MLB Picks

Yesterday was a bad day for me on the baseball picks. I went 1-4 and also got a "no action" due to Bedard being scratched from his start. I went risky on yesterday's picks and only 1 paid off.

I lost $3.75 yesterday and this puts my 3 day total at -$2.01. Blah.

Bye bye bankroll...again

I've almost got everything set up for the semi-regular home game. I think we are going to start trying it out on Thursday nights, but might rotate it to various nights throughout the year to accommodate everyone's schedules.

My buddy Rusty offered to donate his poker table until he gets it sold. It's a decent table with bumper pool built in. It's pretty high quality stuff with cherry wood and ball and claw feet. I'd buy it, but don't have the money that he wants for it.

On the other side of poker, I'm cashing out most of my bankroll. I've lost any desire to grind during these warm weather months. I left about $35 on Full Tilt to donk around with and I have about $80 on Poker Stars. The rest I've cashed out. I'm going to go ahead and finish off the bonus at Eurolinx before cashing out there.

Overall, I'm happy. It took me 2 $50 deposits back in October and I'm cashing out nearly $1000. The bankroll was well over $1000 at one point, but I hit a huge skid that killed that a month or 2 ago. I hit several skids over the course of those months and never really got flowing like in the past. You can blame it on the UIGEA and the tougher games or blame it on variance. I did learn a lot along the way and how to play in today's nittier games.

So what am I going to do with the money? Well, I'm going to buy a lawn mower. Unfortunately, my bankroll only allows for me to purchase about 1/2 a mower, so the other 1/2 will have to come out of my pocket. I think I'm going with a zero turn radius riding mower. They run somewhere between $2500-3000. I can get a 2007 model Cub Cadet for about $2700 with 0% interest for 2 years. So I think that's the direction I'm going. Unfortunately, the Cub Cadet dealer keeps banker's hours and I might have a hard time getting over there. If so, then Lowe's has the chance to beat them out of a sale.

I ended up going 5-2 on my baseball picks today along with a loss on my 6 team parlay. I was 5-1 on my parlay with just the Detroit game costing me. Did Jim Leyland die and nobody tell us or something? What's the deal with leaving Verlander in when he was noticeably fatigued?

Anyway, I ended up with a $1.74 profit on the day and a total 2 day profit of $2.49. I got a little more risky on tomorrow's picks, but I think I have some good lines. The particular picks in question are Yanks over Sox, Marlins over Astros, and Brewers over Mets. Here are my picks:

Date placed:
Apr 13, 2008 12:48a Single #111247074
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
AMERICAN LEAGUE
(979) New York Yankees +135 Sun@8:05p
Competitor: (980) Boston Red Sox


* Phil Hughes (R) must throw first pitch for New York Yankees or this pick is NO ACTION.

Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 1.35

Date placed:
Apr 13, 2008 12:48a Single #111247073
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
AMERICAN LEAGUE
(978) Seattle Mariners -130 Sun@4:10p
Competitor: (977) Los Angeles Angels


* Erik Bedard (L) must throw first pitch for Seattle Mariners or this pick is NO ACTION.

Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.77

Date placed:
Apr 13, 2008 12:48a Single #111247072
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(964) Arizona Diamondbacks -130 Sun@4:10p
Competitor: (963) Colorado Rockies



Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.77

Date placed:
Apr 13, 2008 12:48a Single #111247071
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(959) Florida Marlins +120 Sun@2:05p
Competitor: (960) Houston Astros



Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 1.20

Date placed:
Apr 13, 2008 12:48a Single #111247070
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(957) Cincinnati Reds -130 Sun@1:35p
Competitor: (958) Pittsburgh Pirates


* Johnny Cueto (R) must throw first pitch for Cincinnati Reds or this pick is NO ACTION.

Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.77

Date placed:
Apr 13, 2008 12:48a Single #111247069
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(951) Milwaukee Brewers +125 Sun@1:10p
Competitor: (952) New York Mets


* Jeff Suppan (R) must throw first pitch for Milwaukee Brewers or this pick is NO ACTION.

Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 1.25

Date placed:
Apr 13, 2008 12:47a 3 Team Parlay #111247059
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(957) Cincinnati Reds -130 Sun@1:35p
Competitor: (958) Pittsburgh Pirates



Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(959) Florida Marlins +120 Sun@2:05p
Competitor: (960) Houston Astros



Baseball - MLB Moneyline
AMERICAN LEAGUE
(978) Seattle Mariners -130 Sun@4:10p
Competitor: (977) Los Angeles Angels



Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 5.89

More MLB Picks

I went 4-3 yesterday for a $0.75 net profit. I'm awesome at sports betting. Here are my picks today as I rev things up a bit:

Date placed:
Apr 12, 2008 12:01p 6 Team Parlay #111169089
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(901) Atlanta Braves -155 Sat@1:05p
Competitor: (902) Washington Nationals



Baseball - MLB Moneyline
AMERICAN LEAGUE
(917) Detroit Tigers -125 Sat@1:05p
Competitor: (918) Chicago White Sox



Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(906) Arizona Diamondbacks -134 Sat@3:55p
Competitor: (905) Colorado Rockies



Baseball - MLB Moneyline
AMERICAN LEAGUE
(920) Boston Red Sox -170 Sat@3:55p
Competitor: (919) New York Yankees



Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(910) Pittsburgh Pirates -120 Sat@7:05p
Competitor: (909) Cincinnati Reds



Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(914) Philadelphia Phillies -151 Sat@7:05p
Competitor: (913) Chicago Cubs



Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 24.03

Date placed:
Apr 12, 2008 11:59a Single #111168860
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(903) Milwaukee Brewers +131 Sat@1:10p
Competitor: (904) New York Mets


* Ben Sheets (R) must throw first pitch for Milwaukee Brewers or this pick is NO ACTION.
* Johan Santana (L) must throw first pitch for New York Mets or this pick is NO ACTION.

Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 1.31

Date placed:
Apr 12, 2008 1:36a Single #111152793
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(915) San Diego Padres EVEN Sat@10:10p
Competitor: (916) Los Angeles Dodgers


* Chris Young (R) must throw first pitch for San Diego Padres or this pick is NO ACTION.

Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 1.00

Date placed:
Apr 12, 2008 1:36a Single #111152790
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
AMERICAN LEAGUE
(930) Seattle Mariners -115 Sat@9:10p
Competitor: (929) Los Angeles Angels



Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.87

Date placed:
Apr 12, 2008 1:35a Single #111152789
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
AMERICAN LEAGUE
(927) Toronto Blue Jays -150 Sat@8:05p
Competitor: (928) Texas Rangers


* Roy Halladay (R) must throw first pitch for Toronto Blue Jays or this pick is NO ACTION.

Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.67

Date placed:
Apr 12, 2008 1:35a Single #111152756
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(907) St. Louis Cardinals +103 Sat@4:05p
Competitor: (908) San Francisco Giants



Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 1.03

Date placed:
Apr 12, 2008 1:35a Single #111152744
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
AMERICAN LEAGUE
(917) Detroit Tigers -140 Sat@1:05p
Competitor: (918) Chicago White Sox


* Justin Verlander (R) must throw first pitch for Detroit Tigers or this pick is NO ACTION.

Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.71

Date placed:
Apr 12, 2008 1:35a Single #111152741
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(901) Atlanta Braves -170 Sat@1:05p
Competitor: (902) Washington Nationals


* John Smoltz (R) must throw first pitch for Atlanta Braves or this pick is NO ACTION.

Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.59

Home Game

Before I get started.. How fucking hard is it to distinguish the difference between a phone line and the motherfucking internet? I have a customer who runs a business that has 3 fucking branches. He has some makeshift phone line going to his fax modem for faxing purposes. Of course it doesn't work. So, of course, now I assume all responsibilities of the phone company and they expect me to make it work. Fuck that. I told them to call the phone company.

"Our Internet is through the cable".

"This has nothing to do with the internet".

"We just had brand new cat 5 cable put in!! It can't be the line's problem".

"Jesus H. Motherfucking Christ! How is it not fucking mandatory to sterilize dumbass douche bags such as yourself?"

God damn I hate this place.

------

With that off my chest, I'm trying to start up a semi-regular home game. I'm in the process of getting in touch with all the possible participants and see when a good day/time would be. I have sent out several emails and hopefully we can come up with something.

Poker blogs are ghey

I have been trying to catch up on some of my RSS feeds lately which include more than several poker blogs that I read on a regular basis. However, after today, I really feel that I can slim that down a lot. Poker blogs aren't what they used to be and now are just pretty much gay.

I spent probably a week and a half away from all my blogs because I was too busy watching baseball, playing Oblivion, hanging with friends, bowling, painting, and playing guitar. Then today I decided I need to catch up before they get too overbearing. You know what I found out? I didn't miss a damn thing. Here is your average poker blog these days:

• XXXX is a donkey. He pushed all in with XX and my XX got beat
  
• XXXX, YYYY, ZZZZ, and the crew from WWWW all got together and got drunk and acted like donkies.
  
• I don't play poker anymore, but I still have a blog and can call XXXX a donkey
  
• Obama is God cause he's half honkey and all donkey
  

So basically, it's all the same shit over and over. What happened to the good old days of strategy posts by HDouble and DoubleAs? I remember reading about awesome home games and live games. I remember reading about the higher stakes players bringing in nightly totals that sometimes doubled my yearly salary. These were so fun to read.

Now, I'm sure there are plenty of good blogs out there and I do have plenty good ones in my RSS folders, but the amount of crap is far outweighing the good stuff (this blog included).

I gotta get back on track.

I noticed that Eurolinx has an April reload bonus. The best part of this reload bonus is that you don't even have to deposit. According to their web site, you can transfer money from your poker account over to the main account and they will credit you for the up to $500 bonus. You do have to play 15 times the bonus amount in raked hands though. That's 7500 raked hands for those that can't count. Not bad.

I'm still working on my first deposit bonus though. I'm only about 1/4 of the way to clearing that. It goes fast at the games I'm playing, I just haven't sit down and played any. I think we are supposed to get rain this weekend, so I'll try to clear off a bunch, if not all of that bonus. I'll probably start tonight if nothing is going on.

Once I finish off my first deposit, I'll be able to claim the $500 bonus and play that one off as well. If I can put my hands in, this should shape up to be a big month for me.

Baseball Wagering

I put $20 into Bodog and I'm going to wager on several baseball games a day and see how things turn out. It will probably be all $1 bets. Here are my picks for today:

Date placed:
Apr 11, 2008 9:33a Single #111085326
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(965) San Diego Padres -115 Fri@10:40p
Competitor: (966) Los Angeles Dodgers
* Jake Peavy (R) must throw first pitch for San Diego Padres or this pick is NO ACTION.
Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.87

Date placed:
Apr 11, 2008 9:33a Single #111085318
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(962) Arizona Diamondbacks -150 Fri@9:40p
Competitor: (961) Colorado Rockies
* Brandon Webb (R) must throw first pitch for Arizona Diamondbacks or this pick is NO ACTION.
Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.67

Date placed:
Apr 11, 2008 9:33a Single #111085317
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(960) Houston Astros -180 Fri@8:05p
Competitor: (959) Florida Marlins
* Roy Oswalt (R) must throw first pitch for Houston Astros or this pick is NO ACTION.
Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.56

Date placed:
Apr 11, 2008 9:33a Single #111085311
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(957) Atlanta Braves -160 Fri@7:35p
Competitor: (958) Washington Nationals
* Tim Hudson (R) must throw first pitch for Atlanta Braves or this pick is NO ACTION.
Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.63

Date placed:
Apr 11, 2008 9:33a Single #111085306
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
AMERICAN LEAGUE
(972) Tampa Bay Rays -160 Fri@7:10p
Competitor: (971) Baltimore Orioles
* James Shields (R) must throw first pitch for Tampa Bay Rays or this pick is NO ACTION.
Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.63

Date placed:
Apr 11, 2008 9:32a Single #111085295
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
NATIONAL LEAGUE
(955) Milwaukee Brewers +105 Fri@7:10p
Competitor: (956) New York Mets
* Manny Parra (L) must throw first pitch for Milwaukee Brewers or this pick is NO ACTION.
Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 1.05

Date placed:
Apr 11, 2008 9:32a Single #111085289
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
AMERICAN LEAGUE
(970) Cleveland Indians -165 Fri@7:05p
Competitor: (969) Oakland Athletics
* C.C. Sabathia (L) must throw first pitch for Cleveland Indians or this pick is NO ACTION.
Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.61

Date placed:
Apr 11, 2008 9:31a Single #111085284
Baseball - MLB Moneyline
AMERICAN LEAGUE
(967) New York Yankees -105 Fri@7:05p
Competitor: (968) Boston Red Sox
* Chien-Ming Wang (R) must throw first pitch for New York Yankees or this pick is NO ACTION.
Risk US$ 1.00 to win US$ 0.95

The obsession of the week is....

BASEBALL!

The season has begun and we are more than a week into the swing of things. Baseball is fun. There are so many nuances of the game that normal people don't understand. You always hear "I can play baseball but no way I can watch that shit!". Bah. I could sit and watch it all day long.

My Braves are off to a slow start as is my Fantasy team. I had a cruddy draft this year and I'm trying to make up for it with some key trades. Even with my bad draft, I still have probably the 3rd best Pitching rotation in the league. Here is my entire lineup:

C - Victor Martinez
1B - Mark Teixiera
2B - Robbie Cano
3B - Garrett Atkins
SS - Jimmy Rollins
OF'ers - Josh Hamilton, Hideki Matsui, Nick Markakis, Delmon Young, Jermaine Dye, Brad Hawpe, Adam Jones (on my farm and I prematurely called him up), and Andruw Jones

Pitchers are: Erik Bedard, Ben Sheets, Justin Verlander, Tim Hudson, Roy Oswalt, along with Homer Bailey and Chad Billingsley riding the pine.

My farm club is starting to shape up with youngsters like: Chris Marrero, Andy LaRoche, Jason Heyward, Chris Parmelee, Rick Porcello, Jacob McGee, Daniel Cortes, Andrew Miller, and Luke Hochevar.

I have room for one more draft spot as I traded James Loney from my farm for Hideki Matsui. I'm trying to trade one of my outfielders for a stud farm-worth outfielder such as Jacoby Ellsbury. The owners of Justin Upton and Jay Bruce refused to trade those 2.

Time for a post!

I finally have a break from all my fun work to actually do a decent post. But I can't really think of anything to post about so I'll ramble on for a bit.

TOnight is bowling night. We are somewhere around the top of the standings during this fourth and final quarter of the year. We won quarter #3, so if we win quarter #4, we can skip the roll-off and go straight into the championship. We've had 2 bad weeks in a row though, so we need something to happen tonight. It's hard to focus on your bowling when it's 70 degrees outside.

I'm winning at poker again, although I'm scared to post any good fortunes to this blog because it always starts some downward spiral into being broke. I have been playing mostly $1/2 limit poker. I think my winrate over the last 1500 hands is somewhere north of 11.0 BB/100. Sustainable? I wish.

I've been listening to Widespread Panic lately. Does that make me a hippie? Probably. I've also written my own tune. It's a cool guitar diddy and some sub-par lyrics about my life. I'm gonna get my buddy Spook to help me with a solo. The music is coolest part of the song and I can't get it out of my head. Basically, I took some different chord progressions that I accidently discovered and made a cool sounding rock song. You will never hear me sing so, I'll never post the song on my page or anything, but with Spook's help, I might get him to sing and play the song and I'll post it. The only thing I ask are my royalties when the song goes Platinum and shit.

I'm supposed to be getting my appraisal this weekend. I was supposed to have it done tonight, but we couldn't work out the schedule. So Saturday or Sunday is the day. My hopes are high as I have had several people tell me that $150K would be a low appraisal for my house. Not sure if they are blowing smoke up my ass, but they sure have my hopes up now. My parents house appraised for $100K just the other day and although a nice house, it doesn't have all the features of mine such as the FULLY finished basement, nearly 100% sheet rock walls and ceilings, and the big double lot yard. I think I'll be in good shape.

I can't think of anything else. It's almost home time for me.

Working on change

I've been doing a lot better mentally lately. I have been putting that extra effort out to not be a lazy prick. This, in turn, has made my last few days better. However, there have been a few things that fell to the back burner like poker.

I have been able to play some poker the past week, but only in small spurts. Most of that time has been at the $1/2 limit tables just trying to clear some bonus money. I have faired pretty well at the tables, but that's because the games have been good. I booked a $60 win today in about 15 minutes because some guy decided he was going to raise every hand pre-flop and regardless of the board, he was going to bet/raise every street as well. This was a 6 handed table and my other 4 opponents had no clue how to deal with this. Fortunately, I love these idiots and was able to take advantage before he left.

I still have a good deal to go before I clear my first bonus. I should then have enough money for a 2nd bonus and then I'm going to reload for a 3rd bonus, so I have a lot of poker ahead of me on Eurolinx. The money is all laid out, now I just gotta go put in some time to claim it all.

Sick

My head is pounding today and I skipped out on breakfast to be safe. However, I'm training and had to come into work. Now, it's after lunch time and I braved some food for lunch and I'm starting to regret that decision.

When I get a headache, I also get sick at my stomach and I feel like I could puke at any time now. 4 more hours and I'm in good shape!

Uninterested

I've become uninterested in writing about poker lately. In fact, I've become uninterested about every aspect of poker except playing the game. I don't want to write about poker, read about poker, or even watch poker on TV. For some reason, over the past week or 2, I've lost all interest.

I'm sure the big reason is the weather and Spring time coming. As I spend more and more time outside, I'm spending less and less time in front of the computer. However, the weather hasn't completely killed my desire to play, just my time frames to do it in.

In fact, yesterday I got hooked up with a place that runs 12 week poker tournaments with a tournament of champions at the end. The tournies are only like $30/week and seem to get a fair number of runners. The downside? Most of the participants are retired golfers and therefore typically douche bags. I'm going to start playing in that at the beginning of the next 12 week cycle.

I also have a long list of cash games running around the area and I'm going to start playing in those as well. There's just too much money floating around for me to ignore all those games any longer.

Lastly, I have those bonuses at Eurolinx that I'm working off, so those are pre-occupyign my time as well. I'm having a blast playing limit poker again (just because I'm winning probably).

All that being said, the poker content on this site might drop a bit (not completely), but I will replace that content with hopefully more interesting stuff about investing, golfing, baseball, music, and general bitching and moaning about my job.

Winning the Fast Food war!

Subway has the tools to win the Fast Food war. They could blow McDonalds out of the water because they have found a niche: Fat people. When you think healthy fast food, you have to think Subway. I do anyway.

Subway has all the tools to become bigger than McDonalds. The food tastes better and is better for you. However, there are problems that will prevent that from ever happening.

First of all, Subway is expensive! I just paid $7.50 for a ham sandwich! C'mon guys, everyone has the dollar menu and then you have a product that doesn't even require being cooked and you charge $4-5 for a half sandwich? Add another $2.20 for chips and a drink and it's a down right rip off. For that $7.50, I can make my own sandwiches, chips, and drinks for the entire week!

Also, Subway's service has historically sucked ass. I have frequented many of their establishments all over the east coast and the only one that I would say had good service was the one in a commons area of my old college. The rest are filled with lazy, ignorant workers who can't hold a job any place else. How hard is it to place some meat and cheese between a slice of bread? Evidently, it's more challenging than I thought because for some reason, it always takes me 30 minutes to get my damn sandwich regardless of how many people are in line.

Lastly, what's the deal with not having a drive-thru at most locations? This is just pure laziness on their part. You have to realize that your niche audience are lazy people and don't want to get out of their car. So they will choose McDonalds and the convenience of never having to get out of the car over Subway every time!

Bottom line: Subway, if you lower your prices, practice better hiring standards, and put in some more drive-thru's and you will topple all the other fast food restaraunts in town.

Family Guy

Pauly just wrote a very good post about his family and the disappointments family can lead to. Since, I have been avoiding the poker tables lately, this post actually stirred up some thoughts in my head that I could write about in my own blog.

It's no secret that Dr. Pauly is my favorite of all the bloggers. I envy it when people do their own thing and succeed in life. It's kind of like giving a big middle finger to everyone that shoves doubts in your head from the time you're born to the time you're all grown up and move out on your own. You see it time and time again. Eat your vegetables, go to school, get good grades, get a good job, then become a monkey working paycheck to paycheck. No offense to the other monkies in the world, but that lifestyle has made me want to eat a bullet a time or 2. I'd rather buck the system.

When it comes to my family, I have my parents and then I have the rest of my family. Now don't get me wrong, I love my parents more than anything in this world. However, I do blame them for some of the issues I had when growing up. I was sheltered, being an only child. There were so many things that I have never experienced or didn't experience until later in life than most people. My parents, having been brought up this way themselves raised me to follow that Nazi-like path from childhood to school days to adulthood where you spend 33% of your life working for the man. That's all fine and dandy for some folks, but it's my version of Hell.

I love my parents a lot and the last thing I want to do is disappoint them. However, there has to be a line drawn at some point. They wouldn't be happy if I quit my job and played poker professionally. What about if I quit my job and started my own business? I doubt it. I'm sure if it was a success, but if it failed, then that's what I get for bucking the trend. I'm 30 years old and there is so much I haven't tried because I was following this path my parents lead me down. Blindly I followed that path until I got to this destination where I am today...Hell. Their answer to my problems is "Get another job".

I've chosen a lifestyle to that would make my parents proud (for the most part). I've done the school thing. I've done the good grades thing. I've done the job thing. I'm sure it makes them all warm and cozy inside saying "My son is a computer programmer". Now, I'm getting older and responsibilities pile up and now here I sit having to have this job to survive in life. It's a road that I'm frantically trying to get off of.

I guess things will start with my being "bad debt" free. Not having to be a slave to pay off my debts opens me up to more options. For 1 thing, I don't need as much money every month to live. Secondly, I can save money a lot easier, which will help me get out of the rat race in the long run. But the question is "What do I want out of life?".

Pauly's response to this questions was "I just want to write and be left alone". I can simplify that response to work for me: "I just want to be left alone". I sit down on my couch last night with my guitar and after about 2 hours, I realized that this was as much fun as I had all week. No worries, nobody bugging me, just be banging away at the guitar and sometimes making pleasing sounds come out.

It's all fine and dandy to make someone else happy or proud of you, but I honestly can't sacrifice any more of my time to please other people...family or not. Life is too short to live like this. Changes are coming.

Guitar stuff

I just bought some new guitar stuff. I got a dozen picks because I'm tired of trying to find the same one I've had for over a year. Sometimes I can't find it and have to resort to playing with a cut off corner from a credit card. No more! I will soon have a dozen of my very own.

I bought a capo because some of the Old Crowe Medicine Show songs I've been playing really need a capo if you want to sing and play at the same time. I'm sure there are tons of other songs where this would come in handy as well and the things are dirt cheap so yay!

I got 2 new sets of acoustic strings. The ones I have on my acoustic now have been on for quite a while and I know they are due for a change. I opted not to get any electric strings because I think I actually have some somewhere. I also got a new peg winder because I lost my old one. These things are a must for changing strings.

It looks like I'm going through my guitar phase now. I'll probably be passionate about this for a month or 2 and then move back into poker or golf or something else.

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!

Busy bee

I've been busy today and not able to get my usual blogging done during work hours. I got a new laptop for work and have been dealing with that. Vista sucks... Vista networked to an SCO Unix server sucks major monkey balls.

I played a little bit of poker yesterday, but nothing major. I did fairly well I guess considering I was playing LHE. I'm going to continue to play LHE until I finish off these Eurolinx bonuses too. This first bonus at least. If I get enough so that I can play $50NL or $100NL then I'll switch back to those games. There just aren't enough raked hands at $20NL to even waste my time trying.

I also spent the majority of yesterday evening watching baseball. I watched the Braves/Pirates donkathon. Ummm Atlanta's bullpen needs help as always. Some people are picking the Braves to go to the series, but when comparing them to the Mets, there is no comparison. I'm still rooting for them anyway. Maybe some of the youngsters will break through *Ahem* Yunel Escobar.

My fantasy team started out ripping shit loose. However, none of my pitchers got any run support. I've had 5 starters go since Sunday. Hudson went deep and no-decision, Sheets deep and no-decision, Bedard went 5.1 and got no decision, Verlander went 6+ and no decision, followed by Oswalt going 5+ with 6 K's and a loss. Can a brother get some run support?

Tonight = Poker + Oblivion + maybe some American Idol.