Enjoying Summer

Yes, that's right. For the last couple weeks since school has been done, I have actually been having an absolutely blast doing just about whatever I want. A week and a half ago, Derek and I decided to make a little 3-day trip up to Bellingham which was a blast. Here is a vague schedule of what we did:

Tuesday
- Get into Bellingham at 6pm, to the Pitch by 6pm, out of there by 8:30 in time for the 9pm's on UB and FTP...whiffed :(
- 11:00pm-6:00am: play Chinese poker
Wednesday
- Wake up at 2, head to Sudden Valley to play 9
- Get home at 5, play Chinese until 3am (most of it just me and Derek, but Grant got in for like 1 hand)
Thursday
- Wake up at 1pm, head to the Pitch, go back down South at 10pm

Needless to say, it was a blurrrr of a 3-day stretch. During the 10 hour sesh that D and I had playing Chinese, we really just sat in chairs and watched the olympics for 10 straight hours! Grant, who had lost like $240 the previous night, decided to get in on one hand before he went out. When we play Chinese, we play with royalties (quads are better) which are 3 points (we were playing $5 a point), and if you lose with aces full, it is a bad beat, and the winner pays the loser $30. We always like to slow roll everything also, so it adds a pretty fun dynamic. On the one hand that Grant played, he and Derek went back and forth lying about their bottom hand. Derek eventually rolled over quad 7's, and Grant threw his cards in the muck and yelled. We picked up his hand to reveal quad 8's!!!

It was completely brutal, and I honestly felt bad, as there had been 4 bad beats over our sessions, and Grant was on the winning end of all of them for a loss of $120. I didn't feel too bad though, as Derek obv ran like Durrr and took $280 from Grant and $260 from me. I just can't explain it, but I have never had one winning session against Derek in Chinese - not 1, besides maybe a 4 or 5 hand sesh before we get into a poker game. Lifetime I am stuck close to $800 to him which is silly. After I lose and lose, I take about a month or 2-month break then decide that my luck will turn around and just want to punish him for like $1k, so I sit with him and lose my ass again. Maybe I have a gambling problem.

Other than that, today I worked my 2nd day in shoe care at the Boeing Classic at Snoqualmie Ridge. I decided to volunteer there because I worked there last summer and love it. We are getting paid ~$125 a day, which is cool, and we all got like 5 really sweet polos for free. I am working that through Sunday then heading straight up to Bellingham to move :(

Pokerwise I have not really played many MTT's lately but have focused mainly on $20 SNG's over the past week or so. I was stuck $390 to Derek and paid him back in 3 nights playing SNG's which feels good. The last 2 nights, I have played 4 SNG's, placing 5th in one and 1st in the other 3 for a cool little profit.

One of the SNG's I played tonight, which I ended up winning, I played a real goofy hand against a LAA player:

http://www.pokerhand.org/?3082740

This was the first hand I had opened, and it was in the 3rd level, so I decided to come in with 10-7cc. This guy had been pretty active, so I felt there was a decent chance I was going to be c/r'd on a this paired board. He decided to flat call p/f with KK then flat my flop bet and weak-lead the turn. I really felt pretty strongly that I had the best hand, beating 66-88 and sometimes I thought he shows up with AJ-AK. I didn't really consider an overpair, but he played it goofy and owned me. Yay for the 2 subsequent double ups!

I got my FTP check in the mail, so I am no longer broke ass poor. I think that played a huge part in me having a bad summer financially. I had gotten in the routine of spending so much money, and, when I realized that my roll was diminishing a little bit, I just tried to hard to hit it big and wasn't in the right mindset. For the first time in the while, I actually feel confident in my poker game and am ready to crush as soon as all my obligations are over and I have about a month of nothing.

That said, Vegas is in 15 days, and I couldn't be more excited. I am playing in a golf tournament the day before with Paul, Henry, and Bubs, and it will most definitely be the best weekend of my life tbh.

Well I gotta get up early tomorrow and go watch some 50+ golfers play better than I ever will.

God Bless,

JG