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More on Europe

There will be five of us going and we’re leaving May 15 and returning May 30. I can’t remember all of the itinerary, but we’re flying into Rome and flying out of London. I think we’re going from Rome to Florence, then we’ll travel through the South of France via rental car, then over to Switzerland, then up to Paris and finally to London. It seems like there’s another place or two, but that’s the general idea.

I’m really excited to be experiencing something so new. I’ve never been north of West Virginia and the Atlantic and Pacific oceans have been the East-West boundaries for me so far. Suddenly, I need a passport and I have to make sure I can get two weeks off of work in May.

I still have a lot to learn since I haven’t a clue about backpacking and what that entails. I know I’ll be taking a camera and I only hope I’m motivated to use it. I’m typically lazy about taking pictures and rarely get any good shots when I travel. Maybe my friends will take the camera and get some good stuff.

Anyway, this bland post is just to say I’m definitely going to Europe and I’m really excited about it. I’ll most more details as they become available.

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Europe?

Yes, please! Um, so it looks like I might be going to Europe next month. The details are all very fuzzy, but it looks like I’ll be visiting a mix of places–some “touristy” and some not so well-known. Looks like I might hit London, Paris, Rome, somewhere in Switzerland, maybe Prague.

Things are probably going to have to come together pretty quickly because I have to be back in the States by June. For now, I need to get a passport and find the best airfare possible. That is all.

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Spanglish

What a super movie. I really enjoyed it and my appreciation for Adam Sandler grew quite a bit as the movie went on. I already liked his work, but I think this may be his best all-around performance yet. Though this isn’t exactly the kind of thing I’d like to write, it’s pretty close. I mean, I wouldn’t be at all disappointed if I was capable of writing this screenplay. Unfortunately, I’m not even really capable of writing about writing this screenplay, so I’ll stop now.

Mignon

So, a friend and I went to a fancy restaurant tonight and it was good eatin’. A little on the pricey side, but nothing outrageous. The steak was so good, I was savoring every bite. It was really nice to get out and enjoy myself for a change since I usually spend Friday night on the couch, watching TV and playing poker. If I’m feeling really frisky, I’ll sometimes go to Starbucks and read.

Basketball on the rebound (yes, I’m very clever)

Today, I ran full-court (well, short-court and four-on-four) for the first time in several months. Overall, I played pretty well, but the competition wasn’t all that great. It’s not that I was super good, just that most of the guys I ran with didn’t really know how to play too well. Simple concepts like switching on a screen and boxing out weren’t being used at all. I made some good shots, passed the ball well, got up and down the floor better than I thought I would and got away with only a few minor injuries (a sore elbow and a sprained wrist). By the time the league starts up in June, I’ll be ready to go.

I’m looking forward to the weekend.

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Poker tourney cancelled

I found out on Friday afternoon that Saturday’s poker tournament was cancelled. I was pretty disappointed because I’m confident I could’ve won it. I’ve also been doing reasonably well online lately, although my bankroll hasn’t been growing. I’ve been using cash games and SNGs to fund tournaments. I’ve moneyed in a few recently (some with fields over 1300), but haven’t made the big bucks yet. It seems like the necessary strategy is to play correctly and make the money and then hope luck carries me to the final table. Usually, I bust out on a coin flip, a risk I wouldn’t normally take but, by that time in the tournament, being blinded off is a big threat.

I played some low-stakes No Limit this weekend and did pretty well. I just lost $25 bucks and I’m still up over $30 for the weekend. The $25 went to two bad beats: KQ lost to KJ (I flopped an open-ended straight draw and made top pair on the river; he had two pair) and AA lost to AKs (that last one was all-in before the flop and he made a straight with a AQJTx board). But that’s poker.

Interviewing visit redux

About seven or eight weeks ago, a friend from Florida came out to interview with my company. He’s coming back out this weekend for another go-round. I’m looking forward to having some company and I hope things work out well for him.

Clean?

I cleaned my apartment tonight for the first time in, ummm, too long. I’d been piece-mealing it for months, but hadn’t done a real thorough job until tonight. I just couldn’t take it anymore. The biggest pain? The new towels I bought several weeks ago apparently leave piles of lint every-freakin’-where. I probably could’ve made a new towel with all the lint I cleaned up.

Tylenol PM is kickin’ and that means I’m gonna’ start gettin’ loopy pretty soon. I’m going to get in bed before that happens so I don’t wake up in the grass downstairs tomorrow.

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Same ol’, Same ol’

Not much going on. I’ll give a quick summary:

First, I finally bought a new car. I had been driving a 98 Pontiac Grand Am for almost 5 years. It had 115,000 miles on it and I hated it with a furious passion. It was formerly a Mary Kay car. I bought a new (2005) Infiniti G35 and I couldn’t be happier with it. I described the difference to a friend as follows: “It’s not even like I upgraded. It’s like I moved to a different planet!”

Second, I’ve been playing a lot of poker lately. Essentially, I’ve been breaking even for a couple weeks. Before that, I had a pretty nasty losing streak at $2/$4 Hold ‘Em, so I backed off for a while. That streak came after a big fat winning streak at the same stakes. I’ve been playing tons of smaller stakes tournaments lately (max $10 buy-in) and doing ok. I’ve moneyed a couple times and played some good poker. The highlight was the other night when I played a $3 + re-buys satellite to a WSOP qualifier. The prize was a $650 seat and the top 4 got paid. I finished 6th… but only because my internet connection went out for 20 minutes. I’m convinced I would’ve made the money about 90% of the time… I lost about half my stack while disconnected (blinds were pretty high) and I was dealt KK once while gone.

I’ve also been reading Harington on Hold ’em, by Dan Harrington and Bill Robertie. It’s definitely the best book on NL Hold ‘Em that I’ve read and it could be tied for best tournament poker book I’ve read. I’m trying to let the info sink in because…

I am playing in a $45 buy-in tournament with 37 other players next weekend. First place pays over $700 and the top 5 places get paid. Last time I played with this group, it was an 17-person $50 buy-in tournament and I finished second and made about $200 bucks. I hadn’t played at all in six months before that tournament and I’m much better now. I just hope luck is on my side. If it is, I’m confident I can win it.

Time for sleep!

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Worst start ever

I guess it’s only been one day, but I’m pretty sure I ain’t winnin’ any pools for the NCAA Tournament this year. I’m in three pools and here’s where I stand after 16 games played: 3/3, 19/20, 42/42. That’s right, my best standing is the Fifth Percentile. It would appear this is one of those years where every game I pick will be wrong and they’ll all be close.

I have to keep reminding myself that most of this is just dumb luck, but my ego still hurts a little.

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The Contender

I guess maybe ‘reality TV’ is an acquired taste, but I think this show is almost empirically good. I suppose there are those who ‘don’t like boxing’, and I can accept that but, for the rest of us, this is a super show. I think it’s because boxing is such an ego-centric sport. More so than basketball, football, baseball, hockey, soccer, and on and on and on. Also, the thrill of rooting against a boxer or for a boxer is much greater than rooting for or against a team. It’s just fun to watch such a battle of huge egos. These guys all think they’re the best thing ever… and only one of them will finish on top.

Anyway, my grammar is horrible and I’m not making much sense. Note to self: don’t drink Sleepy Time tea before posting.

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Can’t think of a title

EDIT: For about a week now, I’ve been trying to decide whether to post this online. It’s been sitting on my laptop in the meantime. I finally decided this is where this post belongs. Remembering things in this post is kind of why I started the weblog anyway.

This week was kind of difficult for me on an emotional level because a co-worker of mine (in Dallas) committed suicide early last week. I found out on my way to the airport, so I had a few hours to think about it while I waited on my flight to L.A. I normally wouldn’t write much about this, but I was surprised by how I felt and what I experienced as time went by.

“Co-worker” is kind of vague; he was also a friend. I enjoyed working with him and he was fun to be around. He never complained (ever), always did his job exceptionally well and never missed a beat.

At first, I was only told that he had passed away at his home; I didn’t know how. Other co-workers had been concerned because he missed two days of work and didn’t call in, so they went to his house with the local police. They found him inside.

My initial reaction was a numb feeling and some shock. It didn’t really compute. Then it started slowly dawning on me that he wouldn’t be at work next Monday when I got back. That took a long time to sink in because he’s one of the few people that I interacted with daily, almost without exception. Then I tried to remember the last time I’d talked to him. I think I was subtly concerned that maybe our last interaction was negative. I don’t even know why the thought crossed my mind because I don’t remember ever having a negative conversation with this guy. He was probably one of the easiest people to get along with in the entire building.

Eventually, I remembered that the last time we talked, we didn’t talk. I was heading up to my desk and gave him the thumbs-up, he responded with the smile-and-nod. That seems appropriate.

More time passed and then a sort of morbid curiosity started creeping into my mind. How? Natural causes, some sort of attack, suicide? I couldn’t figure out why I really needed to know or wanted to know, but I did. I now realize that I became very aware of my own mortality. I thought it was possible that he simply quit breathing, his body decided to stop. And if that could happen to him–he was in good health and didn’t have any unhealthy vices that I knew of–then it could happen to me. Just like that. All of a sudden my co-worker’s death was about me. How did that happen? I think it was a combination of two things: selfishness and a defense mechanism. Selfish or not, it was a lot easier to think about myself than a deceased friend.

I had about 16 hours to think about everything before work the next morning. It was there that I heard he’d hung himself. I was told that any number of things could’ve been overwhelming him, but that no one really knew why he’d done it. My initial reaction to this was sorrow. I felt sorry for him and wished I would’ve somehow known he was considering this. Mostly, I think I imagined how overwhelmed he must’ve been by something, by life, that he took his life. It hurt me to imagine someone dealing with that kind of weight privately, without talking to anyone. I can’t think of how to articulate this feeling. It’s just the idea of someone, alone, bearing so much that he could think of no other way to deal with it. The solution he chose was to die at his own hand, alone.

Then selfishness reared its ugly head again. I felt a little relieved. It took a couple days for me to figure out why: again, it was my fear of my own mortality. His body hadn’t just stopped and mine probably wouldn’t either. Then the relief came from rationalizing that at least he chose to go. He made a decision, it wasn’t made for him. That’s just another defense mechanism.

So now I’ve been back to work and it’s a little strange. There’s definitely the “big white elephant” that no one is talking about. But maybe they talked about it more last week while I was in L.A. Every now and then I’ll hear another detail: he was dressed for work. But those details don’t seem as significant to me as the detail that I’d worried so much about before. They just help to paint a more vivid picture, a sadder one.

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Vegas: A couple days later

Ok, so I mostly covered the gambling part of my trip in my daily posts and I feel I should also cover the other things I did. First off, I stayed in a room on the 21st floor of the Bellagio. It was really nice, but the nicest part was the bathroom. Not only was their a shower stall, but there was also a big ol’ bathtub. I didn’t use the tub, but it was nice to know it was there. Everything was made of top-quality materials and there was an abundance of marble.

There was a wired internet connection for $11 a day per computer. My buddy and I both had our wireless laptops, so I brought along a wireless router. It worked really well and we only got charged for one computer (because the router looks like a computer to the internet connection and it masks all the computers that use it).

I ate at a few very nice restaurants. First was Sensi, an international restaurant with all kinds of different food. We had a raw seafood platter for an appetizer (I tried a raw clam) and I had grilled chicken for dinner. Of course, I also had a glass of white wine and it was super.

Next night, we ate at Olives. It was another restaurant with a lot of variety, but it hand a bias to Italian food. Again, I had a glass of white wine and some very tasty salmon for dinner.

After dinner at Olives, we went to a show at the Improv over at Harrah’s. It was pretty funny, but not the funniest thing I’ve ever seen. The emcee was actually funnier than the two headliners. It was a really good time and we all had a bunch of laughs… most of which were at material that I probably shouldn’t repeat here.

One morning, we went to the Buffet at Bellagio. It was incredible. So much food and so little time to eat it all. It took a few minutes just to walk around and look at everything, let alone eat it. I had french toast, sausage, eggs, a muffin and some fruit. I also played Keno for the first time, but none of us made any money (surprise!).

The last morning, we went to the Cafe at Bellagio and played some more Keno. I won five bucks and my buddy’s mom won 20 bucks. She was on fire all week and probably ended up leaving about $1000 up. In fact, my friend’s entire family cleaned up at Bellagio and I was the only one in our group to leave with a net loss.

…BUT, that net loss has been erased as I’ve made back all I lost and then some playing poker online. I was down $214,but between yesterday and today, I made about $230. So, the money I lost in Vegas will be in my bank account in 72 hours or less. I made that money in about 5 hours playing online. Outrageous.

That’s about it. I had an awesome time both gambling and hanging out with my friend’s family. They are really awesome people and I enjoyed getting to know them all better. I got to experience some things I’d never experienced before (like the meals at Sensi and Olives and the show at the Improv). And I stayed in one of the nicest hotels in the world. I learned how to play blackjack and played my first poker in a casino. Man, what a great experience. Hopefully that won’t be my last trip to Vegas.

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Vegas: Day 4 report

Short but sweet: Lost $25 on a hand of blackjack. I figured I’d take a shot at breakin’ even on $25. Basically, if I could double-up three consecutive times without losing, I’d break even. I figured the odds weren’t good (assuming I have a 50% chance of winning a hand–a bit generous, but good enough for an estimate), so I would have about a 12% chance of winning three straight and breaking even. Unfortunately, I was dealt a 20 and the dealer was showing 3. Of course I stood and the stupid dealer shows an 8 and hits a 10 for 21. I’m anxious to find out what the odds of that garbage are.

Anyway, today I lost $25 and won $5 at Keno. That brings me to down $214 for the trip. Not bad since I had allowed $600 and had set aside $1000 to play with.

Overall, I had a great time. My friend that I roomed with had his family here as well. We went to a lot of very nice restaurants and an improv show last night. I mean, even without that stuff, I stayed at the freakin’ Bellagio for three nights. But eating at a few Bellagio restaurants, watching my friend’s uncle play over $100 a hand at blackjack and spending time with great people made for a really good trip.

Now I have to save up my energy to go to L.A. next Tuesday. I’m totally beat.