On February 28<SPAN id=SPELLING_ERROR_0 class=blsp-spelling-error>th</SPAN> I had a $1,500 bankroll, was playing $6 and $12 <SPAN id=SPELLING_ERROR_1 class=blsp-spelling-error>SNG's</SPAN> on <SPAN id=SPELLING_ERROR_2 class=blsp-spelling-error>PokerStars</SPAN>; absolutely broke, and waiting for a call to go back to my old job as a carpenter, because poker had been not so good for the last 15 months, and my financial situation was absolutely desperate.

Tonight, I can't sleep after chopping the FTP 750K for my first 6 figures score: $105,528. I am very happy, but the feeling that stands up the most is relief. The journey was so long, and the difficulties were so many, that all my thoughts are focused on how to pay the most bills, and how not to go back to the previous situation ever again.

Playing poker is my biggest passion, I think about the game at all times; I try to find new solutions to old problems while I walk, I think about difficult hands when I go to bed, and I have developed what I believe is a deep understanding of the game...but playing high stakes tournaments while you can't pay your mortgage, your credit cards are maxed out, your wife goes to work every day while you stay at home not knowing if it's even worth the time...I'm not going through that stress again, it's just not an option.

Today is time to celebrate, maybe go out for a nice dinner, and start looking for plane tickets to visit my family in Spain. But tomorrow I'll make a plan, and I will follow it, because playing tournaments with a buy in larger than what you have in your bank account can not be good for your sanity.

Later this week I will update this blog, and talk about the tournament, but right now I needed to talk about how I feel.

My wife and I have a private joke that has saved us from quite a few fights. It is called "random thoughts", and I give my survival instinct all the credit for it development.

It happens that we love to talk; we talk in the car; we talk while we shop; we talk while having dinner; we talk when we go to bed. In fact, we won't shut up. You must think we have amazing and meaningful conversations; that we are capable of following the subject and pay close attention to whatever the matter of our conversation is; that we extract all the juice to our endless talks, and that, my friend, is not the reality...

Truth is that more often than what you could imagine, while we're in the middle of discussing our financial situation, she would say "don't forget to buy bananas tomorrow". Or if the subject of our conversation is how good or bad her daughter is doing in soccer, she would surprise me with an absolutely unexpected "thank God I have a massage tomorrow". Those are, as you can imagine, what I call "random thoughts".

I am not 100% innocent, and every once and then I have my own share of random thoughts (although, I must say the ratio is close to 9:1 on her favor), and it's not a surprise when I tell her who won the 1K Monday... while she's getting ready to work in the morning, yelling to her daughter to hurry up, and trying to remember where she left the class room keys. At this point is important to let you know that she is an avid poker player, and knows who is who in the poker world; so I guess is not that strange if I try to engage in a conversation about how good Apestyles ran yesterday night to win that tournament for 57th time... despite being 8:45AM, and she was supposed to be at school at 8:30.

One day I started to call those derailments "random thoughts", and instead of getting upset realizing that your couple is not paying close attention to what you were saying, you can just have your good laughs calling her out on it, and that's exactly what we do now. I don't get upset anymore thinking that "my wife doesn't listen to me", I just take a break from my seriousness, and love her for being so spontaneous and not giving a shit about what was I saying.

My interest for getting involved in poker-related discussions is at minimum. Not because I have lost my love for the game, but because I don't feel like digging for gold, trying to find 1-2 worthy posts in the sea of worthlessness that flows poker forums nowadays. I don't want to read about folding KK preflop to a min-re-raise; or how to find a backer; or if it is normal to lose 20 buy ins playing STT's; or how good Moorman runs (hey, we all know that, thanks for the HU); or how rigged online poker is; or why did AJKHoosier made this HORRIBLE CALL FOR 3BB's in the Sunday Million (props to you for not getting out of line with your response Alex, I would have earned myself a new ban), etc, etc, etc.

I am guilty of having posted important amounts of worthless lines on the net, and I'm pretty sure I have not finished doing so... but from now on I'll do my best to keep said lines in the limits of my own space (this blog), and to don't feed other people's unworthiness with my reactions. This is part of the new me as a poker player as well, but we'll go over that in future editions of this Random Thoughts Series.

Andres