Studiousness

I've learned the hard way that my brain is no longer the information sponge that it used to be. While my memorization skills seem to be about the same as they always have been, my stamina for studying has been severely limited. I used to be able to study for hours on end without breaks and exhibit an extremely high level of retention. Today, I was completely burned out after about 90 minutes. I am very confident that I got enough out of my studying to have gotten an A on the test I took today, but the immediate recall I am used to just wasn't there.

Now, instead of studying for my second test tonight I am here lamenting the fact that I can't study like I used to. Strange, but not completely counterproductive. Getting things out of my head and onto this blog seems to help me relax. As an outlet, this little free blog has been invaluable to me. I constantly edit and critique pretty much anything I write. Essays, short stories, e-mails....everything. Here, I put it out there and let it go. No stressing about grammar, spell checking, or editing. While what I put here cannot rival the quality of my better work, in some ways this blog is even better. With certain restrictions on my personal and work information, I will put pretty much anything here. This is truly a window into my mind. I'm not afraid to be self critical (see Evil), or discuss my crazy dreams or the effect my fears have had on me as I have in the last few posts.

For someone without much of a filter to begin with, these posts can let me unleash the few things I do filter.

10 Random Songs

I didn't have a certain CD or playlist in mind today, so I selected the first song and let Mr iPod choose the rest. Here's what my little buddy chose for me today:

1. The Good Left Undone- Rise Against. Like I said, I chose the first song. I can't stop listening to this song lately, so it seemed a good place to start.
2. Tell Me Baby- Red Hot Chili Peppers.
3. Houses of the Holy- Led Zeppelin.
4. Pimp Juice- Nelly. It's a good thing no one was around when this came on....I'm sure I looked like a fool dancing down the hallways.
5. 5 Ghosts I- Nine Inch Nails.
6. Smalltown Boy- Bronski Beat.
7. Dangerous- Ying Yang Twins w/Wyclef. Helping further my man crush on Wyclef
8. Like a Rolling Stone- Bob Dylan.
9. Secret Spell- Tori Amos
10. Let This Go- Paramore

And I have to note that the 11th song was In a Big Country, which has got to be one of my favorite songs (if not my absolute favorite) from the 80s.

Overall a decent mix. Good enough to get me through my boring setup work and now give me a chance to listen to a podcast or two.

Morning Music, Interrupted

Today's CD selection is Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace by the Foo Fighters.

While I normally fly through my setup work in the morning while listening to an album, sometimes I get derailed....and so does the music. I haven't had a chance to complete today's yet, which is too bad. It's been a while since I listened to all of Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace and I definitely need a fresh perspective on it.

As with all Foo Fighter albums, I like this one....but am not blown away by it. Maybe I listen to too many concept albums, maybe I am just not 'getting' all the material on here. There is no arguing that this is quality work, but I think I just expect too much from them and that usually ends in disappointment for me.

One of the things I have noticed about my impression of each Foo Fighters album is that, to me, there is always one song that stands way above the rest when compared to the other tracks. In this case, the album starts off with that song (The Pretender) and, to me, just cannot keep up that pace, even though there are a couple of great songs bridging that first track and the rest of the album.

I was hoping that taking it in as a whole today would help me listen to it better, but will now have to make plans to do it some other time.

Monday Morning Music Selection

How about a little Vampire Weekend to kick off my very human work week?

Confession: I listened to the last track (The Kids Don't Stand a Chance) before playing the album from the beginning. Couldn't help it. I'm too into that song right now.

Fears

I've never been affected much by irrational fears. As far back as I can remember, there has always been a few people in my life that are. My mother has a sometimes crippling fear of heights....anything higher than the second story gets her into a panic mode. When staying in a hotel, she has to request a floor no higher than the 3rd if she plans on getting any sleep at all. When I planned my wedding in Vegas she was happy to be going out there again after so many years, but while most of us planned plane rides of about 4 hours to get there she was making reservations for an overnight train ride.

Thankfully my father doesn't have any real fears. He's not great on a plane either, but when your first plane ride was compliments of the government because you "won" the draft lottery and were being shipped to Viet Nam, I can see why it might bring back some bad memories. Regardless, my father fights sucks it up and gets on the plane no matter what. Just another reason I am happy to have him as a role model. I know that I was indeed a real winner in the parent lottery.

On the way home from dinner with my parents tonight, I listened to a song that I realized late last night had a LOT of meaning to me recently. I've been enjoying the song the last few months, but last night as I was half listening to it while doing something else, one of the lyrics caught my attention. Then I listened to the rest and had an OMG moment. Had I written a song about what has been going on in my head these last few months, it would have been just like this song.

So tonight I hear this song and another light bulb goes on. The dreams that have been the worst for me the last week or so are very much like the ones Wolverine has in X-Men, as I previously posted, but the strongest link other than the flashback type layout of the dreams is that I am under water for many of the worst parts. I do have somewhat of an irrational fear myself, and that is a fear of drowning.

It's definitely not a fear of water. When I learned to body board as a young teen I became nearly hypothermic because I was in the water long enough to effect my core temperature. And here I thought I was always warmer than the average human. So the fear is more of a suffocation fear, and not a drowning fear, but the easiest place to suffocate is in the water. I know I realized this when I was young. I always loved the water, but there was always that risk there in the back of my head....maybe that's what actually drew me to the water. I don't know.

It took me a long time to properly learn how to swim, but when I made my mind up to do it correctly, I learned to be the strongest swimmer I could possibly be, including how to counteract rip currents and undertow....which came in handy more than once in my life. While on spring break in Daytona Beach during my senior year of high school I took my bodyboard out just before a storm hit. The waves were huge for that part of the Atlantic, and the currents and undertow were pretty extreme. Long story short, I got caught in the undertow after a huge wave broke unexpectedly overtop of me and I was dragged along the sandy bottom for about a minute, after having the wind knocked out of me by the crashing wave.

At first it was sheer terror, but that was very brief. Once I realized the situation, I became very calm and remembered to swim parallel to the shore to break free of the current. My problem after that was summoning the strength to do so after having all my breath and strength sapped from my body as I was slammed from the crest of a 15 foot wave to the bottom of the ocean. I finally clawed and swam my way free of the undertow, grabbed my board, and went for a long walk along the shore. For years, I had a light scar on my shoulder from the sand scraping off my skin as I was dragged further out to sea, but looking now for the first time in a LONG time, I couldn't even tell you which shoulder it was.

Hopefully now that I realize my fear is not of the water itself, my nightmares involving water will be less intense. Hopefully, as I look forward to another night of abbreviated sleep, I will be able to handle them the same way I would handle another run-in with a strong undertow. Be calm, and work your way out of the situation.

I use that mantra in my day-to-day life, why not apply it to my dreams as well?

In Dreams, Vol VII

Post number 150. I've been doing this blog for almost 4 years now, and this is my 150th post. Not setting any land speed records here am I?

So lately I have been having some weird nightmares. I just found out the other day that there is a Wolverine movie coming out. I guess I was the only one who didn't know. I am excited to see the movie, but I think my subconscious is taking it a bit far. The dreams I have been having lately are very much like the nightmares Wolverine had in X-Men about being made into what he was. It's been very intense and pretty scary. I don't have many nightmares, and have never handled them well when they do invade my nights as it is....but these are much stronger than normal nightmares and involve all sorts of horrible things with all sorts of people I know.

I don't know much about night terrors, and if there are even dreams associated with them or not, but I can't imagine they could be much worse than the way I feel when I wake up suddenly from one of these dreams. I've come out of my slumber swinging at someone from a dream, running from someone, jumping from a rooftop, and yelling at the top of my lungs....and that may all have been in the same night.

No matter how I wake up, I always have the same physical symptoms; I am sweating and my heart is racing. Pounding so hard that it's as if I just ran a 100 yard dash. Usually I can calm myself down pretty quickly and go back to sleep, but it is a little more distressing each time it happens in a night. Some nights I've avoided going to sleep because I know it's going to happen, but it's not like I can function without sleep. I think everyone knows that I would if I could, but I guess I'll just have to deal with it until my mind settles down.

Start Me Up

This morning's soundtrack: Black Holes and Revelations by Muse.
`


Seems to be a perfect album to start off this Thursday.

Complaints

Everybody complains from time to time, I fully admit I do it myself here and there, but sometimes it's just too much. Some people complain about everything they can, going out of their way to look for every little thing they can find to point out as bad or wrong. Sometimes these people find very legitimate complaints and in telling someone about it will actually benefit others.
My question: Are these occasional instances where it is helpful enough to make up for all the other benign stuff they gripe about?

My answer: Not today.

The day started off pretty much as it usually does, with my alarm clocks going off so much earlier than I would like, but progressed pretty well from there. By the time I was shaving, I was already being goofy....and for the benefit of no one other than myself, since the house was empty other than my dogs and myself. Now, I wasn't in a "dancing in the mirror" mood....but it was still nice to be in a playful mood as I got ready for work.

It seems the dogs picked up on my attitude, as they both wrestled with a few toys, wrestled with each other, and attempted to wrestle with me. They bounced around the house for most of the time I was getting ready, and Kira wanted to play peek-a-boo with me again. That's the best way I can describe it really. She lays on her back, puts her paws behind her ears, then brings them forward so they cover her eyes, before she extends her legs all the way out toward me as if she's asking for a hug. It's pretty effing adorable. I tried to get a picture of it, but my camera was in the other room and all I had was my cell phone.
`
So even though I didn't sleep too well last night, I was still in a good mood on my way to work. When I got to work I was faced with a couple problems. These problems impact everyone briefly, but would have a bigger impact on my morning than just about anyone else. Even with that I was still in a good mood walking in. I do what I can to address the problems, and find out they should be taken care of rather quickly.
`
With that out of the way I settle in for my early morning duties, and hear nothing but complaints for the next 1/2 hour. One person was basically yelling about it as she walked in. She was the straw that broke the camel's back. My good mood was gone, my headache had begun to set in. I now have a full blown headache because I also fielded a few calls with complaints and a text message conversation about a complaint as well.
`
Lunch can't get here quick enough. I could use some food and time to relax.

Swagger

I think I've had lower levels of testosterone the last couple weeks while I was sick and/or unable to sleep. I woke up this morning a lot more refreshed than I should have been from a couple hours of restless sleep, and actually feeling more like myself. I can almost feel the testosterone coursing through my veins at this point. It feels good to be normal again.

I know I have swung the other way a few times in the last couple years, where I am a lot more aggressive than normal in many aspects, but this is the first time I can recall that I've felt this kind of drop for this long. I guess it makes sense, having the flu, which then turned into bronchitis, then not being able to stay asleep for an entire week after that will probably have an effect on your body. I also fell behind in school for a while because I didn't feel like studying, and nothing seemed to stick when I did.

I studied a lot more than I normally would have for a quiz I had last Monday. With a very precise study guide, and being told exactly what the essay questions was going to be nearly a week in advance. I knew exactly what to expect on the quiz. I got a B-. Unheard of. I could get a B- in most classes not even showing up for lectures and doing some light studying for tests. No doubt I should have gotten an A, but the material just wasn't there when I tried to recall it.

I've now caught up with all the material needed for the class, and was actually told by the professor at one point that I needed to give others in the class a chance to speak during our discussions....even though they were slowing us down. With the slow pace of class, we didn't get to finish what we had scheduled for the night, so I am actually ahead in the material again.

I'm sure as the day goes on, the lack of restful sleep will catch up to me and I'll grow tired. But to feel as good as I do right now is a nice change.

Flu

So instead of sitting in class taking notes and learning, I am sitting at home sneezing, coughing, hurting, and sweating....I've only had the flu a handful of times, but it's completely knocked me on my ass each time. If I didn't HAVE to go to work, I would have called in sick the last two days. Going to class, which is something I enjoy, has fallen by the wayside because of this sickness. Sleep has been even more elusive than usual, since all I do is shiver or sweat when under the covers.

I miss the days when I could just take some cough syrup with codeine and completely sleep through the flu.

NIN

Nine Inch Nails LiTS Victoria BC from senada bojku on Vimeo.

2009

Happy New Year. Hope everyone is enjoying national hangover day.

A new year is always cause for resolutions, and while I try not to get caught up in all that too much....it's not a bad idea. Wanting to do something more or better in your life is a wonderful thing....regardless of how it works out practically. You will never do any of these things if you don't try, so trying it even for a week or two is a lot better than nothing. Nowadays I kinda view resolutions as a freeroll, and ANYone can tell you that I love me some freerolls.

So the resolutions I have are kind of simple. Going back to last year's resolutions, here, I am continuing with my pic-a-day thing. I successfully completed my task of taking at least one picture every day of 2008, and will probably now continue that until I am unable to take pictures anymore. I'll try to post more of the pics here, and more likely on facebook, but I make no promises about posting the pics. Facebook is the better way for me to go with the pics because I'm honestly not comfortable posting pics of myself here where anybody and their mother can see them and save them.

As for the other resolution I tried last year, watching and reviewing the top 52 movies as voted by users on the IMDB top 250, I'm not going to try that exactly again....but I will be making an attempt to see as many of the top 50 that I haven't seen yet.

New to this year is a weight one. I've done the weight loss thing a few times over the years with mixed success. This time it is clear that I need to do more to keep myself in check. I'm going to start posting my weight here pretty regularly as a way to keep tabs on myself and hold myself accountable. I hit 244 a couple weeks ago. The most I have ever weighed in my life. 240 was always that magical number that I would never let myself hit....until it happened. Now I'm dropping it and will try and make each 10 lb increment my new magic number as I drop below it. I'm currently at 238 and working my way down to 230.

Now it's time to be lazy while I still allow myself to be. Going to check and see if Full Tilt is still giving away the 3x points today and watch the NHL winter classic.

Under my Skin

Why is it that some people just have this crazy ability to bother me so much more than most others? 99% of people I come in contact with any given day can say something to me in a certain way, and I can just brush it off, but there are a select few who could say the exact same thing in the exact same way and set me off in some way or another.

I understand that some people who know me well enjoy pushing my buttons....as I do the same. Normally it's something that can be easily ignored or not even noticed in some cases. But for some reason, someone I don't know as well who means no ill-will toward me can send me off into a little bit of life tilt.

Maybe I am a bit on edge lately with everything that is on my plate at the moment, I dunno. And I do realize this is mostly just babble right now, but if it can help me talk though what I am trying to figure out....then it's more than worthy of a blog post, even though it won't offer any entertainment value whatsoever to anyone who reads it.

After all this, I can honestly say I just don't know and be fine enough with that to go drink my low-sodium V8 and go through the rest of my morning as calm as a hindu cow.

Not Buying This One....

So I came to my senses after the last blog and didn't buy any of the overpriced Redskins gear I was looking at (even though that gnome is just awesome) but I have still been checking out sales on NFL merch to see if there is anything out there I would like to add to my growing little collection. There is a 20% off sale at NFLShop.com today, so I've spent some time looking at the Skins stuff there. Finally found something that I SURELY will not buy....at any price.

Although, I can't swear I won't get this from my dad for Christmas. This is one time I am happy my parents don't have a computer.

Sports Fan Reflection

I need to be stopped.

I seem to be on the verge of becoming one of "those" fans. I have always been a loyal supporter of the Washington Redskins, my favorite team in any sport since I was a kid. Buying a coat, or a hat, or some sweats with a Redskin logo on them here or there never got out of hand. I'd always had more UM or even Lions gear than Redskins gear....but that seems to be changing.

Last year, after LaRon Landry got drafted by the Skins I found a great deal on an official Landry jersey and bought my first non-Lions (I was a season ticket holder for many years) football jersey. My Redskins gear as of now consists of that jersey, a hat, and a pair of workout shorts I basically just wear around the house. Still, not that bad.

Today, while looking to see what deals I could find on Amazon I came across a Redskins garden gnome. I don't have a garden, but I am still considering it. Other deals I found and considered, or am still considering, include an ugly mousemat that just happened to have a Redskin logo (I do need a new mousemat after all), a garden flag to go along with Mr garden gnome, and a magnetic helmet decal for my car (pictured above). The browser tabs to these items are still open, even though I haven't added any of them to my cart yet....but I am still browsing.

My hope with this post is that I can use it to gain a little perspective while doing my online shopping. At a time where I am cutting my spending in as many areas of my budget as possible, I sit here and can somehow justify spending money on useless items I'd never look at if they didn't have a Redskins logo. Hopefully I can get through this with minimal checkbook damage, but we shall see.

Red Meat Reduction

It's not as if I eat red meat on a regular basis, but I probably eat a lot more than I should so this is my next food to cut from my meal rotation.

The other two foods I've cut back on have seen mixed results so far. I still haven't had even a sniff of bacon since I stopped eating it more than two weeks ago, but I did break down this week and had some chocolate chip cookies. It's been a lot harder avoiding chocolate than I really expected, with Haloween less than a week ago and my birthday being today, but after today I should be able to keep away from chocolate for the rest of the year. Although, I still reserve the right while in DC to suspend the chocolate ban if need be.

It would be irresponsible of me not to say something about the election yesterday. I am happy to see that Obama did in fact win, as I was worried that our voters would somehow botch this election too. What I am happiest to see is that Prop 2 in Michigan (expanding stem cell research) looks to have passed. I was worried the terribly misleading ads being run by the religious right leading up to election day would dissuade many voters.

There are a ton of moral issues on state ballots across the country this year that I am interested in, and will be checking throughout the day to see which ones passed and which ones failed. It's amazing how cut and dry many of these things seem to me, yet how unlikely they are to be resolved in the way I think is right. Sometimes I feel as if our country is slipping back into the dark ages, hopefully some of these states can prove that false as I read the results today.

Ciao Chocolate

As if quitting bacon alone wasn't hard enough, I have decided it's time to throw another food into the "Do Not Eat" category. With all the Halloween candy just lying about here at work, and more to come as the holidays draw closer, I thought this was a perfect time to kick the habit of grabbing one here or there as I walk by someones desk.

The best way for me to drop a little weight is to eat healthy at work. Grazing every day at the desks I pass by probably isn't considered healthy eating.

Unlike the bacon ban, this chocolate crackdown will be lifted while I am in DC. There is a Melting Pot out there that I will probably end up going to, and I do not plan on skipping one of my favorite desserts of all time. This, along with the possibility of homemade brownies or cupcakes being thrown my way by Sarah, necessitates some leniency while I am on vacation. Just another thing to look forward to in DC.

Seasonally Affected

Every year I face a period of adjustment when we move from Summer into Fall. I usually get a bad sinus infection when the weather starts to cool down, which I have thankfully avoided so far this year, and having less sunlight usually does a number on my overall mood too. As the days get shorter and the cloud cover thickens and hangs lower, the amount of natural light we get around here is quickly suffocated.

This year seems to be worse than any previous year. Maybe the lack of sleep and extra time I am required to spend inside because of class are factors. Maybe I have just become more aware of what to look for to see that I am being affected. Who knows? All I know is that I feel unmotivated and this general malaise. Right now, I am supposed to be doing research for a paper in my Human Sexuality course....instead I am blogging. Not wanting to do research about sex? Something is off there.

I know that exercise and proper dietary habits are great mood elevators for me, but I'm rarely able to do them for more than a couple months at a time anymore. Maybe if I can compare my mood now to my mood when I am eating right and working out and see a big difference, I can stay motivated this time around.

OK....enough babbling. Here's a nice little video to show kinda how I feel lately. I hadn't listened to this song in forever, and it just popped into my head this morning.

Bye Bye Bacon

Today marks day one of my bacon-free challenge.

It's no secret that I need to drop a few pounds. In the last 2-3 years, my weight has fluctuated between terrible and not completely unreasonable quite a few times. I'll do well for a while, then I hit a target weight and let certain things creep back into my diet. Soon enough, I am back where I started. I know I have the discipline to do it, I just need to stick with it a lot longer than I usually do. Instead of a few weeks or a couple months, I need to look to do this for a few months or a couple years.

Cutting bacon out of my diet seems pretty extreme to anyone that knows me well. I don't eat it very often really....but I do love it. To me it seemed like a good start. I know there aren't any health benefits associated with eating bacon, so it isn't hard to convince myself not to eat it. The next time I will allow myself to have bacon will be New Year's Day, if I stick to all my diet restrictions between now and then.

There will be more steps to come in the near future. I have decided to start by greatly reducing the amount of pork products I eat, and eliminating some (like bacon) altogether. Reducing simple carbs, red meat, and dairy are all on the horizon. These foods aren't doing anything but keeping me in the terrible shape that I am currently in, and I have only myself to blame for eating them.

Now I will have a burger or something here and there....I am not going to stop craving these foods right away, if ever. and I know this. I am going to eat heathier, just not completely healthy I am sure.

Simple Math

Wrong Place + Wrong Time = 1 Dead Cat

Biting me in front of my already pissed off
Rottweiler and Mastiff/Boxer....not a great idea.

Not So Good Morning

As if getting up at 4:30 isn't bad enough, I got woken up at 3:00am because my dog Kira needed to go out. She NEVER wakes me up to go out, so I figured she must really need to go. I groggily walk to the door and let both her and Guinness out. Didn't take me too long to figure out why she wanted to go out, as they confronted a cat just a few steps from the porch.

A fight ensues before I can get out there, and before they kill the cat I am out in the yard in my sleep attire (aka nothing) trying to call the dogs off when I am bitten by the cat. Two nice puncture wounds on my left index finger.

So off to work I go, looking forward to a nice day at animal control afterward to test the cat's body for rabies....hopefully I can avoid getting a rabies shot.

Loving this song right now....haven't we all felt this way at one time or another?

Time

Time Passes. Even when it seems impossible. Even when each tick of the second hand aches like the pulse of blood behind a bruise. It passes unevenly, in strange lurches and dragging lulls, but pass it does. Even for me.

Changes

Labor Day has passed, and Summer has changed into Fall for all intents and purposes. Schools are back in session, and the NFL is playing games that actually matter now. All within the span of a week, these changes have had an effect on me.

Gone are the days where I looked at the calendar and planned day-long rides, knowing the weather would be warm enough, if not dry enough, to take the bike as far as I wanted. Instead, I look at the calendar and see days that would be good for winterizing my bike, and getting her ready for hibernation.

Also gone, is a good chunk of my free time. After nearly a decade away from the classroom, I am again enrolled for classes. I waited til the very last minute to make my decision to go back to school, so I didn't get all the classes I had hoped for....but starting with a couple classes instead of jumping right back into a full load is probably a good idea anyway.

My remaining free time has been dedicated to football of late. Just over a week ago we drafted players for my 12-team FFL and on Monday we had our annual Labor Day draft for my 10-team FFL. I am pleased for the most part with both teams, but only time will tell of course. I don't like the fact that both teams have two starters in common, but I really like both players this year so if I am wrong....I have no one to blame but myself.

Speaking of football, the Giants beat up on my Skins last night. Going in I really thought Washington had a good chance to win the game, and it turns out they did....but they were much better at playing poorly last night. I don't remember an opening game being so disappointing since they switched the format of the first week to include a Thursday night game in 2002. Maybe my memory is failing me, but I think the quality of the play and the officiating last night was very sub-par.

And in case you haven't heard, Kwame is finally stepping down as mayor of Detroit. It was big news all day yesterday, then he had to go and give his good-bye speech at 7:00 last night....interrupting the game after the first possession. Oh well, at least this chapter is almost over for the city. Let's hope we can write a better one to follow.

The Autumn Paradox

We are on the downslope of summer. Fall will be here before we even know it. The weather will cool, the leaves will turn, the days will get noticeably shorter.

At first this will be welcome. No more dog days of summer. Aren't the leaves so pretty? Yay, we get another hour of bar time.

Then it gets cold, really cold. And dry. Even though there is a foot of snow on the ground, there's no moisture to be found.

The transition from summer to winter means a lot of things to a lot of people. Us sports fans will welcome back the NFL, then the NBA and NHL, and say good bye to MLB with yet another world series the Tigers did not win.

The skiers and snowboarders will rejoice as it will soon be cold enough to make snow. The fisherman, water-skiers, and bikers will reluctantly put away their toys for a few months. Parents will gladly send their kids back to school, unless said student is a college freshman and the parents are footing the tuition bill.

With every end, there is a new beginning. Some of us wish the end would never come, others are giddy with the anticipation of the beginning.

Personally, I will mourn the loss of summer more this year than normal. As I grow older and realize that the summers in my past which I have been able to enjoy probably now outnumber the ones yet to come. I will again lament the fact that I have yet to sack up and move my sorry ass to a climate that is drier throughout the year, and I will procrastinate on shoveling my snow if at all possible.

With the summer coming to an end faster than I would like, I'll be sure to enjoy what I can of what's left. Take the long way home from work on a nice day, ride 200 miles one way just to grab a burger, sit under a shade tree and just take everything in with all of my senses.

Hopefully what I've experienced this summer will help carry me through another winter of discontent.

My New Girl

Isn't she beautiful? After more than three years of looking for the perfect companion, I finally found her. Click on the pictures to get the full size images.

Numbers

So it's late June, nearly halfway through 2008. Hard to believe, but it's a cold hard fact. To go along with that fact, I looked at some cold hard stats about my poker game. I used to fancy myself a very good limit player who used those powers for good, aka buying myself into tourneys and donating in a donkfest here and there. It seems that something has shifted though.

At best, I am a recreational player nowadays....not that I was ever a pro, or even close to it, but I used to play at LOT more than I do now. I play enough to keep my skills pretty sharp, and I still think I have an edge over a good percentage of players. I mean, what poker player doesn't?

So I decided to take a look today at how I am doing in ring games so far this year. Fired up poker tracker, and got out the calculator....just opened the windows calculator actually. I was somewhat surprised at the stats. Before playing today, I was ahead for the year. By $2. Thankfully I posted a small win today and am now ahead $37.10 for 2008.

I've decided to hold off on going pro.

The Breakdown:
65 sessions
2890 minutes
48.17 hrs
1.28 cents per minute
77.02 cents per hour

Only 48 hours in 177 days. Considering I usually play 2-4 games at a time, I've probably only spent about 12-13 at the computer hours playing hold em ring games. I haven't looked at hand histories for SNG play or mixed game tables yet, and I probably won't, but I don't think those stats would boost my win rate by much, if at all.

I've made a concerted effort to play more live poker, play more poker variations, and I still play too many heads-up SNGs....but I think it's sad that I've only gotten about a week's worth of online cash games in this year, and we're halfway through it. I keep looking at the tiny-ass bankroll I have online and it makes me cringe. I don't mind playing the low limit games to work my way up the ladder again, but is seems like I can only get into it here and there anymore.

Cash games have gotten tougher since the UIGEA, but not so much that I am scared to play a $2-$4, $3-$6, or even up to an $8-$16 or $10-$20 game now. I am pretty sure I could still be profitable at these limits with a little game selection and some time on the virtual felt....but why is it that I don't WANT to do this anymore?

I think everyone has their poker breaking point, and playing online will accelerate that exponentially....but I don't think that's the case here. My most enjoyable times with online poker were during the blogger heyday back in 05 and early 06. Reading the blogs, playing the tournaments when my schedule would accommodate, and the peak of that period was no doubt playing in the 05 WPBT Winter Classic in Vegas and final tabling it.

Since then, poker has been more of a hobby than a passion. I just don't get into it as much. Playing, watching, reading about it....about the only increase in poker content for me is the podcasting from PokerRoad, and that's just because it's so much easier to do than actually read a blog or something.

So I still like poker, especially playing live in a casino or someone's basement....I just need to com to grips with the fact that my grinding days have passed me by. I need to want it now for me to actually play, even though it's only a few mouse clicks away.

Apologizing it Forward

I need to let everyone know in advance that I am wrapping myself in a cocoon for the foreseeable future. There are a lot of stress factors in my life right now. Anyone who knows me pretty well knows that I don't really sweat the small stuff in life, but these issues I am dealing with are definitely not small to me.

If I am noticeably absent the next couple weeks, or even months, from things I would surely otherwise attend or if I am present and seem somewhat apathetic or aloof, I apologize. I have a lot on my plate, and need to digest it all before I feel better.

Talking some things out with some of you will undoubtedly help me work through this, but I won't burden you too often, if at all, about most things. That being said, don't be offended or assume I think less of you as a friend if I don't seek out your counsel. There are certain people I find easier to talk to, and even some of them won't hear from me because I don't want to add any stress to their lives. Don't take it personal.

Last but not least, if you know Mark....please give him your utmost respect and condolences. Poor bastard has to live with me as this all goes down.

Peace, Love, and Putt Putt Golf.
~~Max

Super Turbo!

Full Tilt has unveiled a new form of SNG tournament, called a super turbo. 300 chips to start instead of the normal 1500. I'm not always keen on flipping coins, but I figured I would try a few of these to see how they worked.

I wanted to play in today's MSOP event #29, $30+$3 NLHE. I noticed a few of the satellites to this event were super turbos. Two birds, one stone. I register and a few second later get seated, noticing that I only had 100 chips. Talk about flipping coins, that was sick....but I kinda liked it.

I played three of these super duper 100 chip turbos before getting lucky enough to win one, and I am currently playing in the MSOP event....poorly I might add. Currently 1117th out of 1149 remaining. Looks like I won't be missing dinner tonight.

Update: I actually made it to the second break in the MSOP event, and will be in the small blind with an impressive M of about 3.3 when the break is over.

I also had a lot of fun watching a short stack at another table win hand after hand to go from 4 chips to about 100 before finally busting out.

It Was Only a Matter of Time....

I'm breaking down and posting some poker content. Razz is terrible. When I am on, I can play the game very very well....when I'm not, I play like a fool. And it just so happens that Razz is the one poker variation that I can go on hard-core tilt while playing. Throw in a bunch of three of a kinds and three pair hands in one tourney, and I become unhappy. Such was the case tonight. I was already slightly on life tilt when I got home, had a splitting headache, and missed registering for the MSOP Heads-Up tourney on FT that I was looking forward to playing all week. So being the smart guy that I am, I decide the MSOP Razz event was more my calling for the day and decide to satellite my way in.

I play in a single table satellite where two seats are awarded. I play pretty well, get decent cards most of the tourney and find myself in 2nd chip position with only three players left. Of course I get a ton of bricks while the short stack makes good hands, and I finish third with nothing to show for an hour of Razz madness.

So I just buy in directly, feeling pretty good about my chances in the 643 person field. My patience and attention to detail when it comes to watching my opponents betting patterns should help me go deep into this tourney. Long story short, I finish 561st out of 643. A good hour into the tournament, but probably about two hours short of the money bubble. Way to go jackass.

Here is a microcosm of my Razz night. This wasn't the only time I saw this exact hand either.

UPDATE:
The good doctor is in Vegas covering the World Series as usual, here's what he had to say about today's Razz event that the MSOP event I played in was modeled after at 1% of the buy-in.

Event #26 Razz: The 5pm event just kicked off. I think FTrain is playing. I saw Jen Creason lurking around. She went deep in the Razz event in 2005. Yeah this is one of those existentialist days when I look out onto the Amazon floor and I think... what a bunch of fuckin' sadists. Only those twisted souls who thrive on pain are into this event. How do you prep for a Razz event at the WSOP? Wear a cup and invite all the neighborhood kids to come over and take turns kicking you in the junk. If you survive, you have balls of steel and can withstand the brutal insanity of Razz tournaments.

If you haven't already read Pauly's WSOP updates, go do it now. Hands down the cream of the blogger crop this time of the year. Show him some love.

In Case of Emergency....

I used to turn my phone ringer off whenever I went to bed, but decided a few years ago to leave it on every night just in case someone really needed to get a hold of me. I've let all of my friends know that if they needed someone in the middle of the night, and weren't sure who to call because it's late, that I would be available.

Sunday night/Monday morning I awoke just after midnight to my phone ringing. Looked at the phone to see if it was a wrong number I could just ignore. Nope, it was one of my friends. I answer, and after a few seconds of coming out of my groggy sleep fog assured my friend that I was fully awake and ready to listen to what was going on....even though I may have been stretching the truth a bit.

She gets straight to the point. She is driving home, which I can clearly hear is the case, and she got really scared. Scared to the point of being freaked out and needed to call me. She's scared that she's possibly being followed, or that someone is going to jump up from her back seat and get her. On my end, silence as I try and figure out what she is telling me. Finally the reason she is so scared comes out....

She was driving home from the movie theater, where she had just seen The Strangers. For some reason this girl, who is crazy afraid of scary movies, decided to go see one of the few movies that could freak her out, and at 10pm no less. When she knew she had to drive home alone. Now when I say crazy afraid, I mean it. I've taunted her about it before, pretty recently too when she was supposed to come over for a movie night with me and Mark.

I am well aware of how scary movies make her feel because SHE is well aware of it. Maybe not the best decision to go see that movie....I'm just sayin.

Bikenstein

The weather over the weekend was good for riding. Saturday was a little windy, but still nice and yesterday was just about perfect. Unfortunately I am still waiting on my front tire for my bike to be shipped, so the Hawk was out of commission all weekend. With my favorite two-wheeled companion down to one wheel and sitting helplessly on my bike jack, I decided some more work could be done to the old girl. I've always been top notch when it comes to taking things apart....and this is where we stand right now.

Hopefully it'll look something like normal in a week or so after I get all the parts I need to get her back on the road. And even more hopefully, everything will stay on the bike after I put it back together. I always wonder why there are extra screws/nuts/bolts when I put things together.

So, Yeah.

A few people have recently commented on my lack of picture updates. Rest assured I am still taking at least one picture every day, but most of these pics are very boring and not anything I would really want to look at, much less show anyone and explain the story behind. Now that the weather is warming up, I plan to get out and take more pics around the metro Detroit area....assuming I get my motorcycle back together soon and that's it's running when I do. Speaking of, here is a pic of what I took off my bike the other day.

This is what my exhaust currently looks like, laying next to my bike instead of on it. This all started because I need to jack up my bike and change my front tire. The exhaust is aftermarket, and gets in the way of the center stand and my motorcycle jack....so it needed to come off. Now I am thinking of replacing it with a new Vance and Hines exhaust, and looking to do even more maintenance on the bike since it's already out of commission. A tune up and general preventive maintenance seems appropriate now but the more I do, the more I want to do. I am afraid I am going to go from having a bike in working order to a bunch of parts strewn about that could resemble a bike once put back together.

Thank the motorcycle gods for my Clymer manual.

No Phone, Mo Problems

I really don't like forgetting my phone at home when I leave for work. It's good to know that I can live without it for 10 hours, but it's such a pain. On slower days at work I send text messages. A LOT of text messages. No phone, no texts. I am forever using the calendar function on my phone to see what I have going on any day or weekend I a show or festival I want to check out will be in town. This is actually how I found out I wouldn't be seeing NIN this year, and I am surprised my phone survived that day.

My phone also has a calculator I use to figure out the MPG for my bike any time I fill up. It of course has a camera in case I want to capture anything I see during the day, and this camera has taken many pictures that I reference very often. This is what actually spurred my blog today. I took quite a few pictures and videos with my phone while in Vegas, and wanted to check a couple of them out....sorry.

At least I know my phone will be fully charged tonight.

Another Pic-a-Day Update

Here are the photos I had trouble uploading the other day, and a couple more to get me up to date through yesterday.

Click on the pics to see a bigger version.

Jan 14th:I nearly forgot to take a picture on the 14th, and had to do this just before midnight as I was preparing the garbage to be taken to the curb. Guinness' old food bags make very good heavy-duty garbage bags when I have something heavy or sharp to toss out.

Jan 15th:
Of course I didn't expect to see this a couple hours later when I walked out to my car. It was cold when I went to bed, but it hadn't started snowing. This pic is a little blurry as it was really dark out and I took it without flash. I had the shutter open quite a while, and was shivering as I was holding it.

Jan 16th:
VEGAS!

My reservation at MGM for April. I am soooo looking forward to this already, even though it's over 3 months away. BTW, that's not my real confirmation number in case anyone has any ideas about changing my reservation.

Jan 17th:
My cousin Denise and her devil dogs. I took Guinness with me when I went over to her house that night to eat dinner. He was shocked to see them get up on the couch and looked like he was waiting for me to yell at them the same way he'd get yelled at if he tried that at home.

Jan 18th:
With the high temp at about 20 degrees, I doubt seeing this happening at a house in my neighborhood could have been very good.

MMR #2, Alien

Movie number 51 on the IMDB top 250 when I started this project was Alien. I had seen this movie when I was younger, but didn't remember that much about it. There is a good reason for that....there wasn't too much to this movie.

The plot is very simple. 7 crew members on a cargo ship bound for Earth carrying a bunch of intergalactic ore are awaken from their "cryo-sleep" early when the ship's computer receives a transmission from another ship nearby.

They go to a planet which seems uninhabitable where 3 crew members stumble onto a
crash site and find a bunch of pods or eggs or something. One of those pops open and the entity inside affixes itself to the face of a crew member. They take him back to the ship where the ship's 3rd in command, Ripley (played by Sigourney Weaver) refuses to let them past the airlock without being quarantined for 24 hours, in an effort to protect the others on the ship. The science officer takes it upon himself to override the airlock door and let them in.

After a little while the alien on the face of the crew member shrivels up and dies, and the crew member wakes up. Before going back to their cryo-beds for the rest of the trip home, the crew decides to have dinner together. This is where the infamous scene of the alien busting out of the guy's stomach takes place. After that a whole lot of cat and mouse takes place trying to find and kill the alien.

When the crew has only four of the seven still alive, everyone finds out that the science officer isn't really alive after all. He's a robot that was ordered to get the alien back to Earth alive at all costs, even if it meant the entire crew had to die. The three remaining crew members "kill" the robot and decide it's time to get in the shuttle and blow up the ship with the Alien still on it.

Only Ripley makes it to the shuttle alive before the ship blows up, and after a gratuitous underwear scene she realizes she's not alone on the ship. Somehow the alien snuck onto the shuttle while her dumb ass was chasing a cat around the mothership.

Of course she outsmarts the alien and ejects him from the shuttle, sends a message out to any ship in the area that could rescue her, and gets into her cryosleep chamber.

Overall this was a pretty good movie, but seeing as it was made in 1979 the special effects are very dated. I certainly wouldn't put this movie in the top 52, but considering I am too young to remember how other movies were in 1979, maybe it's deserving. Overall I would rate Alien a 7 out of 10.

Tonight I'll be watching A Clockwork Orange, which I've never seen and am excited to check out. The review should be up in the next couple days.

Pic-a-Day Project Update and MMR #2

Amazing how I say I need to update more often, then I actually take longer to post my next update than I had before, isn't it? I will truly make an effort to upload pics more often, and should have the next one up by Sunday at the latest.

This time around I am going to use Blogger to upload my pics instead of photobucket. If there are any problems, let me know. Click on the photo to see the actual size.

Jan 10th:
A boring Thursday night looking ahead to a busy Friday at work. Lots of important people to impress, gotta keep those shirts nice and white.

Jan 11th:
This is not my dog. For a while there I thought about adopting it, but just couldn't justify it with my schedule since she is only (approximately) four months old. I found her running alongside the entrance ramp to I-94 when I was driving home from work. A few minutes earlier, I never would have seen her. A few minutes later, she probably would have ended up as road kill. She came right to me when I stopped to get her. Let me pick her up and put her in my truck with no issue whatsoever. She even laid down on the ride to my house, which I still can't get Guinness to do in the car. Brought her in the house when I came in to get my phone which I had forgotten when I went into work that morning, and she was well behaved. She met Guinness and they got along so well that he was disappointed when I took her to the shelter, and seemed even moreso when I came back without her. I haven't seen him act that way since Kira was still his partner in crime.

It is hard for me to believe it's just coincidence. Which made it so much harder today when I told the people at the shelter I couldn't adopt her. I hope they find her a really good home, because this is probably going to bother me for a while....

Jan 12th:
During the Patriots/Jaguars game Pam begins to speculate on the size of Tim Brady's....well, you get the idea.

Jan 13th:MEAT!

My bowl of delicious pork products, with a little pasta in there, at Mongolian. Notice the size difference between my portion and Sarah's portion there on the left. Even with the rice she couldn't come close to the amount of calories I was about to ingest.

Even the best laid plans don't always work out, so I guess I shouldn't be so disappointed that blogger isn't letting me upload pictures right now....after I changed my layout (yet again) to conform with the blogger pics instead of the photobucket pics.

I'll try and load the rest of the pics and put up MMR#2 after dinner.

Pic-a-Day Update

I really need to update this more frequently, as I have almost an entire week's worth of pictures to post now. Now that I have gotten in the habit of taking my camera with me just about everywhere, the pics will be the easy part of this silly project and the hard part will be juggling when to post picture updates, movie review updates, and regular blog posts.

On to the pictures!

Jan 4th:
With a sink full of dishes, what are two single guys to do when dinner time comes? Pizza is always good at times like this because it comes with it's own container that you can eat right out of....

Jan 5th:
This picture was originally supposed to be the ravioli I was cooking right before Mark, Sarah, and I headed out to the east side for Justin's party....BUT something happened just I was about to serve myself dinner, and now we have this. Story is; I had just finished pouring my sauce onto my pasta when the bread I was microwaving in this container was done heating up. I turned off the burner, placed the sauce pot into the sink, and the styrofoam container with the bread in it on the burner which I guess was still hot. I left the kitchen to wash my hands because it's now time to eat, and when I come back about 2 minutes later....there's a fire on top of my stove. Again. Fret not, the fire cause no more damage than what you see here. And most importantly, the bread was not harmed in the fire.

Jan 6th:
Less than a week ago there was about a foot or so of snow on the ground around here. Sunday began the unseasonable warm-up, and this fog was the result of the quick snow melt. This pic was taken at Rotary Park in Livonia just after I left Marc's house following our day at the Motorcycle Expo in Novi and lunch at Mongo.

Jan 7th:
For the 7th I had many options for pics, and was pretty sure I would post the pic of my bike seeing as it's not very often that you get to ride a motorcycle in Detroit in the first week of the year. Thinking about it though, I am sure to have a bunch of motorcycle related pics throughout Spring and Summer, so this picture made a little more sense. This is a wall at Logan's Road house where I went to dinner with my mom, aunt, cousin, and cousin's husband.

Jan 8th:
I didn't get much accomplished on the 8th, so this pic is a little bit of a cheat. I didn't take this picture. I took a picture OF this picture, but it didn't turn out well....so I decided to use the original. This pic was on a blog I found when I signed in to leave Sarah a comment on her blog. On the blogger dashboard I noticed that one of the recently updated blogs was titled "Max's Blog". I had to check it out. This was the last picture of the last post from his blog, and I found the irony of it all quite amusing.

Jan 9th:
In an effort to save money and lose weight, I am eating more often at home. This lovely bowl of cottage cheese was my whole dinner tonight.

MMR #1

Max's Movie Review #1:
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre,
#52 on the IMDB Top 250.

This was an interesting film to start my movie reviews with. I have never seen it, or any other Humphrey Bogart film, and had no idea what to expect.

The movie starts off simple enough; a down on his luck American (Fred C. Dobbs, played by Bogart) stuck begging for money from fellow Americans in a small town in Mexico. I'm sure the name of the town was mentioned in the movie, but I honestly never did catch it.

The plot really starts to form a few minutes in when Dobbs asks the same man for money for the third time in one day with his vintage line of "would you stake a fellow American in a meal?". The man does in fact give him money again, this time twice the amount he had the two previous times, but rips into him a little for having the audacity to ask him so often in one day.

Soon thereafter, Dobbs finds another American in the city who is offering up jobs with good pay. For a couple weeks he works on this job with his new found friend Curtain (played by some dude who looks a whole lot like someone I can't think of) until they ferry back to town and the their boss on the job tells them to meet him at the pub in an hour to get their pay, and gives them 10 pesos as down payment. Dude doesn't show, they use the down payment to get drunk, then get a couple of cots at a local flophouse.

Here's where the story starts to really form. In the flophouse they meet Howard, an old timer that claims to have struck it rich before panning for gold. Soon thereafter Curtain and Dobbs finally get their money, and they are off to the mountains in search of their fortune.


There are a few twists and turns along the way, and if you haven't seen this movie yet I would suggest you check it out. The second half of the movie had two genuine laugh out loud moments for me. The first involves banditos. I had no idea one of the lines I would hear from a random bandito would be something very famous. The other involves a blooper with the camera panning too far to the left in one scene and revealing part of the set that shouldn't have made it on camera.

Overall I think I'd rate this movie at 7.5 on a ten point scale. If you are into old movies, this could jump by as much as a point and a half, and if you are someone who seems allergic to black and white on a TV, it would probably drop by a point and a half.

In a couple days I'll review the #51 movie and hopefully have a better review up here a couple days later.

New and Improved for 2008!

That's just about how I come into every new year. I don't have too many resolutions per se, but each year I want to do a lot of things in my day-to-day life a lot better. Of course this year is no exception, but this time around I have outlined a couple different projects to tackle on a regular basis.

The first project I came up with was a picture-a-day. I need to take one picture each day illustrating something I did that day, somewhere I was, topic of conversation, etc. This was meant to get me to take my camera out with me more often so I can get some really good pictures when the situation arises. I thought of it a couple weeks ago when most of Detroit was blanketed in fog, and from my window at work high above the fog I was forced to take some pictures with my camera phone instead of getting some really sweet ass pictures if I would have brought my camera with me that day.

Later in the week I came up with another idea, out of sheer boredom at work. I was looking up some info on The Matrix at imdb when I noticed it was in the IMDB Top 250. I looked over the top 25 and top 50 movies and realized that, for someone who claims to love movies, I really haven't seen enough of the best movies of all time. So my second project will be to watch one movie per week, starting with movie #52 and working my way to #1, and give a short review of it here.

Pic-a-Day:

Since we are only 4 days into 2008, I don't have much to put here....but it's a start.

Jan 1st:


This is the monkey I velcroed to Marc's belt as he tried to sleep well after midnight on NYE. Last New Year's, a few of us took much joy in constantly deflating the big man's air mattress as he slept in the living room at The Ranch. This time around he had a room to sleep in, but no closed door could keep me from deflating his hopes of a good night's sleep. The monkey was an innocent bystander until I saw him hanging from the closet door.

Jan 2nd:


The first of my movies, "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre". A review shall appear here sooner rather than later.

Jan 3rd:
Here we have just about every plate and utensil I own, along with a few pots and pans, and even a few more glasses. With my roommate and I both making a dish to take to The Ranch on NYE, the sink got full rather quickly. Unfortunately for my roommate, the dishes are his household chore. Unfortunately for me, there are no clean utensils in the house now as he still hasn't gotten around to this chore. This became my picture of the day because I tried to eat something with a fork last night and stumbled upon this as I looked for a clean one.

That's all for now since my Jan 4th pic is still pending, but check back soon as I am sure I will get one or two amusing pictures in here before long.

Merry Effing Xmas, Amazon

My parents are the hardest people for me to buy gifts for. If either of them sees anything they want, they buy it. I am the same way, so now I know how hard it is to get me a gift....

Every year I spend a ton of time looking for one or two good Christmas presents for them. Usually I end up with something that is just OK in my book, but it's the thought that counts right? I decided to do as much of my xmas shopping for this year online as I could. Somewhere in there I managed to find a gift I was excited to get for my parents. It was something I know they'd love and, just as important, something they would never think to buy themselves. So I add it to my Amazon cart and purchase it, along with a few gifts for Sarah.

Fast forward a week or so. I have everything I ordered for Sarah, yet the mom and dad gift that was supposed to ship with Sarah's stuff is still en route. Or so I thought. At 1:24 am this morning they sent me an e-mail letting me know that even though they guaranteed I'd have it by the 24th, it was not in stock and they had to cancel it from my order. Five days before Christmas.

So for once, I don't procrastinate and I still get to mill around with all the idiots looking for last minute gifts in the malls around here.

Last week, someone at work offered up an innovative idea on how to relieve stress. If you need to talk to me any time soon, I'll be out looking for some pigeons to kick.

Changes

When I got home from work today, I decided I would play 3 or 5 heads up matches and see if I got winner or not before pressing on. Upon opening Full Tilt, I got a new update. Probably something I won't even notice I thought. Ha! This update added a rematch option for heads up SNGs. BRILLIANT! How many times have you outplayed someone heads up only to lose to a suckout or complete crap luck and hurried back to the menu to try and catch that player again before someone else got the chance to take YOUR money from him/her?

I know I have had this happen quite a few times, often missing the person I wanted to play and getting someone else much better as I kept my eye on the player who was busy giving away my money. Needless to say, I thought this addition was great. At first. I posted a 15-11 (.577) record for the day heads up, but that included 4 consecutive losses to someone that I really thought I was outplaying. When I finally beat him in the fifth match, he declined my offer for a rematch. Ugh. I found him right away and sat down in another HU game with him and asked, politely, why he didn't let me have a chance to win back my money after I rematched him every time he won. His answer didn't satisfy me, and I ended up dismantling him pretty quickly and, of course, politely before he "headed off to dinner". I'm still down 2-4 to this guy, but will definitely be looking for him very soon to pull my money back out of his pockets.

Other than that little hiccup, I am very happy with my play and results today. 2-4 against him and 13-7 (.650) against the rest of my opponents. I spent way too much time and energy in the process, but I did end the day up a couple SNG buy-ins after the rake, and got pretty hot at the right time on a limit table in the process. I think I spent about 45 minutes playing two cash games while playing my heads up matches, and in about 20 minutes on the one table I was up 1.5 buy ins....in a limit game. Small stakes may be a big headache for the amount of money you win, but the skill level is still terrible and the tables often produce a decent profit for a good player. Not to mention, it gives me a lot of material for my Low Limit Hand of the Week.

In Dreams v2.0

Not much in the way of details for my dreams last night, but one thing did stick out to me. I was either the manager or owner of a local bar/brewery. We found a niche market.....a VERY niche market. Our best selling beer was made with a certain group of people in mind. This beer was made specifically for homosexual Jewish males and was a kosher pale ale called He-Brew.

In Dreams

It's no secret that I often have trouble sleeping. By nature I am a night owl. By work schedule I am an early riser. Those two things don't always work well with each other. Saturday night/Sunday morning I didn't go to bed until about 6 am....24 hours before I had to be at work the next day. Somehow in that 24 hours I had to find a way to get two full nights of sleep. Easier said than done.

I set an alarm to get me up around 11 on Sunday to do all my NFL picks and manage my FFL teams. It seems that in a couple weeks I won't have to worry about any of that as I am pretty sure to miss the playoffs in all three of my leagues, and my NFL picks are just sucking ass this year. Oh well.


So last night I get to bed at a decent hour after a nice meal with my girlfriend's family. Full stomach, tired....I should have slept really well. But when does that happen on a Sunday? I tossed and turned all night but did get some sleep in there somewhere, because I remember a couple dreams. The one that sticks out the most is the one I probably remember the fewest details from, but the one big thing I remember was very strange. Strange enough to make me realize it was a dream while I was still dreaming it.

Long story short, a bunch of my friends and I were hanging out at my house (which is usually the house I grew up in when I am dreaming) before we went out to the bar. When we went outside to drive to the bar, we all ended up "driving" separately because we were all piloting our own beds. We all laid face down on single mattresses on bed frames that rolled, and paddled with our arms like we were on surfboards. Navigating the neighborhood was no big deal, but when we got to a busier road, I started to wonder how all of us were going to paddle at like .5 mph when the speed limit was 45 mph.

I was the second bed at the stop sign turning right on to the road, and when the guy in front of me took off at like 50 mph (with bad Star Trek FX even) I realized that it was a dream and woke up. I was somewhat disappointed that I woke up at that time, because every now and then I realize I am dreaming when I am in a dream and go along with it. It's very cool to be in control of a dream.

Also at one point last night I woke up from a dream because I could smell something. I don't know if I have ever noticed whether or not my sense of smell is active in a dream before, but it kind of freaked me out when it happened last night. It was so real that I have a scent memory of it.

Hopefully sometime tomorrow I will remember to look into the whole "smell while dreaming" thing, but that will have to wait as my weird ass dreams are calling me to bed once again.

Evil

While cleaning the house the weekend before last I came across some things I forgot I still had. Things that I meant to throw away. Things that reminded me of a time a few years back when I wasn't as nice of a person as I am today. Reminders of some purely evil things I had done. Things I'll never discuss.

It's scary to know that I justified everything that I did. It was rather easy to do actually because nothing I did was illegal, and that used to be something that I relied on as a moral compass. The law. Kind of laughable really.

When I found these things, I was very surprised that I hadn't gotten rid of them. Why would I want to keep them? I set them aside to make sure I got rid of them. Then....I packed them away again. I decided that it might be a good idea to keep them around. I don't see how it could be bad to remind myself of things I used to do that I never want to be able to justify again.

I'm It?

Somewhere during my little bday break I was tagged by JamyHawk. I've never been one to play along with these types of reindeer games, but I don't see what would stop me now that I am making an honest effort to be an active part of the community once more.

Although I am going to go along with this, it's going to have to wait a day or two....and since I haven't really been reading blogs lately, I doubt I will end up tagging any poker bloggers. What a shame huh?

Birthday

So I took a few days off or birthday celebration stuff. Got some cool gifts, got too much food and dessert.

I have, however, discovered an equation that I never knew existed.

Crunch Berries = Love

NFL Week 9

I had thought about doing a nice write up on a handful of games that I'd be betting on if it wasn't such a pain in the ass to do so where I live....but I am going to be happy enough just watching the Indy/NE game at 4 o'clock, so we'll have to save that for some other time.

I say NE takes it 28-24.

Grab some popcorn and enjoy.

I Could Get Used to This....

My birthday isn't actually until Monday, but the celebrations started yesterday at work with a home made birthday cake of my choosing. Tonight is a night of drinking and gaming fun at the big boy Chuck E Cheese in Novi known as Lucky's. My birthday may actually be the lamest day of birthday celebration for me this year....

My Editor is an Ass

I'm making a serious attempt at getting at least one post up here or at my other blog every day this month and next month. I've been an on and off blogger for more than a couple years, but most of that time has been spent in shut down. I always have a lot to say, and blogs are a wonderful tool for the average guy to get his viewpoint out there....I am just too lazy to post as often as I should.

Actually, that's not the whole story. The truth is I am an asshole of an editor. Nothing is ever good enough for me. Couple that with being a writer with a somewhat fragile ego, and I am truly my own worst enemy when it comes to writing anything. For the next couple months, though, my writer-self and editor-self have agreed on a truce. Hopefully this will help me get more content out there.

Quick note: My birthday celebration is tomorrow night. We're starting off at Lucky's in Novi, and I am sure we'll end up somewhere else later in the night. If anyone is interested in joining these festivities, let me know and I can give you the details.

Day One

My first "must blog" day of my own little two month challenge and I have already put myself behind the 8 ball. My sleep habits have left me very little time to get anything up here, but something is better than nothing. The next few days will be very busy for me, so I'll be sure to post but I am not sure the quality of those posts will be up to par. I'll just consider this weekend a warm-up of sorts for next week when I start talking about something(s) with substance.

Or I'll just rant about my bad poker luck like usual....

Happy Halloween!

This token post should be followed up by an outright barrage of posts the next couple of months. I am going to try to take this blogging thing seriously once more and see if I can get a post up just about every day for the rest of the year.

More soon, stay tuned.

Scott Weiland Loves His Bullhorn

Velvet Revolver rocked DTE tonight. What a great show.

Alice in Chains played a great set too.

If this is my last concert of the summer, it was a good one.


Photo Credit: Happy Walters

Long Time Coming

It's been quite a while since I've posted anything of substance here. I'm not going to change that just yet, but it's been even longer since I posted a silly picture of my dog....so here goes.

Guinness says:
"Michael Vick is a good guy....FOR ME TO POOP ON!"

Briefly

This is why I love HU SNGs on Full Tilt.

Full Tilt Poker Game #2705422933: $11 + $0.50 Heads Up Sit & Go (20629860), Table 1 - 15/30 - No Limit Hold'em - 22:35:48 ET - 2007/06/18
The button is in seat #2
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Table_Max [6s 8s]
Table_Max calls 15
Opponent raises to 90
Table_Max calls 60
*** FLOP *** [3d Jd Ts]
Opponent bets 90
Table_Max calls 90
*** TURN *** [3d Jd Ts] [3h]
Opponent bets 90
Table_Max raises to 270
Opponent calls 180
*** RIVER *** [3d Jd Ts 3h] [Jh]
Opponent checks
Table_Max bets 750
Opponent folds
Uncalled bet of 750 returned to Table_Max
Table_Max mucks
Table_Max wins the pot (900)
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 900 | Rake 0
Board: [3d Jd Ts 3h Jh]
Seat 1: Opponent (big blind) folded on the River
Seat 2: Table_Max (small blind) collected (900), mucked



Full Tilt Poker Game #2705430713: $11 + $0.50 Heads Up Sit & Go (20629860), Table 1 - 15/30 - No Limit Hold'em - 22:36:30 ET - 2007/06/18
Seat 1: Opponent (1,050)
Seat 2: Table_Max (1,950)
Opponent posts the small blind of 15
Table_Max posts the big blind of 30
The button is in seat #1
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Table_Max [Td 4h]
Opponent calls 15
Table_Max checks
*** FLOP *** [7s 8h 6c]
Table_Max bets 30
Opponent calls 30
*** TURN *** [7s 8h 6c] [2c]
Table_Max bets 60
Opponent calls 60
*** RIVER *** [7s 8h 6c 2c] [9h]
Table_Max bets 240
Opponent raises to 480
Table_Max raises to 1,830, and is all in
Opponent has 15 seconds left to act
Opponent calls 450, and is all in
Uncalled bet of 900 returned to Table_Max
*** SHOW DOWN ***
Table_Max shows [Td 4h] a straight, Ten high
Opponent mucks
Table_Max wins the pot (2,100) with a straight, Ten high
Table_Max: gg
Opponent stands up
Table_Max stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 2,100 | Rake 0
Board: [7s 8h 6c 2c 9h]
Seat 1: Opponent (small blind) mucked [5d Ah] - a straight, Nine high
Seat 2: Table_Max (big blind) showed [Td 4h] and won (2,100) with a straight, Ten high

Yep, two hands. This happens a lot more than you would think....