Moving up levels

Well, I have moved up to the next higher level of SNG starting this week on Sunday, and so far I am really enjoying myself. I look forward to moving up to the next level, which I plan on doing in the very near future. The secret to building a bankroll and maximizing profits is to continually move up or down as the case may be to maximize results.

People often say don't be results oriented when playing poker, but that is not what I am talking about. If we set a guideline of moving up every time we got to 30 buy-ins at the next level and moving down when we were at 30 buy-ins for the level below the one we are at, then we should have a nice way to judge our results.
The problem with many people is they become too comfortable at a given level of play. They get used to losing the amount they lose when they don't finish in the money and moving up is uncomfortable for them because they will lose more obviously and that can tend to take bigger chunks out of the bankroll.

I did an analysis where I took 25% return on investment at the $16 level and compared it to 15% ROI at the next higher level of $27 and you actually do better at a 10% less ROI at the higher level, granted it is only .05 cents, but it emphasizes the point that even though we don't do as well we make up for it by the higher buy-in.
Now, if we were getting 10% ROI at $20 that would be $2 per game played. Now compare that to 10% at the $100 level and that is $10 a table. It does not take a math scholar to see that we want to get to the highest level of play as quickly as we can while maintaining our winning edge.

Playing 4 tables at a time averaging 10% ROI would yield $10.80 an hour playing at the $27 level, which is better than minimum wage and not bad for a part-time job from home. Now, move it up to the $38 level and it is $15.80 an hour. Now that is a nice little job on the side. And if we dreamed a little bigger the $114 level would be $45.60 an hour, which is a livable wage by anyone's standards.
We must constantly move up if we are to achieve our dreams. All the while realizing that it is the ROI% that is important to maintain. Many pros are perfectly happy with 7%, and in today's economy that is not a bad return on your money.

Back from Vegas

Well, Mary and I just returned from a week in Las Vegas. We were there from Halloween to this morning. This was the latest in the year that we have gone to Las Vegas and so it was very interesting. The weather was fairly nice. The first few days were warm enough to enjoy the pool and sun, and then it got a little windy and cooler. We stayed at the Marriot Grand Chateau which is fairly new. It was might be the nicest of the 4 places we have stayed at thus far, and it is basically right on the strip next to the Planet Hollywood which used to be the Aladdin resort.

We went to a couple shows that the Excalibur, Louie Anderson and the Tournament of Kings dinner show last night which was fun. We treated ourselves to a very nice dinner at Bradley Ogden's restaurant in Caesar's Palace. We had intended to eat at Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill but we didn't have reservations and they told us it would be 4 hours to wait. We walked across the way to the other restaurant and they were far too happy to seat us. It was an incredible meal to say the least, but not one for the faint of heart when you see the cost. Let's just say you don't eat at a place like this very often in your life if you are a commoner like us.

I played in four poker tournaments while I was there. I made the final table three out of four and made the money two out of four. I found a couple new tournaments to play in on Wednesday night and so I only got to play in it one time yesterday afternoon. This tourney was over at the Excalibur where they have electronic poker tables, no dealers. Noah tells me that some of the cruise ships use these tables. It was a lot of fun because I was mostly down during the tourney and got lucky a couple times to stay alive, but when it was all said and done I had recorded my first live tournament win. I wish I lived in Vegas so that I could play these live tourneys all the time on my days off.

We also took a lot of great pictures which I will be uploading a link to in the coming days. Mary's new 10x digital camera really does a nice job.

Boxing at the Emerald Queen

Well, we went to our first live boxing matches last night. It was quite a bit of fun and we did get to see one bout where one guy got knocked down a couple times before it was stopped. There was even a boxing match with two girls.

The saddest thing about the evening was that the thing we remembered most were two jerks that were there. During the girl boxing we had this guy behind us with some girl and he was whistling his support for one of the boxers. This was an incredibly loud annoying whistle about 2 feet behind my head. I would estimate 110 dBs plus which was painful for Mary and I. I let him do it for the duration of the fight, and thankfully he left after that bout. The great thing about it was the fighter he was supporting was perhaps the worst female fighter I have ever seen and of course we did root against her. She was pummeled from start to finish and when they announced the winner, there was a deafening quiet from the seats behind us as we cheered loudly for the winner, who actually was a pretty decent boxer, and actually looked like a boxer when she threw her punches.

Then there was the drunk guy. It is so sad that there is always some jerk that drinks too much and becomes a pain in everyone's ass. We felt sorry for his girlfriend who quite obviously was annoyed by him. This guy would stand up and be talking to his friends obscuring row after row, and could only offer up some smartass comments when people asked him to move out of the way, which of course, he didn't until he was ready to move.

No boxing night would be complete without one bad decision, at least to us and the many that booed at the end. The last fight was pretty good and entertaining and the judges totally blew the winner of it, which was a shame because he didn't really deserve to win the fight.

Embrace the bad beat

If you play enough poker, you will experience the bad beat. Your Aces or Kings will get beat by some low pair or worse suited connectors. You could let yourself get upset or be frustrated about it, or you could choose to not even recognize the bad beat.

I like to embrace them. I look for them to happen whether I am in the hand or not and when they do happen I smile and say, ouch. Phil Helmuth once said if it wasn't for luck I'd win every one. Well, there is luck involved the cards are going to be dealt and we have no control over it.

I amaze myself at how many times I will predict the next card for the bad beat to be completed and be correct. Again, I just smile. Sometimes I will ask my table mates who didn't see that coming? and then laugh, LOL.

I think this is an important part, maybe the most important part of the game. IF we embrace it, we will not be upset when it happens, thus, no tilting, no making bad decisions because we are still mad about that other hand we should have won, but didn't.

If our opponents never sucked out on us, then it would be unrealistic for us to ever think that we will suck out on someone else, and yet, we do, and we really enjoy those ones. By keeping an even keel we will not wear ourselves down by expending needless energy in the form of getting upset and yelling and screaming at our monitors.

Seahawk note

Well, it has become blatantly obvious that the Seahawks will be drafting a QB in this upcoming draft. The two backups that we have are horrific. Seneca you have regressed to the point that we should try and find another backup out there in Free Agency and move you to another position because you have been here far too long to be that bad.

Charlie Frye, I think the jury is still out on him. He has only been here for one whole season with training camp and then one extra season as number 3. I think he might be okay as a backup if they actually opened up the playbook and tried to be balanced.

Mike Holmgren, it has been fun Mike, but do us all a favor and resign now so that we can start the rebuilding process. Your Play calling has been abysmal, and that is being pretty kind. You have handicapped Frye and Wallace to the point you should have just forfieted those games and saved on the risk of injury because your team had no chance of winning.

John Marshal, Defensive Coordinator. You should be Offensive Coordinator because you are doing a really offensive job. The Defense is constantly out of position. We don't get any pressure on the QB anymore, and we are back to getting beat deep every game, again.

Kelly Jennings, it was fun pretending to be an NFL player wasn't it. Your time has come and gone and I hope they cut you from the squad next year, because you can't cover yourself and stay on your feet let alone any NFL wide reciever. You are a liability on the field due to your ineptness.

SNG strategy early

I have been spending some time trying to figure out why my game has elevated itself to a higher level. It is hard to put a finger on success sometimes, because a lot of times we just aren't aware that we did anything differently.

First off, I play turbo SNGs. These are SNGs where the blind levels(the forced bets per round of hands dealt) will automatically go up at a quicker pace, usually every 5 minutes versus 10 or even 15 minutes that some tournaments have. At the WSOP it used to be 120 minute blind levels, I am not sure if it was changed to 90 minutes or not. The longer the blind levels the more the skill of players should shine through, as they have longer to wait for good hands. In turbos the blind levels go up very quickly, thus, putting presure on people to make moves that they don't want to make as their stacks dwindle. This is the time when people incorrectly make calls, and all-in moves that they shouldn't.

I think the key to doing well in these SNGs is to be very deliberate and conservative in the early stages of these tournaments. When you have more than 20 big blinds(bbs) or so, there is no need to be playing a lot of hands or playing speculative hands.

In early position, under the gun (UTG, first to act after the hands are deal), UTG+1, and UTG+2 we don't want to be playing a lot of hands in these positions. We really only want to be raising with hands like AA and KKs. A case can be made for limping QQs, and AK even from early position. I would limp hands like AJ or AQ in early position (EP) so that if there was a raise I could simply fold my hand and move on.

The problem with raising AJ or AQ in EP is that if somebody raises you later you will be out of position, unless it is the small blind(SB) or big blind(BB). If an Ace comes on the flop there will be the posibility that we could lose a lot of chips with a second best hand. What if we hit our J or Q, we could still be in bad shape with AA-QQ against our AJ or AQ hand. I would tend to just throw my hand away and move on.

If I was in Late position (LP) I would be inclined to just limp behind if someone had already opend the pot. If someone had raised I would just fold AQ AJ type hands, and just call with AK a fair amount of time, unless I knew this person to be a loose raiser, then I would raise them to punish them for raising with weak hands, but if the person was fairly conservative, then I might just call and try and trap with my big hand.

The real point of this is to point out that we want to go out of our way to minimize risk early on in a SNG, period. There is no reason for us to give up our percieved skill advantage by taking unnecessary risks. This might mean throwing away JJ on a Q high flop to a bet. We must always remember that we want to be getting our chips into the middle when we are ahead, and not taking chances that we don't have to take.

There is a time to be aggressive, and there is a time to be raising and playing big pots, but most of the time we want to play small pots. We want to try and control the pots so that we don't have to invest a lot of our stack to get to the river.

There is another big benefit when you limp AK early on and hit your hand. If you play it in a passive way and get to the river not betting that much and checking a street or two, you can really send a message to your opponents when they see your AK. Not to mention you may actually win more by checking an A or K flop to someone who limped with A5 type hand and thinks their Ace is good and bluffs at the pot and then when you reraise them they will call thinking that you hit the river undercard to their big ace.

SNG Strategy for building BR

Lots of people that start out playing Sit-n-Gos look for guides on how to play them, or they should. Sure, there are lots of people that don't read poker books or belong to poker sites or poker forums. They are doing themselves a disservice by not trying to learn from others that have played thousands of these types of events.

Over my playing career I have mainly played SNGs as a way to increase my bankroll and to make money. I have had a lot of success playing these. I was pretty successful when I started out playing these and then I became aware of a poker training site called PokerXfactor.com. I joined this site in the first month that they were up and operating and got in on the ground floor. I learned many things that had not even occurred to me, and as a result I learned the more correct way to play SNGs and of course, was even more succesful at them.

From time to time I would enter multi-table tournaments (MTTs) and would win a little here and there but for the most part the variance associated with these would tend to suck money out of my bankroll (BR), although, I did have a nice run on Ultimate Bet (UB) coming in 3rd two days in a row in a $30 buy-in tourney on there for a nice score. And then I would also play what they call double shootouts (DS) which are SNG tournaments where you have to win your first table then all the winners are seated at another table and then usually the top two or just top one win a seat in a bigger buy-in tournament usually $215 or $530, these had some variance to them as well. Even though I did win a few of these, they are a negative impact on my BR.

I am going to try and resist the urge to play any of these types of things until I achieve my BR goal, which would be $5,000. When I get to the magical $10k BR I will open up and play some other tourneys that I believe will be highly profitable to me, as they have been in the past, but my BR just doesn't support playing them regularly. These would include the $100 buy-in tourneys, which have been very nice to me in the past. Better competition is always a plus for my style of play.

It will be a steady diet of SNGs for at least the next 3 months. I am going to try and achieve a 10% per week increase in my BR. That is my goal and I feel it is attainable.

12 yr old girl called rascist for wearing Palin t-shirt

How sad is it that the party that speaks of tolerance and inclusion and protecting those that can't protect themselves would raise children to treat others with such disrespect. When children call someone rascist for exercising their 1st Amendment rights for Freedom of Speach it is a sad day in America. I wonder if they would have called her an Uncle Tom if she was black?

Rascism is alive and well in this country of ours. It is kept alive by the very people that supposedly are the victims of it. If it weren't for the liberals on the left rascism would die a slow quiet death and we would be done with it, but where would that leave the blacks acrossed America? Every time someone has a difference of a opinion in this election, it must be because you are rascist.

How about the thousands upon thousands of people that are going to vote for Obama just because he is black? Isn't that rascism in itself? Martin Luther King, Jr., would be so disgusted at his people of today that don't want to be judged by the content of their minds and the character of their souls, they want a free pass, because of the color of their skin. They want extra benefits because of the color of their skin.

Why can't they just move on and let it go? If it weren't for the white leadership of the democratic party telling blacks that they are being taken advantage of, they would never think that thought, but what they don't realize is, the liberals are the ones taking them for granted manipulating them like silly putty.


http://www.myfoxorlando.com/myfox/pages/ContentDetail?contentId=7664724

Neat facts about the Candidates

Coolest things about John and Cindy McCain:
1) he can fly a fighter jet
2) he survived being a tortured POW for 5 years
3) his father and grandfather have air bases and ships named after them
4) he married a beer baroness!
5) he's not a lawyer
6) she is a massive, globe trotting philanthropist... and never talks about it
7) she is a race car driver (mother/son drift racing)
8) she's also a pilot
9) they've got a son who just returned from serving in Iraq and they never even mention it. They also have a son at US Naval Academy.
10) she's a beer baroness!

Coolest things about Sarah and Todd Palin:
1) she was a state basketball champ.
2) she was a beauty queen.
3) she can shoot and field dress a moose... before school.
4) she helps out on the commercial fishing boats 5) she was a council member, mayor, and governor... without being a lawyer
6) he's been a commercial fisherman since he was 9
7) he's a pilot... and named their daughter Piper after his 1958 Piper Super Cub seaplane.
8) he's a steel union member... and married to a republican
9) he works on the north slope in sometimes -80 degree blizzards
10) he's part Inuit
11) he's a 4 time world champion snowmobile racer
12) he supplies the household with caribou, moose and salmon... and cooks dinner for the governor and family.
13) they've got a son serving in Iraq... infantry in the most dangerous part of the country.

Coolest things about Barack and Michelle Obama:
1) he supposedly quit smoking
2) he's supposedly got a good hook shot
3) she's...

Coolest Things about Joe and whatsername Biden:
1) he overcame stuttering
2) they have a son serving in Iraq (and Biden's not bashful about mentioning it) ... as a lawyer... far from any combat
3) she's...

Why are the liberals always trying to steal votes?

It is really sad that the people that are always clamoring about election fraud and elections being stolen from them are the exact same ones that are usually being caught committing some kind of voter fraud?

If you look historically at all the cases of documented Election fraud, inevitably, you will find that the Democratic candidate is the recipient of the fraud. The fraud always is in favor of the liberal candidate, and yet, they are the ones that are yelling and screaming that everyone is trying to disenfranchise the minority vote. All the while they are manipulating and bribing these same minorities to get them to commit voter fraud.

ACORN is a joke and they should not be permitted to do any voter registrations at all, in any state. People were convicted of voter fraud in this state that were associated with ACORN. I wonder if your Governor's race would have been different if it wasn't for all the fraud on the part of King County and ACORN.

And of course, ACORN supports Obama, big surprise there. They only register people if they vote democrat. The people that yell the loudest about injustice are usually the ones manipulating and taking advantage of those very same people they say they represent, the old, the ignorant, the minorities.

Update

After a lot of thought we have decided to purchase some stock. I was very disappointed in Scottrade's policies of delaying our ability to use our money to invest. As of right now one of the companies I really wanted to buy has actually gone up quite a bit, almost double from where it was when I wanted to get in on it, which was at an all time low for this company. It is very disappointing because we could have gotten in at the bottom. Hopefully it will suffer a down turn so that we can make up for this delay.

I will now share with you that the company I bought stock in was Ford Motor Company. After reading and researching I feel very very good about this purchase and would have purchased a lot more if I were able to. This company is actually in a very good position and has a great outlook for next year. Since we purchased this stock to hold for about the next 15 years I am feeling that this will be a very wise investment, time will tell.

I have my eye on another stock and if my first choice does not come back down, I may invest in this other company that has a very nice price.

Well, yesterday was another awesome day for me at the tables the TPF actually broke the 800 threshold which is very nice. As long as it keeps going up, even if only by a little bit I will always be happy, but, of course, there will be days where it might end up lower than we began which is to be expected. It really is no different than a piece of stock that you invest in, some days you are up and others you are down, but as long as the moving average is an upward trend it is all good.

I have just been having a lot of fun playing and actually have made some mental adjustments to my game that have really paid off. I have not consciously done anything, but something has changed. I have not let the luck of the draw, the bad beats that we all suffer to enter my mind at all. I have really had a lot of fun relishing in the bad beats that get dealt to everyone. I expect them and when they come, I just move on. While playing yesterday I ran Jacks into Aces twice, and Queens into Kings all in the span of about 10 minutes. On the QQ hand I actually hit a Q on the flop, and thought, well, I have to win one of these, but it wouldn't be that one as a K came on the river to knock me out, but it was all good. Later I ran my 77s into the Small Blinds Aces only to hit my inside Straight Flush draw on the river, which was really nice since my opponent had the A of hearts for a flush as well.

Life is pretty good as far as the poker goes. I wonder if it will carry over when we go to Las Vegas in a few weeks, hmm?

Scottrade nonsense

Well, I got up this morning and was going to make my investments using my new Scottrade account. I was happy to see that the stock had not gone up anymore, having seen it move upward 20% the day before when I could not buy it. I was very pumped that it was still about the same level. I plugged in the type of transaction, the Stock symbol, the shares and hit review order, and to my surprise a little warning flashes acrossed the top of the screen saying insufficient funds. This was quite troublesome, because I could see that I had 30% more in my account than what was needed to buy the stock.

I called the local office and spoke to a person there. They informed me that because I used an ACH transfer method from my bank, which by the way is virtually immediate transfer of funds from one place to another, and was buying a stock that was less than $4 a share that I would have to wait 3 days to use my money. WHAT? He said it was on their site. I looked at their site and sure enough there was some little blurb about marginalizations of stock less than $4 and that you would have to wait 3 days.

I asked this guy what the heck was going on, and he told be that stocks less than $4 a share are considered volatile, whether that is true or not is not a consideration, and that people using ACH transactions actually have 3 days to cancel them. What? I never knew that such a thing was possible. I have used this method to buy things all over the place on the Internet and it never occurred to me that it was not the safest, and most secure way for a merchant to recieve their funds immediately.

I consider this to be a clear sign that I should just bag the idea of investing in the stock market, and told the guy that I will probably(98%) going to close my account because I only opened it so I could buy the stock that was low at the moment, but will surely rise. I don't want to use the name, because I don't want the price to keep going up. Yes, this is silly but loose lips sink ships. lol In three days it will be outside of what I was willing to pay for it, if it continues to rise as it has the past couple days. I will take my Scottrade representative's knowledge of canceling ACH's and use it to me benefit and cancel the transaction, something I would never have even know possible before my call to Scottrade.

Obama and spreading the wealth

Yesterday I was watching some news show and they showed a clip of Obama talking to some Ohio man that was talking to him about his tax plan. This man was thinking about buying a plumbing business, but was concerned because he would be in Obama's 200K plus a year bracket and he knows that Obama wants to tax those people. Obama responded to this man that he wants to make sure that the people that are behind him(the plumber) that they could have success and wealth too. He said that we all win when "we spread the wealth around."

When did the US become a socialist nation? Don't get me wrong, if I was your typical ignorant American this sounds pretty good. Why should I try and achieve things for myself if the Government is going to reward me anyway. Obama has promised us all $1,000 each to be paid for by the oil companies. I wonder what effect this will have on oil companies to have to pay such an extreme tax penalty for being successful. Why should people that have been blessed with good fortune be penalized by the Government so that those that underachieve can have more?

I would love to make 250k plus a year so that I had this concern of being taxed, but I don't, unfortunately. I don't want your handouts Obama, because I feel that people have more incentive to make money if they get to keep it. When people make money the economy moves. When the economy moves, my 401k goes up. When my 401k goes up, it gets me closer to the day when I can retire and enjoy the rest of my life, God willing.

When you tax the upper echelon of our society, you stunt growth. Where is the incentive to do more if you just have to give it to the Government? Don't these people then go out of their way to figure out ways to get around paying taxes altogether because it is so onerous on their companies? We will have more and more companies moving jobs overseas to escape these higher tax rates. Look for unemployment to achieve record highs with an Obama presidency, and kiss any raises that you were expecting over the next few years as well. COLAs, ha, a thing of the past. Companies will pinch corners where they can to lower their overhead to deal with the increased tax burdens, which means layoffs and less perks for you the employee.

Ourselves to blame

It is in these times where the Electoral College's purpose in times past becomes very relevant and important. When the founders established our Constitution and the election of higher offices they put into place this often cursed Electoral College. This was to prevent the uninformed from having too much power when it came to the election.

In these days of people voting because: He is a good speaker. Well, he's black. I don't like how she looks. He is old. He is young. She is pretty. I want change. It is a shame that you don't have to pass a test to prove that you actually have a clue before they give you a ballot.

If you ask most people on the street why they are voting for Obama, you find out that they really have no clue about what any of his policies really are, or what the effect will be on America. They have no idea that his proposals that he wants to implement will cost us 100s upon 100s of Billions of dollars. They are clueless that the vast majority of Americans are going to see their taxes go up to fund these welfare programs.

The government could not avert this financial crisis and yet these people want to have the government run the healthcare program for the US? Are they crazy, or just plain ignorant. The answer is very obvious, of course.

We have ourselves to blame. We don't force our children to learn economics or civics in high school so the vast majority of Americas at very ignorant on how things truly work. They are much to involved in their little lives to be bothered with watching real news, or reading papers or books on these subjects. There is no time, wrestling and nascar and reruns of whatever are on and that is more important to them. They just read the headlines or listen to the rhetoric and think it is fact.

We have ourselves to blame, because America is lazy and apathetic when it comes to the economy and government. Liberalism is very appealing for these lazy people. Who is going to go against some slick talker nobody had ever heard of before this year who wants to give them free money. Music to the ears of the Ignorant man.

The markets are up, hooray, but will it last?

Today was a great day on Wall Street, now, let's hope it keeps going forward and upward again.

I have been on a very nice run playing SNGs. I posted another day of positive movement in my BR, which I have termed the TPF, it is like a stock of sorts, PF stands for Poker Fund. lol Which, after the close of business(I decided to stop playing for the day) today posted record gains sufficient to finally over come the losses that accrued at the beginning of the year. The TPF was up a full 18.3% today, which followed a day that saw 7.7% gain on Sunday and 14.1% gain on Saturday. So as you can see the TPF is doing really well.

As CFO of the TPF I hope that these gains continue into the foreseeable future. At this point there is no reason to doubt otherwise. The TPF has seen a ROI of 26.4% since 8/1/08. Unfortunately, the TPF is closed at the present time to new investors.

I am taking the plunge

Well, I decided that I would take the plunge and I opened an account with Scottrade, which seemed to be the best deal for the small investor with $7 trades and a small balance requirement to open an account. I am a little disappointed that I didn't pull the trigger this weekend so that my money would have been there today, both of my stocks that I wanted to invest in happen to be doing very well today. Hopefully, they stay about where they are today for tomorrow when I can actually get my shares, but if not, that is okay as I expect both of these stocks to have nice successes in the future.

I wish I actually had a lot more money to invest because there are a ton of stocks that are really priced well, but are low right now because of the market effect on everything over the past few weeks. There are a lot of great deals out there, and I am sure the rich will be getting even richer.

I will continue to grind away at my poker BR. This weekend was another very good weekend for me. I have been playing very well and my results have been very nice. If not for lady luck smiling on my opponents yesterday, it would have been an insane day for me, as it was, it was very, very nice. I need to thank the Seahawks for some of my success, because I normally don't play on Sunday, but since I had some extra time after turning them off in the 4th quarter, I decided to play and did very well.

The Seahawks are the worst

Well, yet one more dismal effort on the part of the Seahawks. It was nice to see Holmgren handcuff the offense so that they were guaranteed to lose by not letting them throw any passes. He must have felt sorry for GB for losing three in a row and wanted to make it easy on their defense. This way they would only have to worry about the run which for the most part they stuffed all day, and then when we have that big break out run there is the phantom holding call, well done officials.

This team appears to have quit, or maybe it is just the coaching staff that is looking to their next job assignments after this year. Somebody might let the Defensive coordinator know that the worst defense in the NFL is not something to put on your job application. The Seahawks give up more points in the 3rd quarter than any other team in the NFL. What exactly are they doing at halftime? Not making any adjustments from the looks of it.

This team is just hopeless. They play with no heart, period. This season is over. In order to overcome adversity you have to play with heart. This team has proven time and time again that it has no heart. This team has proven that it is very soft, unable to win on the road, and now apparently, unable to play with any effort at home, the circle is complete.

My best investment

Well, I have been thinking about buying some stocks in some companies that actually are really good companies with 2009 projections well beyond their current stock price, but I am conflicted about this. My other option is to take the money I was going to buy stocks with and instead invest it in my poker bankroll. Yes, my bankroll, specifically my online poker bankroll.

To some of you this may seem like a bad choice. For many, most people I would agree. The reason I can intelligently consider this is due to the fact that historically my best investment of money has been my poker playing. Yes, it is true. I have been playing with other people's money for quite some time now. I withdrew out my own money long, long ago.

Looking at my stats for the entire time I have played poker spanning about 3 years now with one year off, most of 2007, I have had a return on my investment playing 1 table sit and go tournamnets of 4.82% percent, which is not bad at all considering this is over my entire career of playing SNGs, some of which I played poorly early in my career. If you factor in every single tournament I have ever played it drops down to 0.79% percent, which is not great, but that includes Multi-Table tournaments where the variance is quite high. For instance, I have only played 4 $100 buy-in tournaments but my return on investment ROI is a whopping 62.24%. Of course, my bankroll(BR) does not support playing at that level at the moment.

If we focus on the period from 8/1/08 which is when I really started back to playing SNGs again, then you find that I have a ROI of 14.6% playing the level I am currently playing. Most people would take that type of ROI any time.

If I invested in myself I could play 2 levels higher than I currently play, and I could win significantly more when I do win. Coincidentally, this would be playing at the level I was playing at when I took a break from playing for a year. The stocks would be purchased for the long-term, so I would be planning on holding them until I retire which hopefully will be in about 16 years or so, so the gains could be nice given the fact these companies' stock is in the dumper right now. And I could continue to grow my BR and just play until it is the higher level without putting any more money in, which has been what I have usually done.

Beyond Politics

Yesterday I was in Seattle working and while I was waiting for my next proceeding to start I could over hear one AG(assistant attorney general) talking to a couple of judges about the economy and the upcoming election, and it was just mind blowing. How is it that we can live in a modern society and yet have two groups of people so further apart than liberals and conservatives?

After my job was done I could not resist asking my liberal AG a question or two to really try and learn some things, or at least his perception of what is going to happen if Obama wins the election. It was astonishing what this well-educated lawyer told me. I asked him about Obama's economic plan since that is the hottest topic on the planet right now. I said, what is the center piece of the plan? How is it going to spark the economy?

He told me that Obama was going to re-prioritize spending and then get more regulations in place and lastly the tax on increase for the wealthy, oh, and he talked about legislation that would stop companies from moving jobs overseas. Yes, these are the words that came out of his mouth. I said to him, you do realize that de-regulation was not at the root of this problem today, but the liberal program Community Reinvestment Act which started this ball rolling. He had extolled the virtues of Clinton on the economy and blamed Reagan. Yes, I know, laughable. I asked him how he could just forget the record economic growth we had with Reagan, and then again under Bush after 9/11. His answer? Well, he just moved on to another topic.

I asked him if he thought maybe the Corporate tax rate was too high? His response, not at all. He told me that it had nothing to do with companies moving overseas. I am beginning to realize that the liberal party is seemingly either clueless or in denial. It is hard to tell really. To suggest that companies don't move overseas due to the ridiculous tax rate is just naive.

He then told me that he would never vote for Palin. My response was, you do realize that she is not running for President, right? I then asked him why the left is so infatuated with Sarah Palin. He tried to backtrack and say he wasn't. He then said he would never vote for McCain, which of course he wouldn't. Diehards refuse to recognize the better candidate because they are blinded by party loyalty. I asked him why would you vote for somebody that has done nothing. He said how can I say Obama has done nothing? I said can you tell me one piece of legislation he has his name on? Of course, he switched topics and tried a very lame attempt at demeaning Sen. McCain by saying, well, he finished in the bottom 5 of his class and just crashed planes.

It takes some real ignorance to insult somebody who fought for this country in the war and was a prisoner of war for 5 and a half years while being tortured while you are back here going to college and having a good time. He asked me about President Kennedy and his accomplishments. I said, it was a shame that he was killed before he could do anything, because we will never know if he would have been a good president or not.

This is the amazing thing about Liberals, they live in a dream state. Several times during my discussion with this AG he referred to the past 40 and 50 years in the past to extol the virtues of some past Lib or to compare our Tax rates of today to then and say, that was higher then so what. It was amazing at how loud and excited this man came when trying to defend his position and at the same time minimize my questions, or at times just ignore the point and move to something else.

The last thing he said to me was basically that John McCain would die in the next four years and he was worried that Palin would be president. I asked him why is it the Liberals always look to the negative side of life. It is amazing at how often liberals get excited when things are bad, and yet they are very reserved when things are going well for America. He was still screaming from 20ft away as the door to the office was slowly closing as I walked to the elevator.

I asked him about term limits, because I want everyone, Republicans and Democrats, booted out of office, and he told me we have term limits, it is called the constitution. This is an educated lawyer, and yet he doesn't know the difference between a term limit and a term in office. Only the President has a term limit of two terms. If it is good enough for the highest office, it is good enough for the lower houses. 10 years, that is long enough for anybody to be in office, period. I told my AG friend that people shouldn't be able to go to Washington to get rich. He said to me, with a straight face no less, they don't. This might have been the most laughable thing he said to me. I said, well, how about Biden buying 4 acres of prime lakefront property and building a 7,000 sq.ft. house for only $300k. I said we couldn't do that. Mr. AG said, well, he had friends that have done it. Whatever, sure you do. Maybe they are corrupt as well.

My AG friend discounted or ignored any point that I made. He had no responses for most things I asked him about and tried to give me canned answers instead. We are in a sad spot in this country because people care more about winning than they do what's best for the country, and that is why the US is no longer a great country. People are putting their party and themselves first and the country second.

What to do with investments, 401k

What a frustrating time it is to be an American. I hate to even look at my portfolio nowadays. My company recently switched 401k providers and they did it at the worst time possible the middle of September. I know that they planned on doing it for some time, it is just a shame that the new provider cared more about getting the account then advising us to wait it out. So my whole portfolio got sold off, which by that time I has already lost 10%.

Since 9/16 when it was official I have lost another 15%, so in the last two months I have lost 25% of my portfolio. Just a few days ago I had lost about 5% and was thinking of moving it all into my inflation protected bond fund, which had actually gone up a little bit, but I keep hearing in the back of my head when all the experts say don't sell, don't sell. So I didn't, now I have lost another 10% and I am faced with what the heck should I do. I have lost so much that it really is frustrating because it took so long to get what I had and now it is going away everyday, more and more.

I am torn between keeping my dispersments the same as they are now, basically 1/3 to 3 funds. two growth funds and one bond fund so that I can take advantage of the low prices on these other stocks, but then I say to myself is this the best thing to do? Will I have anything left by the time these idiots get down taking all their profits.

And then on top of this I get to worry about how devstating it will be to the markets of Obama wins this election. What a terrible time to be an American.

6 out of 10 think depression is coming

http://money.cnn.com/2008/10/06/news/economy/depression_poll/index.htm

This poll really does prove the theory that most Americans are ignorant and clueless. To somehow believe that we would have millions homeless and unemployed because of a few banks going under is laughable.

The left has got to be loving stories like these, because they will convince these people that they need to vote for Obama to rescue themselves. What a shame that after they elect their man, this is a real possibility after he engages his assinine economic plan.

Seahawks, worst team in NFL?

After today's lackluster effort I have to concede that the Seahawks are just a terrible team. It appears that they were still on vacation today. I really don't want to hear how tough it is to fly to he East coast to play a game.

Where to begin with the critique. Let's start with Billy McMullen. That guy needs to be cut tomorrow. He is simply overmatched out there on the field. He runs terrible routes and invites the defender to have a clean shot at any pass thrown to him. He has no clue how to achieve separation or how to run a route. Kerry Colbert, hands of stone.

The secondary today was as usual, terrible. Kelly Jennings might be one of the weakest corners in the league. He is small, and weak. He gets terrible jams on the line of scrimmage and seemingly can't cover anybody. Even when he interferes with a receiver they still catch the ball, because he can't even do that right. I hope he was benched and not just hurt, because it looked like they finally were fed up with him and put Wilson in there, who, in an act of solidarity with Jennings promptly got beat deep.

Julian Peterson was absolutely awful today. As a team leader it was pathetic watching his terrible tackling all day long. Does he really think Jacobs is going to go down just because he hit him? Try wrapping your arms around him next time. The Seahawks are one of the worst tackling teams in the NFL.

Dion Grant, where to begin. This guy constantly was out of position and losing contain on the outside. If he needed to go inside, he went outside. If he should stay outside, he went inside. On one play he was behind a lineback who was already on the outside of the lead blocker and instead of going to the inside where the cutback lane was, he continued to the outside on Hill's hip and got pushed out of the play. He help the lead blocker block him and Hill on the play which went for a big gain. He was out of position all day long. Josh wilson was another guy who gave up big plays because he was out of position.

The Defense had no clue where they were supposed to be. They had no energy, no pressure, no presence on the field. The Giants ran/passed at will. It was one of the most dominating performances ever. The Seahawks were outclassed, outplayed and outcoached. Maybe Holmgren should step down now and let's get the rebuilding started.

Show solidarity as Americans

There are fewer than two months until the election, an election that will decide the next President of the United States.

The person elected will be the president of all Americans, not just the Democrats or the Republicans.

To show our solidarity as Americans, let's all get together and show each other our support for the candidate of our choice. It's time that we all joined together, Democrats and Republicans alike.

If you support the policies and character of John McCain,
please drive with your headlights on during the day.

If you support Obama, please drive with your headlights off at night.

Thank you and God Bless

Surprise announcement

Well, Mary and I are pleased to announce that coming this Spring we will be welcoming an additional grandchild to the family. The exact due date has not been given as of yet, but it is looking like around March. The February to May time seems to be when the majority of the grandkids have been born, coincidentally.

This will be our 5th, and I am quite certain that when it is all said and done, it will not even remotely be our last.

VP Debate

Well, one of the big questions heading into the debate was how impartial was Gwen Ifil going to be as the moderator given the fact that she is a huge Obama supporter having written a book on him that is due out on Inaugaration Day. I think that the answer is fairly obvious that she was very biassed allowing Biden to break the debate format rules that were agreed upon by both parties.

You ask how did he break the rules? The format was the question was asked to a party and they had 90 seconds to respond and then there was a 2 minute rebuttal by the other party, then the next question would be posed. Joe Bided was repeatedly allowed to have a second bite at the apple and respond to everything that Sarah Palin said. In debating circles this is incredibly unfair to allow the party that started the round to end the round repeatedly.

This did not happen once or twice, it happened repeatedly throughout the night and Ms. Ifil never stopped Biden from talking. She never asserted any control over the debate when it came to Biden changing the rules. She allowed him to do whatever he wanted to do.

I thought it was really telling that he would answer a question with his canned prepared answers and then Governor Palin would respond to the question, or in many cases, she responded to what Biden said when he didn't answer the question. She was very colorful and herself. You could tell that her answers were pretty much always genuine by the way she answered them, not some canned response. And then there Joe would go on a tirade after she would asnwer piling on negative after negative comment about John McCain. The fact Gwne Ifil as the moderator allowed Biden to do this over and over again shows how incredibly biassed she is and should disqualify her from every moderating another debate again. She is simply unqualified to do the job.

What a shame that she would put her political party affiliation ahead of what is right and compromise her career as a journalist. What a shame that she would rather be partisan then to do the job she was hired to do. Gwen, you are a disgrace to the profession you are in.

On a sidenote CNN had an interesting presentation of the debate having 6 "analysts" grading the debate as it was going on. The point I want to bring up is that Begala, a democratic hack, through the entire time that I was watching CNN, about 45 minutes, never had a negative mark for biden while the others had several negative marks for him. It just goes to show that you can never believe a word out of Begala's mouth because of his over the top bias.

What a disgrace

Yesterday as I was driving to Port Angeles I heard on the radio that there was a debate for the Governor's race that night. I was saddened to find out that this was the 3rd debate, which was news to me since I had heard nothing of the two previous debates. After I arrived at my hotel room I started checking the channels at 6:00 p.m. and then 6:30, 7:00, 7:30, 8:00 then I gave up.

What a shame that the most important election race in our state is not getting any television coverage for the debates. I asked an attorney today about it and he said it was on Channel 9. This is something of importance and should not be hidden on some PBS station that many people don't ever click onto, and a channel not likely to be in my hotels as they have limited channels to begin with.

What is even worse is that I listen to the radio and watch local channels quite often during the week and I never heard of the first two debates. What a pathetic job of promoting the debates.

Give the 700B to the people

My bailout plan is a lot better than the one in Washington. This past summer Obama was talking about a windfall tax on oil companies and it was brought up the this Obama spokesperson that it would cost about 10B dollars to do it, which just happens to be about the total profits of all the oil companies this past year, but I digress.

The plan was to give everyone that got a tax stimulus check $1,000. Well, if the Obama plan was 10B dollars for $1,000 to everybody then 70B dollars would be good for $70,000 to each person that got a stimulus check. Couples would recieve $140,000.

Imagine what would happen in our country with such an outpouring of cash. Let's see, that credit card debt problem that the US has, gone. Those loans to the automakers would be unneccesary as you know people would buy cars. They would buy just about everything under the sun. The banks would be flush with cash from paying off the credit cards. Home loans would go up. People would pay off their mortgages. People would bring their delinquent loans up to date.

And best of all, no executives would get even richer off of our tax dollars as they would not get a cent, well, they would get their $70,000 just like you and me. This plan does it all, for the people anyway.

Gregoire's secret deals with the Indians

I was just reminded of something yesterday as I was looking at the mail. There was a flyer in there talking about Gregoire and how she let the Indian Casinos out of a $140 million compact that was in place. Of course she was criticised for it, her own party called it shady. Why would the governor of our own state tell the Indian Nation that we don't want their $140 million? Doesn't our state have a huge deficit? and here Christine is turning down money. People around the US said it was shady.

Why, oh, why would she do that? Maybe the $650,000 donations she got from the Indians had something to do with it. At least she is open about her bribes/paybacks. Well, at least she got something out of it even if she did screw over the state.

That money will go nicely with the $1.3 million she has raised from donors that don't even live in our State. Why are Fat Cats from the Democratic party donating so heavily to our governor? What secret deals does she have with them?

Here is but one article, I am sure you could find more.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/366900_gregoire13.html

Huskies, doh! Roll Tide Roll

Well, I caught a little of game last night. It is funny Fox sports lists the channel as off air but when you click on it there are the Huskies getting beaten, again. Tyrone should do us all a favor and resign now so we can get someone else in here to start rebuilding the program. Losing Locker all but guarantees the Huskies will have a miserably bad year, not that that was really in doubt.

The defense is very porous under Donatello, maybe he should have stayed in the pros. This team has no playmakers on it. I wish I knew a bookie, because I would have made a killing yesterday on the Huskies. There was not a lot of doubt in my mind that they would lose, it was just a matter of by how much.

Wow, Alabama looked really good yesterday. So good that we stopped watching and switched over to the LSU game which was a little more competitive. I can only wonder what happened in the 2nd half, but undoubtedly the Tide got complacent with the huge lead they had.

How about a Social Security bail out?

Hey, Congress,
Why not do something about Social Security while you have the check book out? Everyone forgets that it is bankrupt, and yet, nobody is doing anything about it, or talking about it for that matter.

Write a big fat check and send it to the Social Security Administration so that the vast majority of people that didn't get a chance to fleece America can have a little retirement? I know it is tough thinking about us little folk. We don't have golden parachutes like most of you.

Harry Reid is he the dumbest in DC?

How would you like to be living in Nevada and have to pick up the paper or turn on the TV and see that your senator, Harry Reid, has done it again. Why is this guy keeps opening his mouth and saying stupid things, or just flat out lying?

Harry said that the bailout deal was all but done at 1:00 p.m. yesterday, which is a lie, and then when McCain came to town it all fell apart, another lie. Why is it that liberals seem to have a real need to distort and lie to the American people? Why can't they just do their jobs and leave the childish behavior behind.

When we look back over this moment in time it will be, because it is pretty clear right now, who was responsible for heading us down this road to ruin. All one has to do is look back over the last decade and look into the mortgage loan programs designed to help the sub-prime(less than desirable) loan applicants. We won't name names, but just think about it and it doesn't take much to figure out where these ideas come from.

The second part of the problem was the banking industry giving out bad loans and then reselling them to financial institutions. Let's see now, that sounds like a situation where the congressional banking committee would be all over it. Surely, the people that oversee the banking industry would have a handle on this and have some ideas on how to protect the banks and people investing in them, right? I mean, isn't that part of their jobs? I wonder what they were doing the last 5 years when everybody in town is talking about the problem with Fannie and Freddie?

In 2003, 2005 and 2007 both parties, yes, Republicans and Democrats had a chance to pass some legislation to address Fannie Mae's situation and they both dropped the ball. The President and others in the Senate tried to pass this new oversight legislation and the congress shot them down. Remind me again who was in charge for the last 6 years in congress?

Why can't people just put down the partisan talk and just fix the problem. Forget about all that money you are making at our expense, and just do it.

Rossi or Gregoire

Gregoire refuses to rule out tax increases. I’ve flat-out promised to not raise taxes if elected.
Below is a snippet of an email I got from the Rossi campaign as I am, big surprise, a Rossi supporter. What has Gregoire done to warrant a second term?

Gregoire has run up a $3.2 billion dollar deficit and has no plan to fix it. I want to put our children and infrastructure first and provide incentives for businesses to flourish in Washington so our state has more money to fund these critical programs.

Gregoire has already given 3,000 “Get Out Of Jail Free” cards to felons. I would fund prisons and keep these dangerous criminals away from our families and out of our neighborhoods.

Gregoire has no plan to fix traffic congestion. I have a detailed transportation plan that will fix the 9 worst traffic chokepoints in our state, without raising the gas tax.

It’s a pretty simple choice. Gregoire wants to raise taxes, increase burdens on families, and let thousands of dangerous criminals out on the streets. I’m offering a taxpayer and family friendly alternative to the mistakes of the past four years.

Bail out and politics

I have been watching lots of financial programs and trying to read a bunch of stuffo on the economy and I wish somebody out there would explain to me why it would be so terrible if we let these bad banks go under.

How can we bail out these big institutions when the executives of these places have thousands and thousands of shares and are going to line their own pockets with the bailout money? Why does any mortgage holder deserve the Federal Government to come in an pay their loans up to date so they are not delinquent? They deserve to be foreclosed for being irresponsible. I am sure that if I was behind in my payments nobody would give a tinker's damn and I would just quietly lose my home. Who could I blame for this? I guess I should blame George Bush, or maybe Dino Rossi, after all, Christine Gregoire says they are to blame, so it must be so right.


Our country is all about winning, getting mine now at any cost. Our society is driven by self-gratification. Who cares if we walk all over the little guy, as long as we are getting rich in the process it is okay. As long as we win the election, who cares how we do it, right Christine? I mean, does it really matter if we have to fraudulently manufacture ballots to do it? What a shame King County is still part of the process given the incompetents that run the elections in that county.

Any notice that Joe Biden seems to be a nut bag? What is it with all of these open mouth insert foot moments? I mean does this guy even have a brain in his head? Obama and his party blasts McCain for picking Palin, and at the same time they actually say that Biden is the most qualified choice. lol. Ask Biden and he will tell you Hilary was a better choice than he was. Biden would have accepted the VP from McCain if he was asked, again, just ask biden. lol

Assorted Sports stuff

Yea! The Yankees will not be in the post season this year. I will be rooting for the D-rays since they have been the worst team in MLB since they joined. Imagine never having a winning season, ever, until this year. Imagine never even winning a double-header, lol. How sad it is that nobody is even going to their games despite having one of the most exciting young teams out there, and being in first place.


Thanks NYG. Things have started going the Seahawks way. Plaxico Burress has been suspended for the game against the hawks, thank you. These professional athletes really do have their heads in some orifice. They don't realize how good they have it and then they get suspended for basically being stupid. Oh, and he wanted a new contract this year because he had one good year last year. Nice way to show the organization that you deserve more money by going AWOL.

Only in America

Only in America can be go out, get a loan and then later claim they are the victim because they can't pay for their loan. A fact that seemingly escaped them when they were applying for it to begin with.

Hey, slackers, if you can't pay your bills now, hmm, the odds are pretty good that you are not going to be able to afford that new house you are trying to buy. If you have collectors calling you, maybe you shouldn't be trying to get a loan for anything.

Christine Gregoire actually had her picture taken consoling a some blacks because Countrywide had given them loans that they shouldn't have gotten. Wasn't this what the liberals wanted? Everyone should be able to get a loan for a house.

Liberals have all these grand ideas and dreams that they think about and wish were so, but then they go ahead and live their lives as though this dream world was real. Conservatives see the world as it is and act accordingly.

Liberals are like children living in a make-believe society where they can say and do anything. Conservatives are the ones that end up having to deal with the mess left behind, see Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton (bin Laden and 9/11 to name a few).

Here is a thought, how about we let all these idiots that were not paying their bills before they got their mortgages to go down the toilet. They don't deserve a bailout and even if you reduced their interest rate down to 5%, they would still default on their loans. These people are deadbeats and there is no saving them.

On a sidenote, why is it that we even allow "shorting" of stocks? This is about as un-American as you can get, to bet against your own economy. I would think that Liberals would love shorting stock, after all, Liberals are on top of the world when bad things happen. They have to root for collapses in the economy, or increased body counts in war zones, that way they can blame somebody for something. They can't be happy when things are going well.

Why is it Liberals have such short memories?

In the current economic state it seems a bit disingenuous for all the Democrats to be pointing fingers at GW and blaming him for what is going on. Wasn't the concept of using Fannie and Freddie to give low-income (not qualified) people mortgages? Barney Frank isn't he a Democrat? Wasn't Clinton a pioneer in signing legislation that helped all of this happen?

It seems the Dems forget in 2003 President Bush tried to get congress to pass legislation to reel in Freddie and Fannie. Why is it all the democrats forget that they blocked this legislation? Oh, let's not leave out the many Republicans that also blocked this legislation.

The current situation is why we should have term limits in congress. These idiots would not be so worried about doing the right thing if they knew their time was short. How about 10 years and you are gone for representatives and 2 terms for Senators. Why do we need career politicians that are there to enrich their own bank accounts. How is it even possible that someone can be in charge of a Federal agency and make close to $100 million dollars for themselves?

Why is their no outrage in the streets over these politicians increasing their own net worth some much while in office? They go there with nothing and leave with their bank accounts swelling, net worth's soar.

The saying I didn't become a politician to get rich is a joke. They do it for the money and the power, screw the people.

Gregoire, what a joke.

Gregoire is just realizing that she has spent us further into debt. I wonder why the republicans knew about this months and months ago and she didn't? What is even funnier is that she is blaming this past weekend's Wall Street problems on why we are going to have a budget shortfall. It wouldn't have anything to do with them increasing spending as much as they did. She took office with a $2.5 billion deficit and she grew it to $3.25 billion. Well, done Christine, oh, sorry, Chris.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2008189261_govbudget19m.html

State of the Economy

What is it with all these huge Wall Street companies going under? I am kind of getting sick of my Government bailing out all of these companies with my tax money. Perhaps I would have a different view of things if I had tons of money invested with them, but I don't, so maybe it is a blessing to be one of the not-rich in our society.

Would it be so bad for the weak to go under or be consumed by the strong? Isn't that how a healthy economy works? Let's have a good blood-letting and let them all go down the tubes. The sun will rise tomorrow and life will go on. Maybe it would be better to let those companies that cannot survive to die. People that can't pay their mortgages, lose their homes.

God help us if Barack Obama wins the election, instead of us being near the bottom of this economic hole, we'll be on our way to even deeper into the pits of hell.

Yea! a little help on the way

Well, the Seahawks swallowed their pride yesterday and signed Koren Robinson, again, to a one year contract. If he is in half-way decent shape, Matt, should be throwing him the pigskin this weekend. Not too mention he could be returning punts/kickoffs maybe. At any rate he should be able to shake the rust off and get up to speed very quickly given his knowledge of our system and terminology.

The Hawks also signed Keary Colbert in a trade with Denver. He has been a productive receiver in this league in the past, certainly better than McMullen. He should be a nice addition given how lousy a reciever Courtney Taylor appears to be.

Another Seahawks blunder

Well, another Sunday, another disappointment. I guess the referees didn't get the memo that the Seahawks are one of the most disciplined teams in the NFL and seldom if ever get penalties judging by the way they were bailing out San Francisco today. They also missed the seminar on what pass interference is as well.

Courtney Taylor once again forces us to ask the question of why exactly he is on the team. As far as I am aware there is no league requirement that you have a receiver that is good for a few dropped passes every week. And McMullen, where to start. This guy had several drops, ran too short of routes to pick up first downs, fumbled a ball on the 10yd line, oh, and was a key player in an 86 yd interception return for a touchdown due to his inability to catch a ball that hits his hands. Carlson was the only guy that was just catching footballs. Bumpus did a fine job in the return game as well. We must scratch our heads every time Taylor is on the field doing nothing and dropping balls sent his way, why is Jordan Kent on the practice squad?

The secondary once again gave up too many big plays to win a game. Hey, Mr. Jennings, you might want to play better defense or you might find yourself sitting at home with Plackemeier watching the games on Sunday. It probably didn't help us today that our defensive calls seemed to be off base at times allowing O'Sullivan to run wild at times, or their running backs, AGAIN. It was also nice to see them get some deep balls in with nobody covering the deep middle. I had thought we fixed this problem last year, but I guess it is back, AGAIN.

We were running the ball very well today, thank goodness. Can anyone explain why we ran 3 passing plays after they scored in the 3rd quarter there? Then we have to punt and give it right back to them. The next possession we go back to running with a few passes here and there and we move down the field and score.

The Seahawks should have easily crushed the 49ers today, and yet they lose, because they can not get a 3rd stop when they need one. Who cares that you dominated for 90% of the game when you allow the big 3rd conversions in the 4th quarter, and worse yet, overtime. What an incredibly stupid time to decide to blitz on 3rd and 7 when they were doing nothing. Good job, you give up a huge gain and the game was all but over.

Recievers get an F
Tide Ends A
O-line B
D-Line B+
Secondary D
Special Teams C
Coaching C

The Rams are up next for a battle for the division cellar.

JC_Saves, what does it mean?

JC_Saves is the screen name that I use when I play poker on Poker Stars. I like to spread the word in anyway that I can. It is very interesting the comments, mostly very positive, that I get. When I started this blog long ago I was going to use it mainly just for talking about poker. That is why I put JC_Saves in the title of the blog. Although, I certainly intend to talk about poker, I am going to try and talk about my life, family and other matters that interest me.

Oh, and just for everyone's benefit, asking for God's help while playing cards is one of the sillier things you could do. During the WSOP main event last year at the final table there were two people that continually called out for God's help. It was one of the most pathetic things that I have witnessed. There was a woman who basically was asking over and over for God to intervene so her boyfriend could win a hand. She kept repeating some very obscure bible(I am assuming) reference. After a while I found myself disliking this person and really rooting for them to lose and be gone so I wouldn't have to hear her any longer, and thankfully, that prayer was answered.

The eventual winner of the main event, who was also asking for God's help, was a social worker who was planning on spending his prize money to help the needy people of his community, so maybe God did smile upon his fate that day, who knows. I do know this, God does not care about helping you win a hand of poker, a game of baseball, football or any other sporting event. To ask for his intervention in such matters is foolish. I would much rather ask for wisdom, patience and good health, which will serve me far better in life, and the team I am rooting for.

Repair 2008

Repair 2008 118, originally uploaded by monkzila.

This is after I tore down and put back together the engine. The red lines are new silicone vacuum lines. I replace all the vacuum lines which were old anyway with these new ones. Notice the new chrome air intake pipes. It really does look sharp up close and personal.

While I had it apart I took the time to remove some uncessary water lines and assorted other systems that Nissan subsequently did away with in later years due to there unimportance and lack of real use

Hello

Hello everyone,
I am going to try and start posting things again, although, we will have to see how up-to-date I can keep it.

I have been very busy working on projects around the house and with work. Although, work in the summertime in my business fluctuates a fair amount, I was still pretty busy. In early August we had a bit of an overheating issue with the 300Zx and blew the head gasket. I have been tearing down the engine and doing a little comsetic work on the engine. I took the opportunity to clean and pain many of the parts, and I also replaced all the fuel injectors as the last time we had the emissions done on it it failed and the guy that worked on it told us that the injectors were not firing the way that they should. This was very disappointing because I had them supposedly cleaned and rebuilt when I put the new engine in.

My mechanic, or my mechanic's son as it happens to be is not very good. Unless absolutely necessary I doubt I will have anyone work on this engine/car again due to the shoddy work and added expense. The shop wanted $1800 to replace the head gasket. I added headers, new fuel injectors($500), new intake, new gaskets, new radiator, new thermostat, new ignition module, new vacuum lines, chrome bolt package, numerous cans of engine spray paint, assorted tools, 3 new guages and guage pod to hold them(which looks really nice, by the way), and a new hands-free amplified speaker for the interior. Even after adding all these things I am still well under, by a significant amount, from the $1800 my shop wanted to do the job. It always saves to do it yourself.

We have also been spending a fair amount of time seeing the grandkids. They really like coming over to the house and running around the backyard playing with the dogs. Kids and dogs is a natural as the sun rising from the east. Even though Shalisa is only about 18 months she is very adventurous and loves the dogs. She especially loves to play with their water bowl outside, often deciding to stand in it with her sandles on. The other day she watched the dogs getting a drink and walked over and leaned down and put her face down to the water to try and get a drink for herself, priceless. It is a shame you can never get the camera in time. Mischief is very cute with the little ones and seemingly never knocks them down, even though she is much bigger than all three children.


Shalisa sticking her tongue out at the dog, mimicking the Mischief.


Neveah being cute.


De`Andre having a good time in the backyard on a hot day.


Our three girls relaxing.

I have been lazy

Back in April I decided to end my subscription to PokerXFactor, and shortly after that I started playing Everquest again for fun. I used to play with my son when it first came out and it was very interesting how the game has changed. I is what I spend my leisure time doing. I still play poker online but the fire in my heart has dimmed a bit. I did last week play in a $20 tourney with 1045 people in it and ended up finishing 33rd, which was really nice. I thought I played exceptionally well, especially given the fact that was my first tourney in 3 months. I have played some SNGs and have monied about %80 of those that I have played. I still love the game and anticipate playing more in the future.

I have not had a chance to do many of the projects that I had wanted to undertake due to a back injury in May that I have just recently revovered from. I had wanted to paint the house and lay some concrete but they will have to wait perhaps until next year, although summer is just getting going so I may do some of that yet.

I did get a new car (at least to me) in May. I acquired a 2002 Mercedes C230 Kompressor. I have really enjoyed the zippiness of this compared to my 300E. The 300 is still in great shape, although it needs some work, which will be done as soon as I sell my Isuzu to pay for the repairs.

We jus booked a cruise for this winter so that will be something fun to look forward to. Although leaving my house to my 18yr old daughter will have it's potential drawbacks. lol

Update

Not a lot has been going on lately. My work has really picked up so that has kept me busy. I have played hardly any poker at all the last week and a half and that has been okay with me. I still love to play, but it is nice to do some other things as well.

I have canceled my PokerXfactor account as I don't think it is worth the $25 a month at this point. You can only hear someone say the same thing so many times in so many videos. Down the road I may try out one of the other sites to get some fresh new perspectives, which is always valuable.

The weather is starting to get nicer and it will be time to do some work on the yard and fences, and maybe even on the truck to get it ready to be painted.

Recalibration

Recently I started reading Harrington on Hold'em Vol. 3, the workbook, and I must say that this is a very nice read. This is the type of book that you can sit down and read any time any where when you have 10 minutes you can do a hand. The ideas and concepts in this book really are worth the read. We all try, or at least we should be trying to put our opponents on hands while we are playing. Some of us do this better than others, and this is what makes them very succesful. People that are very good post flop players can put people on hands and then you play accordingly.

It would be silly to try and make a move on someone if the range of hands we put them on is such that there is little to no chance they will fold. We must therefore act accordingly. At times I think I have done a very poor job at this. I think it is the last frontier, or hurdle to cross to becoming an even better poker player.

I have also been reading Super System 1 by Doyle Brunson and friends. I am reading the NL chapter, though I actually bought it for Razz and Lowball, and even Stud for that matter. I use to be of the opinion that I didn't really care what was in this NL section by Doyle. I am very sorry that I had this opinion for so long. I wish that this was the first book that I read. I would be even further along in my journey.

I have been playing a lot more MTTs than SNGs lately and I think my SNG game has suffered because of it. I also recently tried Sharkscope out, which is a program that tells you everyone's STATS at the table so you can see who the loser players are. I thought when I first got this program that it was a great tool, but now I am of the mind that it is very counter productive and I have stopped using it. I find that when I know who the really bad players are I let it influence my decisions too much when I am involved in hands with them. After all a donkey can wake up with a hand some of the time and that is why you see a lot of donkeys with lots of chips because people keep paying them off with sub par hands. I will not be using it anymore, except for enterainment value not while I am playing.

I have decided while I am on the big skid that I am on, mainly due to all the MTTs I have been playing. Although I have had success there, and in the SNG arena I have decided that I am going to drop down to the minimum level of play and just concentrate on being patient and getting back to my game. I am going to use the time to concentrate on reading people and making the correct play regardless of the result. I had some really nice success yesterday and learned a few things about reading hands and people, and the best part about it all is that if I bubbled, though, frustrating, it really was not that big of a deal because the affect on my bankroll was inconsequential.

I think a lot can be learned by going back and learning to deal with really bad players and how to play hands with them. This will translate greatly in large field tournaments due to all the bad players that satellite into them. In the past whenever I felt like the stars were aligned against me, like the last few days, I would stop playing and go to the play money games and then just crush people and have fun. I am doing the same thing except I am still playing for money and the other people are as well, and hopefully most of them are playing some sort of game and not just throwing it away with disregard.

There are so many things to learn about playing poker and sometimes we get caught up into the wanting to advance to the next level of game that we don't learn everything we should have at the lower levels. While I am dreaming of the day I can play the 50 rebuy and 100 rebuy and all the other high buy-in tourneys, I will grind my way there absorbing everything along the way. I know that it will come to me if I lay the foundation properly. I am confident that I have what it takes to become a top notch player. The trick is nurturing that confidence and protecting it and giving it all the tools it needs to stay that way even in the face of adversity. There is no secret we can learn that will automatically make us great. No system to be found. Just the hard work to learn and incorporate the things that will make you succesful, where it is second nature and you just know this is the play to be made and now is the time to do it.

update

Well, I have been dealing with a downswing the last 10 days or so, which is frustrating. I have seen a lot of cold decks and for some unexplainable reasons cannot seem to win a coin flip, not even when I am ahead, which is 90% of the time. It has been very odd because I feel that I have played incredibly well and that just adds to the frustration. It is part of the game obviously so I try not to think about it too much and just keep plugging along.

I have been playing more MTTs lately and have been playing really well, going pretty deep in a number of them. I think my play has evolved into something that will be more successful long term. Although, I misplayed AKss yesterday very badly by over-thinking the situation. I intend to go over a couple HHs today and set up some guidelines that will be my poker philosophy. I am going to help myself by eliminating some of those tough decisions that we face. Obviously, each hand is a world of its own, but by using M calculations and number of BBs left I think I can simplify the game a little. I made a really bad laydown because my stack was at an awkward size and I gave my opponent too much credit, when I should have been happy, I was confused. It won't happen again, period, when it comes to that situation.


Aggression is the key and the more times you can be brutally aggressive the more times you will be successful. I had a perfect hand a couple days ago where I played 86ss and hit top pair and a flush draw. I was ck/raised on the flop a significant amount and just called, when I should have shoved this person. I played this hand and hit the almost perfect on the flop. I had two 8s, three 6s, and 9 hearts that could give me the winning hand. That is 14 outs on the flop. I should take charge right then and either double up, early, or go home, which is fine because I was playing many other tournaments. 14 outs on the flop using the rule of 4/2 we multiplay 4 by 14 and get 56% chance of hitting our hand. With that kind of percentage I should have shoved to the reraise and let the cards fall.

This is a situation that I misplayed badly and ended up crippling myself because of it. it won't happen again. When playing speculative hands you have to be willing to go for broke if you hit your draw hard. So many people out there will be betting flops with nothing, ESPECIALLY after raising preflop that you have to be willing to put the maximum pressure on them.

I have had great success picking up more pots lately by playing more hands and picking up pots that nobody wants. These are chips that in the past I would not have had in my stack and I would have been in trouble sooner because of this.

I still feel that 2007 is going to be huge for me and I am very confident that I will win something this year, which will be nice, but I am looking for a lot of final tables. If I could just find a way to have my hands hold, lol. Poker is fickle and there is nothing anyone can do about the donkeys that call raises with K2ss and hit the flop perfect when we have top pair and get it all in, oops.

Remember, don't get mad at the donkeys that make assinine calls when they should fold. If they hit, just remember that you played it well and move one. It is hard, but necessary.

A new year

Well, this year has gotten off to a great start with some spectacular football games. Boise State, I must apologize. After rooting for you and watching until that fateful interception I watched something on the DVR and gave up on you. Oh, it does happen from time to time that the miracle happens, and I have seen my share, which is why I usually will not turn away, but I was so disappointed in the effort late in the game and so I turned away. What an amazing finish. If you have not seen it, I hear you can download a 20min clip on Itunes of the game. Truly amazing.

I have been busy reading the many many poker books that my wife, bless her heart, got for me for Christmas. All top notch and interesting books, my wish list is empty at this point.

I think that this year is going to be a very very good one for me. I am going to strive to eliminate negativity of any kind around me so that my poker playing can be without distraction. It is my goal this year to money some big tourneys, and if it is God's will I hope to win a seat to play in the WSOP main event this year.

I hope you all have a great 2007.

Governor Gregoire is anti-Christian

Well it is official for all of you that needed another reason to hate the lame governor of Washington. She lights a menorah, but refuses to have Nativity scene at the Capitol. I hope all Christians in the state of Washington remember this when her term is up.

New ideas

Well, I have come a upon a few realizations over the last few days concerning how to play in MTTs. Last night I decided to put my new found theories into practice. I played 3 tourneys and monied two fo them and final tabled one of them. Two were real nice tests, the third one was a short-handed event so it was not as good due to some donkey at my table.

I picked up some things by analyzing some hand histories on PXF and coming to some conclusions. I ordinarily would share these thoughts in the forum, but that forum has been pretty rude in the past so I am not going to be posting there. Recently I askeds a couple questions directed at the 'pro' players because I want to elevate my game and I wanted to know their thought process, but instead I get one loser player ripping my questions apart and before long it has lost any value.

Forums are a great place where people that are very insignificant in real life to be big men in Cyber life. It really is amazing how many people think that the world revolves around them in these forums. They think of themselves as the cyber police. And by all means, don't disagree with them. I have one guy on PXF that is a cyber stalker that will follow my every post and pick it apart to the point of obsession. It is okay though, because I get enough emails and IMs to tell me that I am not alone in thinking this guy is a whack job. I find it kind of funny because he is such a bad player and yet he tells everyone how badly they play.

I will read the posts and look at hand histories and watch videos, but posting doesn't bring anything positive so it is out.

I am poised to make a real run in 2007 and beyond.

Merry Christmass and a Happy New Year.

Update

Well, not a lot has been happening recently. Thanksgiving was really nice and we had a feast as usual. I have been playing really well and had some nice finishes in some MTTs, which is always nice. I tend to play SNGs (sit-n-gos) more as I can consistenly make money playing those so it is always nice to do well in the Multi-Table Tournaments(MTT).

We are getting ready for the Christmas season as most are. We had some really nasty snowy weather this week which was very unusual. It made Monday Night Football great to watch though, and of course the Seahawks came through like I knew they would. Could the announcers be any more in love with Brett Favre? They kept talking like Hasselbeck was playing so poorly, which just was not even close to accurate. Kornheiser what a baffoon. Bench Matt? moron. I had zero doubt at halftime that we would win that game. The packers really had not done anything on their own and the Hawks just moved up and down the field at will. It was just a matter of time before Brett threw a few to the Hawks and as usual, he was good for it. There are some QBs that you just know are going to toss a few up for grabs and he is one for sure. He should have hung it up a couple years ago. Now he is just an interception throwing machine.

I have tried to really vary my game this week and have just punished some people, which has been a lot of fun. I am really on top of it. I have made a few lifestyle changes as well. I no longer waste my time posting on PokerXfactor forums. It really is a waste as there are so my "geniuses" there. It is a waste of one's time trying to share information or spark discussion only to have these people that for the most part are not very bright rip you apart. There was one guy there that was so jealous for some reason that I never fully understood, but it was like he stalked me ripping apart sentence by sentence any post I made. It really was very amusing. I liked to play with him for a little bit, but it is hard to have a war of wits when the other guy is unarmed.

As Gigabet said, it is very counter-productive posting, because it will lead to negativity and as poker players we should strive to be positive and let that energy flow around us. It works and I have been very happy to not post or share info with the people that are negative. As always there are many people that send me private messages or emails asking for help, and I am only too happy to help anyone that asks me.

Good luck at the tables, and if you are at my table be very very careful.

Well, off to the tables.

hello

Well, it is getting to the holiday season again. This year has gone incredibly fast for me and the time flys by before you know it. I am have been playing as much poker as I can and have really learned a lot of things in the past few weeks. I have had some incredible highs and some annoying lows for sure.

I think the lows are the biggest learning process that a person can go through. It is against our nature as humans to accept defeat. We think that if we do everything right then everything has to work out well for us, but that is not the way of poker. You can play your hand perfectly and your opponent can still win. Both parties could play flawlessly and usually there is a loser. These are the moments that try our metal as poker players. The good players put it behind them and don't let it bother them. In the past I might have let it bother me, but I have learned to deal with it more and more.

Don't get me wrong, I get frustrated at not catching time after time when I have live cards, but I get over it very quickly and move on to the next game. The more times you make the correct play regardless of the outcome the better player you become. In the end it is about getting your money in good, or making the correct tactical and strategical decisions.

I feel that my game is on the edge of the next level of play. I still have the occasional screw up, but the funny thing is I tend to sense that I am about to make a bad play, and sometimes I just can't help making it. You know the type of hand, AK, and the sort when someone makes some crazy bet.

Crazy bets I have come to the conclusion more often than not mean a set or two pair and the person is so afraid, of what they don't know, but they are afraid of losing or they think I have a huge hand I want all my chips in there. I have seen people pushing 20 plus big blinds with very big hands preflop for no apparent reason other than they are afraid of being drawn out on so they would rather win the pathetic antes and blinds than more.

Happy Thanksgiving to you all, and see you at the tables as I will be playing a lot this week with my depleted work schedule.

up and down, but mostly up

Well today was a funny day. I have been playing and running pretty good all week as I have played a lot of poker, but today I could not win a race to save my life. I could have my opponent totally dominated AK vs. K3 and a 3 would hit and I would lose. It really was unreal. I haven't hit a set in about 2000 hands of poker as well, which is mind numbing. I had live cards all day today and I would miss constantly, or I would be up against someone and they would hit a set on the flop and I would be drawing dead.

I have been doing an experiment with taking $5 to a .10/.25 NL cash game and trying to double and then I take the 10 and move to .25/.50 and then if I double I move to .50/1.00 NL table and today I got to the .50/1 table with 23$ and when it was folded to the CO who raised it to $3 I figured I would push my pair of 88s from the BB and then the SB smooth called so I figured what a perfect time for a squeeze play. I reraised to 23$ and the CO folded and SB thought for a long time and then called, ugh. AK. I was ahead for about 2 seconds when the flop of xAA hit and turn K which I figured I was totally screwed and then the river came and the cards got flipped up an yes he had the nut full house. It was fun while it lasted.

I went to the store to get some materials for a home project and while I was eating lunch my alarm went off reminding me of the 12:00 Pot Limit Omaha tourney which I wanted to play in. I ran to the office and fired up the computer and entered it. It was only an $8.80 tourney. I wish it was 20, or better 50. I was down early to about 600 chips when I doubled back to 1200 and then I got a little stack and built it up nicely when I was outdrawn and left with 700 chips at the 50/100 level which is tough in Omaha.

I went on a little run and eventually got a pretty decent stack when I hit a straight on the turn. I had checked the flop and my opponent a total luck sack by the way, checked behind. I bet 11k on the turn when I hit my Q high straight. He reraised me and I went all in. Luckily I hit a flush on the river to become the chip leader which I head for a very long time. I entered the final table I think at 3rd in chips and eventually that is where I finished after playing very smart and watching the 2nd big stack implode to finish 4th. Pretty funny because about 15 minutes earlier he announced how he and the chip leader would finish 1, 2.

So when you can't win a race with 2 cards in NL maybe you need to switch to Omaha where you get 4 cards, much easier to hit something with the extra two cards. lol.

Movie Review - The Marine

This was one of the worst movies I have seen in some time. First off, it was out of focus and despite telling the guy in charge of the theatre, Lakewood AMC, they did nothing to fix the problem. Add to that two drunk idiots that sat down in front and the two talking children a row behind us and you have a recipe for disappointment.

This movie was incredibly pathetic. The Director of this thing should never be allowed to direct another movie. The special effects guy went out of his way to blow up as many things as he could with over the top explosions. It was like some little kid that was given the green light to go crazy.

The direction in this movie was non-existent. I mean how realistic is it that a guy gets hit in the stomach with a 10lb sledgehammer and is not phased by it at all. This movie was laughable because it was so bad. The acting and writing were on par with a really bad B movie.

Life happens

Well, I have not been this busy in quite some time. Usually when I have free time from work I can spend it pretty much as I please, playing poker or other things of interest, but for the past two weeks or so I have been working away on my house and on my 300zx.

First the house, we have wanted to replace the windows in the three bedrooms for a long time and we finally took the plunge and did it. While in the course of replacing the windows we found out that there was some rotten siding and even some framing that had gone bad underneath.

I am no carpenter, but I do pride myself on being able to solve any problem that I am faced with. I guess those years of Naval training and living and working on a submarine have paid off. I have to solve problems on a boat, you just can't rely on someone else or drive down to the repair shop and have someone bail you out.

I reframed the window and while I was at it replaced all the siding on the back side of my house. It had been in bad shape from when I bought the house. Knowing what I know today I would have passed on buying this house probably, but that is how it goes I suppose. To make matters worse, Lowes window department did a very poor job for me. I questioned them and requestioned them about replacing my windows. I gave them precise measurements and yet they did not as me critical questions that a lay person would not know to ask.

Well, the job is almost done, all the outside work is basically done, just a touch up brush here and there and it is all complete. I have to finish all the new trim pieces for the inside, but when I do finish it off it will look even better than ever. What is the saying, when life gives you lemons, make lemonade.

I am pretty much down putting in a whole new car stereo system in the 300z as well. I replaced the speakers and the head unit and added an amp. The first speakers I got were not as nice as I had hoped so I returned them to Circuit City and got some Kicker 6 1/2 speakers, which sound wonderful. I made the mistate of going for bigger peak rating than RMS, which I corrected and now it sounds incredible. I have to re-run one speaker wire as it is getting some interference I think from the power cable that I ran for the amp. All and all it was a pretty nice job and well worth the effort to do.