throw in a strong reraise to steal a pot to keep me afloat while I was waiting for a made hand. It was very boring and very frustrating. While this was going on, I played 2 other MTTs. I entered a $3 with 25 people for a guaranteed $100 pool. First payed $50, second $30, and third $20. I was doing quite well. I doubled on the first hand with 66 vs ?? on a J62 flop. The turn was another J and the river a 4, so I would imagine the guy had some sort of J but I don't know. I won another big pot about 5 minutes later with KK vs ?? on a final board of 99833. A high? I don't know why he would've called off all of his chips, but I've stopped trying to understand most players because I'll never see them again. I was then put to a test for nearly all of my chips and I intentionally chose wrong because of my other tourney. I called off all but 300 of my 38k stack with Q high to a set of 5's because I was also in a freeroll at Full Tilt. I know this doesn't make sense because first in the freeroll was only $15 and the MTT at Bugsy's paid $50, but I really need to get some money to Full Tilt without depleting either my Bugsy's bankroll or my checkbook. The Tilt tourney was hilarious. I THOUGHT it was an Omaha Hi/Lo tourney for the first 1.5 hours, but it was in fact an Omaha HI only tourney. Despite my misunderstanding, I still managed to somehow stay in the top 50 in chips for the duration of the tournament. 2400 people were there at the start, and I finished 6th for $5. I think it took over 4 hours, but oh well. It was fun. My Bugsy's bankroll is at $343.94 and my Full Tilt roll is at $5. I don't know why I'm still blogging as it is very, very late, so if you want details (Brandon) just call me tomorrow evening. Peace.
Listening: Viva La Vida by Coldplay. It's awesome. I think it's about war. I haven't read anything about it (other than the lyrics to the title track), but just listening to it makes me think it's about war. I think it's because it is epic in effort. If you plan on catching them on tour for this album, expect to see a full orchestra performing along with them. Every track is richly layered and most have split personalities, ie the first half of the song is different from the last half. This is probably related to the Rocky and Bullwinkle nature of the CD title (Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends). I don't have the case with me now and I'm too lazy to go back to my desktop computer and look at track names, but there are several songs that I can't stop listening to. Go buy this CD because it's important. It's about war for God's sake. I think. I swear it's about war.
So mortgages are stressing me out. I don't like the fact that I have to run around to get fifty different pieces of information just so I can owe somebody a large chunk of money. It seems like they should have to do this. Things are going more smoothly with the house now. Our walk-through is tomorrow afternoon, so the inspector will let us know if everything is kosher. Virginia and I had a half-assed fight about the whole thing this evening though. My primary concern right now is getting the mortgage squared away because I'm tired of dealing with it. She has moved past the mortgage thoughts and has moved onto the various projects that we'll be doing once we move in. We were on the phone. I was asking her about copies of her contract. She was asking me about fence posts. Then I got snippy. Then she needled me. This is our way. When I get upset or frustrated, I just need a minute or two of peace and calm to tangle with things inside my head and wrestle them back into their cages. When Virginia senses that I'm upset or frustrated, she tries to act goofy to cheer me up. She does so by annoying the ever loving shit out of me. Misunderstanding things that I say, talking in funny voices, etc. I love her for trying to make me smile. I'd love her more if she'd just let me be surly for a few minutes. Anyway, we sorted out both the mortgage AND the fence once I got my moment of respite, so my day off today is going to be pretty busy. This whole process of buying a house really needs some improvement. It should be fun and exciting. If you drop over one hundred thousand dollars on something, you should have a perma-grin on your face for awhile. I've just got extra frown wrinkles so far.
Poker was pretty good tonight. I had a ridiculously frustrating experience in HU matches tonight against a guy named M. deSad. We played 7 matches and I ended up at 4-3. Things did not go my way. Three matches ended in coinflips. Guess who came out on top in all 3? His playing style is very easy to beat but very irritating. He raises and bets everything. Except there's no variety. Only 1 time in nearly 3 hours did I actually have to wonder what he had. When done right, this technique is incredibly difficult to combat. This was not one of those times. What was so irritating was my frigidly cold deck. I had another ridiculous string of unpaired flops. I stopped counting at 18. So I just waited. Periodically I would throw in a strong reraise to steal a pot to keep me afloat while I was waiting for a made hand. It was very boring and very frustrating. While this was going on, I played 2 other MTTs. I entered a $3 with 25 people for a guaranteed $100 pool. First payed $50, second $30, and third $20. I was doing quite well. I doubled on the first hand with 66 vs ?? on a J62 flop. The turn was another J and the river a 4, so I would imagine the guy had some sort of J but I don't know. I won another big pot about 5 minutes later with KK vs ?? on a final board of 99833. A high? I don't know why he would've called off all of his chips, but I've stopped trying to understand most players because I'll never see them again. I was then put to a test for nearly all of my chips and I intentionally chose wrong because of my other tourney. I called off all but 300 of my 38k stack with Q high to a set of 5's because I was also in a freeroll at Full Tilt. I know this doesn't make sense because first in the freeroll was only $15 and the MTT at Bugsy's paid $50, but I really need to get some money to Full Tilt without depleting either my Bugsy's bankroll or my checkbook. The Tilt tourney was hilarious. I THOUGHT it was an Omaha Hi/Lo tourney for the first 1.5 hours, but it was in fact an Omaha HI only tourney. Despite my misunderstanding, I still managed to somehow stay in the top 50 in chips for the duration of the tournament. 2400 people were there at the start, and I finished 6th for $5. I think it took over 4 hours, but oh well. It was fun. My Bugsy's bankroll is at $343.94 and my Full Tilt roll is at $5. I don't know why I'm still blogging as it is very, very late, so if you want details (Brandon) just call me tomorrow evening. Peace.
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Hung Over, Poker
I am decidedly hung over today. My sister called me at a quarter to eleven and asked if I wanted to go jet-skiing. I didn't even realize that I was alive at first. The problem I have when I go out with Jeff is that I don't know any of the people that he does. They start talking themselves into a proverbial friend corner and I'm left in the middle of the room. So I drink. I remember everything from the bar. Home is hazy. I can picture chicken McNuggets with buffalo sauce and Demolition Man. Apparently I called Virginia. I did not call the President. I'm trying to motivate myself to do things, but it's difficult because my head weighs three hundred pounds right now. It doesn't hurt, it just feels heavier than my neck can handle. I want to job hunt, clean up the bedroom, do some laundry, go lay by the pool, and maybe work out. But here I sit too lazy to put a shirt on. I am listening to the new Coldplay album which is quite good. I imagine that my hunter-gatherer instinct will kick in here soon because my stomach is eating itself.
I had a nice score last night. I played a $2 MTT and came out tops of the 65 entrants for a $45 win. I absolutely steam-rolled the thing. I started off really slowly, but with about 40 people left I started to build it up. I was 4th in chips with 20 left. I started the FT at 3rd and in 3 hands I had the lead. I floored it and just raised every hand and quickly amassed a massive stack. With 8 left I had 250k of the 650k in play. With 5 left I had 450k. When I got it to HU I had a 600k to 50k advantage which I almost coughed up somehow by doubling him in 3 of the first 4 hands of HU. Everything just went my way and my calls were rewarded. Overall, I was happy with the ROI and it boosted my bankroll up to somewhere around $322. I don't know exactly because this morning has started out decidedly poor. I dropped my first $10 HU match when my JJ ran into QT on a J98 flop. It was sad because the dude I was playing was very ungood. He was overraising and overbetting everything, so I was waiting to pick him off, it just so happened that he hit gold when I woke up with a hand. Of course he didn't play me again. I dropped another $10 HU when a guy either kept getting tough or had the sickest run of cards ever. I was colder than a penguin's ballsack so I got chunked off bit by bit until I took and stand and got chopped off at the knees. It was like having a small cut on an artery but also being anemic. It sucked. I also whiffed in a $1 rebuy HORSE tourney. I think I was in for $4. After the first round through I was the overall chipleader but the big limit hold'em took 75% of my chips and I fizzled in Omaha 8B. So yeah, not so hot today. I'm going to take a break to get some food and then I'll probably hit it again later, hopefully with better results.
I had a nice score last night. I played a $2 MTT and came out tops of the 65 entrants for a $45 win. I absolutely steam-rolled the thing. I started off really slowly, but with about 40 people left I started to build it up. I was 4th in chips with 20 left. I started the FT at 3rd and in 3 hands I had the lead. I floored it and just raised every hand and quickly amassed a massive stack. With 8 left I had 250k of the 650k in play. With 5 left I had 450k. When I got it to HU I had a 600k to 50k advantage which I almost coughed up somehow by doubling him in 3 of the first 4 hands of HU. Everything just went my way and my calls were rewarded. Overall, I was happy with the ROI and it boosted my bankroll up to somewhere around $322. I don't know exactly because this morning has started out decidedly poor. I dropped my first $10 HU match when my JJ ran into QT on a J98 flop. It was sad because the dude I was playing was very ungood. He was overraising and overbetting everything, so I was waiting to pick him off, it just so happened that he hit gold when I woke up with a hand. Of course he didn't play me again. I dropped another $10 HU when a guy either kept getting tough or had the sickest run of cards ever. I was colder than a penguin's ballsack so I got chunked off bit by bit until I took and stand and got chopped off at the knees. It was like having a small cut on an artery but also being anemic. It sucked. I also whiffed in a $1 rebuy HORSE tourney. I think I was in for $4. After the first round through I was the overall chipleader but the big limit hold'em took 75% of my chips and I fizzled in Omaha 8B. So yeah, not so hot today. I'm going to take a break to get some food and then I'll probably hit it again later, hopefully with better results.
Friday, July 25, 2008
Delirium, Problems, The Infamous Poker
There's a delirium that comes with old age that I'm just not ready to handle. I won't ever be. I it at the bank every day. Subtle things sneak in like a master thief, and then slip back out again, unnoticed. Calling twice to check a balance on a checking account. Not remembering stopping in the previous day. Things that aren't necessarily out of the ordinary for most people, but for the elderly they're as damning as bloody gloves. Right now I forget things because I never really committed them to memory in the first place. Or because I'm fending off three other things that threaten to drive me into the ground like an emotional railroad spike. Or because I drank a lot for a long time. But if I see seventy-five, I'll forget things because everything is falling apart in my head. A jigsaw puzzle in a rat infested house; pieces missing pieces, pieces missing entirely. I'm not ready for that. I already find myself laying awake at night because falling asleep feels like dying. I can't imagine having to close my eyes at night wondering if the reaper is hiding inside my eyelids. I don't believe in an afterlife because I can't. I always prepare for the worst. I've always wanted a bomb shelter. Just in case.
It's not just the fear of death that scares me. The fading of life scares me more. Everything is so rich and wonderful as it is, I can't look forward to a life that's like watermelon in December. Tasteless. Crumbling. Save it for prisoners in Gauntanamo. Tell them that their best years are behind them. That they've become a nuisance to the ones they've loved and their sole remaining activity is awaiting a dirt nap. They'll beg for the waterboard and draw a map to Osama.
I'm kind of a downer to be around right now. My roommate wanted to go grab a beer. I advised him of the terribleness of that idea. For his sake. I'm nice sometimes.
Some of the cloud cover is caused by the perpetual problem that has become my house. The mortgage guy called today. "PS, you don't qualify for the lower rate mortgage. You're still approved, it's just going to cost an extra $600 up front and an extra $8,000 over the course of the loan. Love ya bye." My budgeting is going to have to be exquisite and my job searching will be vast and determined. Call me if you have a hook-up, even if it is your friend's cousin's dog-walker's neighbor. Bretty need new jobby. if(NewPay = (2(CurrentPay) || 1.5(CurrentPay))) then NewJob = 1. If you understood that last part, you're a huge nerd. And probably one of my friends. Or a computer science major. Or a mathematician.
I may have been doing this before, but I'm trying to build a $10,000 bankroll from $20. A professional poker player named Chris "Jesus" Ferguson (he looks like most people picture Jesus Christ, he really does) did this, except he started at $0 and had $10,000 after eighteen months. I started at $20 probably six months ago and I'm currently at $239.89. It took Jesus nine months to get from $0 to $100 and then another nine months to get from $100 to $10,000. Don't hold your breath. I'm really going to do my best not to be me this time and actually keep building this, but if history is any indicator, I'll get to around $2,000, get a bright idea, and be back at $0. For the time being, I'm playing $5 and $10 HU matches, $.02/$.05 NLHE and O8B, and the occassional small SnG or MTT. I'll keep you updated. That's enough for tonight.
It's not just the fear of death that scares me. The fading of life scares me more. Everything is so rich and wonderful as it is, I can't look forward to a life that's like watermelon in December. Tasteless. Crumbling. Save it for prisoners in Gauntanamo. Tell them that their best years are behind them. That they've become a nuisance to the ones they've loved and their sole remaining activity is awaiting a dirt nap. They'll beg for the waterboard and draw a map to Osama.
I'm kind of a downer to be around right now. My roommate wanted to go grab a beer. I advised him of the terribleness of that idea. For his sake. I'm nice sometimes.
Some of the cloud cover is caused by the perpetual problem that has become my house. The mortgage guy called today. "PS, you don't qualify for the lower rate mortgage. You're still approved, it's just going to cost an extra $600 up front and an extra $8,000 over the course of the loan. Love ya bye." My budgeting is going to have to be exquisite and my job searching will be vast and determined. Call me if you have a hook-up, even if it is your friend's cousin's dog-walker's neighbor. Bretty need new jobby. if(NewPay = (2(CurrentPay) || 1.5(CurrentPay))) then NewJob = 1. If you understood that last part, you're a huge nerd. And probably one of my friends. Or a computer science major. Or a mathematician.
I may have been doing this before, but I'm trying to build a $10,000 bankroll from $20. A professional poker player named Chris "Jesus" Ferguson (he looks like most people picture Jesus Christ, he really does) did this, except he started at $0 and had $10,000 after eighteen months. I started at $20 probably six months ago and I'm currently at $239.89. It took Jesus nine months to get from $0 to $100 and then another nine months to get from $100 to $10,000. Don't hold your breath. I'm really going to do my best not to be me this time and actually keep building this, but if history is any indicator, I'll get to around $2,000, get a bright idea, and be back at $0. For the time being, I'm playing $5 and $10 HU matches, $.02/$.05 NLHE and O8B, and the occassional small SnG or MTT. I'll keep you updated. That's enough for tonight.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Ressurection
Wow. Over two months since I've blogged last. My how time flies when you can't tell the days apart. Actually, that's not true in the slightest. In the past two months, I have (in no particular order):
Bought a house
Had Virginia move in with me
Been denied a promotion
Regained the ability to walk
Bought a new cell phone
Been through several tornadoes and ridiculous storms
Actually, that's about it. For the last month I've been working fifty hour weeks at the bank. We had a part-timer get fired so that means Bret works six days each week. I even had a thirteen consecutive day stint because I'm a retard and agreed to work a Sunday at another branch. It's been pretty brutal. Virginia and I both get home around 6pm, make dinner, do one chore, and then we're both exhausted and it's time for her to go to bed. The bad part about having her here is that I don't get to bitch about my hours. For those of you who don't know her, she's a first-year general surgery resident at UNMC, which means she works eighty hours a week. The fundamental difference is that her work is intellectually stimulating. Her reward for killing herself all day every day is that she gets to spend several hours rearranging peoples' squishy bits. My reward for my work is having survived another day without jamming a paper clip into the outlet after the third time Mr. Vecchio has come in without his hearing aid that day. For instance, we were decently staffed on Friday, so I decided to spend some time away from my drawer and take care of things. By the end of my 8.25 hour shift, I had finished a week's worth of work for two people. Sadly, I'm not kidding. I hadn't done anything myself all week, and my customer service manager is out on vacation. So I did all of the things that she would have done that week, and all of the things that I should've done that week, and I did them all in one day. This speaks to the mental gymnastics that I'm subjected to every day. It's harder than you think to not drool on yourself.
The house. Virginia and I bought a house. Yard and all. Garage and everything. My real estate agent said that I'm a hard-nosed negotiator. The reality is more that he must be terrible and I'm slightly less terrible when it comes to house negotiations. We close on August 22nd. A house-warming party will ensue. The peasants will rejoice.
I have more to say on these subjects, but I'm struggling to write this morning. As I age, I wake up earlier and earlier after I drink. I went out with Jeff last night because Virginia is afraid that she's sucking the life out of me. We went to a bar and felt old. To pass the time, we counted people wearing Affliction t-shirts and performed an informal survey of how many people know who Jackson Pollock was. Let's just say that the future of the country doesn't look too bright. ZZ Top can take off his shades. I'll write more later when the brain clouds clear up.
Bought a house
Had Virginia move in with me
Been denied a promotion
Regained the ability to walk
Bought a new cell phone
Been through several tornadoes and ridiculous storms
Actually, that's about it. For the last month I've been working fifty hour weeks at the bank. We had a part-timer get fired so that means Bret works six days each week. I even had a thirteen consecutive day stint because I'm a retard and agreed to work a Sunday at another branch. It's been pretty brutal. Virginia and I both get home around 6pm, make dinner, do one chore, and then we're both exhausted and it's time for her to go to bed. The bad part about having her here is that I don't get to bitch about my hours. For those of you who don't know her, she's a first-year general surgery resident at UNMC, which means she works eighty hours a week. The fundamental difference is that her work is intellectually stimulating. Her reward for killing herself all day every day is that she gets to spend several hours rearranging peoples' squishy bits. My reward for my work is having survived another day without jamming a paper clip into the outlet after the third time Mr. Vecchio has come in without his hearing aid that day. For instance, we were decently staffed on Friday, so I decided to spend some time away from my drawer and take care of things. By the end of my 8.25 hour shift, I had finished a week's worth of work for two people. Sadly, I'm not kidding. I hadn't done anything myself all week, and my customer service manager is out on vacation. So I did all of the things that she would have done that week, and all of the things that I should've done that week, and I did them all in one day. This speaks to the mental gymnastics that I'm subjected to every day. It's harder than you think to not drool on yourself.
The house. Virginia and I bought a house. Yard and all. Garage and everything. My real estate agent said that I'm a hard-nosed negotiator. The reality is more that he must be terrible and I'm slightly less terrible when it comes to house negotiations. We close on August 22nd. A house-warming party will ensue. The peasants will rejoice.
I have more to say on these subjects, but I'm struggling to write this morning. As I age, I wake up earlier and earlier after I drink. I went out with Jeff last night because Virginia is afraid that she's sucking the life out of me. We went to a bar and felt old. To pass the time, we counted people wearing Affliction t-shirts and performed an informal survey of how many people know who Jackson Pollock was. Let's just say that the future of the country doesn't look too bright. ZZ Top can take off his shades. I'll write more later when the brain clouds clear up.
Sunday, May 11, 2008
Hello Again
So, where do I start? As I mentioned previously, I broke my ankle. It has turned out to be the worst thing that I've ever done to myself. I have a new respect for permanently disabled people because I flat out couldn't do this all the time. It would be slightly different if I didn't have the use of my legs, but as it stands I'm essentially helpless. I can't really feed myself because I can't move a plate or glass because of my crutches. I'm not too bad with things with bags, and I can use two fingers to hold a pop bottle and still operate my crutches, but aside from that, I'm screwed. I've gotten pretty astute at getting around at least. I can shower and get dressed by myself, as well as navigate around my apartment. I'm back working, but I'm pretty useless there. There are some narrow areas and I can't get around with any sort of speed. Aside from that, if I have my foot down for more than maybe twenty minutes my ankle hurts quite a bit. I was going to try driving today, but we went to the mall so I could pick up Virginia's graduation gift and I was humbled by an escalator which took the wind out of my sails on the driving. Driving would involve my left foot exclusively as I still can't put any weight on my right foot. Anyway, those are the nuts and bolts.
Emotionally, I'm doing a lot better. I was laid up the entire week after my accident. I tried to go to work on Tuesday before I had surgery, but I only made it about five hours before I had to throw in the towel. I spent the rest of the week on the couch with my leg up. It really wore on me. I was really mad at myself, as well as feeling like I would never be able to walk again. I also felt like I would be in pain for the rest of my life. This feeling was compounded by several things. In the quest to permanently keep my foot elevated I have to sleep on my back. Normally, I can NOT sleep on my back. This means that I'm only getting four or five hours of sleep a night at most. Also, I developed a tolerance for my pain meds, meaning that I was in a constant state of discomfort. I was fine when I had Virginia here with me, but when she left Thursday morning I had a long weekend. Everything has gotten better. They put me on new pain meds, my ankle is healing which means that I'm in less pain in general, and I'm not such a burden on my sister anymore. I'm still a big pain in the ass, but I've gotten some other people to do things like give me rides and help me out at my apartment. I'm still eagerly awaiting the 29th, which is the day that I will start physical therapy and be able to walk in my boot. I think I have nearly a month of that, so it will be July before I'm walking bare-legged again. That will be a good day. For now, I have to settle for small things. They skipped putting me in a permanent cast, so I went from a splint to a boot, which was cool. Everything appears to be healing quickly, which is why I'll be walking on the 29th and not three weeks after that. Also, my friends and family have been amazing. Like I mentioned before, there's no way I'm going to be able to repay my sister for all of the help she's given me. Picking me up most of the days of the week, getting me food, doing nearly everything for me, she's been awesome. My buddy Mike has been helping me out quite a bit too. Also, people have been keeping me company as well. D'vo and his girlfriend Sarah came over last weekend and watched a movie with me. This weekend, Caleb and Tisha were in town for a wedding. They stayed at my place. Even though they have other friends in Omaha, they stayed in with me Friday night and came back a bit early from the wedding on Saturday to hang out with me some more. It was very cool of them.
I've done several things to keep myself occupied. I've read two Car and Drivers, one Popular Science, and I'm halfway through another one. When I finish this magazine, I'm going to tear into my real estate book and hopefully polish it off by Thursday when I leave to go to Reno for Virginia's graduation. I've also got some other plans for productive things while I'm laid up, but I'm keeping those under wraps for now in case I change my mind. I've played over twenty-four hours of the new Grand Theft Auto. I'm still not even halfway done. I watched every single show that was on my DVR, which was nearly twenty hours worth. I've also played a small amount of poker. I've avoided writing because my general state of drugedness and sleep deprivation reduce my eloquence. Hopefully I'll get back into the habit of blogging regularly. Well, that's all for now, hope you are all doing well.
PS - Go skydiving. It's amazing. Just make sure you are better than I am at landing.
Emotionally, I'm doing a lot better. I was laid up the entire week after my accident. I tried to go to work on Tuesday before I had surgery, but I only made it about five hours before I had to throw in the towel. I spent the rest of the week on the couch with my leg up. It really wore on me. I was really mad at myself, as well as feeling like I would never be able to walk again. I also felt like I would be in pain for the rest of my life. This feeling was compounded by several things. In the quest to permanently keep my foot elevated I have to sleep on my back. Normally, I can NOT sleep on my back. This means that I'm only getting four or five hours of sleep a night at most. Also, I developed a tolerance for my pain meds, meaning that I was in a constant state of discomfort. I was fine when I had Virginia here with me, but when she left Thursday morning I had a long weekend. Everything has gotten better. They put me on new pain meds, my ankle is healing which means that I'm in less pain in general, and I'm not such a burden on my sister anymore. I'm still a big pain in the ass, but I've gotten some other people to do things like give me rides and help me out at my apartment. I'm still eagerly awaiting the 29th, which is the day that I will start physical therapy and be able to walk in my boot. I think I have nearly a month of that, so it will be July before I'm walking bare-legged again. That will be a good day. For now, I have to settle for small things. They skipped putting me in a permanent cast, so I went from a splint to a boot, which was cool. Everything appears to be healing quickly, which is why I'll be walking on the 29th and not three weeks after that. Also, my friends and family have been amazing. Like I mentioned before, there's no way I'm going to be able to repay my sister for all of the help she's given me. Picking me up most of the days of the week, getting me food, doing nearly everything for me, she's been awesome. My buddy Mike has been helping me out quite a bit too. Also, people have been keeping me company as well. D'vo and his girlfriend Sarah came over last weekend and watched a movie with me. This weekend, Caleb and Tisha were in town for a wedding. They stayed at my place. Even though they have other friends in Omaha, they stayed in with me Friday night and came back a bit early from the wedding on Saturday to hang out with me some more. It was very cool of them.
I've done several things to keep myself occupied. I've read two Car and Drivers, one Popular Science, and I'm halfway through another one. When I finish this magazine, I'm going to tear into my real estate book and hopefully polish it off by Thursday when I leave to go to Reno for Virginia's graduation. I've also got some other plans for productive things while I'm laid up, but I'm keeping those under wraps for now in case I change my mind. I've played over twenty-four hours of the new Grand Theft Auto. I'm still not even halfway done. I watched every single show that was on my DVR, which was nearly twenty hours worth. I've also played a small amount of poker. I've avoided writing because my general state of drugedness and sleep deprivation reduce my eloquence. Hopefully I'll get back into the habit of blogging regularly. Well, that's all for now, hope you are all doing well.
PS - Go skydiving. It's amazing. Just make sure you are better than I am at landing.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)