Friday, April 23, 2004

Howdy! It has been 13 days since I posted! Wow a ton can happen in that short span of time. I feel the need to make a statement about junk mail, school financing, soccer, and poker adventures.

Quick blurb on junk mail! Any company who puts "Important Document Enclosed" and it is another 0% financing credit card offer should be responsible for paying all of our taxes. Or can I have all of the money in postage that is generated as junk mail.

We enjoyed a nice rib-eye and salad for dinner. I am still enjoying the Yellow Tail Caberbet Sauvignon. Crap I just lost with a set of 9's. I had 9A and the other guy had a boat holding 95. Why me? All you can do is say 'nice hand"! Cards are pretty cold so far this evening, I am about to play in a limit holdem tournament, but first I thought I would try to build back my bankroll on Paradise. Last Friday I reached the $20+ mark and I played Omaha-8. I lost $8 on some decent hands. I am trying to build it back so I can try again. I am at $16 right now.

OK! School financing in Texas. This is an easy one to solve. Legalize poker in Texas! They just busted a couple more poker rooms. The interest is there and the games are certainly going on. I could play every night here in Austin if I had the time and bankroll. Our wonderful congressman will squander another special session. Isn't it great to see our tax dollars at work.

I have a good one about soccer. I am the assistant coach of a 7 year old girls team. Our team has yet to win a game, but I would say the girls are improving. We played this very good team. In fact they probably have been together for awhile, because they were wearing the fall silk jerseys while we wer ein our spring tee shirts. Any rate we started the game as usual with both teams and parents on the same side of the field. Every game has been this way. I ran over to the opposite side so I could help the girls on defense. After a little while the head coach came over and say "Hey switch sides with me". "OK!" our girls were playing really well and actually controlling the game against this superior team. I was cheering the girls on when the other head coach walked past me. "Get off my Line". "Excuse me" "I said get off my line" "Your line?" "Yes my line. Your team should be on the other side of the field." "Get off my Line" "Sir you do not speak to me as if I was a 4 year old. What is your problem?" "How is this your line?" Man I was fuming. I had not been this ticked in 10+ years. Oh no the tournament has started! One of our parents lightened the situation. "I got your back Carl!" I stated that it was not worth my time. I can not believe he takes seven year level soccer so seriously. He kept his star player in the entire game except for the last 1.5 minutes. Insane! We lost 4-2, but it was like a victory. We essentially scored 2 of their goals. We dominated the game. he did move his team to the other side of the field at half time. He did apologize after the game, but I thought it was hollow! I will edit this later with some poker thoughts. I can not keep up with this and 2 games.

I'm back! I managed to finally make it to the top 3 in the Midnight tournament. The leader decided to do an even 3 way chop. I was all over that! Third paid $7, so we all walked away with $12. Not bad for a $2 buy-in. So far today I have had pocket K's twice, flopped a K, then lost on the river both times to a flush and a straight. I flopped 2 pair As and 9s. Lost on the river to a straight. So now I am down to $14 at Paradise.

Here is a hand during the tournament that almost cost me. How would ya'll play this. I am in the big blind with JQo. Everyone checks to me. I check! Flop comes KKQ. I bet and get two callers. Turn is a J. I bet again and get two callers. The river is a 2. I bet! I get raised. I call! Player turns over 9T for the straight. Arrghhh! Fortunately I recovered by bluffing at the pot a couple of times.

Finally I did not finish on the bubble or in 5th in the midnight tournament at dynamitepoker.com. My PC did lock up during a crucial hand. My quick fingers managed to get me back in just in time to bet. I flopped a pair of Aces with a ten kicker. I won a decent amount. Sure can be frustrating online when the PC locks up. Thats life on the internet!

Big day tomorrow! Work day at the church 8:00 AM - 10:00 AM.. Soccer game at 11:30AM. The off to another crawfish boil. It should be fun especially if Jim Bob brings a keg of homebrew.

Play on! Rock on! Roll those cards over! I am playing in a NL omaha-8 tourny, but I am fading fast! Goodnight!

Sunday, April 11, 2004

"I'm caught up in a dream ... I ain't going to change a thing no way its my dream..." Nice little tune by Tesla. I am currently playing in a limit holdem tournament at Dynamite Poker. I played in this same tournament on Friday night. There were 29 players and I finished 4th. Once again on the BUBBLE! Now I am listening to "Lovely" by the Suicidal Tendencies. What a name for a band! I only made one mistake during the tournament on Friday. I was holding KQ suited and the flop came AK6. I checked the player to my left bet. I went to the show down thinking he was bluffing. He turned over AK. I should have folded after the flop assuming he had an ace. I lost half my stack. I did battle back, but I was out gunned down the stretch and was forced to go all in with a marginal hand.

Darn I just flopped a set of 8s and a flush came on the river. There was also a straight almost sitting on the board. I was dead meat unless the board paired up. I am in the middle of the pack right now, so I need to win a big hand soon.

A quick update on Paradise Poker. If anyone reads this thing they know that Paradise was foolish enough to give me $2. Well I have managed to grind the .02/.04 and .05/.10 tables to have a stack of $20. I want to move to Omaha-8, but the smallest stake table is .50/1. I am going to attempt to grind to $30, but I may get impatient. I think if I sit down with $12 I can be profitable. All thought it takes time I love making money from nothing!!

Today I managed to do some weeding. Why do nasty vine weeds start to grow at the very base of your favorite rose plants. There is this one weed that has nasty thorns. We have tried to be organic gardeners, but weeds are killing me! I need to find a cure for weeds. I wonder if I can nuke nut grass by adjusting the pH of the soil. The yard is looking pretty good!

We played in a soggy soccer game today. It got cold quickly! Once again we got our booties kicked all over the field, but the girls did show signs of improvement.

I just won $890 with pocket 9's. I had a feeling the bettor did not have a pocket pair and the highest card on the board was a ten. Wahooo! I was toast if my hunch was incorrect. I am now in 4th with 11 players left. The chip lead has double what I have though! I just won another 800 with a pair of Ks. I better finish in the money tonight! Gotta go and concentrate!

Well I had trouble posting, so I might as well share the conclusion to the tournament. There were 5 players left (2382, 2050, 1422, 1670, and 727). Guess who was low man on the totem pole. I get dealt AA. I raise pre-flop. Flop comes 8k4 rainbow. I raise again. Turn brings T. I am all-in. River brings a K. So what does the only player in have? Yes a King. Chit out 5th with an awesome hand! I played it right so I can not complain. I am about to enter a crazy game. It only costs $1 with no rebuys. No limit Omaha-8! Should be exciting!

Play on!
"I'm caught up in a dream ... I ain't going to change a thing no way its my dream..." Nice little tune by Tesla. I am currently playing in a limit holdem tournament at Dynamite Poker. I played in this same tournament on Friday night. There were 29 players and I finished 4th. Once again on the BUBBLE! Now I am listening to "Lovely" by the Suicidal Tendencies. What a name for a band! I only made one mistake during the tournament on Friday. I was holding KQ suited and the flop came AK6. I checked the player to my left bet. I went to the show down thinking he was bluffing. He turned over AK. I should have folded after the flop assuming he had an ace. I lost half my stack. I did battle back, but I was out gunned down the stretch and was forced to go all in with a marginal hand.

Darn I just flopped a set of 8s and a flush came on the river. There was also a straight almost sitting on the board. I was dead meat unless the board paired up. I am in the middle of the pack right now, so I need to win a big hand soon.

A quick update on Paradise Poker. If anyone reads this thing they know that Paradise was foolish enough to give me $2. Well I have managed to grind the .02/.04 and .05/.10 tables to have a stack of $20. I want to move to Omaha-8, but the smallest stake table is .50/1. I am going to attempt to grind to $30, but I may get impatient. I think if I sit down with $12 I can be profitable. All thought it takes time I love making money from nothing!!

Today I managed to do some weeding. Why do nasty vine weeds start to grow at the very base of your favorite rose plants. There is this one weed that has nasty thorns. We have tried to be organic gardeners, but weeds are killing me! I need to find a cure for weeds. I wonder if I can nuke nut grass by adjusting the pH of the soil. The yard is looking pretty good!

We played in a soggy soccer game today. It got cold quickly! Once again we got our booties kicked all over the field, but the girls did show signs of improvement.

I just won $890 with pocket 9's. I had a feeling the bettor did not have a pocket pair and the highest card on the board was a ten. Wahooo! I was toast if my hunch was incorrect. I am now in 4th with 11 players left. The chip lead has double what I have though! I just won another 800 with a pair of Ks. I better finish in the money tonight! Gotta go and concentrate!

Play on!
"I'm caught up in a dream ... I ain't going to change a thing no way its my dream..." Nice little tune by Tesla. I am currently playing in a limit holdem tournament at Dynamite Poker. I played in this same tournament on Friday night. There were 29 players and I finished 4th. Once again on the BUBBLE! Now I am listening to "Lovely" by the Suicidal Tendencies. What a name for a band! I only made one mistake during the tournament on Friday. I was holding KQ suited and the flop came AK6. I checked the player to my left bet. I went to the show down thinking he was bluffing. He turned over AK. I should have folded after the flop assuming he had an ace. I lost half my stack. I did battle back, but I was out gunned down the stretch and was forced to go all in with a marginal hand.

Darn I just flopped a set of 8s and a flush came on the river. There was also a straight almost sitting on the board. I was dead meat unless the board paired up. I am in the middle of the pack right now, so I need to win a big hand soon.

A quick update on Paradise Poker. If anyone reads this thing they know that Paradise was foolish enough to give me $2. Well I have managed to grind the .02/.04 and .05/.10 tables to have a stack of $20. I want to move to Omaha-8, but the smallest stake table is .50/1. I am going to attempt to grind to $30, but I may get impatient. I think if I sit down with $12 I can be profitable. All thought it takes time I love making money from nothing!!

Today I managed to do some weeding. Why do nasty vine weeds start to grow at the very base of your favorite rose plants. There is this one weed that has nasty thorns. We have tried to be organic gardeners, but weeds are killing me! I need to find a cure for weeds. I wonder if I can nuke nut grass by adjusting the pH of the soil. The yard is looking pretty good!

We played in a soggy soccer game today. It got cold quickly! Once again we got our booties kicked all over the field, but the girls did show signs of improvement.

I just won $890 with pocket 9's. I had a feeling the bettor did not have a pocket pair and the highest card on the board was a ten. Wahooo! I was toast if my hunch was incorrect. I am now in 4th with 11 players left. The chip lead has double what I have though! I just won another 800 with a pair of Ks. I better finish in the money tonight! Gotta go and concentrate!

Play on!
"I'm caught up in a dream ... I ain't going to change a thing no way its my dream..." Nice little tune by Tesla. I am currently playing in a limit holdem tournament at Dynamite Poker. I played in this same tournament on Friday night. There were 29 players and I finished 4th. Once again on the BUBBLE! Now I am listening to "Lovely" by the Suicidal Tendencies. What a name for a band! I only made one mistake during the tournament on Friday. I was holding KQ suited and the flop came AK6. I checked the player to my left bet. I went to the show down thinking he was bluffing. He turned over AK. I should have folded after the flop assuming he had an ace. I lost half my stack. I did battle back, but I was out gunned down the stretch and was forced to go all in with a marginal hand.

Darn I just flopped a set of 8s and a flush came on the river. There was also a straight almost sitting on the board. I was dead meat unless the board paired up. I am in the middle of the pack right now, so I need to win a big hand soon.

A quick update on Paradise Poker. If anyone reads this thing they know that Paradise was foolish enough to give me $2. Well I have managed to grind the .02/.04 and .05/.10 tables to have a stack of $20. I want to move to Omaha-8, but the smallest stake table is .50/1. I am going to attempt to grind to $30, but I may get impatient. I think if I sit down with $12 I can be profitable. All thought it takes time I love making money from nothing!!

Today I managed to do some weeding. Why do nasty vine weeds start to grow at the very base of your favorite rose plants. There is this one weed that has nasty thorns. We have tried to be organic gardeners, but weeds are killing me! I need to find a cure for weeds. I wonder if I can nuke nut grass by adjusting the pH of the soil. The yard is looking pretty good!

We played in a soggy soccer game today. It got cold quickly! Once again we got our booties kicked all over the field, but the girls did show signs of improvement.

I just won $890 with pocket 9's. I had a feeling the bettor did not have a pocket pair and the highest card on the board was a ten. Wahooo! I was toast if my hunch was incorrect. I am now in 4th with 11 players left. The chip lead has double what I have though! I just won another 800 with a pair of Ks. I better finish in the money tonight! Gotta go and concentrate!

Play on!
"I'm caught up in a dream ... I ain't going to change a thing no way its my dream..." Nice little tune by Tesla. I am currently playing in a limit holdem tournament at Dynamite Poker. I played in this same tournament on Friday night. There were 29 players and I finished 4th. Once again on the BUBBLE! Now I am listening to "Lovely" by the Suicidal Tendencies. What a name for a band! I only made one mistake during the tournament on Friday. I was holding KQ suited and the flop came AK6. I checked the player to my left bet. I went to the show down thinking he was bluffing. He turned over AK. I should have folded after the flop assuming he had an ace. I lost half my stack. I did battle back, but I was out gunned down the stretch and was forced to go all in with a marginal hand.

Darn I just flopped a set of 8s and a flush came on the river. There was also a straight almost sitting on the board. I was dead meat unless the board paired up. I am in the middle of the pack right now, so I need to win a big hand soon.

A quick update on Paradise Poker. If anyone reads this thing they know that Paradise was foolish enough to give me $2. Well I have managed to grind the .02/.04 and .05/.10 tables to have a stack of $20. I want to move to Omaha-8, but the smallest stake table is .50/1. I am going to attempt to grind to $30, but I may get impatient. I think if I sit down with $12 I can be profitable. All thought it takes time I love making money from nothing!!

Today I managed to do some weeding. Why do nasty vine weeds start to grow at the very base of your favorite rose plants. There is this one weed that has nasty thorns. We have tried to be organic gardeners, but weeds are killing me! I need to find a cure for weeds. I wonder if I can nuke nut grass by adjusting the pH of the soil. The yard is looking pretty good!

We played in a soggy soccer game today. It got cold quickly! Once again we got our booties kicked all over the field, but the girls did show signs of improvement.

I just won $890 with pocket 9's. I had a feeling the bettor did not have a pocket pair and the highest card on the board was a ten. Wahooo! I was toast if my hunch was incorrect. I am now in 4th with 11 players left. The chip lead has double what I have though! I just won another 800 with a pair of Ks. I better finish in the money tonight! Gotta go and concentrate!

Play on!

Monday, April 05, 2004

Crazy weekend! Friday I played poker until 3:00AM to win a grand total of $0.16. I was up $1.50 at one point, but got loosy goosy. A friend of mine won a tournament at pokerroom.com. I also watched to of my friends from Houston take bad beats to get knocked out of the Party Poker $30 buy in tournament.

Saturday morning up at 6:30 AM to get ready for the neighborhood garage sale. Well I was very disappointed in the the Home Owners Association (HOA) did not advertise nor did I see any signs or banners posted to get people into the neighborhood. HOA will hear about this one. As I prepare the last details my wife comes to the garage to tell me that there is no hot water. I try several times to relight the pilot to no avail. I know I was doing the correct procedure. My wife found the receipt and we had replaced the water heater just a year ago on March 1. Figures the one year warranty would be expired. We called three service companies. First one to return our call gets the business. The first one believe it or not was Roto-Rooter. We found out that they charge the same rates 24/7, so no surcharge for the weekend. Turns out it was a thermal-couple, but it was to the tune of $120. Ouch! So much for same rate 24/7, but we had to have hot water. I happened to be wearing my 2002 WSOP tee shirt. The repair guy asked if I had played in it. I stated I wish, but it is a long term goal of mine. He asked if there were any local tournaments. I answered do fish like water. He is supposed to send me an e-mail so I can hook him up with some live action. We will see if he follows through. I also gave him some URLs to sights I typically play.

In the mean time very little traffic for the garage sale. I sold a couple things, but now I was pretty much giving stuff away. I was coming up with a strategy to pack everything away, Goodwill, or trash. We had two garage cabinets that I just wanted to get rid of. A guy in a pick up asked how much. I said the pair for $5. He took it plus 4 other items for $15. My wife asked how much I got for them. I told her and thought I was in for a lecture. My rebuttal was that it would cost me $5 to drive them to Habitate for Humanity. She concurred!

Oh yeah! Since my better half could not shower she decided we needed to repaint the front door. Off to Home Depot she goes. At 2:00 PM we start on the door project. The process involved sanding, primer, and two coats of paint. I had to leave at 5:30 PM for a moonlight sail on Lake Travis. The long and short of it was that I put the door back on the house at 5:30 PM, knowing it still needed another couple of coats of paint. Bummer more work for Sunday.

I made it to the Austin Yacht Club in about 35 minutes. I was the first on there. We loaded up the 21 foot sailboat, Vitamin Sea. I started with a Shiner Bach, then once we were on our way we switched to wine. The sun set was spectacular dropping between 2 dark swirls of clouds. The full moon was already positioning itself in the sky. We sailed to a small tranquil cove. The skipper grilled salmon steaks, which was accompanied by a pasta salad, a garden salad, slice of fresh bread, and of course more wine. The moon brightened the night sky. The mood had some dark rings attached to it. Finally we headed back to the dock. There was little wind so the motor was called upon. When we docked I was amazed at how much light the moon provided. I learned a tiny bit about sailing. How some of the latches work. I also got to help fold the gib (sp?). I made it home at about 12:15 AM. I tried to play a little poker, but I knew daylight savings would get the better of me.

When we woke up our daughter was not feeling well, so I stayed home. My wife took our son to a birthday party while I slaved away at pulling weeds. I did that for about 4 hours. Fun Fun Fun!

One last rant - Why do we do this daylight savings bit anyway? I was so tired this morning. Thank goodness for my boss encouraging me to go for coffee. One eye-opener (1 shot of expresso in dark roast). Yummy!

Play on!