Week 3 wrapup.....

I had a good week as far as getting in lots of hours and playing lots of hands, but my results were somewhat lackluster.

I played 36 hours and 25,321 hands, but I only ran at 1.09 BB/100 which is pretty abysmal. I know it could be worse....I could have had a losing week, but it is frustrating to play so many hours/hands and run below expectation. The good news is that I ran really hot at 5/10 and cold in 2/4 and 3/6 and still ended up winning $5,285 on the week.

Total results after week 3:
Online: +$8,370
Live: -$1050
Total: +$7,320

That is decent money, but I am pretty disappointed with that figure considering how much I have played.

I am still waiting to have a bust out week and hopefully it will come sooner rather than later!

I am going to be hard pressed to get all of the hours in that I want to in the upcoming weeks. Landon is coming out for about 10 days starting on the 5th and then I think Derek, Joey and Kelly (Derek's sister) are coming out starting on the 16th for a couple of weeks. I know all of those guests will tell me that they don't want me to miss out on playing while they are here, but it is still tough to play when people are here....not that I mind, I love having visitors.

I am looking forward to bowling tonight since I missed last week playing golf. 600 series here I come!

Week 2 update....

Week 2 started off with some promise, but I had two really awful days back to back that kind of got me in a funk as far as my poker confidence goes. I ended up having a losing week, but it wasn't near as bad as it seemed in my mind. I felt like I would never win again and I was on my way to going broke, but that obviously wasn't true. I took a couple of days off and played some golf and just tried to regroup my thoughts.

A quick side note about running bad: It is very hard to overcome the inevitable downswings that happen in poker just due to the nature of the game and the variance involved. If you are a winning player (big if in most cases) eventually you will be able to overcome any variance that gets thrown your way. However, it can be extremely dangerous to ever let variance affect your confidence and cause you to alter your winning style. In my opinion, playing bad and having low confidence in what you are doing is at the heart of just about every extended losing streak. This low confidence usually stems from some kind of negative variance you've experienced. I think it is very important that the instant you realize you are suffering from low confidence and/or not playing your best you take a step back to collect your thoughts and work on getting it fixed a.s.a.p. Sometimes it is amazing how long it takes you to realize that you aren't playing your best. Low confidence and playing bad can creep into your game so subtly that even the most self-aware person doesn't realize it is happening until a lot of damage has been done. I think this is something that a lot of poker players struggle with. It isn't ever fun to tell yourself that you are playing bad and actually quit playing or spend time on fixing your leaks before you play again. For some players it seems almost impossible for them to have enough discipline to stop playing even when they KNOW they aren't playing their best. I think these are the players that tend to have the longest losing streaks or "run bad" more than other players.

In short what I am trying to say is that the next time you think you are just destined to "run bad" or you have been the victim of too much negative variance recently I think you should examine your own psyche and recent play before you start whining about how unlucky you are. Basically, I think people would be much better off and have shorter downswings if they started taking more responsibility for their results. This type of thinking fits well with one of my favorite truths in life..."you make your own luck".

Sorry for going off on that rant, but I just wanted to get that off my chest. During week 2 I ended up winning $246 playing hold'em online, lost $1,200 playing live, lost $550 playing online tourneys, and lost $850 playing PLO online.

Online: -$1154
Live: -$1200
Total: -$2354

I am already 4 days into my week 3 and I have played quite a bit, but ran a little below expectation (1.83 BB/100). The good news is that I am crushing the little bit of the 5/10 that I have played and running poor at 2/4 and 3/6. So far I am up $4,126 this week in just over 20 hours of play.

So far I am up about $6200 since the start of this 7 week challenge which is well below what I think I should have made. However, it isn't such a bad thing to "run bad" and make over $6K in 2.5 weeks. I feel like I am on the verge of busting out of my "slump" and running hot for a week or two to get back on pace. If I can just run hot for a week or two I can make some serious money playing 8 tables. It sure is gonna be fun when that does happen! Wish me luck (not that I'll need it).

Matt decided to prank himself....

This was our car ride home last night. Matt was a bottle of wine, infinite red bull and vodka, and a shot of tequila deep at this point.

This should be good and embarrassing for him....

Oh dear Matt.....

For any of you who saw the blog that Matt posted on MY BLOG just sit back and wait....I will eventually post a blog explaining in detail the monumental prank I pull on him in retaliation. I have no idea what it will be yet, but he is going to be in town for a while. I am in no rush to get him back so if I can't come up with something before he leaves just rest assured it will be coming one day...and it will be funny!

For anyone that missed it. The blog that he posted under my name was titled "Please Help...." The subject was: .....me to get a girlfriend.

For some reason it always really bothered me when people chatted pretending to be me on my instant messenger name, used my phone to text people, and now I suppose it also bothers me when people pretend to be me and post on my blog.

I am very creative, but if anyone has any good suggestions of pranks they would like to see pulled on Matt please feel free to email them to me. Don't leave them in my comments because he will read them. My email is pncruse@yahoo.com.

Stay tuned to find out what happens when Matt decides to open one of these....

Day 2 week 2.....

To my two blog readers that left anonymous comments, but let me know who they were thanks and I appreciate you reading....to the joker that left the anonymous comment and didn't let me know who they were....not funny! Actually, it is pretty funny and I would have been shocked had one of my friends not been such a wise guy.

Day two was a good day. I was able to play 5 hours this time while still playing 8 tables. I ended up winning $1870 and ran at 3.39 BB/100 today for just over 4,100 hands. It gives me the willys to think that this is "just another typical day" of me playing poker and it still doesn't seem like I should really be able to make so much money doing what I love.

Matt and I actually made it to the gym today, but I feel like the gym got me more than I got the gym. Matt tried to sneak in and was NOT smooth at all when the lady at the front desk caught him.....he acted surprised that he had just unintentionally walked past the desk where you are supposed to show your membership card to get in. Anyway, they made him sign up for a membership if he wanted to come in for the day. Since he plans on being out here a lot he went ahead and signed up for one full year. It was going to be $199 for just that gym for a whole year. Then they pulled some strings and gave him the "Super Sport Package" (a nationwide membership that gets you in to the really nice club that is in Summerlin) for only $250 for the year. Wait a minute I thought to myself.....He is getting the same membership I have for only $250 for a year and I am paying $70/month! I ended up renegotiating my contract, but it wasn't cheap to do it (for today anyway). For some reason the best deal they could give me was $999 for the year, but I got the next 3 years for free ($250 per year). After the 4 years are up I only have to pay $150/year for the rest of my life. So I am paying much less to be a member, but it still wasn't fun giving them $1,000 today!

Who knows what we'll get into tonight, but its time to go eat somewhere.

Exhausting first day of week 2....

So today was the second full day of playing 8 tables of 6 max poker on my new setup. I was really looking forward to playing today and motivated to put in a long session so that I can be sure to reach my goal of 30 hours this week. I played for about 4 hours and 20 minutes straight and it seemed like I played for about 8 hours. It really wears me down much quicker to play 8 tables instead of 6. I suppose it will get easier eventually and I will develop more stamina for playing 8 tables. I played just over 3100 hands today which would take me about 5 hours and 40 minutes playing 6 tables and I very rarely played that long when I was 6 tabling so I guess it is a pretty good trade off. I won right at $1200 today after getting off to a fairly rough start. I ended up running at 4.25 BB/100 which is slightly better than what my goal is. I know this is all very boring stuff to anyone reading this so I will stop rambling about my statistics that I am pretty much obsessed with.

For anyone that wants to comment on my blog.....I love getting the comments, but I HATE when you don't say who left the comment! I have gotten several comments from "Anonymous" and even some from people who did leave their name and I still didn't know who they were. If you are a stranger commenting on my blog let me know how you found my blog. If you aren't a stranger just let me know who left the comment.....thanks!

Matt and Josh are breaking my balls for spending too much time writing this blog (even though them talking to me is the reason it is taking me so long) so I better wrap it up. We are headed to the Bellagio to eat at Noodles. Having friends in town is horrible for watching what you eat! Matt and I have promised each other that we are going to the gym every day while he is out here (wow, that sounds extremely gay, but I am gonna leave it in here anyway) so I shouldn't have to worry too much about what I eat.

A solid first week.

I didn't play as much as I would have liked, but I did manage to get some other much needed chores done. I finally got my taxes paid and I spent WAY too much time at Best Buy buying a new computer. First off, I want to give a shout out to my dad....he didn't bug me about paying my taxes even one time this year! There is no doubt in my mind that he had been biting his tongue since the first of the year. I managed to get them paid even if it was only one day before the deadline. So, thanks for having faith in me Pop.

I had two good days this week and the rest of them were either small wins or small loses. I ended up only playing about 25 hours and won $4239 online and $150 live. My win rate ended up being 3.65 BB/100 which is nothing special, but above the 3.5 rate that I set as my goal so I guess I can't complain. Having a 3.5 BB/100 rate probably just got a little tougher, but a lot more profitable with my new computer setup. Josh and I both got some sweet new computers which runs dual 28" monitors. I can pretty comfortably play 8 tables of 6 max NL now and my hourly rate should go up pretty nicely just from the extra two tables. I think it should raise my hourly rate by $20-40/hour so my new computer should pay for itself pretty quickly.

Matt gets in town today for 9 or 10 days so I should be pretty busy for a while. Hopefully I am still able to get my 30 hours for the week in. It is pretty retarded to think that I can't get 30 HOURS A WEEK in sometimes. I mean I am giving up soooo much money by being lazy it is sickening. So right now it is time to SNAP OUT OF IT!

Half-way dominating....

Poker went great today, but I didn't do much too much (anything) to get in shape. I got up early and got dressed to go to the gym and then just never made it out of the house....I am such a bum. Going on that cruise and just stuffing my face everyday all day just makes me want to eat all the time now. It is rough getting back in the groove of eating healthy, but I'll get back in it soon.

I played about 3 hours today of some decent poker and had a really solid day going as I was up around $1500, but just didn't really feel like putting anymore time in. I told myself I should at least play one more hour and I am glad I did....I ended up playing about 4.3 hours today and won $3,529 while running at 14.34 BB/100 for the day as a whole.

Josh and I decided randomly to go play the Venetian Deep Stack Extravaganza that both of us have had good success in in the past. It started at 6:00 pm, but they have late registration and we didn't leave the house until about 6:30. I flopped a set of 2's on my first hand and got some action and picked up AA on the very next hand and got more action! Don't worry though...I busted out about 40 minutes later, but I did manage to outlast Josh by about 5 minutes.

I got in a calcutta format golf contest for the Masters today and I went kind of crazy....maybe. If you don't know how a calcutta works it is where all the players in the field are auctioned off and all the money goes in the total prize pool. In this pool, whoever bought the player that ends up winning the Masters gets 40% of the prize pool, 2nd place gets 30%, 3rd gets 20%, and 4th gets 10%. I ended up paying an absurd price of $1150 to buy Tiger Woods!

If he gets:
1st I get back $2,080
2nd I get back $1,560
3rd I get back $1,040
4th I get back $520
5th or worse I get back $0

I applied some poker/equity math to my purchase and going by his stats for all of his tourneys for the last 3 years my purchase is worth about $9 in profit (it ends up being very similar if you use his stats for just the majors). I feel like he is playing better now than he ever has so it should be worth a little more than that. Either way....any gambling with a positive expectation makes for good times and extra money in the long run. I ended up splitting half of my action with my buddy Andy Swan so we'll have something to root for together.

Tomorrow = Masters + Poker = Fun

Lets hope to see lots of this....

Operation Dominate Life.....

So my last little challenge was somewhat successful and I plan on this one being even more successful. My last challenge was 7 weeks long and I got a little worn down towards the end of it. I am going to make this one 7 weeks as well and see if I can have some better endurance this time. Today was my first day of the challenge so it will be last from April 8th through May 26th.

I am going to again try to play 30 hours of online poker per week and mix in some live play as well.
I WILL make a better effort on getting to the gym during this challenge and that is where the dominating life part comes in. I did well last time playing poker and lost quite a bit of wait, but not as much as I could have if I had gone to the gym like I should have.

Predictions/Goals for ODL:
-Average 4 days per week at the gym (28 days total)
-30 hours of online poker per week (210 total)
-Have a win rate anywhere over 3.5 BB/100
-Play 100,000 hands total (14,300/week)

I am going to keep my weight loss goals/progress out of my blog, because I want to surprise people at home that haven't seen me in a while (hopefully, they can tell!).

Time to go Dominate Life!

Today was my first day and I played 4.4 hours and won $105. I was a little rusty and some big hands didn't go my way, but my patience was really improved due to my vacation. I was stuck pretty good early on (about $1850), but managed to make a nice come back so the +$105 feels much better than it sounds.

Almost home....

I am sitting in the San Diego airport waiting for my flight to board. I won't have time to finish this blog before I board, but I'll be able to write more on the flight which should pass the time nicely. I am sure this will end up being a pretty long blog, because I have lots of stories (and pictures) from my trip.

After Heather and I finally got to our hotel in San Diego we decided to walk to the Padres game which ended up being about 5 or 6 blocks away. I am sure if I had wanted to haggle or hustle for a for a better deal I could have gotten one, but I bought some decent seats from the first scalper we saw and just paid what he was asking. I got two tickets about 20 rows right behind home plate for $100 total (face value of $130). The seats turned out to be great, but the weather was pretty chilly. Since I decided I wasn't going to be making any effort whatsoever to stick to my diet on my trip I started off with a bang during the game. I got an order of garlic fries, a cheeseburger, a diet coke, a vanilla milkshake, and finished with a hot chocolate.....yum! We eventually moved down about 10 rows into some slightly better seats. The game ended up with the Padres winning 2-1 and we got to see the all-time saves leader, Trevor Hoffman, get another save. It was quite a show seeing him come in from the bullpen.

*Heather and I at the Padres game.

We then met an older couple (Corky and Barbara) that were San Diego locals and Padres season ticket holders. We asked them for some more advice about getting to Ensenada and they were not optimistic about our safety to say the least. She was a lawyer, he owned a rather large pest control company, and they had a couple of luxury boxes and 4 other sets of season tickets throughout Petco. Park so they obviously had plenty of money and had done plenty of traveling to say the least. They called a travel agent friend of theirs, asked some others around the park, and tried to think of everything they could to help us get to Ensenada safely. Everyone they talked to couldn’t come up with any solutions that they felt were safe alternatives for what we already had told them we planned on doing. Basically, even though they tried very hard to help us, all that really happened was that we became pretty scared for our safety and started to second guess our original plan of travel. They next morning we talked to some people at the front desk of our hotel and they seemed to be just as apprehensive about our plan as Corky and Barbara did. They got one of the Mexican housekeepers to give us a hand written note (in Spanish). Together Heather and I used our minimal Spanish skills to determine that the note basically said that we were two gringos that had no idea what we were doing and were ripe to be scammed. Actually, it said that wanted a taxi ride to Ensednada and to get on a cruise ship for less than $100. This wasn’t exactly want we needed our note so say as it wasn’t our original plan, but it might help us eventually get to where we needed to go so we kept it. After everyone we had talked to we just decided to go with our original plan. We walked about 5 blocks to the trolley station with our luggage in tow and I asked someone that seemed to know what they were doing to help me buy a trolley ticket. I bought two tickets to San Ysidro/Tijuana (the Mexican boarder) for $5 total. About 5 minutes later our trolley showed up and it the people on it were similar to what you would find on a New York Subway or probably any public transportation in any major city. If you don’t know what this crowd is like there is everything from homeless to middle class, people of normal body odor to incredibly smelly, very non-threatening people to crazy looking I’ll knock you out and rob you blind if you don’t watch your back type of people….except probably over half of the people spoke nothing but Spanish. I was a little uneasy with the trolley ride and Heather was pretty much a nervous wreck the whole time. We sat across from a nice looking lady that we decided to ask about what she thought the nest way to get from the border to Ensenada. Her reply: “Ah…No aspeaka Enlish.” Hmmm, well we decided we should show her our note and see if we could possibly use our Spanish skills to decipher her reaction to it. She read it, smiled, shrugged, and handed it back. Sweet! Thanks for the help. Well, we got off of the trolley and surprisingly she motioned for us to follow her. She walked us over the border and directly to the bus station (which we maybe never would have found on our own) and told the person working the ticket counter exactly what we needed, found out how much it would cost us and when it would be leaving.

*Me walking across the border

The tickets were $21 total and the bus was going to be leaving in about thirty minutes. That lady was a lifesaver (possibly literally, haha) and we were very thankful for her help. I was going to offer to buy her bus ticket to wherever she was going, but she wasn’t even going to the bus station she just went out of her way to make sure we got where we needed to go. The bus ride took about an hour and a half and they even had a movie playing for us to watch....in Spanish. Once we got dropped of in Ensenada we still didn't really know where to go. Using my great directional skills (I might have the worst sense of direction of anyone I know) I decided that we should walk away from the mountains we could see and hopefully towards where the water might be. We eventually were able to see our ship and found a group of really drunk Caucasians that looked like they could possibly be on our cruise as well. They told us to take the shuttle that was just up ahead. We got on the shuttle for $1 each and were getting really close now. At the end of the shuttle ride some security looking guy climbed aboard and asked to see everyone's Carnival Cruise card. We obviously didn't have one since we hadn't been on the boat yet, but for some reason he just passed over us and went to the back where he was being really strict with the people who hadn't gotten their cards out fast enough and stuff....shew! To get back on the boat you had to once again show your Carnival card along with a passport. After a small delay and some Spanish walkie talkie talk they let us board the boat. We had made it!

*Me collapsed on the bed when we finally had made it.

The weather was cold at first until we got closer to Cabo. Early on there wasn't much laying by the pool to be done and when we did our beach towels were used more as blankets than anything else. Instead we played putt-putt, did our fair share of eating, and just relaxed from our hectic day of travel.

The people that we randomly got seated with at dinner (same seating every night on a cruise) happened to be some really fun people and we did most of our hanging out with them.

*From left to right: Me, Heather, Jenn, Matt, Michael, Alexa...(I just noticed that I somehow got stuck posing for this picture holding Heather's purse...I swear it was because I had just got done handing the the photographer Heather's camera from it and I wasn't really just carrying it around all the time). This was all of us after dinner smoking some cigars and having some drinks before we went into the karaoke bar (three of my favorite things, haha). We had already told the waitress we didn't need anything else, but when she propositioned the women to have a "Juicy Pussy" I couldn't help myself from buying a round for the ladies and that is what they are toasting in this picture.
Since we missed out on all of the off shore excursions in Ensenada we wanted to make sure we did something fun in Cabo. We tried to book a trip through the cruise ship, but they were already all full by the time we got around to it. We decided that we would be able to find something on our own and it would probably be cheaper that way anyway. We walked around for a while once we got to Cabo, but it was so early that most of the shops were still closed. Some guy that had a stand set up to promote tours and trips you could take in Cabo stopped us to ask if he could help us out with an activity for the day. We told him that we wanted to kayak somewhere and he gave us a map and showed us where we were and where we wanted to go to find the kayaking. We took about a 20 minute cab ride to the beach that he suggested and he dropped us off in an empty parking lot out front of the beach. We walked along a dirt path to get to the beach and when we got to the beach we were the only two people on the whole beach and there wasn't a kayak in sight!

*Heather's actions shot.


*My action shot
*Heather and I under one of the shade huts....other people had finally started showing up to "our beach" by this time.....jerks!
Now that we had gotten here and realized that we weren't going to be doing any kayaking we started to wonder how we were going to get back to the ship. I don't think this was a typical tourist spot; there weren't any cabs waiting for us in the parking lot and its not like we could just call up a cab with our cell phones. We made some small talk with a nice couple from Seattle that had a a house in Cabo that ended up offering to give us a ride back with them and their two children....in a Volkswagen Jetta! It was a tight fit, but we were very grateful and gladly accepted. They gave us their card and told us to give them a call if we were ever interested in renting out their house for a week.

We got back just in time for our 11:00am rendezvous at "The Office" with our new friends from dinner. "The Office" is a really fun bar right on the beach. Everyone had a great time and there was plenty of eating and drinking that took place.

*Our crew at "The Office".

*Here is a picture of some typical drunken shenanigans that takes place in Cabo. A race to see which couple could run to the water and switch bottoms first (please don't overlook the guy with HER bottoms on).I am really getting sick of writing this blog so I am going to wrap it up quickly. There aren't too many other fun stories worth sharing and this thing is already WAY too long (I am sure no one outside of Heather and I care about these stories or pictures to begin with anyway). All in all, this was maybe the most fun I have ever had on a vacation and Heather makes for a fine cruise partner. Anytime you can spend five days straight with someone and not get sick of them at all you know you are pretty good friends....its weird how little it seems that either one of us has changed since high school.

There will be another blog for me to post soon with some new goals and hopefully some ideas for my next planned vacation break!

There is no way I am proofreading this whole thing so deal with it and enjoy.

April Fools!

I wish anyway. Today is the day that I was leaving for my cruise. Heather's flight left early from Charleston, SC and she had a layover in Atlanta. We had already planned on her calling me from Atlanta to let me know that everything was going smoothly and she was going to be making her connecting flight safely. I had already planned on giving her a good April Fool's scare when she called me to check in. Well, she beat me to it, except it wasn't a joke! Her plane in Charleston had technical problems and she didn't get to Atlanta in time to catch her flight....she wasn't going to get to San Diego in time for her to make in on the ship. We called the emergency travel hotline for Carnival Cruise and they told us that if we could make it to Ensenada, Mexico (our first port of call) sometime before our ship left for Cabo San Lucas that we would be able to board there. Well, Ensenada doesn't have an airport and it is in super shady Mexico. Since we didn't book our travel through Carnival we were kind of on our own as far as getting to Ensenada. Heather got put on a later flight to San Diego and I just took mine as scheduled. Now I had to figure out how we were going to get to Ensenada once we both made it to San Diego.

Of course I did what I always do when I am in a sticky situation....I turned to neverwinpoker.com I quickly made a post in the Vegas airport before my flight boarded 100% confident that someone on there would come through with an answer for me by the time I landed in San Diego (keep in mind...none of the travel agents or rental car people I talked to could give me any useful information on how to get from San Diego to Ensenada.....not how long it would take, how much it would cost, what mode of transportation I should use, they were seriously zero help). I swear, anything you need to know in life there is someone on NWP who is an expert in that field and/or is an internet wizard of some sort that will go out of their way to do research to find out an answer. This is both good and bad....there are some crazy degenerates on there that will do everything in their power to make your life hell if thats what they choose to do. They will find info, pictures, and just about anything you think they could never find out about someone just to embarrass them on NWP. Simply put, the people on NWP are amazing whether it is for good or evil.

So, just as I thought when I landed in San Diego NWP had come through for me.

This was the first post in my thread from a girl I have met one time in person and exchanged only a few messages with online (basically, only when I needed favors in the past...she has connections at Full Tilt).

"I don't know much about it except that it is a 90 minute DRIVE from San Diego, and Southwest airlines doesn't fly there. I'll try to find you the closest airport unless someone more knowledgeable gets to you first, which I hope. You're a fuckin mess. GL, obv.

I just looked up that you can take a bus from San Diego to Ensenada. I think that is going to be the best rout, because it looks like the closest place to fly from SD is Tijuana. Not sure though. I have to sleep now "

-I was pretty impressed that she didn't actually know anything about my question to start with, but took the time to find out some useful info. for me. Btw, The one time I did meet her she was quick to apologize for her somewhat vulgar language and explained that the F-word was just something that was part of growing up in the pool halls/poker rooms/somewhat mob-related lifestyle that she had on the East Coast. She is a cool cat.

The second post:

"San Diego-Tijuana-Ensenada

If you reach San Diego, you must first get to the Tijuana border. There are three options to go from the San Diego airport to the Mexican border (San Ysidro):

1) Take a taxi (expensive option).

2) Take a bus (about 1.50 US) to San Ysidro. The bus stops at the other side of the parking lot of the United Airlines terminal. Buses leave every 15 to 30 minutes.

3) Take a bus to the "trolley" station at the center of San Diego. The "trolley" will take you to San Ysidro for 3 US. This is the most frequently used option.

Cross the border on foot (avoid heavy luggage!). Just accross the border there are 2 bus stations servicing Ensenada (ABC and Aragón). Buses leave every 30 minutes, and the price is about 3 US. The trip takes 1.5 hours (you can watch the scenery or a movie).



I think you will be just fine. Does your cruise stop in Puerto Vallarta?"

-Now THAT was helpful! I now knew exactly how to get to Ensenada from San Diego, how much it was going to cost, how long it was going to take, and even what my entertainment options were on the bus ride there! The cool thing is that I don't ever even remember conversing with this guy before on NWP, but he saw I needed help and happened to be from Puerto Vallarta and has apparently made the same trip I will be making tomorrow morning a time or two. Also, he was wondering if I was stopping in PV, because he was going to offer to show us around while we were there. I was so thankful for his help that I sent him $50 on Full Tilt and he was more than happy about that I think.

I found a fairly cheap hotel room ($109) in San Diego while I was in the airport (laptops and free wireless internet are probably two of the greatest things on earth) and started looking for something for us to do in San Diego since we would be spending the night there. Well, what do ya know? The Padres just so happen to be in town playing the Astros tonight and I can the stadium from my hotel window! NWP even came through with a recommendation (and someone else seconding that recommendation) to eat the garlic fries at the game if I end up going.....and I think I will :)

Heather just called; she finally made it to San Diego and is on her way to the hotel via shuttle right now. She has had a really long day....I hope she feels like going to the game.

Hopefully, your April Fool's day has been less hectic than mine has. Even though, it seems like a tough break missing the beginning of our cruise I am actually kind of pumped about spending the night in San Diego and going to the game. If I get any internet access on the cruise I will try to post some pictures and some blogs while I am there. If not, I'll do it when I get back (Sunday the 6th).

Here is the view of the stadium from my hotel room (limited, but at least it is within walking distance....I think):