Back in the saddle

Was able to play a short session on Paradise last night....about 30 minutes is all I was able to get in between feeding Alan and taking care of the girls while Jen was at work.

If I had been smart, I would have left the table after the first 15 hands, as I was up $250, but decided to play another 40 hands or so and ended up walking with $140 instead...still not a bad night, but lost a good chunk of my profit on two hands.

first loss saw me in EP with AA, open the pot with a raise that get 3 callers (including the BB). Flop comes down 4-4-9 and I figure I'm in pretty good shape. I open the betting and get called around. Q hits the turn and I get check raised by the BB...at this point I put him on Qx...maybe AQs or KQ to call the pre-flop raise. Blank on the river and he check raises me again...I have to call and he shows 34s for a flopped set and takes down a nice pot by cracking my AA. sigh.

About 10 minutes later I have to step away from the computer, so I miss the blinds...I come back in late position and opt to pay both blinds to get back on the table. Find 58os for my money and get to see a cheap flop....which hits 5-Q-8 with two hearts. I raise the mid-position open and three of us see the turn, which was a 2 I believe (non-heart). Mid-position opens, I raise, BB calls, mid-position re-raises, I cap, BB calls and mid-position calls. River brings a 9 of hearts, completing the flush draw....BB opens (?!?!?!), mid position goes all in with remaining $19 (raise), I call and BB calls....shows the 4-10 of hearts for a 10 high flush draw....late position shows KK and I show my two pair that got chased down to the river. Now I ask you....how do you call 4 big bets after the turn with nothing more than a 10 high flush draw? If he had the nut-flush draw, or a straight-flush draw, maybe, but nothing more than a 10 high flush....crazy. Non-the less he took down a $200 pot for his chase to the river.

At this point I there were numerous comments about my loose call of 58os, so I figured I was good to get some action on any good cards I was dealt. The next four hands went something like this....

JJ - raise to open the pot, folded around to me, pick up the blinds
AQos - ditto
A10s - ditto
KK - get the BB to call....flop comes 6-6-9 and he check-folds to me.

So my loose call generated no action what-so-ever and I basically pick up about $40 in blinds with some solid hands. I go card dead for the next two rounds until hitting a set of 4s on a ragged flop and busting QQ and AKs with them for a nice $80 pot. Waited for the blinds to come around and walked away with the profit. Halfway done in clearing my bonus on paradise and then my new chipset from Pokersourceonline.com will be on the way....how cool is that.

In other news, getting a huge grin from reading the posts regarding the blogging group that got to play out at the Playboy mansion in LA last weekend. Opportunity of a lifetime and I'm enjoying living through these guys and what they were able to do. Congrats to them all....check out Tao of Poker and Al Can't Hang among others to see the pics and hear their stories.

Nothing much else going on...still working on the house, hoping to have it on the market by Easter, so lots to do between now and then. Will keep everyone posted.

ttfn.

Not poker related...but...

Ok...I don't usually post links and such, but I had to respond to this nut job...

http://husbandonstrike.com and http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=1780687

OK, so here's the scoop...this guy has a 2 yr old son and a 3 month old daughter and is upset that the kids are sleeping in the bedroom with he and his wife. He has taken to living on the roof of the house to protest the situation, with his main argument being a 'lack of intimacy' with the kids in the room....also that 'he was there before the kids, so he should come first'.

Now...aside from the lunacy of this whole topic...here is my response as the father of 3 young kids.

Get over yourself...by having kids you have lowered youself on the pecking order of the house for roughly 18 years. You do not come first anymore. The welfare of the kids come first. The 3 month old is most likely nursing, requiring your wife to get up 2-4 times a night to feed the baby. Much easier for her to get up, take a step or two, grab the baby and feed her as opposed to going to a different room....not to mention the racket a baby can make at 3am if they're hungry and not getting the attention they deserve (believe me...Alan had Jen and I up 4 times last night...even though I just roll over, it still makes for a bad nights sleep.

Count yourself fortunate to have 2 happy and healthy kids, as well as a wife willing to give them the love and care that they need, cause you're sure not doing your part by living on the roof.

I could go on, but I have to get back to work.

ttfn

Quick update - No poker news

been working on getting all the little projects done around the house before getting it on the market here in the next week or two...Jen's hoping to have a sign in the yard by Easter. Fixing sink drains (ugh...hair clogs) and touching up paint jobs are all just gearing me up for tackling the disaster that the garage has become since my back surgery 2 years ago. Hoping to get some general cleaning/garbage collection done between now and Friday, then focus on a huge reorg and downsizing over the weekend if the weather cooperates and I can put stuff in the driveway to help with the reorg.

Hopefully get some time in for poker tomorrow...haven't played since loosing the buy-in on Sat, so I'm hoping to get the girls in bed and then Alan and I can hang out together and play some poker until Jen comes home from work.

Have my first CQA course tonight up in New Albany. 8 weeks of prep classes to get ready for my certification exam in June. Looking forward to the classes, as I've always enjoyed the learning aspect of school and classes, just the exams and papers that I dread.

ttfn.

The streak ends

11 straight positive sessions at $5/10 came to an end when I lost a buy-in on Sat evening on Paradise on a very loose and wild table. Had one guy at the table that only knew two comments..."FU" and "Dummy"...he pretty much berated anyone that beat him with the "FU" and then called them a "dummy' if they called him to the river and he beat them. There were three of us at the table that started berating him back, and I played way to aggressively at him in trying to bust him, as I saw him show some very marginal hands, especially when he three-bet pre-flop into my AA with Q3os and caught a Q on the flop...he led the betting to the river when I popped him for a check raise, which he called with top pair and my pocket rockets crushed him. I know it's risky playing AA like that, but the board was scattered and I really didn't think he could beat me....of course, if he catches a 3 then I'm toast, but it was worth it to see what he was playing, as he was able to win numerous pots against other players by raising and reraising and bullying them out of pots. Was fun to see the table turn on him and we collectively busted him...but I was out about$100 in the process, then proceeded to loose the rest in two hands....pocket 9's flop a set but get caught by 6-2 suited chasing down a flush draw and catching on the river....then my AKos flops an A, turn a K and loose to a flopped set of 2s. Nothing I could really do about either hand, but they pretty much delpeted the rest of my buy in for the evening. I am almost half-way to clearing my bonus on Paradise, but have cleared about $1200 at the tables over the course of the last 10 days...so I'm quickly becoming a convert to the Paradise $5/10 games.

Can't wait to hear the stories from Pauly and the gang from their weekend in Vegas and the tourney at the Playboy mansion. If I had known ahead of time, I might have been able to extend my stay in La to catch up with them last week, but probably better off that I didn't, as painting and moving furniture all weekend was MUCH more fun....

Not sure how much poker I'm going to get to play in the coming weeks, as we're getting very close to putting the house on the market, so lots of little projects that need to get done between now and then. I may be crawling under a sink tonight to clean out a trap that is clogged, as well as touching up some paint and such in some of the rooms of the house. Not to mention cleaningout the garage at some point in time, staining the last of the woodwork in the basement, etc, etc, etc. Hopefully wll have enough time to complete my bonus at Paradise in the next week or so.

Back to work now...have to finish my expense reports from last week....fun fun fun.

ttfn.

Day 3 in California...poker, time change, etc.

Here's is where I spent the night last night...the Mission Inn is an absolutely beautiful hotel here in Riverside, CA. Two room suite with a small balcony overlooking the courtyard. I'm sitting at the desk with the windows open listening to the birds outside...if only the room had a coffee pot for a nice cup of coffee, I'd be all set in getting my day started.

Wish I had a camera to take some pics rather than snagging the photos from their web site...but they're enough to give you the picture of the place.

I finally feel that I'm good with the CA time change. Stayed up until about 10:30 CA time and woke up about 5:45 this morning. Was disappointed last night, as Catwoman was supposed to be on HBO, and nothing is finer than Halle Berry in a leather cat suit for a couple of hours, but the HBO that was on here in the hotel was showing something else, so not sure what happened there.

Anyway, took it easy last night after getting into Riverside after the hour plus drive up from Carlsbad, CA. Ordered some room service, talked to Jen about getting the current house on the market and getting ready to move. Looks like some painting and minor home repairs is in my immediate future when I get back to Columbus. Have to get some cleaning in the garage done as well so we can start putting boxes of packed stuff in there to prepare for the move. We have our eye on a house in Johnstown, so we're hoping to get a quick offer on our house and then move on the new one. We'll see how it goes.

Played some more on Paradise last night...cleared another $10 in bonus now (only 750 more raked hands to go to clear the remaining $80 and get my chipset from PSO). The bankroll rebuilding is going well, as I'm up about $800 since starting on Paradise on Sunday...not bad for 3 days of work. The tables are probably better than UB at this limit, which I never thought I would say...of course getting smacked by the deck is always a good thing....AA twice, KK twice, numerous Ax, either suited or with solid kickers....I did make one bad/good play on a large pot...Here is the hand history:

Table "Bikar" (real money) -- Seat 4 is the buttonSeat
1: WilySSC ($856.00 in chips)
Seat 2: oldtex1 ($427.00 in chips)
Seat 3: MVilla888 ($448.00 in chips)
Seat 4: betsi ($174.00 in chips)
Seat 6: Josephine ($217.00 in chips)
Seat 7: andy5683 ($151.00 in chips)
Seat 8: Shaqatak ($637.00 in chips)
Seat 10: ZOE 123 ($197.00 in chips)
Josephine: Post Small Blind ($2)
andy5683: Post Big Blind ($5)
Dealing...Dealt to MVilla888 [ Th ][ Qd ]
Shaqatak: Call ($5)
ZOE 123 : Fold
WilySSC : Fold
oldtex1 : Fold
MVilla888: Call ($5) - loose call, but had been running well and hitting flops, so no real harm here in limping...the remaining players in the hand had been playing tight.
betsi : Fold
Josephine: Fold
andy5683: Check
*** FLOP *** : [ 8s 5h Jd ]
andy5683: Check
Shaqatak: Bet ($5) - big stack at the table...played a solid game...but would also bluff at weak flops
MVilla888: Call ($5) - have a gutshot straight and the Q over the board...worth seeing a card
andy5683: Fold
*** TURN *** : [ 8s 5h Jd ] [ Ac ]
Shaqatak: Bet ($10)
MVilla888: Raise ($20) - stupid raise here, but wanted to see where I was and the A would be a scare card to Jx
Shaqatak: Raise ($20) - ok...he's smelled my bluff or has a hand...I have outs (K and 9) here for my straight...pot is about $80 here, so it's a loose call, but I know I have outs in the hand.
MVilla888: Call ($10)
*** RIVER *** : [ 8s 5h Jd Ac ] [ Kc ]
Shaqatak: Bet ($10)
MVilla888: Raise ($20) - Shazam....hit the K for the nut straight...wheeeee
Shaqatak: Call ($10)
*** SUMMARY ***
Pot: $124 Rake: $3
Board: [ 8s 5h Jd Ac Kc ]
WilySSC didn't bet (folded)
oldtex1 didn't bet (folded)
MVilla888 bet $60, collected $124, net +$64 (showed hand) [ Th Qd ] (a straight, ten to ace)betsi didn't bet (folded)
Josephine lost $2 (folded)
andy5683 lost $5 (folded)
Shaqatak lost $60 [ 8h Ah ] (two pair, aces and eights)
dethkilla didn't bet
ZOE 123 didn't bet (folded)

Like the Cincinnati Kid...."sometimes you have to make the wrong move at the right time to win big"...or something like that.

Pre-flop, I'm behind 48% to 51%
Post Flop, I'm behind 36% to 63%
Turn, I'm behind 20% to 80%

Anyway, I caught some flack on the table after that play, as the guys with 2 pair was not happy that I chased down the straight draws on him. When I look at the stats from Cardplayer.com...looks like a terrible play on my part to chase the outs, but I didn't have him on two pair until he reraised me after the turn...at that point I either fold or call and see what the river brings. I got lucky. Told him I had outs and the pot was reasonable enough to chase and see the river...the raise was questionable on the turn with the A...but not terrible as it was common for players to chase with Ax on the table...just so happened that he hit his two pair with it and lost to the striaght on the river. Good for me, bad for him.

Anyway...time to hit the shower and get ready for the day here in CA...another vendor audit and then heading for the hotel near LAX for the next two nights...will be nice to sleep in the same bed for two nights this trip...I hate bouncing from hotel to hotel during a business trip...oh well.

ttfn

How sad is this

I'm currently live blogging from the Vegas airport as I wait to catch a flight to LA. Should have planned better and left more time for the layover...only 45 minutes and plane just showed up, so I have to pack up and stand in line for Southwest. Almost played a slot machine, but resisted at the last minute.

more from LA later.

Made it to LA and drove down to southern LA without incident. Had a great evening with Ernie (our West Coast QA Director) with dinner and a small Italian place....lobster ravioli...mmmmm

Want to thank Iggy for setting up the tourney the other night...I was only in for about 30 minutes, as I had my flopped set of 4s cracked by a flopped set of Qs....oh well. I also lost a chance to double up early when my 99 hand flopped an open end stratight draw (6-7-8 rainbow)...faced a bet from the blind and I went all in to try and steal the pot...he had KK and I was behind, but had outs...which all came together when the 10 hit on the turn, only to be followed by the 9 on the river to put a 5 card straight on the board and a split pot....sigh. Anyway, I'm up about $500 since Sunday on Paradise....the $5/10 tables are just as juicy on Paradise as they were on UB, so I'm happy to work off the bonus on Paradise while Ub gets there act together.

Time to get to the gym and then ready for the day here in La....ttfn.

Blogger Tourney

I am registered to play in the Online Poker Blogger Freeroll Win your share of $25,000 and a set of Nevada Jacks poker chips. Hosted By: Absolute Poker Sponsored By: Poker Source Online Registration Code: 66129238

not much to blog about

Haven't played any poker since the weekend...hopefully that will change tonight as Jen is working and I should be able to play some poker after the girls get to bed as long as Alan is content to hang with me while I play on UB. Will see how he is doing this evening.

Decided to pass on the house in Granville...nice house, but not one that Jen and I loved, so we decided to keep looking. Granville may be too much for us, so I think we're going to go back and look in the Johnstown area...good schools and nice community, so will fit us well.

Big weekend and week coming up...Jen working tonight and tomorrow, Dealing on Sat night, Jen working on Sunday then I head for CA on Monday for the week. Gotta get packed and all on Sunday, then hopefully play in the blogger tourney on Sunday evening. Doubt I'll get to make the Commerce or Bicycle on this trip, but we'll see what happens.

good luck in your tourney pools...I'm hoping to win the perfect pool prize and a cool 5 Million....wheee.

ttfn.

Quick update....just paid off my remaining student loan from college....15 years after graduation and my loan is paid off....HOORAY!!!! Before anyone asks, I had my loans delayed through grad school, and through a mistake at loan company, they added 5 extra years to the deferment, so I only started paying on the loans in 1998.

But HOORAY none the less.

Getting too old for weekends like this

but had a great time all weekend....here goes a review of the weekend for everyone.

Friday night
Drove across town to deal at Rainman's home poker tourney. Tourney scheduled to start at 7, cards in the air around 7:45 after everyone is setteled into their chairs. Didn't have any problems dealing, the players were great to watch from the dealer's chair, as I've played and will continue to play against many of them. No issues of any kind, watched Bishop go from a very short stack when we're down to 2 tables and work his way to the chip lead and finally 2nd place overall...great work in managing a short stack and a nice run of cards. Wrapped up the tourney and got home around 2:30am.

Sat morning & afternoon
After numerous wake up calls from Danielle (7am, 7:20, 7:35 and 7:50) I finally decide that I need to give into reality and crawl out of bed. Grab some coffee and brakfast and feel fairly human. Watch the kids for a bit while Jen runs some errands and then Danielle and I are off to Dublin to watch Dave and Amanda test for their next karate belts. Danielle really got a kick out of watching the students perform their forms with the swords, kai, sticks and such....not to mention the "jumping, kicking and punching". Congratulations to Dave and amanda for both passing their tests and advancing their belts. Was very impressed by the slow motion forms they both did, as I know the amount of concentration and training it takes to do them correctly over the course of 10-15 minutes....you should be very proud of your accomplishments.

Sat evening
Jeni, Todd, Phil & Jahnine all stopped by for dinner Sat evening. Was absolutly fabulous getting some time to catch up with all of them for a couple of hours. Really need to spend more effort this summer in getting to Toledo and letting all the kids get together and such. Can't believe that Zoe and Sven are approaching their teens already....hard to believe that they're that old already. Met up with the gang at the "Thirsty Ear" to listen to Todd's band play some great blues for a couple of hours. Wish I had gotten their earlier, as it was SRO at 9:30 and my back was really aching by 11:30 when we finally got a table at the back of the room. Mike and Leah also stopped by, but I didn't really get to do much more than introduce them to the Toledo gang before the band started again and it became impossible to talk. Thank you Mike and Leah for coming out...sorry I didn't get to talk more to you....of course, a few more drinks and the Toledo gang would have been spilling all kinds of dirt about me from my Toledo days...probably a good thing you split when you did for my sake. Anyway, I headed home around 12:30 and crashed around 1am.

Oops.....two things I forgot to add....played a little poker on Sat morning for another positive session....and my mother called to see if she could stop by on Sunday morning to see the girls. She wanted to make sure we would be home, and more importantly if she could bring Dave along, since they were in Findlay seeing his grandkids on Sat.

Sunday
Bandit had me up at 8am to go out while Jen and Alan were at church. A friend from work stopped by around 9:30 to pick Bandit up to take him to a pet expo for the day and use him as a test dog for her pet massage therapy. Apparently he had a great time and was well behaved for the day. He slept like a log after he got home, so I know he at least had some exercise for the day. Mom and Dave met all of us at 11:30 at Bob Evans for brunch and small talk...then came over to the house until about 2 or so and spent some time with the girls and Alan. Nothing to speak of for the visit...everyone was cordial and polite, so no firworks.

Jen had to work at 2, so I spent the rest of the day with the kids. Ran to Westerville to pick up some packing boxes for the 'hopefully' upcoming move (Thanks again Kelly). Watched the Buckeyes loose the Big Ten tourney championship and a probable number 1 seed in the national tourney....they looked pretty tired at the end of the game, so resting between now and Friday will be very good for them as they look to advance deep into the tourney.

No problems with the kids for the evening. Watched a couple of movies and had the girls off to bed around 8:30. Ashley has been kind enough to give me her cold, so I'm feeling pretty rough around the edges (lack of sleep and cold = cranky Mike at work), therefore I'm taking a half day to get some rest this afternoon before we go out and look at the house in Granville this evening.

Did hit a loosing session last night to break my string of 9 positive sessions in a row. Dropped a buy in at the $5/10 tables ($250) over about 45 minutes of cold cards, ill-timed bluffs and generally loose play on my part. Not to mention a really discouraging time in dealing with UBs lags and hiccups over the first 20minutes or so....probably played for over an hour, but spent about half that time with the server freezing the game for up to 10 minutes at a time. Lost 2 hands to these lags, as I had entered a hand, had the system freeze and me miss the rest of the hand in having to take care of Alan and getting timed out when the system restarted. I filed a complaint on the lost cash with UB CS....will see if they do anything about it.

Spent the balance of the evening loading more tunes on my iPod from some old CDs...found my AC/DC and GNR cd's buried in a box of video tapes and such from the last house, so i'm happily listening to them here at work on the iPod...greatest invention since sliced bread in my opinion.

That's pretty much it. Time to slide though the next hour or so and then head home for a nap.

ttfn.

Ohhhhhhh What a night

Not sure what UB did during their recent server upgrade, but man is it paying off in spades for me. Played 5/10 for a little over an hour yesterday and racked up over $600 in profits. Bank roll back into four figures now and I'm happy as a clam.

It was a pretty interesting evening....started out datamining UB for an hour while I took care of the kids...baths and bottles and such. After everyone was asleep, and after realizing Lost was a repeat, decided to find a table and see what might happen. So sat down at a short-handed 10-man table and started working away. Was getting hammered to start with....JJ getting cracked by Ax, AA getting cracked by JJ spiking a J on the river after we both bet the heck out of the pot...that one hurt bad. Anyway, my $300 buy-in was down to about $40 when two guys left the table and we were playing three handed. At this pont the deck warmed up to me and I started catching solid hands for a three handed game. And started hitting flops finally....suited connectors flopping straights, pocket pairs hitting sets, etc. Pretty much broke the other short stack on the table for his $150 when my pocket 9s hit a set on a ragged flop and cracked his limped KK for about $120...cleaned out his remaining cash two hands later when my 89s flopped the nut straight and cracked his flopped set of sixes.

The table had started to fill back in at this point and the deck continued to warm up to me. At this point I was back up to about $250 and then hit the following run of hands...

A-10os...flop K-J-3 rainbow, Q completes the straight and I win a 5 handed pot for +$160
KK...flop 2-7-10, guy chases a weak flush draw to the river and then pays me off on the river when he misses...+$60
QQ...everyone folds to my pre-flop raise
AA...get 3 callers to my raise UTG+1 (right after the QQ hand)...rainbow flop and 3 guys call me to the river with low pocket pairs or mid-pairs on the board +$90

So, now I'm sitting with about $550 at the table and feeling like the king of the world. Play a couple of additional small pots and walk away from that table +$297 to give Alan another bottle. He falls back to sleep and I head back downstairs to see if my run can continue.

Sit down at a different $5/10 table with $200 and wait for the BB to come around. See two guys at the full table that are playing almost every hand, starting with a pre-flop raise and then just trying to bully people out of every pot....not sure if they are working together, but feels fishy. So the BB hits me with AA to start out the session and I'm smiling again. True to form, one of the lunkheads raises from mid-position and gets me and 4 others to see the flop. No one was respecting his raises anymore. The flop comes A, 3, 3 (2 hearts) and I have a full boat....I check from the BB and wait for him to generate the action for me....checked to him and he starts the betting....I cold call and the guy to my left raises, the maniac 3 bets and I cold call again, only to see the guy to my left complete, with 4 people capping the betting post flop. A blank hits on the turn and I check to the maniacs who don't disappoint, betting and raising with little regard to the cards on the board. A couple of players have dropped from the madness and three of us see the river, which completes the heart flush on the board. I decide to bet from the BB and see what they do at this point. I get raised and reraised, allowing me to cap the pot and they both call off the bets and show down a QQ and a 10-J hearts...I don't understand the QQ player forr playing so aggressively with an A on the board when 5 players saw the flop....one of them had to come in with an A of some kind. And I'm sure the guy who hit the flush was pretty happy when he hit it, only to see my boat take down the huge pot. I cleared about $150 on that hand alone and coasted around the table 3-4 times taking down a couple of pots to walk away +$200 for that session, as I had to get Alan who had started to fuss again.

By the time I get back to thecomputer with Alan, the table had collapsed and I was forced to head off to another table to push my luck on the night...found one seat open at a 10 seat table and waited for the BB to come around. No amazing hands to talk about, just some tight play and a couple of good hands that stood up and I finish at 10:30 with another $100 in profit. Alan was cheering me on the whole time as I added to the bankroll.

Man...was so nice to write about a positive night. Looking forward to dealing at a tourney this weekend and catching up with some local players, then hanging with not one but two sets of old friends that will be in Columbus this weekend for various events. Hoping to catch up with Dave and Amanda on Sat morning during their tourney and then Jeni and the gang from Toledo down at Easton with Todd's band. Going to be a great weekend.

ttfn.

Ups and downs this weekend

had some time for poker over the weekend. Played on a great 5/10 table on UB on Friday night...was hitting every hand I played and walked away with $300 over the course of about 30 minutes. Was a great session.

Proceeded to give most of it back over the rest of the weekend. Had a set cracked when a numbnut called two re-raises on his gutshot draw and hit it on the river....no pair, no flush, just a gutshot to fill his K high straight when the Q hits on the river. Then when I complimented him on his chase he responded that "this wasn't the time for lessons"....So I proceeded to crack his KK a few hands later when I hit my flush on the river with 7-10s. This opened a pretty cool dialogue between us that was very cordial. He admited to chasing the straight as I chased my flush, so we were cool.

Lost to some other weak players....had my AKs busted when I missed on the flop and turn, betting both times only to get called down by K6s that catches a 6 on the river to pair up and win the pot. No mind you, there was no flush on the board that did show a Q and a 10, so I had the straight draw, but he had nothing at all and called down to win with a pair of 6s. Bah.

Anyway, pretty much back where I started at the beginning of the weekend, but did once again prove that I can still play this game and will continue to work on building the bankroll in the coming weeks.

ttfn.

February Review and March Goals

Well....dug myself out of my hole a bit from Jan with a +$500 to the bankroll in February. Didn't get to play as much as I would have liked, but I'll take it after the disaster that was January.

Wanted to play a bit last night, but UB was done, so I was relegated to playing .05/.10 no limit with the 2.50 I had at all in poker. Had is the key word, as I donked off the $2.50 in about 20 minutes at a shorthanded table that was seeing every flop. Lost the last $1 when my JJ ran into Ax and he spiked an A on the turn to bust me....oh well, donkey poker at the best.

Been spending alot of time house hunting over the last couple of weeks. We've setteled on the Granville area for the school system...going to push our finances a bit, but will be worth it in the long run as the kids will get a great education....that way they can take care of Jen and I when we get old(er).

Not much else to write about. I picked up the last trim pieces to finish the basement, so that should be done soon. I'll probably cut and hang the pieces tomorrow night and then stain & finish when the weather warms up a bit.

ttfn.