So, I am really going to make a concerted effort to keep blogging. It
seems to be very therapeutic for most poker players I know. Hopefully
it will help me focus as well.
So, I haven't posted in... 6
months? Holy shit, worst blogger of all time. I have been extremely
busy however, with school mostly as well as other just life stuff. I am
working in the lab hopefully trying to get some reactions to actually
work. The good news is, that recently the reaction that I have spent
pretty much my entire summer on has started working with a lot more
frequency and this upcoming week I plan on scaling it up to a pretty
large scale so I can get full characterization on it and have a key
compound that will the basis for my Master's Thesis that I need to
write up here in the next month. After that, who knows? Maybe I will
continue on to work on my PhD. work here at Notre Dame, if not I am not
sure what I want to do. This area of Northern Indiana unfortunately
doesn't have a shit ton of jobs for MS Organic Chemists and I would
easily move somewhere if it wasn't for the fact that I live with my
girlfriend who is smarter than me and will be getting her PhD. in
Biochemistry from this University sometime in the next 2.5-3.5 years.
Leaving her right now isn't something that I want to do, I don't really
feel like being one of those couples that need to travel to see each
other every weekend if I happen to get a job in Indianapolis or
Chicago. Long distance for 2.5-3.5 years is -EV for sure.
Poker-wise
I have been pretty fortunate to get to meet as many people as I have
considering I am a super donk. I was really hoping to improving my game
in '08 and so far, a little over half a year, I have done that. What I
am starting to realize more everyday is, how much more I need to learn.
Also, what I am learning is that this game is a whore, a dirty whore
that usually just gives you the HIV. I shouldn't bitch too much, I have
made some money this year even though I am stuck in the biggest
downswing of my life at the time. Before Jan. 1st I had one count them
1 4 figure score in my life. It was in the Grand Prix on PokerRoom like
2 summers ago. I remember it well because it was the same day I was
updating the blog for my good friend and poker bff Jeremy Gaubert as he
was playing in his first ever WSOP Main Event in 2006. Well, since the
beginning of the year I have had 4 figure scores on 8 separate
occassions. I am still chasing that elusive 5 figure score but have
been painfully close the last couple of months. My biggest scores have
been wins in the Full Tilt Poker 32k guaranteed for $7050 and I also
won the FTP 28k guaranteed for $6950. I also have won the UB 10k bounty
for $3100 2 weeks ago. I have a 3rd in the FTP 50/50 for 4100. As you
can tell I run good on Full Tilt usually. My best scores on PokerStars
have been a 3rd place finish in the 3r a month or so ago for 2700 which
took 11hours, and was so disappointed that I didn't win it because it
was apparent as we were down to two tables that I was the best player
in that tournament at that point and I had chips. Lost a couple of
races and then I was unfortunate that the big stack woke up with AQ
when I had A9 3-handed, I know it may sound like I am donk for putting
my life on the line with A9 there, but I had been opening up a lot of
pots weak with the big stack in the bb. I thought when he re raised me
on the 3rd or 4th straight time I had raised his bb he might be doing
it light out of spite. No, it just turned out he was a weak tight pussy
and got lucky to have a hand. Also on PokerStars I have final tabled
the 50/50 in the last month, to get 9th! ARG. So disappointing, it was
during double guarantees week and first was 16.5k. I walked home with
only $1133. Everything else has been pretty standard for me so far this
year. I still run horrible, but there have been times when I run like
Carl Lewis and those have been the tournaments I have gotten very deep
in. Since the beginning of the year where I started at about 50th
percentile on Pocket5s.com in mtt tournaments, I have now gotten myself
into the 95th percentile. I still am chasing the dream however.
I
owe a lot of my success to my poker bff Jeremy Gaubert. Most people
know him as "thechemist83" in the online world. He is an extremely good
player and I have known him for a long time dating back to our
Pokerroom days. Well I was home in Omaha at my parents house over
Christmas this year, and I was thinking that I wanted to really try to
play more and better poker. On December 3oth Jeremy asked me if I would
be interested in being backed by him and another player, as they were
going to start their own backing business. I was like, hell yeah!
Apparently that was some sort of lucky charm, because that day Jeremy
went on to chop the 1k buy in Sunday Million for a whopping 233k!
Thanks to him, I have been introduced to a lot of good players who I
now am able to talk poker with and improve my game, and to my own fault
bitch about my shit luck to as well, which I am sure they are all
pumped about. I am really fortunate to have the network that I do. I
also gotta tell everyone about Jeremy's sick run in teh WSOP this year.
He came up a little short as he got busted my Mike Matusow in the Main
Event in the 58th place when J's AK ran into Mikey's JJ and the flop
came J 66 or something. Thanks for the sweat... At least this year he
should get some TV time. He also played on Phil Hellmuth's table for a
bit, even though he didn't manage to piss him off like everyone else
did. It'll make for some fun watching the event though. Hopefully next
year I will get my shot.
I am going to be extremely busy the
next 2 months of my life, and I am hoping to get as much poker in as I
can during that time frame, but we will see. I am going to KC on the
first of August for a Bachelor Party that'll be a fun weekend. Then I
am back here at home for 2 weeks until the 15th when I fly out to New
York for my first and last Yankee game at Yankee's Stadium. My friends
and I have never been there and we are running out of time, so we had
to get out there for this game. Then 2 weeks after that I may be going
to San Diego to head to a Padres game and just see the sites as Kim
will be there for a conference. I have never been to California so that
would be cool.
Other than that, all I have done in the last 6
months is put a hole in my wall, break my computer a couple times.
Overall, a good time. Seriously though, I am trying to chill out and
just play better and be more calm.
I am gonna try to update this a lot more in the future with poker as well as other life things. Thanks for reading.