Poker is amazing

I just won $6,000 for first place in a tournament on Full Tilt!!! :) I am so pumped. I played great the entire tournament and I feel I really deserved that first place prize. I'm hopin this is the start of a lot of success online. I'll be in the $100,000s in no time ;)

Ways to Improve

I figure if I write em down I'll follow em more.

1) Quit Scratch Tickets!!!!!- They are my biggest weakness, and although I won big, I still spend way too much on them. I got the money now so I'm gonna just quit.

2) Play the trombone- Music will always be my first love. I took my trombone out a few months ago and cleaned it and told myself I was gonna play it, but i never did. I haven't played it since I played in a concert for the reading Symphony Orchestra. I have plenty of free time so I'm gonna try and play it more often (preferably a half hour or so every day).

3) Discipline for online poker- I need to learn to quit when I am losing. My new rule is I'm not going to lose more than one buy-in in a sitting.

4) Eat healthier- This is always a problem, especially around this time of year. I'm just gonna try to cut back on the snacks and subs/calzones. We'll test that one when I get hungry lol


There's probably more but that'll do for now. It's something for me to think about, and I think it will lead me to true happiness.

Amazing CD

I just bought one of the greatest CDs I've ever listened to. It's called "Jeff Buckley Live at Sin-e`." Before Jeff got known, he played every monday night at a little cafe called Sin-e` in New York City. He would just go up and freeball a set, playing all night or just a couple of hours, and people eventually started hearing about him and coming to see him, which is how he got signed to Sony. This CD is basically going back to those days. It's just him and a guitar playing his own songs, many of them different versions from the ones on other albums, and many covers from Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin, Van Morrison, and others. It's such a personal album.. You really feel like you're there, sipping a cup of coffee and listening to this insanely passionate musician just jam all night. The thing I like the best is they left in everything, so you hear Jeff talking to the audience (probably less than 50 people), messing around like his goofy self, and just having a good time. I listened through the whole album and it was one of the most enjoyable music experiences I've had.

The Battle

The following is based on a true story........

I stand on the ladder, legs straining for balance, wrist flowing with the gentle stroke of the brush. Back, Forth. Back, Forth. I reach as far as I can, for that one spot beyond the tip. Suddenly, I see an obstruction, in the form of a fiery red, winged demon, right in the path of my stroke. I pause, contemplating my next move. I stay my hand, allowing the foe to move along without confrontation. This was not his plan. He stands there, mocking me with his stubborn reserve, taunting, jeering. I give him a peaceful nudge, one more chance at going our separate ways. He remains stubborn, and propriety goes out the window. I rear back, summoning all the strength of mighty Zeus, and slash at my enemy with my thistled weapon! He plummets, soaring through the air, and I raise my arms in triumph.

Alas, too soon is my victory! My adversary regains his composure and flies straight toward me. He flitters with the wrath and fury of a thousand suns. I bat at him furiously, trying to stem off his relentless attack, but he foresees my every move. Slash left, he goes right, flying at me before my next maneuver. I receive my first injury, a gouge to my arm. It was the spur I needed to enforce my offense. I summoned all my capabilities; strength, focus, and aim; and I smote my enemy down in a heap of entangled wing and body. I finished my work with renewed vigor, and left the job with my head held high.

I'm terrible

I have been completely slacking on this whole blog thing. I even have plenty to write about, I've just been reeeeally lazy. So here goes some major catching up.

One big thing is I'm painting a house. That's right a whole house! It's my mother's cousin's husband's house that he was renting to others but now he's going to sell it. It's kind of a mess, but I've gotten most of the bad scraping and stuff out of the way. The whole yard is kinda crazy though, so we're clearing a lot of brush and junk out of the way too. It's cool though I'm gonna be able to say I painted a whole house by myself :)

Also..... I'm going to Ireland!!!! It's the one big thing I got with my scratch ticket winnings. I've always wanted to go to Ireland, and Sarah's always wanted me to go on a trip with her, so here's both! It's a beautiful country and it'll be great for my first big trip.

Nothing big on the job searching front. I'm definitely searching, just haven't gotten much feedback. I went on an interview on Friday to EF, concidentally the company with whom I will be traveling to Ireland, but they went with someone else, so that kinda crushed my hopes. It's very frustrating but I have faith that I'll find a job.

Poker sucks and I keep losing.

So yeah that's pretty much it. I'll try harder to keep up with this as things happen.

I am the luckiest man in the world

I won $20,000 on a scratch ticket!!!! All my hard work scratching over the years finally paid off yesterday. I am still in complete shock and it hasn't really hit me that I have more money in my savings account right now than I ever have. I got some good plans for the money, like my car and student loans and other boring stuff like that. But it's great to not have to worry about not having a job yet, for a while anyway. :)

Feeling Great!

Hey guys sorry it's been so long. It's been a mix of being busy and lazy, but I think all my laziness may be going away. I'm doing really well right now just overall in life. I don't have a job yet but as far as bettering myself I'm finally taking control and doing the things i need to do to be the best I can be. That sounded a little cheesy but I guess I'll work on that later. I've been eating A LOT healthier. The biggest thing is I've pretty much given up soda, except for a diet pepsi every here and there. I've also started eating more fruits and nuts and stuff at work, rather than getting a soda and bag of chips at 9 in the morning.

I'm also officially studying for the CPA exam, which I honestly didn't think I'd start doing for a while but I figured I can get it as soon as possible. It'll take a loooot of studying, like 6 months or so, but it will definitely be worth it in the end. And I got half off the study books cuz my cousin works for a publishing company, Wiley, that makes CPA study guides. They are a huge help and are definitely preparing me for what to expect on the exam.

Other than that I'm just enjoying life, doing what I need to do, and I'm just a lot happier than I've been in a while. :) :)

very happy

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Told ya I was very happy. :) I have (unofficially) passed all me classes for the spring semester! I say unofficially because my auditing professor told me I did but the grade's not posted, and strategic management isn't either but i'm pretty sure i'm good. I am in such relief mode right now. I get to walk in a week :) and I just have one more class, Business Law, over the summer to be totally done with undergraduate college. It's a very strange feeling, and me being me, I've been getting really sentimental over the past weeks.

And..... I start painting on tuesday!!!! I know that doesn't sound very exciting but I was worried that he was gonna have enough work for me this summer, so it'll be good to have some guaranteed money. Despite the 4:30 wake up, I can't wait to get going again.

Other than that, I'm gonna try and relax as much as I can over the next few days, until I start my summer class on wednesday. Not much relaxation but I'll take it.

Spring is here!

Finally the nice weather is showing itself in New England! Although i wish there was some grace period before it got really hot. It went from 40-50 to 80-90 with barely any nice 70s between. How are we supposed to get used to that right away? How Weather?! Anyway I've spent the first nice days doing manual labor. :( We're takin up our brick patio and and replacing it with wood. Yesterday we took up the bricks and brought them to the back of the yard, and this morning we shoveled stone dust. very very fun stuff. At least it's helpin me get in shape, along with finally being able to play some bball. Of course I'm saying this while sitting on the computer in my nice cool basement. lol

the next step

I have made it over $1,ooo on fulltilt! :) :) I'm now at the highest I've ever been on online poker. I made it around the 1k mark before on ub but i forget the exact number. I'm just really excited. I can start taking this really seriously and I have the potential to win a good sum of money. Hopefully variance doesn't kill me too bad. Also, Fulltilt has their FTOPS coming up soon, which is their big string of tourneys, kind of their online version of the WSOP, and I have enough to try my hand maybe at a few of those. I'm not big into tourneys, but if there's a reasonable buy in I may give it a shot. I'm also hopin to just become a better player, playing at the higher stakes (I know many people would laugh at me saying 1-2 was high stakes but whatever it's big for me).

I cannot stop watching the video of Susan Boyle on Britain's Got Talent. If you haven't seen it yet, which I doubt, definitely check it out. I get chills every time I watch it.

Perfect Job?

I am so excited about a job prospect the Chair of the Accounting Department told me about. It's at a company called OurStage. It's a music business that helps up and comers get into the music scene. It would just be so perfect to be able to work at a place in my major but with my first love of music too. It's an internship to start out with, but they say there is a possibility of staying on full time. I'm just really excited and pumped. I e-mailed them right away so I'm crossing my fingers waiting for the response. Pray for me!

Oh and I'm kickin ass on Full Tilt right now. I'm at about 800 and playing very well. Things are starting to go really well for me, so I'm nervous what the life variance is gonna be.

Good eating week

I wanted to make this a separate post because i'm just so excited lol. I have so many good eating plans to look forward to. Tomorrow evening I have a function called "Dine and Dress for Success" at Lowell. It's a 4-course meal where speakers come in and tell you how to have a formal dining experience in a business setting. I also get to wear my suit :) Then on Tuesday I have a test and we usually get out really early so me and my buddy Bobby are going to the Owl Diner in Lowell. It's a great little greasy-spoon diner that has delicious breakfast. Biggest omelettes and pancakes you'll see. Finally, on Thursday my work study boss is taking us out, I think to Bertucci's. She does this once a semester, which is really cool cuz most work study bosses don't really care as much about their students. All in all it'll be a very great and filling week.

A sad day

I have officially stopped my cash game challenge. It was just too much and ub was completely against me. I was up and down dollar for dollar for way too long and I just got down to $400 and said that's it i'm cashin out. With my situation the 400 will be very good and I couldn't risk it. I had a few bucks left and i remembered i could change some ultimate points for cash so I'm at about $40 right now. I guess I'll just try to grind it out again. I'm also playing on fulltilt and up a little there. The best thing is I'm starting to do more homework. I'm kinda mad cause I think all I have to do is start makin pro lay downs again. I was doing really well with that the first time I had a big cash out on ub but now I'm just paying everyone off even though I'm calling most of the hands before I see them. Granted the hands I'm calling are always the nuts to my second nuts, but I just have to realize that's how it's going to be sometimes. O well you live and you learn.

Other stuff i guess

I am being forced, against my will, to recount the other activities of my life, aside from my cash game challenge. Although I have a boring life, I will oblige to this request. Let's see.... It's been a pretty good and relaxing Spring Break. Done a lot of hangin out with friends and going out to eat. The buffet at Bamboo... o man that's the good stuff. All the sushi you can eat is ok with me. Got some nice candy at beantown in Jordan's Furniture. Delicious. Been playing some poker...oops sorry, i'll get to that later. I read some for Auditing, which is necessary. I'm starting to get a new obsession. I just bought a Jeff Buckley CD, and although it's not really the music I usually listen to, I love it. The emotion he put into his music was just inspiring, and I feel myself truly affected by his songs. It's an absolute shame that he died several years ago, because I think he could have touched many people.

Ok on to the good stuff :) The new level is a rollercoaster ride and a half. I've been up and down hundreds of dollars since I moved up. I think I'm starting to get the hang of it, but when i'm runnin bad i'm runnin bad and there's nothing I can do. It's definitely a whole new game. There are some fishes, but mostly it's really play and the players can spot a lot of the moves you're trying. It's good though, I love the challenge. Right now I'm hovering around $700, which is about the average I've been at.

All kidding aside, I appreciate the push back to reality. I have to keep talking about my real life so I'm not completely consumed by the challenge. Thanks Tahly!

10K here i come

I'm movin up again!! :) After turning quad 9s in a huuge pot, I have won enough to push me over the $500 mark and move me up to $0.50-1.00. I really feel like I'm playin some great poker. I'm startin to play very careful. A lot less curiosity calls, which were really killin me in the lower levels. It was helpin get some info but a few times I called the hand exactly and then paid to see what I thought it was anyway. I'm now officially up to where I'm not used to playing, and the real challenge is gonna start. I'm excited to truly test my poker skills against some better competition, and maybe become one of those young gun internet stars the pros are always talking about. I'm hopin to get some good playin done over this week when I have a lot of time off, but I'm gonna make sure I do other things I need to get done first.

:) :)

I'm up to $0.25-0.50! :) As brutal as the ups and downs are this is gettin pretty fun. I truly believe that I can reach my 10k goal. The real challenge is coming because I haven't played much beyond 0.25-0.50, but I'm in my comfort zone now and I think I'm getting better at every level. As long as I can keep playing smart I think I can make it to the high levels no problem.

In other news.. I'm on Spring Break!!!!!! It is very much needed. This is a tough semester so I'm glad to be able to just relax for a week. I should get a head start on a couple of projects, but I'll be honest I probably won't. I'll just play plenty of poker and probably visit Sarah a couple of time. She's in London and Paris right now :( so when she comes back we'll have some go0d catching up to do.

For now I'll go back to probably feeling the pains of variance.

crazy crazy day

Today started off so terrible. All the little things happening at once happened. I hate when that happens. I got up a little late and was rushing around to get ready and then I got to school later than I usually do and got a bad parking spot. Then I got a big Auditing Exam back and I did a lot worse than I thought I did :( So basically I was in a terrible mood all day and kinda just drifted through school today not really caring.

Another terrible thing was the awful run I was on in online poker. After making my way up to $82 earlier in the week, i got the longest string of brutal beats and cold cards. I was down to $46 when i quit last night. So I got on today and was like OK let's see if i can actually win a hand today. And o did I do just that. I mean it was ridiculous the run i went on today. I couldn't do a thing wrong. I also beautifully exploited a few super-aggressive donks for very very big pots. I worked my stack up to $140!!! That's almost $100 profit in one day at that low level. And that also means...... I GET TO MOVE UP A LEVEL!!! That means I only spent 5 days in the 0.05-0.10 level and I'm already movin up to $0.10-0.25. The swings are brutal but knowing that it's going to even out is a little comforting. And I'm starting to get up to the blinds that I normally play in. I'm starting to get really excited about this challenge.

movin up

I'm up to $0.05-0.10!!!! after a little less than a month I finally am done with the 0.01-0.02 level and I can continue my progress towards 10k. I'm already up to a little over $60, down from what i was about an hour ago after a couple absurd beats. I actually met someone at the lowest levels that was doing the same thing I am. He actually has a side bet with his friend that he can make 20k in a year. His friends layin him 5 to 1 so not a bad deal. I like that I'm doin it just for fun, because it's less pressure and I'm still undecided as to what I'm gonna do when I reach my goal.

Tom "durrrr" Dwan is really inspiring me to make success in the online circuit. He is a phenomenal player so i know I have a loooong way to go before I can be near that success, but it's just a good story that he's close to my age and he's built his bankroll up to the millions. Eh it's a goal lol

I'm gonna go back to watching the brand new season of High Stakes poker, in which coincedently Dwan is making his debut.

Truckin along

After losing my way back down to $10, I've discovered the secret of doing this challenge a lot quicker. More Tables!! I can't believe I didn't think of it before but my buddy mike pointed it out for me. I was sittin at one table and just gettin bored playin any hand I could because the limits are so low I can't take it seriously. Now I'm playin 3 tables at once and playin rudimentary poker and it's workin like crazy. I've worked my way up to $25, which is actually the amount that i should be movin up to the .02-.05 level that UB doesn't have. O well I'll just hafta grind my way up to the $50 mark so I can move up to the .05-.10 tables and get into the slightly better competition. This is gettin really fun though now that I have a set plan on how to pretty much guarantee winning sessions every time I play, and I'm getting a good feel about how the people down here are playing.

progress

This cash game challenge is a slooooooooooow process. lol I knew it would take at least months to reach my goal, if not over a year, but now it's really coming clear. I've been at it for about 1-2 weeks and my account is at a little over $20. That means $8 profit. Not bad actually considering the stakes. One snag is that UB doesn't have a $0.02-0.04 or 0.02-0.05 level, so according ot my rules, I have to wait until I have $50 to move up to the $0.05-0.10 level, which will be a loooong time. Oh well, once I get past this level I think it'll start gettin easier and easier, getting up to the limits i'm used to.

lot to blog about

I am currently typing on my laptop that is hooked up to a desktop monitor. I stupidly dropped my laptop the other night and broke the screen :( It's kinda weird typing like this. Anyway, school's underway and I have a pretty good feeling about this semester. None of my classes seem like they're gonna be too tricky, so I think it'll be a good way to end my stay at UML.

I'm also trying the cash game challenge online. Some poker players try to start with $10 at the lowest level, $0.01-$0.02, and work their way up. I think it's supposed to be $10 to $100,000, but I don't think I can set my sights that high, so I'm hopin to get up to $1,000 and see what I want to do at that point. It'll be a pretty good story to tell anyway, even though it's pretty frustrating with the level of play at the lower levels. The toughest people to play against are bad players. I just never know what the hell they're doing, and they chase evry draw and always seem to hit them. O well I'm just gonna keep playing. I already have the story of being down to only one chip and coming back to win a tournament, so I'm gonna try to add to my resume of good poker stories. Hopefully it works out for me.

I'm also trying to get back into music. I cleaned my trombone the other day, so I'll finally be able to practice more, which I really miss. I'm also messing around on the keyboard too, although I'm still not good I know enough to make something that sounds like music. My first passion will always be music, so It's great to get back into it.

So basically I'm just workin on doing things that make me happy. It's the perfect time for it with all the stress going on between bein broke, worryin about findin a job, having a messed up laptop, and being in my final semester, along with other things I'm sure. I'll have a pretty good balance to my life.

breather

I had to just make myself take a break from UB for a little. The gambler's "gotta get my money back" mentality is comin on strong right now. Man what a tough couple of days i've had on there. I was up over $400 a couple days ago but I have hit a massively bad streak that it seems I can't get away from. I can tell i'm startin to worry about the money too much, so it's gettin tough to have every set I flop be beaten by a rivered straight or flush. I'm only down to 300 but still I was expectin to keep goin up. Whatever i'm still usually havin fun and i'll break the slump soon.

I can't believe I'll be goin back for my last semester in less than a week. I wish i got more work over the winter break. I was hopin to have a nice chunk of change saved up for books and what not. UB needs to help me out quick lol. I made an account on Monster.com the other day. I'm kinda skeptic if that'll actually help me find a job or not, but I gotta give it a try. I wanna get one as soon as possible so i'm not stressin out about that after I graduate. I know it's not imperative to have a job right out of college, but that's the plan i've set for myself so I wanna try to stick with it.

I guess I'll go back to watchin Everybody Loves Raymond. Very funny show.

update

It has been a veeeerrrryyyy long time. Strangely enough i've had plenty to talk about, I've just been kinda lazy. O well i guess you guys will just hafta be in the dark about the last few months of my life. For an update, I am greatly enjoying the month off after the worst semester to date. I passed all my classes :) so I just got one more teeny semester til I graduate! I'm playin online poker again, but not live after a bad situation in which I punched a hole through the wall in my basement after a loss. I'm really ashamed that I did that. I never let myself get out of control like that and if something is gonna cause me to get that angry I figured I should take some time off. I had already put money online, so I figured I'd just play a really tight game online and play for the fun of it rather than a source of income. I think that's the best way to look at poker and I didn't realize that until I blew up. Playing like that, I'm also doing very well, already quadrupling the money I put on there, spurred by a 6th place finish last night in a field of 548 players. I'm playin some amazing poker and it's just a lot more fun and a lot less stress. So yeah there's your update and i'll give another fruitless promise of writing more often. :)