YES!! Random Act of Kindness: Part 2

So on my day off from poker I decided to be a bit of a go-getter. The first thing I did when I woke bright and early (3:30 pm) was put a load of laundry in. Without missing a beat, I quickly changed out of my PJ's and into something that was presentable to wear in public and walked out the door. You see, if I had let any more time lapse before leaving the house I surely would have found something else to distract me from starting on my errands. Anyway, I decided I was going to get my haircut and I am proud to say this was the very first day that I started noticing it needed to be cut!

Finally, I convinced the lady that I didn't really care how she cut my hair and that I just wanted her to do what she thought would look best. While I was getting my haircut a young girl, her friend, and her grandma walked in and the girl was explaining to the lady at the check-in counter what she wanted done to her hair. "A little bit more blonde, just a little bit trimmed off, and some black highlight streaks." You could tell she was pretty pumped and proud of what she had decided to do with her hair. The girl working the counter turned around to ask the boss lady (who was cutting my hair) how much all of this would be. She said it would be right about $100 and the girl looked to her grandma with anticipation. Her grandma, very matter of fact, said "$100?! I don't think so!" She tried to not get too visibly upset, but you could tell she was crushed. I was eavesdropping on them negotiating on some prices for different stuff they could do with her hair that was cheaper than what she intended to get done, but it was time for me to go back for my shampoo and the "green tea facial treatment". I know it sounds super duper gay, but it is really awesome! Basically she puts a hot towel on my face and I sit there for a while and then she comes and massages my face with some tingly feeling stuff that is pretty cool. The haircut, shampoo, and facial is $18 total which feels like stealing to me.

I asked the boss lady that was washing my hair if the girl was going to be able to get her hair colored and she said that it was to expensive and she was just getting it a little more blonde and a trim. I told her that I wanted to pay for her to get whatever is was that she wanted done when she first walked in. She looked at me like I was a crazy person and tried for about 3 minutes to talk me out of doing it! Finally, I convinced her I was serious and she went to tell her the good news. Needless, to say the little girl was very happy and the boss lady was telling anyone that would listen that I was a poker star and an angel and blah blah blah. It was a super cool feeling. The lady ended up only charging me $50 for the girls stuff she got done. I gave a nice tip and headed to get my car washed. Two chores in one day!

Running super hot, monster noises, and a 24 hour lock-in

It is kind of boring for me to write blogs that have only poker content in them, but that is pretty much all I have been doing lately and its all I have to write about at the moment. I had been struggling with motivation a bit in early March and I got somewhat sloppy with my play. Once I got back from my visit to Evansville I wrote down some goals for the upcoming 35 day stretch that I was going to be in Vegas without anything else on going on. Basically my main goal was to make $20,000 over that 35 day stretch and I wanted to do it with a mix of playing 2/4, 3/6, and 5/10 NL. I determined that I would need to play about 67,000 hands and run at my normal win rate in order to make that much money. To play that many hands in 35 days meant that I would have to average around 5 hours/day of 8 tables at a time. I kinda nixed the idea of playing very much 2/4, because it seems silly to me when I know I have an edge in the 5/10 games to play smaller limits. Anyway, I have been playing almost all 5/10 and mixing in some tables of 10/20 when the full ring games run. After my first 13 days I was up around 6-7,000 and I was pretty close to being on the pace I wanted to be. However, my 14th day I won almost 7,000 and my 15th day I won almost 8,000! It was a pretty awesome two days as it seemed like I just never lost any decent sized pots...and I didn't.

So, what changed? I definitely ran great when it came to being on the good side of the coolers, but I felt like I made some drastic improvements in my attitude and play. My friend, Jeremy and I had been discussing our river play quite a bit and I decided that I was really going to focus on being MUCH more aggressive on the river and winning more pots that I would normally just give up on. It is pretty amazing how successful this new style has been for for me. Sometimes you look really foolish when you get called and you have air, but people just fold so often on the river it more than makes up for it. It has also been pretty entertaining for me to play this style and having the mindset of being a RIVER MONSTER! I have been rewarding myself for successful aggressive river plays that I wouldn't normally make by growling very loudly (much like a real life river monster might) and making a clawing motion with my hand at my computer screen. I hope you all enjoy the mental picture that just gave you and I promise that I really have been doing that! RAAAWR!

Yesterday I ended up losing about $2,200 online and it was a bit of a set back after my two huge days online. I could feel myself losing my focus a little bit so I quit after only a couple of hours, because I didn't want my surging confidence to be rattled by a long poor session. I then decided to go play a live session and I ended up playing for almost 10 hours and booking a $3100 win so it wasn't such a bad day after all.

Speaking of long sessions...anyone reading this blog has been cordially invited to the first annual 24 hour lock-in taking place in the Bellagio Poker Room which starts on Friday, April 3rd at noon. Josh and I came up with the idea since neither one of us has never played a super long session like that. It should be interesting and hopefully some more people will join us.

I am taking tomorrow (today) off from poker because I have been playing way too much lately and I want to rest my mind for a day or two.

I am not a celebrity hound, but this was pretty cool.

My friend, Patrick Kelley, and his wife, Katie, are in town and I was playing tour guide and and showing them around a bit on the strip. March Madness is going on so the sportsbooks are packed. Patrick wanted to make some bets for tomorrows games so we went in the Wynn sportsbook. I explained to him what all the numbers meant and how to makes the best that he wanted to make. There was a long line and Patrick and Katie went first to make their bets and then they waiting for me while I made mine. Once I was finished up I turned around to walk out with them and Katie nervously started whispering to me telling me to look over her shoulder. Much to my surprise was one of my childhood....heck one of my heros, Bobby Knight! Patrick went and shook his hand and we were about to leave until him and Billy Packer (an announcer for CBS basketball that I really detest) grabbed microphones and had a question and answer period for about 45 minutes. Some people got up from their front row seats just as they started talking so we ended up with great seats for what was a pretty cool impromptu Q & A with Bobby and Billy.

Here is a picture that turned out really crappy with my phone:

Moral of the story: Don't be a smart alleck...

So about 4-5 months ago I went to get my oil changed and I drug along all three of my friends that were in town; Matt, Jason, and Brian. After about 20 minutes the technician came in to get me so that he could begin the hustle of showing me how my wipers, air filter, transmission fluid, washer fluid, and every other possible thing that can be changed for a small fee at a quickly lube type place was way over due and needed to be changed immediately if I cared at all about both my car and myself living a long life. This wasn't my first rodeo involving getting hustled by a quicky lube guy so as I followed him out of the waiting room I turned to my friends and said "here we go...". I didn't intend for the tech to hear me, but he clearly did and he said back to me rather confrontationall "What's that?" He caught me off guard and as badly as I wanted to I couldn't come up with any way to defend myself and I sheepishly replied with an honest answer "Um, I just said here we go". Since I had made it apparent that I thought he was about to try to hustle me he tried to extra convincing about how vital all of these changes and repairs were. Since the cat was already out of the bag that I wasn't buying any of this guy's nonsense I was rather short with him and just said that I didn't want any of his recommendations. Needless to say, this guy wasn't a fan of my negative attitude.

Fast forward to the next morning...my front right tire had a nail in it and was totally flat. Brian, Jason, and I changed the tire...it wouldn't normally take more than one person to change a tire, but these two were so hungover that together they totaled less than a full person. I made a joke about how the tech probably put a nail in my tire on purpose because I was a smart alleck when he was trying to "help" me.About a month after that another tire was low on air...no big deal I stopped at the gas station for a can of fix-a-flat and reapired the tire myself while Kevin and Josh sat in the car and laughed at me as I got it all over my hands. About another month after that when Clint and I were leaving the Wynn, my tire was totally flat and we had to get a cab home. That tire required two cans of fix-a-flat, but then when my car got up to 70 M.P.H. It began to shake.

Right now I am Wal-Mart Tire & Lube Express being the go-getter that I vowed to be...getting my spare (with a nail in it) reapired and balancing the tire with the two cans of fix-a-flat in it. Don't worry, the tech found a nail in ANOTHER tire as well.

At first I was joking, but I am not so sure I don't really believe that the tech at the first quicky lube put a nail in all FOUR of my tires!

Moral of the blog: Don't be a smart alleck the technicians at quicky lubes...they can make your life pretty miserable. Then again, I probably just got unlucky with my flat tire luck. Apparently there is as much variance involved in flat tires as there is poker...who knew?

I wanna be a go getter....

My good friend, Landon, was talking to me one day about what he thinks one of his greatest life skills is. He claims that what separates people from sucking and not sucking in life in general is the ability to learn to do new things that they want to accomplish and most importantly having the motivation to actually get started and follow through on them. He says that both him and his brother, Andy, are both great at doing this. It should come as no surprise that they are two of my most successful friends.

Landon claims that just about any task you are wanting to accomplish should begin with a google search on your desired topic and end with a "See, that wasn't so tough". It is very simple when you break it down like that. The hard part for most people lies in the motivation factor. The act of doing whatever you want to accomplish is usually very easy, but getting started can be quite the hurdle to overcome sometimes.

I have decided that the longer you put things off the chances of them not happening increase exponentially. For me the things I want to be more of a go getter on are always really simple things and each passing day that I don't take care of them makes them that much harder for me to do the following day. For example: If I don't pay the bills the first day I think about doing it I am much less likely to pay them the next day. If I don't cut my finger nails the first time I notice they need cut there is a pretty good chance they will get way longer than I like them...the same applies to shaving and getting my haircut. I mean sometimes I will plan on getting my haircut for 3 weeks before I actually get it cut and that is just ridiculous. Each day I don't write my blog it gets that much tougher to write a new entry. Each day I don't go to the gym, each day I don't eat healthy, each day I don't wash my car or buy the new windshield wipers it currently needs, each day I don't go to get the flat tire in my trunk repaired and my oil changed, each day I don't clean my fish tank....it get that much tougher to get started on. NONE of those things take more than an hour to do and I could probably get all of them done in less than 3 hours if I really hustled.

Today I vow to be more of a go getter and it started with my going to the gym today for the 3rd time in 5 days, eating healthy for the last week, writing my first blog entry in about a month in a half, and reviewing some of yesterdays hands before I begin today's session (I always say I am going to do that, but I NEVER do). I will get started on that other laundry list (speaking of laundry, that is probably the best example of this yet!).....tomorrow. See there I go again, already putting things off to another day! No, but seriously...I can only do so much in one day before I get my poker fix in.

Thanks for reading and I am sorry it took me song long to update.