I had a fairly full-fulling weekend. I spent most of the time working on the yard. I woke up early on Saturday morning because the Puppy just wasn't being good. I let him sleep outside of the crate and I paid for that one. I really wanted to go back to bed and skip out on his vet appointment, but I sucked it up. I wasn't sure if I could handle the pup on no sleep in a room full of strange animals.

Fortunately when we got there, he was a good pup. He wanted to check out the other animals, but just some sniffing. He was in a new environment and wanted to check out EVERYTHING. But I was able to reasonably control him (Much better than some of the other pet owners). He did good for the vet too. He got all his shots. The vet said he was probably about 7 months old. He was completely healthy with no heart worms or any other things they try to scare you with. Did you know that dogs can get venerial diseases? What's next, puppy condoms? I also made an appointment to get him neutered on June 20th.

After the vet, I had to go find some mulch. It's not like the shit is hard to find. Everybody sells it. I picked the place closest to the house. The guy didn't seem very interested in selling it though. He then quoted me a price of $60/scoop. I politely told him to go fuck himself and moved on to the next place. It was $22/scoop at the 2nd place with much better looking mulch. Sold.

Then came the fun part...actually putting that shit down. It really only took about 2 to 2.5 hours, but it was manual labor though. My damn fingers can barely move right now after a constant swinging of the shovel and rake. Fat people and manual labor don't mix.

My parents left about 4:30 a.m. this morning to go to Atlantic City. They are just staying through Wednesday. It's a birthday trip for my Mom and Dad both. I, on the other hand, don't have any obligations in the evening time until they get back into town. So the timing is perfect. I have the next 3 nights to work off as much of the Full Tilt bonus as possible. I'm not going to get the entire bonus worked off, but I want to get at least $100 of it.

I didn't get in any of the marathon sessions this weekend like I had intended because of the yard work and all the nice weather we had. I did get my 2 hour session I had promised in though. This week, I kick it up to 2 hours a night on the tables. I might mix it up between 1 hour limit and 1 hour no limit. It just all depends on the flow of the games.

Lastly, I've been following this guy trying to win $10K in a month at $25NL. Talk about a grinder. Sweet Jesus the man has played like 150K hands in 10 days. Thats just sickening. I wish I could find a way to even get remotely close to that kind of number. By the way, no chance in hell he is able to pull this one off. $10K is a huge number when youre talking microstakes poker.

Yard-ersize

I had a weekend filled with food. I almost feel hungover today because of all the food I had this weekend. It was all good too, but the gluttony ends today. I'm going to grind out a healthy week this week. No fast food, healthy food only for me please. This week, I also want to incorporate at least a little exercise into my program.

I get my new camera tomorrow and there are tons of subjects I want to take pictures of. I'd like to take some photos of the yard, the house, and just the beautiful scenery around me as Spring tries to kick into full gear. One thing I plan on doing with my new camera is taking some hikes into the countryside and just taking pics of the beautiful community I live and work in. The walks/hikes will be good exercise and the photography will make it fun.

Also on my agenda will be landscaping. Saturday evening, I did break out the weedeater and went over the yard with a semi-fine-tooth comb. I used an entire tank of fuel in the weedeater and even hit some spots so thick with weeds, that the trimmer bogged down. When I was done, my tennis elbow had kicked back in and I could barely move my arm. My Mom came by to show me some pictures and when I held a picture, my hands shook like a dope fiend looking for a fix.

Now that the weeds are cleared, the next step is the prep work. I've decided to start with the flower bed that I already have built. It's beside the house and right now, it has a couple of little bushes, some stumps, and a bunch of dandelions that pop up on a daily basis. I want to take a little time each day this week to work on the flower bed. I think this evening I'll work on tilling up some dirt. I have no tools to do this, so I'll have to go shopping in my Dad's utility shed :)

I figure all this yard work is good exercise since it all involves shoveling, picking, raking, etc. I know every time I get into heavy yard work, I'm sore as hell the next day. It's not hard to make a fat man sore though.

The long journey has been completed

Back in June of 2000, I took this job. It paid way more than I had ever made in my entire life and I was so happy. I celebrated by going out and splurging for the 1st time on a vehicle. I bought a brand new 2000 Model Pontiac Grand Prix GTP. It was black with heated leather seats, sunroof, and Supercharged! This thing would fly. I didn't pay that much for the car, but considering what all I had been driving in the past, it was like rolling in a Bentley. But also with it come my first car loan and a $444 payment.

I loved that car, but when winter time rolled around, it sucked. Foolishly I tired of that and about a year later, I traded the car in for a brand new 2002 Chevy Silverado. The price was a bit more than the car I bought, but the payment was a reasonable $521...not much more than what I was paying before. Cool enough. I drove that truck for a while and it went great in the snow and all, but wasn't exactly what I wanted. I really wanted a crew cab truck so I'd have room for passengers and to carry my crap around. As I passed a car lot one day, I saw the truck I wanted.

Within a day, I had traded my blue 2002 Silverado for my Red 2001 F-150 Supercrew. I loved the truck. It had leather seats, 4 doors, looked pretty stylish and plenty of power. It also came with a brand new loan and a $525 payment. I had found the vehicle I liked and decided to quit trading.

During this time frame, there were some other things I bought and charged. I paid $8000+ for an ATV and all the bells and whistles. Then I traded it for another ATV. I also bought another car to go along with my truck. I bought countless other things that run my loans up (I can't even recall what all I owed on now). Then I started to look at houses. I found a brilliant deal on a house in an upscale neighborhood for a low budget price (Divorcee special). I was approved for yet another loan because I was making all my payments on time, but I took notice of my finances at that same time. When you list your assets vs. your liabilities, I noticed I was WAY in the hole there. I owed nearly $50K and had nothing to show for it. This was around spring of 2004 when I made this realization.

I vowed at that time that I was done making these random purchases and getting myself further and further into debt. Hell, I was still living with my parents and there was no way I could make it on my own at this point. I had a payment for this and a payment for that. If was going to buy a house, I'd have to sit in it all day long and not do anything. Because there would be no money left over after payign the bills and all my loans.

That year, I found Party Poker. Thank goodness I found that awesome site. This would be my source of toys. I needed a new laptop and this would be my brilliant idea for owning one. Why get another loan when I can just play poker and use my winnings? I did so much better than I ever dreamed possible, making enough money for that laptop, but also paying off my car, truck, ATVs and many other toys that I've bought over the years.

All of the sudden, there was a light at the end of the tunnel. I could move out of my parents house and be on my own. I opted to go with the mobile home/trailer route to begin with since I found a good deal in a good trailer park (not infested with pill poppers and pushers). However, when I moved out there were many necessities that I didn't own yet like a good bed. I also needed yet another computer because I gave my parents the old one when I left. Slowly, I felt the debts start to rise up again.

I then bought my house in the summer of last year. The remodeling took a toll on my finances. I exhausted most of my HELOC as well as ran up a credit card in the process. I then would have hard time stretching out a paycheck from period to period, so the bank gave me a "roaming" credit line for those occasions. I almost exhausted that in the process. So I was deeper into debt, but not as bad as before. Plus most of this money was going to an investment and not to toys or vehicles. I was putting this money into my house.

Finally, I got the call today. After being dicked around for several weeks on my refi at the bank, the loan officer called me today and made everything official. Credit Card balance = $0, Roaming line of credit balance = $0, Car/Truck payment $0, Appliances $0. The only debt I owe in this world now is my mortgage payment. I owe $92,000 on a house that just appraised for $128,000. $36,000 in equity and growing is awesome.

I have no bad debts to my name. No annoying $150-$200 payments every week or so. No $500+ vehicle payments. No $100 autodrafts out of my checking account. Nothing but that house payment. Let me tell you what. It feels fucking awesome. This is one goal I set out to accomplish 4 years ago and I followed it through to the end. The house was my 2004 Party Poker. I knew it was a good investment at the beginning when I bought the house. You always hear that money is made in real estate when you buy, not when you sell. That house was living proof of that. I paid 54% of after repair values. With the renovations I put in, I ended up investing 70% of the after repair value. Just like Robert Kiyosaki said I should do!

I am celebrating my financial freedom this weekend with a shopping trip. Not for toys, guitars, computers, vehicles, or whatever. I'm buying some clothes! My wardrobe has suffered over the past 3-4 years. Clothes were one expense that I cut out almost completely. If I didn't get it as a present for birthday or Christmas, I didn't get it. My wardrobe is full of tattered clothes right now and then I have just a few outfits that are suitable for public :) This will change this weekend when I replenish the wardrobe. This is my prize. Well, that and a bottle of Grey Goose. You heard it right folks. This boy might very well be getting drunk...another expense that I have avoided that past 3 years or so.

Landscaping with MS Paint

I hurried home to work on my yard yesterday. I got it about 90% mowed before the sun ran out of juice and I was mowing in the dark. I had no time to weedeat or anything else. I'll try to finish it up this evening if it doesn't rain.

In the meantime, I've been thinking about landscaping and coming up with a gameplan of where I want the flowers/shrubs/etc to be. Here are my thoughts on where those should go:



The squiggly circles are trees. They are marked "M" for Maple, "P" for pine, and "A" for apple. The brown area is my house and the lighter brown surrounding it is my porch/deck/patio thingy. The red areas are areas where I want to focus my landscaping first.

I'm going to start with the area between the 2 apple trees. I plan on building a flowerbox in between the 2 trees and having a few flowers there. Nothing fancy...just landscaping timbers, some dirt, and flowers.

The red area between the sidewalk, porch and driveway is an already built flower box that houses nothing but turbo growing dandelions. I cut them down one day, the next day, they bring a bunch of their buddies along and laugh at me. I need to do some digging to and get some good dirt and weed mat in there so I can grow flowers and not weeeds. There is also a section across the sidewalk from that box which is on an incline. This section already has some flowers and shrubbery that looks fantastic right now. I just need to clean it up a bit.

The next thing is the big red square in front of the privacy fence. I'm not sure what I want here. I'd like to build a nice flower box, but I have a lot of room to play around. I was thinking maybe even a small pond or something like that would look nice here.

Once that part is out of the way, all I have are some areas surround the perimiter of the house. These are already marked off, but with some PVC tubing instead of something proper like bricks or landscape timbers. I have some ideas for this, but I want to bring in my greenhouse running buddies for a 2nd opinion.

Turbo Sunday

Yesterday was a super quick day. It seems like it was over before it started. I usually experience these types of days when I sleep very late or I'm sick or something. However, yesterday I was up at 8:00 a.m. I pretty much stayed busy the entire day and I guess that's the reason why.

I got up early, intending to mow while the church crowd was off to the temples. I didn't want everyone in the neighborhood watch me mangle my yard or myself with my new zero turn radius mower. However, mother nature didn't cooperate and I had to wait it out a few hours so the ground would be dry enough. In the meantime, I started doing the laundry.

While doing laundry, I caught the first part of Major League. I've seen that movie 100 times in my life and although a decent baseball flick, it gets worse and worse each time. I saw that the Braves were going to be on TV, so I ditched the 2nd half of the movie in favor of mowing grass. I was thoroughly impressed with my first mowing performance on my new toy.

After that, I had enough time for a shit, shower, and shave, and a couple innings of the Braves game before my parents showed up to take me out to eat lunch. We went to Hinton to a new BBQ restaurant. The place (which I can't remember the name) overlooked the New River. It was quite beautiful. The food was fairly good. I had a pulled pork platter with baked beans and roasted red skin potatoes. The pork was awesome. The beans were great. And the potatoes were meh. They had a texture sort of like potatoes you would get from a frozen dinner. I won't get them again when I go back.

Once we headed back home, I had to go to Wal-Mart to pick up some groceries, a blender, and some lawn mower oil. I managed to leave there with almost everything I need. Every time I go to that forsaken place, I swear I'll never go back. Yesterday was no exception. I spent the entire time in the store trying to get dumbasses to get out of the fucking way. Honestly, you have a buggy which barely fits down the aisle. Then you have another buggy coming the other way. Let's just stop our fat asses right here in the middle and carry on a conversation. Fuck the world around us...let them figure out another way around. One fucking guy was looking at salad dressings and kept backing up to see the selection. I stopped to see what his next move was. I then let out an "excuse me" to announce my presence and suggest he get the fuck out of the way. I thought I got an acknowledgement from him until I walked by and he backed his nasty ass up into me. He apologized. I refrained from cussing him. I would have liked to beat the idiot over the head with his salad dressing.

I got home from Hell-Mart and unloaded all the groceries. I made my first smoothie and by the time everything was said and done, it was 8:30 p.m. I settled down on the couch and flipped between Napolean Dynamite and the Mets/Phils game. I didn't make it through the entire game. I hit the sack and fell asleep almost instantly. I remembered waking up around 1:00 a.m., but falling back asleep again almost instantly. Then the next thing I remember was alarm clock to start off Monday....ugh.

25 Minutes

I finally broke down and bought a lawn mower yesterday. It was the most important thing on my agenda. I didn't want to spend a whole lot of time shopping as I have looked around plenty. I knew basically what I wanted and now it was up to the stores to sell it to me. I went with a small local shop that services their own products as opposed to Lowes or Home Depot. There wasn't much price difference plus this guy was nice enough to help me learn to drive the thing (hah!) and even filled it up with gas and delivered for me.

Once I got home, I was nervous. I tried to wait until there were no neighbors visible so I could go play on it. I started off badly. The damn thing was impossible to steer and I was scared to death I was going to send it over the mountain. After my first test drive in my own yard (with the blade up so I could just drive around), I came to the conclusion that this was how I was going to die...chewed up and spit out by a lawn mower. It's a mean looking sucker.

After I figured out a little bit of turning maneuvers and handling of the mower, I was ready to give it a try for real. Unfortunately, mother nature was not cooperative and started dumping rain on me. I gave up and went back inside, worried to death that I made a bad decision. What good is this $3000 piece of equipment if I can't control it?

This morning, I woke up to try the mowing thing again. Unfortunately, it had been raining during the night too, so the ground was wet. The dude at the store told me that I should do my first mow on completely dry grass because it will just look like a cleaner cut. I waited a bit and had almost written off today as a day to work on the yard. Then around 11:00, I said "Fuck it". No test drives without the blades down. Get out there and use the damn thing.

I started out slow. It took about 10 minutes of mowing and then I got the hang of it. After 15 minutes, maneuvering the machine was almost 2nd nature.... as long as I was going forward. It's hard to make your brain learn how to stop one of the machines. When you spend 15 years hitting a brake pedal to stop something, you're not used to just letting go. After all was said and done, I had my back yard mowed in under 25 minutes. I was pleased with my purchase after that.

I started out worried to death someone would be watching my dumb ass trying to maneuver the machine, but after a few minutes I was like "Yeah! Look at me!".

Appraised

Well, the appraiser just left my house and early guesstimates put the value of the house in the $130,000 range. This was pretty much the number I was hoping for. Anything over that would be gravy. I told the appraiser, I wanted him to get it as high as possible so I can finish all the work on the house and be a virtually debt free man. It's looking now like that will be the case.

After all is said and done, I will have around $90,000 invested in the house. So we are looking at somewhere around $40K in equity. I'm happy with that. I still have a few projects around the house too. I have had some estimates to rebuild my porch. So far, I've been told that concrete is my cheapest option right now. The only concrete estimate I've had is $6500 and the same size porch made of wood supposedly will run about that much just in materials. I'm getting some other quotes though because I find that hard to believe.

Other than the porch, I still need carpet. I'm going to get new carpet in the downstairs bedroom (which will be my office), in the den, the living room, and the bedrooms upstairs. However, I am going to get some quotes for hardwood floors upstairs and compare that to carpet.

Lastly, but definitely not least is the upstairs bathroom. It needs completely overhauled. I want ceramic tile and a walk in shower with no tub. I also want a pedestal sink. I have everything laid out in my head how I want it, but it isn't going to be cheap. I might save that project for next year.

This summer will be spent working on the exterior of the house. As I mentioned before, the main project will be rebuilding the porch. However, I also need to do some landscaping (which I intend to start doing this weekend), and price some outbuildings (buying vs. building). I'll be buying a new lawn mower this weekend most likely and ripping shit loose on it :) I am going to check on one this evening though that supposedly a great deal (used).

Another Friday

TGIF. I got a busy weekend ahead of me. I have to finish painting because my papers are finished at the bank and I should be expecting a phone call for an appraisal any day now. I also need a haircut. I've turned into a complete hippy and haven't had a haircut since like November or something. Needless to day, my hair is getting long. Lastly, I need to change the oil in both vehicles, go to the dump, hit the bank, and go see my new second cousin who was born day before yesterday. Oh yeah, I gotta clean house too! Luckily, it's supposed to rain all weekend, so I don't have to feel bad for bailing out on a golf trip with my buds.

I did play a little poker last night, but my heart just wasn't into it. I booked a win and called it quits early. Then I fired up Oblivion and played it for a little while before settling down to watch the Braves game. I need to quit watch Braves games. I've watched 3 and they lost all 3. The only game they won was the one not on TV.

Speaking of TV, I'm cutting an expense today. I'm getting rid of my Netflix account. It's not their problem or anything. I just don't watch the movies anymore. I have had the same 3 movies at my house for a month now and have only watched 2. Yet, I'm keep forgetting to put those 2 in the mail. The only time I remember is when I'm at work. I'll probably resubscribe in the winter.

I'm contemplating taking guitar lessons. I need to check around for prices. I'm also going to ask my buddy SPook if he wants to school me a bit. I'm sure he doesn't care, but they have just had a baby and I don't get to see him that often these days. When I do, he's usually playing a show with his band. I doodled around the acoustic last night so much that my fingers are in pain today. I can tell that I'm getting better, but I'm kind of in a rut playing the same stuff over and over. I think my way of avoiding work today will be to find some new stuff to play.

Can't find the motivation

I'm having difficulties finding the motivation to play poker lately. I'm sure the reason is a combination of Spring time and this little video game called Oblivion. Sometimes you just get burnt out on poker. I'm not going to force myself to play unless there's something involved like a bonus. It just so happens I have a bonus to clear right now so I have to force myself to play. I'm sure the urge to play will come back in due time though. It's not like I hate the game like I have in the past. I'm just kind of ready for something else to occupy my time.

I've been playing A LOT of guitar lately. I can tell it has been a lot because when I type, my left fingertips are so callaused that they kind of slide off the keys. Guitar is fun when you learn new stuff. It's also pleasing to the ear and relaxing. I still haven't broken out my electric guitar in ages. It's such a pain in the ass hooking the amp up. I also need new strings for the guitar as well. I love acoustic music though, so I have no problem banging away on the Tak.

I guess one of my reasons for not wanting to play much poker lately has been my work. I've had a rough week here at the office. Between Windows Vista headaches and my boss mumbling about some crisis all the time, I'm ready to go postal. All I want to do when I get home is relax. Poker is not relaxing. The guitar is.

I'm not sure if I'll play poker tonight. I might take one more night off and then start back at it tomorrow evening. On Saturday, I have so much to do. I need to finish painting the trim in my big bedroom. I also need to go to the dump and get a haircut. Now my friends are hounding me to go golfing and I REALLY want to go, but Saturday is my day to get shit done. I guess I could paint tonight...who knows, I might. Doesn't seem too relaxing to me.

Tidbits

...Like those poor sots who are going to vote for Obama thinking he'll actually shake up DC.

Pauly wrote that quote and it couldn't be more on the money. Think about it.

- I've noticed the conservative talk shows spewing some garabage lately about the economy not being as bad as the press lets on. I can feel the effects of the economy more than the average citizen. I don't rely soley on a monkey's wage to live. I have other irons in the fire that make income. When the economy is bad, I feel it. I've felt it for the past 6 months. Where does all my money go? Food and gas. Food, I can deal with... Gas is another issue.

Diesel fuel is over $4/gallon now. Diesel fuel is cheaper to make than regular gasonline. Also demands for oil are lower now than before. So, what gives? I understand the basics of supply and demand. So if demand is on the decline and supply is on the rise, how come prices are also on the rise? Bottom line is that $3+/gallon is too much for product that affects so many peoples' lives. I don't blame the oil companies either. They show record profits, but the profit margins are very low when compared to other products being sold around the world. I blame the tree-huggers who won't allow us to build any more refineries.

- I stay away from the internet as much as possible on 4/1. Everything you read is crap anyway. Then when 4/1 comes, the non-crap even turns to crap. I had read American Idol was having Dolly Parton night. I was very surprised when this turned out to be true. Brilliant move AI execs. Needless to say, Dolly Parton night was crap.

- I did play poker last night. At least I tried. I got a couple hundred hands in before I gave up. My PC just didn't want to behave. I've had the same install of XP on it for about 2 years now. I guess it's time to clean that up a bit. I need to back up a ton of files and downloads before clearing out that beast. At least I won at poker. Not much, but a win's a win.

- I used my special "Small Town" guy powers to circumvent my fears of getting a bad agent to do my house appraisal. I used my underground network of relatives and friends and secured the same guy that did my last appraisal. He knows my house, he knows what it looked like before and will be impressed when he comes in for a 2nd visit.

- If you are running a fantasy baseball league, avoid USA Today's Sandbox site like the plague. So far, we've had a draft page not work (manually drafting in a keeper league sucks!), our live scoring page has yet to work properly, slow updating of the stats, and now the whole damn webpage will not show and allow us to set our lineups. Oh yeah, and they just raised prices $2/month starting this month. Awesome job guys!

- Oblivion is still ruling my thoughts, but I'm getting aggravated because I don't have time to play. I had time last night and was able to play for about 30 minutes before my computer problems blew me away. I haven't even picked up Bioshock since starting Oblivion. It's such an awesome game and everything about it is impressive. I never really gave RPGs much of a chance in the past, but they are right up my alley when I think about it now. I guess you can think WoW for that one.

- I'll be out of town for the GTA:IV launch. Boo!

Big day!

I'm stoked for tonight. Baseball season kicks off for real on the home turf tonight when my beloved Braves meet the stinky Nationals. I love baseball season. It means summer is here. It also means fantasy baseball and shit talking.

I didn't play any poker yesterday. Instead I spent the entire day painting. I had yet to paint the downstairs bedroom. It was a mess too. The room used to be hot pink. Then they had primered it and started painting over that, but never finished for whatever reason. So it was a mixture of hot pink and olive green. Beautiful! I (meaning my Mother) chose a hearth brick color to cover that clusterfuck of colors. It took 3 coats to do the trick. What I thought would be a 1/2 day job was an all day event. But it was worth it. I got to spend time with my parents as they came over to help me.

After that, I watched some of the 2008 Civil Rights baseball game between the Mets and White Sox. Joe Morgan has to be the most annoying announce on earth (Just ahead of Joe Rogan). On normal days, Morgan is barely tolerable, but on Civil Rights day, I finally quit watching. The man just babbles about stupid shit and second guesses every move made by every manager. He also makes sure to regurgitate all this crap about racism and how hard blacks have it. We all have it hard dude, it's the 21st century. Get over it and quit doucheing up my baseball games! Morgan will be on hand to announce tonight's game. My finger will be on the mute button.

I also went to some friends house last night and played some cards (not poker) and watched some stand up comedy on Comedy Central. I have 5 words for you: DANE COOK IS NOT FUNNY!. What a joke this guy is. His entire routine consists of telling far fetched stories in excrutiating detail while making stupid gestures and body movements the entire time. He's a shitty actor too as Good Luck Chuck would prove. My theory is that he spent too much time with Ryan Reynolds on the Waiting set and tried to mimick him.

Today is more of the same. I might grind some poker or might just play some video games. It all depends on how I feel. I'm feeling a cold coming on. I haven't had a cold all year long and it pisses me off that I'm getting one in the Spring time!

Refinance time

I've just begun the process of refinancing my house. This is scary for me because it's my first time. I'm most scared of the appraisal. Will I get some dickhead/cunt having a bad day? Or will I get the appraisal I want? The house appraised for $101K last summer and I did about $20K in renovations to the house including a brand new kitchen, all new ceramic tile throughout the downstairs, and all new paint, new heat pump, etc.

I really don't know what to expect, but I do know my goals. I would like to be able to pay off my debts and have the money left over to finish the house. I don't think this will be a problem considering I bought the house for $72K. I have around $90K invested in the house. So, once everything rolls over, I should have around a $90K mortgage for a house that once appraised for $101K and has since been remodeled.

So, I'm expecting the house to appraise in the $130K-$140K area, but this is all new to me, so I don't know. Unfortunately, the bank can't choose the appraiser anymore, so it's a luck of the draw. This is idiotic to me, but whatever.... that's just a bank being a bank. They are just a shade more efficient than the Federal Government at some stuff, so I don't put any stock into them.

If all goes well, I will be absolutely debt free with the exception of my mortgage. This will translate into me not being a broke bitch anymore. I will be able to do some finishing touches on the house, but most of all, it will allow me to save more money and not live paycheck to paycheck. If I can get everything rolled over into the mortgage and still have another $40K in equity in the house, I'm going to be a very happy man... Mission accomplished and shit.

Even if I can just be rid of all my "bad" debts, I'll consider it mission accomplished. If that day comes here in a couple weeks, you'll see this man celebrate. I don't celebrate often, but when I do, I do it good!

Then, when I'm done celebrating, I'll take that opportunity to scope out House #2.

******* Edit **********

I was looking at comps in my area using my super secret website with a not-so super secret (stolen) username/password. I looked a few comps in my area. I think I'm in good shape. There aren't many houses comparable to mine in the same neighborhood because 1.) I have the double lot, and 2.) I have a full, finished basement instead of just a crawl space. One comp sold for $151K earlier this year and it didn't have a heat pump. However, it was a split foyer instead of a ranch...not sure if that makes much of a difference. There is another active listing now that is comparable... they are asking $180K ...again, no heat pump and the square footage is less than mine. That's uplifting/comforting news.

Vacation / Pisgah House / My Neglected 360

I'm going to take a hiatus from poker for a couple days. I've decided this is the best thing overall for my bankroll. This isn't a permanent vacation or anything... just until the weekend or at the latest next Monday. Poker has wore thin on my patience the past few days and I need to take a break from the tables to get my head clear. That's not to say I won't be studying the game or even blogging about it, because I more than likely will!

So what to do with all the extra time? Well, I've had my 4th bedroom that needed repainted. That's getting done this coming weekend. Once that is complete, then I'll need to touch up a few things and I'm ready to re-finance the house, which in turn should take a lot of financial burden off me this coming summer. I only expect the room to take a few hours to paint as there is nothing really tricky paint around. The closet was the hardest thing to paint in that room and it has already been done. Once the house is re-financed, I will be able to roll over my HELOC into my mortgage and then pay off the rest of my credit card that got run up a bit during the renovations. I should also be able to pay off my appliances and any other outstanding debts I have. This will ease my financial pain a bit.

Other than working on the house, the weather just hasn't broke like I had hoped, so I still need to do something to occupy my time during the cold hours. My poor Xbox 360 has sit collecting dust for a long time now. I think it's time to break it out. I'm going to find a good game this evening to pick up. I'm probably either going to get Oblivion or Mass Effect. It all depends on which I can find the better deal on. I'll also be placing my pre-order for GTA: IV which comes out towards the end of next month....awesome.

I have missed out on a lot of gaming the past couple years. Some due to poker, but most due to buying a house. There are a bunch of titles for the poor neglected 360 which I'd like to pick up: Oblivion, Mass Effect, Assassins Creed, Orange Box (I've never played any of the Half Life games, except for a little Counter Strike back in the day), COD4, and Bioshock. The good news is that I have friends that have most of these games and can just borrow one instead of having to buy them.

Also, I'd still love to have a Wii, especially since we have SSB: Brawl and Mario Kart coming soon.

I hate my job part 98723562

I'm back to the office today and each day I rot in this hole just provides more motivation for me to grind out poker hands. I didn't mind the job when I was out on the road and not getting bombarded with tech support calls, interruptions from co-workers, and aggravation from the boss. I was doing my own thing. Then today comes and it sucks again. Yay!

I'm struggling to find poker time these days too which sucks. I had anticipated being able to grind out a ton of hands in the motel room Monday night, but I couldn't get the wireless internet working. Instead I watched a bunch of episodes of Family Guy.

Yesterday, I didn't get home until later and by the time I got settled down, it was almost bed time. So again, no poker. Tonight is bowling night which leaves zero time for poker.

Thankfully Thursday is just around the corner and so is grinding. I'll just have to wait it out until Thursday. Then I'll probably play as many hands as I can get in before Lost comes on. Friday I'm not sure about and Saturday, I might be able to play some later.

One thing I'm planning on doing Saturday is beginning the renovations on my poker office. I'm going to move everything out and start painting the room. Then I need to score a desk. I already scored a brand spanking new water cooler for the office. It's pretty sweet! I just need water for it. Total price...FREE! My mother's office throws away a lot of stuff like that for no good reason. I'm hoping they decided to get rid of a fancy executive desk soon!

Tuesday night's are for poker

I love Tuesday night's. American Idol stinks up the teletubes for most of the night, and I really don't ever have plans on a Tuesday....except for poker (and House when a new episode comes on). Tonight, I plan on playing the $13.5K guarantee with one of my tokens and I will also be playing some cash games as well. I don't plan on doing anything else other than poker.

I've been thinking about my poker bankroll and all the things I can blow it on. There are quite a few things out there that I really really want. The problem is that they are wants and not needs. Also, I'm having so much fun with poker right now that I don't want to blow my bankroll on anything. However, I do want to put my poker earnings to good use.

This is going to take discipline, but the first order of business for my poker earnings is to pay off my one remaining credit card that has a balance. This credit card balance shot up during the remodeling of my house and I've been working to pay it off since. However, when I refinance (which I'm going to start looking into doing sometime soon), I should be able to pay off the credit card with the added equity in my home.

The good news is that the credit card balance isn't outrageous, but I hate having credit card balances and I hate paying interest. So it's first on my agenda. However, I think the refinancing thing will happen before the poker earnings become high enough to pay off anything. I'm OK with that because all the stuff on the credit card was used in remodeling my house. It wasn't like I was out buying plasma TVs or anything.

The 2nd thing on my agenda with my poker revenue is to pay off my balance on my kitchen appliances. I did a 12 month same as cash deal with these around August (maybe) of last year. I have been paying off a little bit at a time. I'd like to have a real good month and just finish this thing off before spring.

Aside from those to "bad" debts, the only other debt I have is my house. I don't mind paying that though.

Once the discipline pays off the bad debts, then it's time to set up a reward fund using poker money. Basically what I'll do is take 1/2 of my earnings each week and put it in an account. When I want something to reward myself (like a nice BIG TV), I use the money from that account. In fact, any "treats" like that will have to come from the reward fund.

This will allow me to take my regular salary from my job and spend that money wisely. When I get the urge to splurge, then that money comes from my reward fund. No money in the reward fund? Tough shit...go grind out some hands and put some in there!

Stick to NL

I need to stick to No Limit. The problem is that it's boring. I pretty much donked off some money today. I spent several hundred hands at the $25NL tables where I donked off 3 buyins. What the hell was I thinking? I have a hard time wining 80/20s. What would I think I have a chance when everything is 60/40? I also donked off 1.5 buyins at the heads up NL tables (stay away from those too!). I did get some back at the 6 max $50NL tables though.

I think I'm going to go back to 6 max for a while. It's easier to find good games at the short handed tables. Also, it's more fun than full ring which is just wearing me out lately. I think the bankroll is healthy enough now to handle some short handed swings.

Speaking of the bankroll, I am going to have to take a couple hundred out for a new water heater for my house. The one I currently have is on its last leg.

New Office

I have been thinking about what it is that I want to do with some of the extra space in my house. I still have this huge 4th bedroom that still needs to be finished, but also has no real use to me. I was thinking about turning it into a gym at one point. I also contemplated turning it into a work shop. I think I've finally decided a use for it. How about a new office?

If you viewed my pictures from the other day of the house, you can see my office is less than stellar. It's got that ugly wood paneling. It's also small and feels cluttered. Then throw in the fact that I don't have a decent computer desk and you just have a crappy work environment. Worse than what I used to have before. At least I used to have a computer desk at my old place.

The first item on my agenda is to find a decent desk. I don't want you standard Staples/Wal-Mart computer desk that is made of nothing but particle board and you have to spend an entire day putting together. I want a quality desk. Something like and executive or a teacher with taste would have. I'm not sure where to find such a beast without having to spend a gazillion bucks, but I'm searching.

I love my chair, so I'm good there. I bought it from Sam's Club a few years back. It's probably the only thing I've ever purchased from that place and been satisfied with the product I got. The chair was still in the $200 range, so it wasn't a cheapo deal.

Here's the gameplan for this huge 4th bedroom. First I will get a good desk and move my computers to the room. This will un-clutter my space as well. I also would like to have a smallish LCD TV hanging on the wall in the room, just above my desk. I have a nice bookshelf stereo deal that can go into the room for tunes plus I have 7.1 surround on my PC. Other than the computer equipment, there will still be plenty of room for some exercise equipment as well. I have a treadmill, weight bench, and one of my friends offered me a weight machine for free. Those should all fit without any problem.

I think it will be a pretty pimp little pad when all is said and done. A good place to focus when it comes poker time. I can also get in a little exercise between sessions or do some gaming or watch TV. It will be my sanctuary within my own sanctuary :)

New Heat Pump

I finally said "fuck it" when it comes to dealing with my old heat pump. I tried getting it worked on and now it's just going to cost a lot of money to fix. Then I tried just dealing with the "emergency heat" until this summer comes and I need an A/C. A $250 electric bill cured that thought.

This Saturday morning, I'm getting a new heat pump installed. It's going to cost a pretty penny, but not as bad as I anticipated. The good news is that all the duct work is in place, so hopefully it's just a matter of putting the inside and outside units in place and plugging them up. Hopefully.

My major expenses continue to add up for the year. This heat pump added to the fact that I'll probably need a new car, plus all the house work that still is to be done (carpet, outside paint, porch, lawn mower, etc). It's getting about that time to refinance the old homestead to free up some cash for this year. Interest rates are lower than this summer, so it might be a good time to do so.

House Pics

I've taken some new house pics of the upstairs of my house. I thought I'd snap off a few pics yesterday while everything was good and clean:

New Bathroom Sink, New paint, need some new receptacle covers


Same Ugly ass bathtub


Bedroom side-view


Bathroom floor (I want new tile)


Bedroom


Living Room


Living Room


View on a snowy day


More snow


My Office


Kitchen


Kitchen


Kitchen


Kitchen/Dining Area



Living Room

I'll try to take some pics of the downstairs tonight and get those posted soon.

House Pics coming soon... more poker

I've been promising pics of my newly renovated house for months now. However, my camera is dead and I never did find my charger. So I finally broke down yesterday and bought one. Amazon wanted $32 for a charger. I got mine off ebay for $0.49 + $5 shipping. Hopefully the seller is prompt and the USPS doesn't take forever for it to get here.

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I spent most of day inside my house yesterday. The only time I ventured out of the house was the Walmart trip. The rest of the day was spent inside, cleaning, doing laundry, cooking, and playing poker. It was actually a relaxing day.

Today, I have some more poker planned. I'd like to get in at least another 1000 hands to finish off the month. This will put me close to 20,000 hands for the month of December. This will be the most hands I can remember playing in a month ever with the exception of one month where I did a 30K in 30 days challenge. I came up short and ended up playing like 24K hands that month, but that's the most I can remember playing. I think I definitely would have broke that mark had I started 6 tabling the Full Ring games more than 8 days ago.

6 tables seems to be the most comfortable to me. I have played as many as 8 tables at a time, but when I tile more than 6 tables, the HUD stats get a little too small for me to read at times. I feel I could comfortably 8-10 table for a decent win rate if I had a second monitor. I do rely on the PA HUD stats a lot.

I'm still working on my game a bit. I have been focusing on various things to help me out and they seem to be working. In fact they took what I thought would be a for sure losing month and turned them into a winning month for me. Again, I have been focusing on table selection. I have also started building a buddy list for my sites as well. Another thing I have really focused on the past couple days is isolating the fish on my right. This accomplishes a few things. One, you get heads up with the worst players a lot and they are easy to outplay post flop. Also, you kind of get under their skin, expecially after you have raised their open limp 5-6 times in a row. They start putting in a bunch of money with mediocre holdings.

I filtered out only NL hands and it looks like I'm now making $14/hour playing the microstakes. That's a brag in my book. The bankroll is getting close to the $1000 mark. This would give me 20 buyins at the $50 level. I want to spend at least 10K more hands at the $25 level, but I might incorporate a $50 table or 2 into my game as I see fit.

I got one more post in mind. It's going to be a 2008 poker goals post. I'll post it up later on today maybe.