Well the car is on it's 2nd fix since the accident, the new radiator last week, and now a new air conditioning compressor. Like I need A/C in Canada, but the wife feels it's needed as she doesn't like to sweat. Just over $1,200 so far in total repairs and I haven't even taken it to a body shop to get the new bumper and passenger door fixed. The guy I ran into, with the car, has yet to call me with an estimate of his cost of a new rear bumper and I am sure we won't be getting our insurance companies involved as it is past the time to have contacted them. My friends suggest I don't call him and cross my fingers that he won't be calling me, either due to pure laziness or the fact he may have lost the paper with my information on it. Doing it without insurance will in the long run cost me less as it would increase my monthy payments far more than the damage costs itself.
The retreat I went on a few weeks back has been more than helpful in so many ways when thinking about life, problems, good times and daily routines. I have no control over some things and will just have to get used to the fact that I can be an emotional person... I found out my youngest son, with Russell-Silver Syndrome will need another operation. Not on his left eye but on another part of his body, of course on the left side, as it is smaller than the entire right side of his body since birth and as a part of his diagnosis. The Dr. assures me it is a routine operation and that it is regular for some boys his age and has nothing to do with the diagnosis. He, my 4 yr old son David, loves to talk and tell lots of jokes, just like his father, and I look forward to him being a ladies man in his teen years. The wife and I have done almost everything we can and taken advantage of most resources available to ensure he is almost at the same intellectual level of boys his age, and most of my fears since his birth about his adulthood life are slowly going away.
I am enjoying my break off from the things in life that can consume my inability to seperate my emotions from things I can't control and am feeling more healthy than I have since the age of 18. The Doctors and specialists have done a wonderful job with me and getting my internal functions back to almost normal. I am also happy to say I will not be needing the operation on my small intestine any more and there was no trace of cancer cells in my body. Even my liver and kidneys are almost back to normal. I am almost, I repeat almost looking forward to returning to work and helping other people and there children have the best possible chance at a productive life. The birth of my youngest son was a big awakening and I can have a greater level of empathy towards other parents and fathers who take on guilt when they have a child with a disability. It was real easy to tell people what they need to do, but extremely difficult to listen to those words myself.
OKAY enough of all that and a little about poker, I have been slowly getting back into playing and increasing the amount of games I play per day. Getting away from free rolls and starting to play buy-ins larger than the $1 level.
I have improved most of my online bankrolls slightly and will post some "updates" once I get more than 50 games played. I also came in 5th in a PokerVT event on Pokerstars and will receive an 8% of 2,000 bonus that was put up by our training site.
I have watched all the HU National Championships on utube as well as all the seasons and episodes of High Stakes Poker and am looking into purchasing a DVD on more poker shows, recently I bought a season of the WPT and Phil Gordon's Final Table which were both helpful in my pursuit to increase my game.
This week's new training videos were put out last night and after watching them I also plan on completing the re-watching of all the training videos on the PokerVT home page, I am about halfway through. I have 2 new poker books to read when I have completed "Fooled By Randomness" and some bonuses on FullTilt and Mansion Poker which I need to play out before they expire in the middle of May.
Nick Rainey has chosen 8 students that he will be closely helping to improve their poker game and I am not surprised by the students he picked. They are all great players and I wish them all the best in that pursuit.
The final table for the SnG challenenge will be played this Sunday and if my wife will let my "duck" out near the end of my son's birthday party I expect it to be a great game of solid players, I hope my cat has the potions ready to increase my luck factor as I would love to win and take it down, realizing that if I do it will be a tough battle as all members playing have earned their seats and it will most likey come down to a lot of luck and hopefully me stealing pots when it appears my opponents have marginal holdings.
Afterwards I plan on finding out if Nick is still able and wanting to play me in the HU match from the FNF's competition he was holding recently when I won two weeks in a row, luckily beating the other members who won in the tournaments they played.
I also am happy to say I made my 3rd appearance in a PVT video, for about 5 hands, in the Josh (thenorfman) video. I folded every one and had my blind stolen by spacegravey, the honour was all mine! So a video by Nick, one by Tan the Man and Josh... three seperate videos and nothing that really gave other members a chance to see how I play my game, so no worries just yet about having to adjust my style when playing vs PVT members.
I have also been continuing to aid a few friends with thier poker game with the little insight I can provide into becoming more aggressive. My theory is basically if you can't raise you should just fold! I do enjoy the game very much and find it relaxing in the sense that my focus is soley on the game, while playing, and not on the rest of life's issues.
I missed Sarah Conner Chronicles again this past week and saw a few shows I have been not keeping up with, Chuck and Reaper, both are "good" and nothing is as amazing as "Lost" which happens to be on tonight. Some movies picked out by my wife, and T.V. shows which she likes to enjoy, bonding, also was part of my viewing entertainment in the last week or so.
I have also joined 2 baseball teams for the summer and look forward to playing on a weekly basis, my body just recovering from this past weekends tournament. I am very happy to also be playing with my younger brother and getting a chance to "get to know him again" as adults. I have also decided to quite smoking, as I have done so with all the other bad habits I picked up in my teen years. It will be a slow process but feel that 8 weeks from now my lungs and breathing will finally have a chance to also return to that of an ex-smoker for 18 years and the Dr. says 10 years down the road I can maybe have a set of lungs almost equal to that of a person who never smoked.
Good luck to all that take the time to share in my life and my journey, the topic of my blog says it all... Now more excuses the time is now, and after slowly regaining my health I can begin to focus on the goals I have set for myself in poker... Soon I will have to revisit them and see if I need to put more effort into any given area to ensure the goals are met, though I am positive those of my bankroll, training and increasing my game are coming together and will only grow as I do so with a "clear mind, a focused mind" and a healthier body. :)
Cheers and Shambone! I have never felt so good about life in about as long as I can remember. Even If I was the kid who had to touch the burning stove 4 times to learn my lessons the "hard way".
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