It just so happened that today was a string of coincidences that was a mix of anger and comedy. Recently I’ve been watching a bunch of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” episodes. In every episode, the plot develops in small steps and you can almost predict the ending until Larry David throws in a hilarious twist. I’ve watched at least 5 episodes in the past couple of weeks.

When I woke up this morning I was excited to make a great breakfast with all the the food I had bought last night at the grocery store. Usually the night I go I end up eating half the food I bought, but this time I had the self-discipline to hold back. However, all the dishes in the house were dirty. Upset that I had no ability to make breakfast, I made a cup of Kona coffee and watched sportscenter. Because I couldn’t make breakfast, I didn’t have enough energy to make it to the gym. The one day of the year that someone calls and asks me to go to the gym with them, I can’t go. At this point I’m pretty upset so I go to turn on some music and play poker.

My phone is ringing and I get to my desk just in time to miss a call from my Dad. Like all people over the age of 50, he leaves me a voice mail. He says he is at the dentist by my apartment, and that he wants to meet up after his appointment. He then also told me not to call him back because he was going to be in the dentist’s chair. I oblige, passing up playing poker because I’m under the impression I’ll be seeing him in an hour. Back to sportscenter, I’m getting frustrated with spending the day so far in my house. 2:30pm rolls around and he calls me back. He tells me he doesn’t want to really want to meet up anywhere but he wants to stop by just to say hello. However, my house is currently a mess and given the short amount of time I would have had to clean, I just couldn’t invite him over.

Embarrassed I said, “You can’t come over here right now, my place is in no shape for you to see it.”

We talk for a few minutes longer, prolonging the unfortunate realization that we just won’t see each other. My frustration grows.

As soon as I find out he is not coming over I hop right onto online poker. First hand I get dealt AA get it all in vs KK and lose. I wasn’t too mad because it was only a $20 buy in, but I decided it wasn’t my day for poker. I was in about 3 others and was making calls to massage places near me. I unregistered for all my other tournaments while I was booking an appointment. The first place I call is a place I have never been before, but is close.

I make an appointment for 5:30pm and at the end of the call the receptionist says, “Ok so I have you for 5:30pm with Orien, is that ok?”.

While mindlessly multitasking I reply, “yes”.

About 3 minutes into the next 5 minutes, I start doing some research. I look up all the stats about Orien and find out he is just some random dude at a massage parlor. I begin thinking to myself about the situation. Am I going to drop $100 for some random dude with no accolades to give me a massage? If I’m paying $100 I want a hot red head or a little Asian girl that can do handstands on my back.

I panic.

I quickly think of the most common excuse I can, and call them back. I tell them that I have just gotten called into work and I have to cancel. She responds optimistically almost assuming I was going to cancel. It makes me wonder if she won a bet or something.

Situation under control, back to playing 3 tables. I bust on all 3 in the next 2 minutes. However, the doorbell rings and its Fedex, giving me a check. I feel a bit of relief and decide that I am going to get a massage, at the place I have been going for the last several months. On the way I can deposit my check. I call up the other massage parlor, “Fu Shen”.

The lady who picks up seems to have spent all of 2 weeks in this country, and less time learning English. She knows almost nothing, understanding every 8th word I say. Let me just put it this way, It took 7 minutes to book the appointment. Finally after battling the language barrier, we come to an understanding that I have an appointment for 4pm, under the name Jeff.

I excitedly hop in the shower hoping for my day to turn around. On the way in to the bathroom I drop my towel on the dirty hallway floor.

I make it to the bank which is literally next to Fu Shen. There is only one ATM in kiosk, that accepts check deposits. I wait patiently while a girl exhausts every single option at the ATM before she withdraws her 20 bucks. Finally I deposit, snatch my ATM card, and I head into Fu Shen 5 minutes late.

As soon as I enter the hallway there is an awful smell. It smelled like some gross chemicals but not like bleach. Not even really sure how to describe it better as it was a first for me. There is a tanning salon across the hall and I just assume its that place. I walk into Fu Shen, and I greet the little Asian Lady at the desk.

I said hello to her optimistically, excited for my massage. She follows with, “hello?”. I pause for a second wondering why the hell she is saying hello as a question. I just continue the conversation and explain to her that my name is Jeff and I have an appointment at 4pm. The whole time she is just smiling at me and then just replies, “hello?”.

I don’t know what to say at this point. She stands up and walks over to the doors where I usually get my massage. I follow her by the door and she opens it up and there is a person getting a massage in the room. At this point I’m totally confused, I’m trying to get a level on this receptionist. Is she just messing with me? There’s just no possible way the person getting a massage could feel comfortable with me looking into the room. She then closes the door and just starts laughing.

I say, “what the hell”.

She walks me back to the front of the store where there is a clock. She says, “come back” in very broken English. I realize this is a strugglefest in the making, so I just say, “I have massage at 4, I am Jeff”, while holding 4 fingers up. She looks at me and starts laughing again. This was a weird and creepy laugh. She then ushers me over to the clock and points at it. She points at the little hand of the clock then points to 5 o’clock notch.

While pointing at the 5 o’clock she says, “You come back at 4″. I look at her and burst out laughing hysterically and saying yes,yes, yes, over and over again. “I’ll be back at 4 you crazy woman”. About 2 seconds into me laughing she just starts laughing again and nodding her head really fast. For about 5 seconds we were just standing next to each other laughing at each other. I’ve never laughed so hard in my life with an Asian lady.

After the 5 seconds is over we just pause. She doesn’t say a word and neither do I. She isn’t even smiling anymore. I look at her once more and leave without saying anything. I don’t think I’ll ever be going back.

The day is only half over.

I still don’t think I can win the bluff challenge unless I ship the major at the end of the month. But it doesn’t matter, the only thing that matters is showing you are capable, which I am.

I owe a lot of this run good/play good to taking Tuesday off. Instead of grinding for 8 hours I got a massage and a burrito, in that order. It is amazing what just 1 day off can do for you mentally and physically. After all, don’t you work as hard as you can during the week just so you can live for those days off?

Hopefully you are running as good as I am at the moment

Speaking of next level, I won the $50 rebuy last night on Lock for about $4,600. I went into the final table with more than half the chips in play, I believe my stack was around 200,000 and 2nd in chips had somewhere around 35,000. The key for me in that tournament was my bubble play. I got really lucky in that my whole table just wanted to cash. There was one point where I raised 10 out of 12 hands and took them all down preflop. So just about all of my equity in the tournament came from a 25 minutes span of relentless aggression…easy game.

The bluff challenge is underway on lock poker and it is awesome. This is one of the best promotions I’ve ever seen as people are playing either way above their limits, or 10x as much as they would usually play. Since everyone is going for so much volume, I’m going to let everyone burn themselves out this month and ship the rake race next month…good plan I think. I don’t think I have any chance of winning this competition, but I’d like to come top 10. Considering they don’t factor in rake back, sit n go grinders have a much smaller chance of winning than a heads up cash game player does. You can follow the challenge here….

http://www.lockpoker.com/challenge/

With that being said, what you talk about is going to carry the most weight in a conversation. When I’m meeting new people at a party I try to bring up a positive topic. A topic that will draw in everyone’s discussion, about a positive issue. I think when you engage a lot of people together, they will use you as a buffer. That means they will try to maintain a good relationship with you. When I don’t have a good issue to talk about, I’ll usually open with a joke so that people won’t feel awkward around me.

When talking, I want to hold the attention of as many people as I can. Talking to slow will bore my audience, and talking too fast will convince them I’ve had way too much Redbull. If I raise my voice too high I’ll be obnoxious and if I speak softly I’ll look like a bitch. The crowd and makeup of the crowd is the controlling factor.

I walk into a room, there are 4 girls including my girlfriend. I say, “Hey I must be Charlie, because you’re all my angels”. Instant hit.

I walk into a room 5 girls 5 guys, and use my friend Jesse’s joke. “Why does the chicken coop have 2 doors?…Because if it had 4 doors it would be a chicken sedan”. If someone says that it was a good joke, I then say, “it’s for the kids”. A great way to cap off a joke that is funny in every possible mix of people I can think of.

If there are more guys than girls in the room I’ll just talk about sports, you can’t go wrong there.

I’m not saying this is what you should do by any means. I wrote this blog trying to analyze my social situations. Sometimes its fun to look at the way you socially progress throughout a party. Some times, you meet everyone at the party or you’re that guy alone in the corner with a bottle of jaeger.

The next time you have a bad social interaction, think about the reasons why it happened. It might help you avoid another one.

What a tournament….the NCAA has to be the best I’ve ever seen it. Everyone has a losing bracket because every team is getting upset. I really want VCU or Butler to ship, I think Butler shipping would be one of the coolest stories of college basketball. Even though I had Kansas winning it all, I’m not mad they lost because they didn’t lose to a high ranked seed. Is there any format better than the NCAA tournament? Absolutely not, imagine if football did the same thing. The brackets would be outrageously fun for college football, and it would draw in so much more attention. The bowl games generate a ton of money via sponsorship, but way more people would watch if it was the tournament format.

Spring training for baseball is happening and I couldn’t care less.

Is anyone else getting completely dominated by allergies? They have to be the worst part about spring.

Aside from the very saucy rakeback deal I have with Lock, it is also offering very cool promotions. Every Monday night, the Lock pro “Jason Young” hosts a $20 super turbo tournament. It isn’t there for the super grinders, its just a fun tourney to talk trash in and make a few hundred bucks if you run good. Also, if you knock out Jason, which I did the first tourney, you get a $100 bounty. As the site gets bigger and bigger, more of the Lock pros will get to host a tournament. Which eventually means, I will get to host one…FUN!!! Although it would never be the caliber of the FTOPS, or the SCOOP, it would probably much more care free and enjoyable. Given that I would be the host I get to think up any format I want, and submit it to Lockpoker. I was thinking of a $30-$50 buy in 6 max shootout. Considering I play more 6 max tournaments than 99.99999% of all poker players, it would be suitable.

So, when/if the time comes to host. I’ll put up some links on here to sign up under my affiliate. I’ll probably even offer some sort of incentive like free coaching for an MTT, rake back, deposit bonus, or even an online stake…I don’t know just thinking on paper.

For those of you who read this blog that play poker, what would it take to make you sign up on lock? This is open ended for all sorts of suggestions, including hate from “the constipation”.

Happy friday!!!

International issues are so confusing. Are we at war with Libya right now? We drop missiles on them and issue a no fly zone, what does that mean? If we have jets flying over a country when they aren’t allowed to fire unless fired upon, what good does that do? I guess I’ll just leave these issues up to the politicians.

I’ve been looking into acupuncture for my growing carpal tunnel syndrome. All these places are charging $100 for just 40 minutes. What the hell is that? Maybe I’ll just google acupuncture and stick some needles in my forearm and see what happens. It can’t be that hard right? When that doesn’t work I’ll be forced to seek treatment, you really can’t mess around with this stuff. That’s just the side effects of a rake race though, what can you do?

I’m almost hoping that the next season of the NFL is canceled. These guys are arguing over making a few million and several million. I just don’t care anymore. It would probably good for the country to get off the sofa on Sundays and do something real. Also we wouldn’t have to listen to these smug ESPN sportscenter anchors talk about slavery in the NFL….GET over yourself ESPN.

For some reason when people bring up Cage, they mostly bring up his newest garbage. “Season of the Witch”, “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”, and “Bangkok Dangerous” are just a few of the titles where he is clearly just trying to get paid.

The real Cage brought us truly great movies. Just to name a few, “Fast Times at Ridgemont High”, “Rumble Fish”, “Raising Arizona”, “Leaving Las Vegas”, “Con Air”, “The Rock”, “Face Off”, “Gone in 60 Seconds”, and “National Treasure”. Clooney has great movies too, but for some reason he just doesn’t have the lead talent that Cage has.

As far as best actors ever go, I’m not ranking Cage in my top 5 but I give him a big pat on the back. Best actor of all time has to go to Danielle Day Lewis….thoughts?

Wherever you live its easy to get bored and you start to take for granted your every day comforts. For me, traveling has always been the best refresher. I like to meet new people, eat new food, and experience new cities. Even though Chicago and Fairfield weren’t as exciting as Paris or Rome, they both were a change from the cold snow swept streets of Boston.

Also, a great way to impress a girl is to take her some where. Even if its a day trip, being adventurous has its rewards.

Right now I’m looking to take a trip to the place with the best food. So far the best single meal I have had was in Paris. The restaurant was set at the top of a hill by the Sacré-Cœur overlooking the whole city. The best food overall was in Rome, which was all next level. I’ll never eat anything in America as good as the street food in Rome, just how it is. Got any suggestions for countries or states with good food?

top of paris…

So far this NCAA tournament the big east has been a real disappointment. They still have a couple of teams left but overall they haven’t been as strong as everyone said they were going to be. I never understood why people put so much weight on a team’s conference. Last year the ACC and whatever donk region Butler was from, both were in the finals. Both conferences were weak. I’ve had many debates with roommates and friends about the legitimacy of BYU and San Diego. They all say that BYU and SD are bold predictions because they played crap teams all year, even though they were two of the best teams in the country before the tournament started. The whole tournament is based on the idea that any team can win, that’s why its format is so damn good.

Even though I have both those teams going far, I still think the Jay Hawks are going to scoop this year.

ROCK CHALK!!!!!

I’d like to address the issue of prop betting. While I was in Vegas, anything you said jokingly, or not, about making a bet, was given action. I learned that my first time eating sushi in Vegas, when I said, “I’ll bet you $200 I can beat you in beerpong”. However, in a place where not that many intend to gamble, or care about it, the application of prop betting changes. With friends you have to structure your bet right. If the bet is too big, they will care too much and try to win it, or some people won’t even pay. The best way to make a bet is to do it small enough so the person won’t really care if they lose. That way it won’t deter them from normal activity and you can create bets where you have a solid edge.

Winning a lot of small prop bets is way more profitable and fun in the long run, than winning one or two big bets. Sometimes I’ll wager a losing bet, just so I get more motivation to do something I normally wouldn’t…something like playing 1200 sit n goes in a week.

Boston is crazy right now because there are so many drunken Irishmen. Its fun going to the bars and seeing everyone wearing green while downing, or drowning in, car bombs. Nothing beats day drinking, especially when a whole city is doing it. As far as all these negative comments on my blog go, did I take your money or something on the tables? Somehow people I’ve never met dislike me…weird.

I do encourage you to leave a comment of your most ridiculous prop bet, if you have one.

The weather is perfect right now, spring may have finally arrived. Due to my last post, I’ll try to leave reality stars out of my blogs. Apparently “the situation” brings out the best, and the worst in people.

My college basketball expertise peaked when I was a junior in high school. I picked Syracuse to beat Kansas in the finals and took down the $300 first prize. I remember how exciting it was to win $300 in highschool, I think this was the first real gamble I won. Which brings me to my real point.

Can you remember the first time you took down a poker tournament, or even a big bet? For me the first online tournament I won was my freshmen year of college, after maybe $2,000 worth of deposits. I finally won a $5 limit tourney on pokerstars for $1,000 I think. The next 50 racks of natty light were celebrated justly. However the money doesn’t matter, its the feeling of winning. Now if I ship a tourney for $1,000 its just standard variance. I’m looking forward to the day where I can say I shipped my first tourney for $100,000 and get that feeling back. After all, isn’t that why you play the game?

After last night’s roast of Donald Trump, America is questioning itself once again. How the heck does “the situation”, make more money than 99% of its citizens? Reality stars are truly bogus. The reason reality stars can’t ever eclipse their 15 minutes of fame, is because they never had talent to begin with. The only thing that makes them funny or entertaining at all, is their production team. Without the wizards that MTV has hired, he is just simply a dirt bag. Not funny, not nice, not even D list. It is insane how different people act when they are not in their element.

Anyways here is a really beat up version of the roast last night. I couldn’t find better quality, but it gets the job done. Try not to feel awkward while you watch this…

As far as the tournament goes I’m very excited for it these year because I actually get to watch it. Last year I was in Jamaica which was very fun in its own right and I’d much rather be there, but college basketball is awesome. Also it happens to fall on St. Patty’s day which becomes a 3 day bender in Boston. Good times ahead!!!

Companies like Microsoft are using the devastation to promote their business. They are donating money to Japan every time someone searches the web using Bing. People are tweeting that the Japanese deserved it due to the bombing of pearl harbor. Does any of this make sense?

Now that March Madness has hit in America the disaster has taken a back seat. People care more about having a solid bracket than the 100,000+ death toll in Japan.

So what does this say? Does it say we don’t care about Japan because of our history. Does it say that America is trending towards losing it’s humanity? Does it even matter, should we care? At what point do you have to stop thinking about yourself, and give up whatever you can to help those who are backed into a corner? Maybe you never do, maybe you should just focus on your final four. I don’t know the answer because its much more complex especially if you go on a case by case basis. I will say that I care about whats going on in Japan 10 billion times more than what verbal diarrhea Charlie Sheen is spewing….and for the record he isn’t winning, and if you think he is than you don’t know what winning is.

: of, relating to, or having the characteristics of an epic

a : extending beyond the usual or ordinary especially in size or scope

For some reason everything has turned into “Epic”. Bro, that party last night was epic. Do you have any hot sauce, that would be epic. Charlie Sheen is unleashing epic quotes on twitter right now…

As our vernacular changes so do the value of our words. The word epic no longer has any worth when describing something overwhelmingly outstanding. After all, if that party last night was truly epic, than how would you describe the, “The Iliad and The Odyssey”? Super epic? OG epic? Down right dirty epic?

Language is a way to benchmark our times. Throughout history The art of tongue has been used mostly to seduce women, but also to persuade men. We all are going to die and as far as I know, nothing will matter to us when we are 6 feet under. When our grand kids are learning about the current generation, the best way to describe it would just be to sing the word “epic”, then auto-tone it. You heard it here first, in this epic blog!!!

The point I’m trying to get to is that Anna’s and Chipotle represent an idea. Anna’s is a small but growing burrito chain in Boston, while Chipotle is a national powerhouse. No matter how many arguments I partake in, the resounding vote seems to be split EVERY time. People who love Chipotle will pass up all other foods just to eat it, and the same goes for Anna’s. I will never eat Chipotle again, at least in Boston.

Given the two restaurants are so similar, shouldn’t residents want to eat at the locally founded business before the national brand? Or do people just not care?

For me there was just one thing to turn this scene around. Countless hours of grinding in front of a 27 inch monitor with no regard for life. Tunnel vision towards a goal just out of ordinary reach. The only real thing that changed day to day was the music I listened to. I had all the motivation I needed, to stack fish every day. After all, the money you make in winter determines how fun your summer can be.

Now the Spring is upon us. I set a goal this month to make $30,000 with an average buy in of $32. Right now I’m doing well on my way to completing that goal owed to all the rake back bonus I receive. My goal is to have $14,000 of profit, and $16,000 worth of rake back. That’s it, no big score no big risks, true grinding. I don’t care what people say, true grinding is the hardest form of poker.

In April Lock poker and Bluff are running a competition. The idea is simple, whoever makes the most money on the site wins. The winner receives a cover on Bluff Magazine and a Lock sponsorship. I’m wondering if it will take over $30,000 to win. Anyways, I’m going to give up 24 tabling and really go for profit because I don’t think rake bonus will count towards the win.

Daily blogs coming…

Last night our whole house went out drinking and I got pretty banged up. There is nothing like returning to O’sheas for some back hall beirut…especially when you win $20 off of some Dutch boys. Oh did I mention I lasted less than 2 orbits in the WSOP $1k, fun!!!

So far on the trip

Live poker -$2300
Online poker -$400
Pit games $-100
beer pong +$20
Massages -$50

Day 1 of Vegas and I started playing the WSOP sngs. I got it in good a lot but got it out bad equally as much. I ended the day stuck about $300 after winning some online, but the field was so bad. The $175 sngs have a really good structure. The blinds start out at 25 25 with 15 minute levels and you have 1k starting stack. One of the first hands I played I limped under the gun +1 with pocket kings, and the button raised to 150. I jammed and he called with pocket 8s, it was disgusting. Another play a guy made he opened under the gun to 250 with 25 25 blinds, my friend jammed with AK and the guy called with AJ.

Well today starts my WSOP 2010. The $1000 buyin is just about 2 hours away and I’m very excited. I got a ton of sleep after grinding 10 hours yesterday and never felt better. Also all the bracelets and watches for the WSOP are all displayed out in front of the pavilion. I talked to the creator for about 20 minutes yesterday and I was really impressed with his work. He also seemed like a really cool guy. Oh well, ship oneeeeeeeeee timeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!! No video today, I will tomorrow though.

It doesn’t take a good video to win the contest, only a bunch of votes. I do think a good video will help, but mostly its driving votes. Some kid already has like 800 votes so I have to make a video fast and I have to get on my social media grind.

Before I make the video, which I think I’m going to do tonight, I need some good ideas. Help me come up with a good idea. If you read this, give me a comment, one time!!!

Here is a link to the contest site Victory