I feel so unsatisfied.

This is the 2nd night in the row I'm making a solid run in a decent sized tournament field. It's really sick how well it seems I'm running with the little I'm playing.

I just got 21/351 players in a $5.50 regular MTT. Last night I took 15/244 in a $2.25 deepstack turbo MTT. Then I checked last months excel sheet and I see 24/691 , 19/368 , 28/377. Then of course I took 2nd in a 90 man as well good for $50 profit.

With the exception of the 90 man all these close but no cigar runs are difficult to swallow. I really thought that coming up short in the last 4 runs tonight's $5.50 would have been better. The Dray Days Twitter page has all the updates as I played it through so I won't rehash hands but it's like I always say: if you're going to run good in a tournament, do it at the end.

I will always carry reservations when I run great early or midway through tourneys. Historically any time I've won or final tabled something big it's been tight play followed by a good run down the stretch. Maybe I shouldn't think negatively but it's based on history what can I say?

Besides fun poker tournaments online I've had a great weekend so far. I got to spend quite a bit of good quality time with Kristina as she's now in her 9th month of pregnancy officially. With my schedule it's kind of lame that even when I'm off I end up sleeping a large portion of her Wednesday's off. We're managing though and I'm still keeping my fingers crossed that some kind of schedule change is coming. I have a resume submitted for Billing at work which is M-F but it's been 2 weeks and I haven't even heard about an interview. :(

My old boss at KTSW sent me an email about a job opening at Clear Channel this week. It's an audio design engineer position producing commercials and promotions for the cluster of Austin stations they own. I went to Mix today and burned off everything that I produced when I was unemployed and able to pick up hours working in that department.

Came back home and earlier tonight made my first production demo with short clips of several different projects to try and show my "range". I probably listened to it 30 times after finishing it. Did my cover letter and resume and sent them in with the mp3, so now all I can do is hope. A steady full time radio gig and in production would be an AMAZING opportunity to learn and grow.

Another deep run tonight.

Last night I played 2 tournies, a $3.30 deep stack and a $5.50 bounty 6 max. I went deep in both, moreso in the 6 max. 19/368 players and claimed 7 $1 bounties altogether. It was a pretty crazy rollercoaster towards the end where I was putting some pretty bad beats on people. I really thought I'd end up final tabling just because of that, but alas feel short. $12 profit altogether. I had chips in the $3.30 for a while but didn't end up cashing.

My sleep schedule was all out of wack today because I was up all night, slept for 4 hours and then got up to go to my wife's doctor's appointment. We also went grocery shopping too, and rather than take a nap I wanted to stay up so I could watch the season premiere of Fringe - one of my FAVORITE shows on TV. The only thing I don't like about Fringe is that there's never any resolution! :) They just keep things hanging all the time. So we both crashed out after the show and I woke up at 2am and jumped into the same $3.30 deep stack tourney. Instead of the $5.50 I opted for another $3.30, a turbo deep stack bounty sng, for my 2nd table.

I got 2nd in that one and for the first time used the new "make a deal" feature that full tilt FINALLY implemented after years of there being no way to do that. It's really easy because they do all the math for you, the default I guess is chopping it up based on ICM (Independent Chip Modeling). I know I'm going to botch this explanation but that calculates your equity for the prize pool based on your chip count. I really don't understand this math side of poker very well, but to make things simpler - the deal basically got my an extra $9. The difference between 2nd and first place was $20 essentially and since we had nearly even chips, we halfed that $20. If he had me 3-1 in chips then I probably would only have gotten and extra 2 or 3 bucks. In which case making a deal probably wouldn't have really mattered. But overall it was a $50 profit and as Jules and Vincent would say in Pulp Fiction: "We Happy."

I cashed 28/377 in the $3.30 deep stack as well. It was sick at the end I ran into Aces TWICE with my big playable hands on the bubble. LOL so for a 3 hour game I made less than $2.

But hey, I'm pretty amazed that I've had 4 pretty deep tournament runs this month with the small sample size I've put in. Even though tournies don't pay much until the end, I still think they're more exciting than cash games. It just seems I get so bored in cash games for whatever reason. Tournaments always have the element of excitement and anticipation which I've always liked, even if you can make more money from cash games.

So anyways I'll probably be up for a few more hours, I go back to work tonight. :( I will leave with a movie recommendation, and that is Vicky Cristina Barcelona starring Scarlett Johanssen Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem, who most people will recognize as the villain from No Country For Old Men. Cruz won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for her role in it this past year. It's a Woody Allen movie, romantic comedy but not your typical Matthew Mcconaughey or Jennifer Aniston style blockbuster formula.

It's a story of 2 friends, Vicky and Cristina, who go to Barcelona for the summer and have 2 completely opposite views on love. Vicky's engaged to be married - values committment and stability. Cristina is passionate and free spirited - she knows what she doesn't want (typical accepted relationship standards), but she also doesn't know WHAT she wants. They meet a painter (Bardem) who's known for his publicized fiery split with his ex wife (Cruz) and he invites the girls to fly with him to a small Spanish town to go look at sculptures. It really just takes off from there - but I just think that the script is great and there are lot of great interactions between the characters and a LOT of really funny moments.

So yeah, I recommend it. LOL

Not much to report poker wise

Work has been pretty brutal the last 2 weeks. Working 9pm-8am for 3 days straight with the last 2 shifts ending a little earlier. Weekends are now Wednesday, Thursday. I'm still trying to get my bearings on a sleep schedule. In general I try to get to bed soon after it's over but sometimes I'll stay up until 11:30ish.

The weekends are weird too because Kristina's generally either exhausted from doing shipment or is getting up early the next day to go to shipment. So I'm spending the wee hours on my days off quietly on the computer. Like now.

That's about the only time I really have to play poker too it seems. I just feel like there's not enough time in the day lately especially with this schedule so I want to try and get enough couple time in when I'm not sleeping through the day.

I've actually been spending a LOT of time on the facebook game Farm Town. I'm completely hooked! (Growing grapes as we speak) I didn't think I'd ever start playing a Facebook game, but just like the site itself, once Kristina got on board so did I. It's really kind of sad that we talk about it so much.

We're moving in 2 weeks and we've already got a lot of things packed up. I'm getting rid of the garage sale "dresser" that's housed my turntable setup since I was in school. I don't know what I'll do with the stuff when I get to the new place but I figure it's time to upgrade, and so getting rid of the dresser will force me to when the time's right. Besides I don't spin as much as I used to and there may not be a good place for all that at the new apartment.

Baby Aubrey Belle is coming along. We're just beginning the 7th month! It took a while to feel her kicking but now I can feel her all the time. It's already so much fun. :) Haven't been updating the baby blog lately, things have just been busy and stressful. I think by this time next year we're going to be in dire need of a vacation.

Hey man nice shot

Finally a shot taken has been rewarded! Just took 2nd in a $13 90 man good for $175 profit.

Roll's now up to 625. ^.^ (I learned that symbol from my work btw)

For those who don't have me on Facebook, I start my new 9pm-6am shift this Sunday night. :/ Tonight (Saturday) will likely be my last on-air shift for a while seeing as this new job has screwed me by scheduling me in the middle of my normal Saturday gig.

I don't particularly like all this change in my life, but perhaps looking back it will all have been good for me. God knows what he's doing up there. I don't have a clue, but He sure does. In the end everything will be OK.

Thank you Sir for the late night victory!

I keep forgetting to mention this

The computer guy at my new workplace is named Mike Moneymaker.

He's a distant cousin to Chris Moneymaker.

After talking to him the day I found this out, he revealed that he's never met the guy. Small world. :)

What it takes to win tournaments

Whole lotta luck. And I haven't won yet.

Full Tilt Poker Game #12386668393: $3 + $0.30 KO Sit & Go (92444970), Table 3 - 200/400 Ante 50 - No Limit Hold'em - 12:48:22 ET - 2009/05/23
Seat 1: decdealer (5,963)
Seat 2: 1967charger (3,401)
Seat 3: blackcash88 (14,995)
Seat 5: Redbarn59 (8,135)
Seat 6: pedrocecch (2,590)
Seat 7: ktcady (11,975)
Seat 8: Yankee-C (4,565)
Seat 9: Dray (5,570)
decdealer antes 50
1967charger antes 50
blackcash88 antes 50
Redbarn59 antes 50
pedrocecch antes 50
ktcady antes 50
Yankee-C antes 50
Dray antes 50
1967charger posts the small blind of 200
blackcash88 posts the big blind of 400
The button is in seat #1
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Dray [8h Ac]
Redbarn59 folds
pedrocecch folds
ktcady folds
Yankee-C folds
Dray raises to 5,520, and is all in
decdealer raises to 5,913, and is all in
1967charger folds
blackcash88 folds
decdealer shows [Qh As]
Dray shows [8h Ac]
Uncalled bet of 393 returned to decdealer
*** FLOP *** [8c 9c Ad]
*** TURN *** [8c 9c Ad] [8d]
*** RIVER *** [8c 9c Ad 8d] [6d]
decdealer shows two pair, Aces and Eights
Dray shows a full house, Eights full of Aces
Dray wins the pot (12,040) with a full house, Eights full of Aces
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 12,040 | Rake 0
Board: [8c 9c Ad 8d 6d]
Seat 1: decdealer (button) showed [Qh As] and lost with two pair, Aces and Eights
Seat 2: 1967charger (small blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 3: blackcash88 (big blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 5: Redbarn59 folded before the Flop
Seat 6: pedrocecch folded before the Flop
Seat 7: ktcady folded before the Flop
Seat 8: Yankee-C folded before the Flop
Seat 9: Dray showed [8h Ac] and won (12,040) with a full house, Eights full of Aces

Been grinding $5 cash game for the last 3 hours and am also in the tourney above. Another week without even touching Full Tilt. Kristina's working this morning though so I'm having myself a lazy Saturday start. May has been a very unusual month in terms of poker playing, but I've gotten a lot more sleep! Blizzard training has just been taking it out of me I guess.

They gave my set shift once I'm out of training: 4pm-1am M-F. Which really blows because I also work the radio shift 6-12am on Saturdays. That means my lady's alone 6 out 7 nights during the week. :/

What's funny is I might end up switching jobs just in time. I interviewed with another company about a shipping/receiving job almost two weeks ago. Yesterday I got an email saying they had a few more people to interview but I was at the top of their list thus far. If I don't end up getting it I'll probably be pretty pissed that they sent that email but for right now I like my chances. :) More money, would still have benefits, and half day Fridays. Best proposition I've had since getting laid off.

Satellite Sunday

I haven't played any poker at all since Sunday night before I started training at my new job. The hours have been 8-5 and after that I've mostly just been spending time at home with Kristina this week just chillin.

Out of nowhere I got an $45 affiliate bonus this month for players that I already have signed up earning 200 points? I wasn't even aware I could still make money off of players once I got their initial bonus money. I'm certainly not complaining, but like all big bonus money it's so much easier to spend because it isn't "earned". So even though I haven't played one hand of cards this week I've signed up for the $33 200K Stiumulus tourney that FTP is running. It's a mega satellite for the ginormous crapshoot $1K WSOP tourney plus $1500 in travel expenses.

It's really exciting because this is the first real shot I've ever taken to try and get to Vegas. But even if I win I'm still not quite sure what I'll do. There's a very good chance I'll just keep the money in my roll and just grind with it. The main determinate will have to be what my work situation ends up being.

So I've started this new tech support job but I'm under 90 day temp status essentially. I'm also interviewing for another better paying job on Monday. Regardless of where I end up I'm probably not going to be able to immediately ask for a day or two off to go to Vegas. Eh I'm really just getting ahead of myself.

One last thing is I'm trying to install World of Warcraft on my external harddrive. It's taken HOURS starting from last night and lasting still through this very moment. SO annoying and I know it's not going to be worth it, but I have got to understand what the fuck everyone is talking about in training.

The hits keep on comin

I had me another nice run in an MTT, 3rd in a $2.25 180 man good for like $45. That boosts me up to like $275. It's funny how streaky poker is. I've actually been indecisive on what to do with this money boost, like what direction to go in. Sometimes I get bit by the tournament bug really bad and that's what I find myself looking for constantly. But I also know that the variance is so high, I don't REALLY want to bang away at them because the money's always few and far between.

Honestly lately I've been so indecisive lately that when I'm not feeling it I either don't play at all or just very little. I haven't started 4 tabling $5 sngs and I'm glad because the $2.25's I've been grinding the last 2 weeks haven't been going well at all. It seems like the last few sessions I've put in I cash in 1 out of the 4 I play and it's usually a 3rd or 2nd. Good thing I'm making up for it in other games!

I'm thinking about straight buying into the $33 WSOP satellite in two Sundays. It's a big guarantee for $2500 packages to the series, $1000 buyin for event #4 and $1500 travel expenses. My interest in tokens and satelliting in for less is really down because I'd probably spend the same amount trying to win the dang buyin. I dunno we'll see. I'm just going to keep doing what I'm doing and take it as it comes.

Real world update I officially have a job with Blizzard Entertainment, the company that created World of Warcraft. I start training in a week. The pay is kind of low so I'm still keeping my eyes out for other opportunities. I actually have an interview with a real estate company tomorrow to be there admin assistant. The pay's a little closer to what I was making at SWA but they don't offer benefits. Whatever happens I'll be happy to be working again. Blizzard seems like a really cool company with a very young employee base. I already have two friends that work for them.

OK I'm getting distracted from the $3.30 90 man I'm in right now. Later!

Saturday's off to a good start

I've barely touched Full Tilt this week. Since last Saturday I played one 4-tabling round of SNGs. I've just been really busy working the temp call center job from 7-2:30. That schedule has me ready to crash anywhere from 10:30-Midnight. Tuesday night we also had our church small group meeting which went well. It was nice going to church this past Sunday and recognizing people from the group.

I probably could've stayed in and grinded a lot last night while Kristina closed at Old Navy but instead I invited Patrick over to spin some records. I really love that the speakers are working well thanks to me restripping the speaker wire when Eli came over a month ago. Long before I was obsessed with poker I was hooked on vinyl. Even though I've heard most of my records hundreds of times I still get the same joy from mixing and jamming out. Last Friday I had an hour and a half between work and meeting Kristina to get her hail damage appraised. I just came home and straight rocked it for the whole time and then headed out. The only greater satisfaction with DJ'ing is doing the same thing but in front of a crowd that gets it and loves it.

So anyways this morning Kristina's back at work and I just fired up a $5.50 18 man and took 2nd place, good for a $21 profit. My account balance this month started out at $133 and now it's up $187 so I'm definitely walking on sunshine so far today. I know $21 isn't anything to get giddy over in terms of itself, but in terms of percentage increase in my bankroll and that it's 3x the amount a $2.25 SNG win would get me it's a VERY nice boost.

Oh about the hail damage, State Farm's cut us a check for $3500 so we'll be shopping around for a used car in the coming weeks. Kristina came up with the brilliant idea of us keeping her car with the salvage title to it and using the money to get a 4 door that she'll need for the baby. So she'll get the four door and I'll start driving her Civic, which means we can kiss my piece of shit car goodbye!!!!!! And not only will I have a car with AC after being deprived for over 5 years, but all the stickers are updated so no more sweating close encounters with the police. And I imagine with the change in car status perhaps our insurance premiums will go down too.

No real advancements in the job search. As far as I know the temp job is over for now until they call me back, which could be on Monday if last time was any indicator. I do have a possible lead through one of Kristina's friends. Her fiancee knows a guy who's leaving next week and so as soon as he knows what I have to do to apply for the job they'll let me know. It's a good company with flexible schedules and good benefits and the job would be kind of an inventory clerk type deal. So I'm really keeping my fingers crossed that it will work out and we can get some kind of stability back in this sphere of life.

Don't forget to check the baby blog for updates about the pregnancy. We've got another appointment coming up this Wednesday afternoon! I'm officially excited for this baby now. :)

Annoying

The start of this month I was running insanely good and the last few days it's starting to even out. The last 2 or 3 rounds I've put in I've cashed in maybe 1 out of 4, no wins either.

This just happened and I wanted to post it because it's really annoying to me. It really eggs me when I've spent 10 minutes shoving and abusing the bubble and the tightwad that's not playing anything does this to me in 2 hands:


Full Tilt Poker Game #11625563951: $2 +

$0.25 Sit & Go (87248110), Table 1 -

150/300 - No Limit Hold'em - 10:24:47

ET - 2009/04/11
Seat 3: 1Krom (4,380)
Seat 4: Dray (4,415)
Seat 7: romasik77 (1,910)
Seat 8: skeyediver (2,795)
Dray posts the small blind of 150
romasik77 posts the big blind of 300
The button is in seat #3
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Dray [Ks Th]
skeyediver folds
1Krom folds
Dray raises to 4,415, and is all in
romasik77 has 15 seconds left to act
romasik77 calls 1,610, and is all in
Dray shows [Ks Th]
romasik77 shows [6c 5c]
Uncalled bet of 2,505 returned to Dray
*** FLOP *** [Qc 8c 2c]
*** TURN *** [Qc 8c 2c] [9h]
*** RIVER *** [Qc 8c 2c 9h] [5d]
Dray shows King Queen high
romasik77 shows a flush, Queen high
romasik77 wins the pot (3,820) with a

flush, Queen high
Dray is feeling angry
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 3,820 | Rake 0
Board: [Qc 8c 2c 9h 5d]
Seat 3: 1Krom (button) didn't bet

(folded)
Seat 4: Dray (small blind) showed [Ks

Th] and lost with King Queen high
Seat 7: romasik77 (big blind) showed

[6c 5c] and won (3,820) with a flush,

Queen high
Seat 8: skeyediver didn't bet (folded)

Full Tilt Poker Game #11625569699: $2 +

$0.25 Sit & Go (87248110), Table 1 -

150/300 - No Limit Hold'em - 10:25:20

ET - 2009/04/11
Seat 3: 1Krom (4,380)
Seat 4: Dray (2,505)
Seat 7: romasik77 (3,820)
Seat 8: skeyediver (2,795)
romasik77 posts the small blind of 150
skeyediver posts the big blind of 300
The button is in seat #4
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Dray [Ac 4h]
1Krom folds
Dray raises to 2,505, and is all in
romasik77 raises to 3,820, and is all

in
skeyediver folds
romasik77 shows [Js Ah]
Dray shows [Ac 4h]
Uncalled bet of 1,315 returned to

romasik77
*** FLOP *** [Kc Jh 5h]
Dray: gg
*** TURN *** [Kc Jh 5h] [7h]
*** RIVER *** [Kc Jh 5h 7h] [2s]
romasik77 shows a pair of Jacks
Dray shows Ace King high
romasik77 wins the pot (5,310) with a

pair of Jacks
Dray stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 5,310 | Rake 0
Board: [Kc Jh 5h 7h 2s]
Seat 3: 1Krom didn't bet (folded)
Seat 4: Dray (button) showed [Ac 4h]

and lost with Ace King high
Seat 7: romasik77 (small blind) showed

[Js Ah] and won (5,310) with a pair of

Jacks
Seat 8: skeyediver (big blind) folded

before the Flop

Sorry for the poor formatting this is just how it looked after I pasted it into Notepad. I got my first rakeback deposit yesterday for $3.70 which is cool.

On a real world note I've been working as a temp at a call center for the last week. The shift is from 7am-2:30pm and the people there are really laid back. They don't regiment your breaks they just want you to document them. The break room has internet and Wii. It sucks getting up going to be early and waking up at 5:45 but I really like getting out at 2:30. Not battling traffic is pretty sweet too.

I still need to keep looking for a permanent job though. I did my minimum searches all on Monday when I was off and nothing since. I called and did a phone interview for a dentist's office, still haven't heard back about that. One of Kristina's friends had a lead for me too in her friend's husband's office. Some guy is going to be putting in his 2 weeks this week I think. It's an inventory type job and it's supposed to be a pretty decent company with lots of perks.

What else...we're probably going to be getting a new car soon. We took Kristina's civic to get appraised for hail damage yesterday and they said it was really close to totaling out. So we might end up taking the money and getting a used car that has four doors. That's our primary concern because trying to get a baby in and out of that thing would be a pain in the ass. I always thought we'd be replacing my car but it's been 3 or 4 years since I've talked about it and it's never happened. It's at 191K miles right now (Mazda Protege) and even though it has no AC, among other things, I still think I can get a couple more years out of it.

Also, we were looking into possibly transferring into a 1 bed/1 study apartment this week that was going to be cheaper than the rent we're paying. But that got totally screwed because I don't have a job and so I wouldn't be able to pass their screen for that. Dammit. Kristina wasn't happy with the situation, but I thought about it and at least the timing of my layoff was good to where our lease isn't up until August. If it had come up sooner and we were looking to move we'd be facing the same situation.

That's enough for now. Here's a made for TV hand that I played this morning:

Full Tilt Poker Game #11625332924: $2 + $0.25 Sit & Go (87248199), Table 1 - 60/120 - No Limit Hold'em - 10:01:30 ET - 2009/04/11
Seat 1: volucer (3,520)
Seat 2: bellheim (2,350)
Seat 3: crazyboyroy (2,820)
Seat 4: Sphageus (935)
Seat 5: SwannySA (1,490)
Seat 6: Dray (1,650)
Seat 7: mt204 (735)
volucer posts the small blind of 60
bellheim posts the big blind of 120
The button is in seat #7
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Dray [Ac 4c]
crazyboyroy folds
Sphageus has 15 seconds left to act
Sphageus folds
SwannySA folds
Dray raises to 1,650, and is all in
mt204 folds
volucer folds
bellheim calls 1,530
Dray shows [Ac 4c]
bellheim shows [5d 5c]
*** FLOP *** [3s Ad 5s]
*** TURN *** [3s Ad 5s] [2c]
*** RIVER *** [3s Ad 5s 2c] [5h]
Dray shows a straight, Five high
bellheim shows four of a kind, Fives
bellheim wins the pot (3,360) with four of a kind, Fives
Dray stands up
The blinds are now 80/160
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 3,360 | Rake 0
Board: [3s Ad 5s 2c 5h]
Seat 1: volucer (small blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 2: bellheim (big blind) showed [5d 5c] and won (3,360) with four of a kind, Fives
Seat 3: crazyboyroy didn't bet (folded)
Seat 4: Sphageus didn't bet (folded)
Seat 5: SwannySA didn't bet (folded)
Seat 6: Dray showed [Ac 4c] and lost with a straight, Five high
Seat 7: mt204 (button) didn't bet (folded)

2:30am random stuff post

I've been slacking on SNGs the last week or so, instead playing a few more tournaments. You know the usual hoping to run like God and make a halfway decent score. Nothing to report there. I did fire up some SNGs around 1am tonight and got sick lucky for 3 first places. The fourth SNG I busted in 8th when QQ cracked my rockets on the river. Can't complain because of how bulletproof I was in more than one of my other SNGs.

Kristina and I have started a baby blog @ http://babykinney.blogspot.com. I've linked it on the right hand side of the page. Oh and by the way, I'd love to snag a few more followers on this and that blog too. So if you're just lurking with a google or gmail account and you haven't signed up as a follower, you should. :) I think they've made it fairly easy with a follow button in the spot where all the followers are listed.

It's SXSW right now and I've never bought a wristband and done it up despite having been here for over 10 years. It's just too expensive, and you're not just paying for the wristband. There's gas, drinks, food, etc. Anyways, I did finally check out a free show at Auditorium Shores with Jason and his girl Allison. I was there to see M. Ward who's become one of my absolute favorite artists, especially his album with actress Zoeey Deschanel. Together they're called She and Him. Here's a few links to videos of them, and also some M. Ward on his own. The show was great!

You Really Got a Hold On Me cover



Black Hole (I'm trying to learn this one on guitar)


Lonesome Town cover (just found this one tonight, I know it by Ricky Nelson from the Pulp Fiction soundtrack)



M. Ward - Fuel For Fire



Paul's Song is one of my favorites from the Transistor Radio album



Hold Time (title track of the newest album)

7 weeks now?

It still doesn't seem like Kristina's pregnant. It just hasn't hit home yet, and it probably won't really until she starts showing. Maybe when we hear the heartbeat which won't be too long.

So far the biggest challenge she's faced is being tired all the time. Her taste buds have been affected too so that green veggies are not sitting well with her. She normally likes them way more than me, but they just make her want to gag now. That's supposed to change in the 2nd trimester.

A couple of weeks ago she was still cramping and bleeding a little bit. It made her worried so she went back to the doctor and they saw that her progesterone levels were at half of what they should be. So since then she's been taking that prescription twice a day and will be for the rest of the month. Apparently low progesterone can be a major culprit for miscarriages, so thank goodness we caught that. It makes us wonder whether that was why her cycle was so off to begin with instead of PCOS (Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome).

This past Tuesday we went to the State Department of Health and Human Services to apply for Medicaid assistance. We both felt really out of place in the waiting area. The room was filled with Hispanic mothers with young kids. We met with a younger girl named Tierra who was AWESOME. She left out all of my income information so that we would qualify, because if she had entered what was in our savings account we wouldn't have.

She told us she's got a bone to pick with the system because people like us come in all the time who have been working and are just having a hard time but can't qualify because they have money saved up. If you think about it that really is backwards because why should we be punished for being responsible and doing what we're supposed to do you know? So between Tierra and Pat at the gyno's office "hiding" us from the insurance company when Kristina had her initial ultrasound, God is really blessing us in more ways than one.

I got a text last night from Rob while I was at La Zona Rosa watching Adele. It said he's got $75 collected from people who are making bets as to what the gender of the baby will be. I was curious to know which was the running favorite: girl by $5. :)

Well I guess that's about it for now. I'm going to have some serious fun this weekend. My DJ friend Eli's coming over and we're going to spin some house records, something I haven't done in AGES. Then Sunday there's a cash game at Bruce's. Hopefully I'll do OK. I haven't played cash game since the last time we played at Eric's. Hopefully all this SNG action hasn't affected my cash game negatively.

February recap

First and foremost the BIGGEST news of the month is that Kristina and I are expecting! We've been "at it" for a while now and we didn't think this would happen anytime soon because she doesn't ovulate properly. But last Sunday night when she got back from out of town she took a pregnancy test and it was an instantaneous positive reading. We're both a little worried about the timing of this since I'm out of work. But we have faith that God knows what's going on and that we'll be taken care of in some way shape or form.

As for poker, the SNG experiment went well I think. I'm nowhere close to a reasonable sample size but I definitely put in more volume than I thought I was going to be able to. Here's the breakdown for the month:

120 $2.25 SNGs = $270 invested

11 firsts x $9 = $99
25 seconds x $5.40 = $135
19 thirds x $3.60 = $68.40

$302.40 returned - $32.40 profit

12% ROI (return on investment)
46% cashing rate

Early on I double checked with a new 2+2 friend and he said 45% was a good cash rate to shoot for so that's really the biggest stat to me. Now if I could just get a few more first places dammit. :)

By the way when you're playing 3 games and you cash in all of them it gets REALLY hectic. My computer almost can't handle it. Overall I lost around $16 for the month because of all the damn tournaments I played in. Just goes to show I can't ever stick to ALL of my self imposed rules.

Meh

Just spent the last 4 hours online playing. I did good in the cash games, just played solid. The balance isn't going up though because I've been in shot taking mode the last couple of days. I feel like I just have to get the fuck out of the bankroll rut I'm in. I respect the grind, really I do. But when you get down to it I'll go crazy if I'm struggling to grind a $5 profit every month considering how much time I play this damn game.

So I keep looking back at my July spreadsheet when I was at the exact same place and the only way I got up to like $700 was winning a token and then final tabling a $26 90 man SNG. The problem is I can't afford to be playing all token games. The cycle's been: have a good cash session, take the profits and take a shot once in a while, fail, come back and try again later but just not right away. And I haven't even gotten a token to use and fail that too. AHHHHH!!

I'm peeved I lost the $5 heads up I just played too. It's not in my bankroll rules but dammit I just wanted to win and take that $ to take another shot. My logic is really working at 2:30am lemme tell you.

In outside world news, I have a job interview at 2pm today. It's not a far cry from what I was doing before. It's a Remax real estate company and I'd be working on Broker Price Opinions. The pay's a little less than what I was making, but I'm hoping with my experience I can negotiate into them paying me a little more. I think my best argument will be that since the job requires 30% travel and my car is in ok shape but probably won't be for more than another year or two, they need to pay me more so I can save up for another one.

Stir of Echoes - the girl playing the ghost

The other night I re-watched Stir of Echoes with Kristina. I'd seen it a while back but didn't remember everything about it. Without spoiling anything, in this viewing the other night I realized the girl playing the ghost is Jennifer Morrison, better known as Dr. Cameron on House.

Check it out:





On a quick side note, I re-lost that quick turnaround money. AK against AA. Another example of me ignoring critical information. *sigh*

Laid Off

The last two weeks I've just not been in a blogging mood to be honest. Last Thursday I was laid off from my day job as a receptionist. I'm not upset or too worried about it though. For one thing I was ready to move on and I probably needed to get booted to make me go out and look again.

I took the job to make good steady money with standard M-F 8-5 hours and benefits, but I also wanted to learn some about real estate. The main thing I learned is that there are a lot of really stupid people with real estate licenses. I did get a promotion last year when *Lin* left and that gave me an opportunity to review home appraisals. So I did learn SOMETHING. But, not enough to make me want to continue in that business.

It's time to move on to other things! I'm not going to be actively seeking another receptionist job. I've done it for the last 3-4 years and I've had my fill. I will most likely continue in some kind of office/clerical work, but I'm shying away from the front desk. I'm not completely opposed to some kind of manual labor to be honest. If I knew they were hiring for it, I've always considered becoming a cable tv installer. I like technology, it would be something different, and the cable bill would become cheap to nonexistent. I love my internet, and if I could get free standard cable (right now I just have basic) that would be the shiznit.

My wife's still working part time at Old Navy, although her hours have been very skimp last week and this week. :/ I've still got my radio gig on Saturday nights. My severance check should be here this week to cover the rent. Between the savings and our good support system with family and friends we should be OK. I got a head start on sending out resume's and apps before they actually let everyone go so I hope that helps me find something even faster.

Since this is a poker blog I'll just share a couple of snippets about my play lately: this month I've fallen asleep in two $3 90 man sngs with chips and managed a 9th place, just in the money. :) The other day I made quad Jacks. There. :)

I'll try and write something a little more detailed soon.

Thanks TFPL for making job interviews and bank visits comical

The Fantasy Poker League is the bar poker company I worked for up until May of this year. TFPL is actually the public brand name, but the company that owns TFPL is "Got the Nuts LLC". This often ilicits a smile from someone who comes across the company name and doesn't know poker vocabulary.

I had an interview with an FBI agent this afternoon. We went over an application I submitted to gain access to a secure database my dayjob uses regularly. It was a very lengthy application asking me for residences in the last 7 years, people who knew me at each and could verify, etc. So when he got to the employment history asking about part time jobs he couldn't help but laugh at Got the Nuts.

So, for those who don't know, the nuts is an unbeatable hand in poker. No matter what cards are on the board or in your opponents hand you can't be beaten. Likewise, you never want to hear your opponent say "I got the nuts" after you've called their bet on the river. It leaves no room for interpretation, if they've got the nuts, you can't win.

So thank you Luis, for creating a company name that future employers and cashier girls at the bank can giggle at when I deposit your checks. Well, at least they did when I still worked for Got the Nuts.

Spicy Donut - another friend to check out

I added a couple of more blog links under Unpoker Blogs on the right hand side. Pen Pen is a friend of mine from high school. Hers is pretty personal so I don't know how much people who don't know her will be interested in it, but I want to link her anyways.

Spicy Donut is another friend from high school, Devin Lawson who's one of the most amazing artists I've ever known. DEFINITELY worth checking out.

Apestyles gets an article in the Sunday Statesman

Online poker pro: 'A hard way to make an easy living'

John Van Fleet is without a doubt Austin's premiere online poker professional. He's ranked #1 in the state actually on Pocket Fives last time I checked. I was poking around the news sites trying to find the story about a northeast Austin game getting robbed this weekend when I found the above article. Cool stuff...

Most of the people I know who went to Westlake know who John is, even people who know nothing about online poker. This summer I met my extended family of cousins, aunts and uncles for dinner. A lot of my cousins that live here in Austin went to Westlake. My cousin Chad's girlfriend found out through the course of conversation that I was into poker and that I played online. She asked if I knew him and I said I knew of him, but not him personally.

I actually messaged him once on Pocket Fives to ask him about a story my old college roommate told me. He responded back saying it was true (I won't go into details, sorry too personal I think). That's all I got and I haven't contacted him since. Truth be told I've often thought about trying to befriend him to maybe learn a thing or two. I don't know if that will ever end up happening though.

The article is really good I must admit. The only incorrect information was calling sit-and-go's "sit-and-plays".
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I'm purposely avoiding my regular poker sites today in the attempts to shield myself from finding out the results of the World Series. They were supposed to play down to the final two yesterday and I think today they'll finish the heads up battle. This year is the first time they've delayed the final table for 4 months to air everything up to it on ESPN, THEN air the results on delay. The idea was to generate more hype and garner bigger ratings.

But the great thing is you have a better chance of avoiding the results and keeping the element of surprise. Since I follow all the tourneys online as they're happening I pretty much always know who's winning every WPT that's aired because it happened 6-8 months prior. If I can successfully dodge spoilers until tomorrow night I'll actually have that element of surprise. Pretty exciting.

Flight delays meant no Harrah's this weekend :/

I'm not exactly a frequent flyer, but I've never experienced flight delays before. Today I learned what it was like. I was scheduled to leave Austin around 7:30 this morning, connect in Houston and arrive in New Orleans just after 10am. Unfortunately the Austin plane was brand new and we experienced a lot of vibrations on the runways so we turned around and went back to the terminal.

We got put on another flight to Houston immediately but that was still delayed because of all the people from our plane (over 100). I make it to Houston but could not make my connecting flight into New Orleans. I had a choice of waiting for an 11:55 New Orleans flight that had no seat guarantee, or I could get a sure seat on a plane to Lafayette. I took the latter and felt bad my mom drove to NOLA and had to turn right back around and pick me up in Lafayette. But to top it all off you know what? The flight to Lafayette was delayed for over an hour because of a seat maintenance issue! Hey what can you do? I really wasn't perturbed with the overall 3 hour total delay because I wasn't missing out on anything important.

I had a good day once I got here though. Had lunch with Mom. Took a short nap. Got up and ate dinner at my sister's and spent time with my 2 week old niece Kaylee who is incredibly sweet and precious. I get so nervous holding little babies, I'm terrified of dropping them or hurting them in some way. Once I had her I barely shifted her at all for that very reason. But she's so cute and she did wake up and was looking around a lot certain parts of the night. Mom took this picture and it feature's my Obama pin perfectly! (My family is Republican so I wore it to razz everyone, especially my sister) So great.



Another of me and Kaylee:


Ashton fell asleep using Queenie as a pillow LOL:


Kuristin said Ashton and Queenie have ended up face to face asleep before or curled up together, but this scenario was a first and just friggin' funny to see.

Grandma still doesn't know I'm here. She's out of town for a funeral but will be back tomorrow for the party. I can't wait to surprise her. We went to Target after dinner and I got her a new red electric tea kettle that will match her new red kitchen my mom and aunt Lori are giving her. :)

As for poker I just finished up a deep run in a $3.30 turbo 6 max. 12/216 just shy of the final table. I was using M calculations (take the blinds and antes and divide them by your chip stack to determine your plays. Comes from Harrington on Holdem Vol. 2) throughout and that was helping while I played an $11 regular speed tournament at the same time.

The hand that crippled me I had AJ against KQ. Villain was short stacked around 5 big blinds and pushed from early position, I reraise all in to isolate knowing his range was wide and AJ was easily ahead of it. He hits a 4 card flush to double up. I didn't have many chips when the hand started so 2 hands later when I picked up 44 I had to go with it and lost. :( $7 bucks profit woo hoo!

I think mom and I are going to try and drive to Isle of Capri tomorrow night to play some. Even though Harrah's had 1/2 running and is better for my puny bankroll, I would prefer to play at the Isle on a Saturday night than Harrah's on a Friday or Sunday morning just so I can get action with the recreational crowds. Anyone who's playing on Friday or Sunday morning is probably more decent on average than the donks that are there on the weekend nights. We'll see if it happens. I really want to go but I'm struggling internally because that's not really WHY I'm here. Plus I'm going to be here for a week come Christmas time so I'll have opportunity then.

If I do make it'll be same plan as last time: take $100 to the bonus table and try to double it, go sit at 2/4 and try to parlay it into whatever. I'd be happy if I could just freeroll the flight cost and have money to come back with next month. I feel very fortunate to have had live success the last couple of months so that I could fly here and do something spontaneous and fun with my family. Well, that's all I got. Not too much poker I know, but I want to keep adding other content to keep the outside world interested in reading.