Lot of stuff has happened lately in my life, and I plan on posting an extensive entry -- but I'm back now!

How effing cute is my puppy? His name is Sherpa.

Hope y'all are having a great day!

Word,

Keith

Sweet... spring break is FINALLY HERE!!! I'm currently on Fripp Island, SC listening to the ocean. I'm staying at my parents' beach house with 3 buddies, and it's a really fun time so far. Here are some house pics.

The inside is really cool as well. The back of the house faces the 4th fairway on a fairly nice golf course around here. I went to the driving range for the past 2 days with my friend Ben (BKMcCorkle or something like that on CR, he's new!) and I plan on playing this course every day for the next four days. I'm going to play the hole that the house is on several times during the day. Outside of golfing, I'm planning on playing on the beach with my dog and just relaxing. I'm not planning on touching schoolwork at all until I get back in town and it's pretty much going to be a great, relaxing time.

Update on the girl situation: we have been talking more regularly and according to Jeff218, she'd be retarded not to know that I'm interested. And yet she's still talking, and it's actually getting easier to talk to her. All I have to do now is quit being a sandy vagina and ask her out.

Oh yeah, speaking of, well.. random stuff. I went to a new psychiatrist today who thinks I have Type 2 bipolar disorder. He wrote me 2 Rx'es and I'm already feeling really mellow and really even keeled, so I think it's going to be a good thing.

Onto a little poker?? Sure why not. While at the driving range yesterday, Ben and I started a system where we each got 3 shots and we worked on specific skill shots. We had a closest to the pin from about 30yds away, a long drive contest, a closest to pin from about 100 yds away, closest to the 75yd sign (I hit it once, shipppppp the cheddar!) and, using a bunker that was about 180yds away, an accuracy drill there too. Yeah, no poker references yet, but it's coming. I realized that I got a whole lot better by focusing on those goals as opposed to just going up and hitting the range balls. I think this can be applied to poker as well. I think the next time I sit down to play poker, I'm going to have a few set things that I'm going to focus on improving. My first two are:

1) Not making crying calls on later streets when I know I'm beat

2) Quitting AS SOON AS I reach anything lower than my A game.

"Elements of Poker" talks about being able to "quit better than your opponents." The way Mr. Angelo makes it sound, if I can quit better than the people that I play against, I make money and they lose. In his mind, money doesn't exchange hands if I hit set over set on someone (or some other cooler, setup hand), because, had the hands been reversed, the same outcome would have happened. Thinking about that has really helped me tilt less (ha, if you get it, you're in the club!) lately when coolers go against me.

Anyway, I have a long day of beer and golf tomorrow ahead of me. Good night kids, and good luck @ the tables.

Oh, and if you're on spring break this week... be safe, but dammit have a drink for Vintage!

-- Keith

Okay, so.. here's the deal. I have been thinking of trying to get back with my ex (refer to old blog entries, it didn't end well) almost nonstop lately. I don't know why it's creeping into my mind so much lately. It's definitely not b/c of Valentine's Day, because... well I dunno. It may be, but it doesn't feel that way to me. It's been almost three months since we broke up, and I think the three month gap is pretty much my "Tipping Point" as far as ex-relationships go. When I got with this girl, it was ~3mo after breaking up with another ex, and I had big problems at the beginning figuring out where my feelings lie.

I'm proud to say that, personally, things are very different for me than they were at the time of our breakup. I'll cliff note it for you guys. I was.... majorly depressed, not going to class, flunking courses, drinking ALL the time, basically letting myself go. Yeah. Ideal person, right? The anti-depressants+alcohol probably did me in the worst, as they would cause me to get really angry at anyone that was around me. At this point, I don't mind putting this on a public forum, because I feel it's important to be open, even though I still find it hard to forgive myself.

Now, although I still do drink more than I should (I am in college ya know...), I'm doing well in school (A- average this semester FTW!!!!!!), I'm good about getting up in the morning and going to class, and my Dr. has officially taken me off of the anti-depressants, saying that I have learned to handle things well enough at this point to take care of myself and adjust to adverse situations. That was a huge lift off of my shoulders, because I now feel so much more in control of myself than I have in quite some time.

The dilemma lies here. Things didn't end well with us, but it was pretty much completely because of the aforementioned problems I was having. In retrospect, I don't blame her at all for bailing. Also a retrospect thing, I really think that breakup was good for me and helped me get the help I needed. However, outside of those problems, we had a really special thing going. I want that back, now that the rest of my life is on track again. Question is, we don't talk a whole lot anymore. We are beginning to chat (just small-talk type shit, but better than nothing IMO), but nothing too lengthy. I'm still being very careful not to bring up anything about "us" quite yet, basically because I'm a huge sandy pussy and I am skurred. I'll get over that though, eventually scoop the sand out of my vag and talk to her about it.

But... what's my best approach? Some ideas I'm considering:

1) just keep chatting smalltalk with her and let her make the move (yes, im a pussy. i dont like this move, but its an option)

2) Just flat out ask her out. As friends at first, but something like going for coffee after class or something.

3) Send some sort of communication, whether it be phone, email, AIM, facebook, whatever, explaining how stuff is different with me.

I'm looking at a merge of #2 and #3. IMO #3 sounds way desperate, but as long as the end result is there (me getting at least another shot), I don't really mind sounding desperate if it gets the job done. It's like pounding Keystone Light. You aren't gonna go be proud to be drinking it, but it'll get the job done. Ironic, the alcohol reference. ANYWAY, I need some help. Since I was 15 (I'm nearly 22), I have been single for exactly 6 months, so my "game" is not really all that great. I don't really know if it's even "game" i'm looking for. I just don't know what the next step is.

When we broke up, she said "fix yourself and then we'll talk". I'm not sure if I'm 100% fixed yet, but damn it feels good to have control of myself again (and to be a gangsta).

Anyway, any comments are VERY MUCH appreciated. Haven't played much poker lately. 4 exams this week. Bleh. Good luck @ and away from the tables, and thanks for reading my ranting. I promise an entertaining blog of "random goofy shit I see on campus" is coming. It's in the works, and it makes me laugh, so endure this one, and the next will be more entertaining.

-- Keith

Phil Ivey would go busto eventually on a 5bi bankroll

That was something I mentioned to a friend of mine today, and I think it's one of the most overlooked aspects of poker. No matter who you are, you will never be able to succeed unless you manage your money well. That being said, the converse is also true: if you DO manage your money well, almost anybody can succeed. I have a friend that plays whenever he gets a paycheck in. He IMMEDIATELY goes to the games that "mean something" to him, rather than the games that he is properly rolled for. This usually means depositing 300-400 and heading to .5/1 6max or even HU tables.

I'm sure you can guess the outcome of this time and time again: busto. This part doesn't really bother me, honestly. I used to be very aggressive with my bankroll, especially when I had supplemental money coming in (i.e. paycheck that I could just dump online if variance went bad). The part that bothers me is that he goes broke, bitches to me about losing as a 70% favorite over and over. Then there's always the comment about "FTP's random number generator" or something like that, and I usually end up not listening by this point. I learned really quickly that it's very easy to string up several 70/30 losses in a row, thus making you go broke if you don't manage your money well. It's just very frustrating for me, because this guy is of well above average intelligence, and is a pretty solid card player. I kind of think the fact that he is still used to the uh... (soft is not a big enough word) games at pacific, and knows that people at low stakes generally play poorly, that he can "run up a huge roll" from 3-4 buyins. Sorry for the rant, just frustrated.

Weeeeeee Prop Bets!

So, when it comes to hanging out with my friends, I like to do some neutral EV gambling. Over the long haul, everything's gonna come out even. We don't do the bets for cash, so essentially that means that we humiliate each other at roughly an even rate. Well the other night was a sick/fun one. My friend John that I've known forever and is also a degen calls me up and says "I wanna do a prop downtown tonight". I'm immediately a little nervous, b/c John is the kind of guy where I can almost hear the "glare in his eyes" when he talks sometimes. He has something up his sleeve. So I humor him and listen. He proposes that we each get 1 hour downtown and try and get as many girls to kiss us as possible. I laugh it off, thinking "wow, could we be less mature, plz?" but he seems convinced. Long story short, I came up with a brilliant plan of attack, and thus accepted the bet. I proceeded to get 229 kisses in one hour. Life is good. I was cruising Youtube and saw an episode of Kenny vs. Spenny (btw... that show.. is hilarious IMO, but you gotta be in the mood for it) where they had the same bet. The guy that won it dressed up as a French guy (b/c they kiss on the cheek when they greet), and racked up. Well, I happen to be fluent in French, so the game was on. He didn't even get a hundred. The "humiliation" part of the story is good times, but I'm waiting on pics from another guy's camera. I'll post later.

School started again last week, and classes are awesome. The only thing that's weird is that MWF I start at 9am and T/Th I start at 12:30pm. Makes for a weird night schedule. I'm trying to make it to where I just get up around 7:30 no matter what, but it's not working out so well so far.

Anyway, good times. Gotta drive home and get my car back from the shop. I got ROYALLY screwed by the car repair people. First off, they promised the car back on 1/8 and I am just getting it today. Second, the repairs ended up costing nearly DOUBLE what they originally said, 6k as opposed to 3k. This doesn't mean much for me, b/c I just pay my 500$ deductible and go on, but the insurance company wasn't happy. And overall, I just got screwed around with by these people. Well, my father has been an insurance agent for 25+ years, which helped speed things along. It also got some extra cool stuff for me. They gave me a 100$ amazon gift card as well as COMPLETELY detailed my car free of charge (probably would cost 100 to get this same service). They also filled up my tank, topped off fluids, and changed my oil (I was almost at 15k miles anyway). So overall, I paid 500$ to get my car fixed, and I probably got 350$ worth of stuff from it b/c they screwed around with me, so I'm happy.

Everybody have a good day! wordddddd

Hey guys,

Merry Christmas! I hope you guys all had a good day w/ the people that you love. I've been getting gradually sicker over the past few days. I just got back from the dr., and I have walking pneumonia...ugh. So I'm on a potpourri of antibiotics and drinking a lot of water and catching up on BS television. I must've watched A Christmas Story 4 times yesterday.

As far as poker goes, unless the games were REALLY good, I haven't been playing much lately. I think I have logged 500 hands in the past 8-9 days. There are several reasons for this. Besides being sick lately and having lots of family stuff to do re: Christmas, I'm at my folks' house right now, which means A) using my mom's laptop instead of my desktop, B) having to live SOMEWHAT on their schedule, and C) no PT. Being sick is probably the biggest reason for my lack of hands lately, b/c I also have a double ear infection and I think it's messing with my inner ear. Either way, it's making it to where I can't stare at the computer for a long time.

I'm going to New Orleans on friday to watch UGA beat the shit out of Hawaii. If anybody wants to bet the game for a fun and reasonable amount, PM me, I'm down. Obv I'm taking UGA w/ the spread, but I'll also take over/under, which I think I'll get more action on, since I disagree with everybody's opinion of "Hawaii is gonna put up 100000 points!".

On the coaching side, I think I might have snagged a new student, but we're having a little trouble communicating b/c of the holidays. However, I do have a 2hr video lesson to sift through, so I'm gonna see how much of that I can do before my antihistimine kicks in. Peace!

Vint

First of all, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU to those who posted with advice, kind words, or just simply to let me know that you were pulling for me. I really REALLY appreciate all of the things that were posted. Please keep 'em coming, it's awesome!!!

So, I decided to wait a few days. She's at home with her family now, and I think that will be good for us both. We had a long conversation last night, that culminated in me saying the following:

"I am excited about the future. Yes, I know I screwed up a lot in the past, but for the first time in a long time I'm excited for the future. I know I have promised you that I have been getting better in the past, and that was good enough. However, I don't want you to commit to anything now. I want you to MAKE ME prove to you that I'm getting better."

I am gonna try and hang out with her as a friend and just have fun. I've always skipped the "friends" part of my relationships, and I think that might be my downfall, so I'm going to attempt to start from scratch (as much as that's going to suck b/c she'll be dating around, etc.) but I'm kinda going with the "If you love something, let it go. If it comes back to you, it's yours. If it doesn't, it never was" mentality.

In related news, I went to see my shrink yesterday, which was AWESOME for me. I always leave the psychologist's office feeling stupid. Sounds weird, but I always have a sense of "damn, why didn't you think about that before? how stupid!" However, I think that's the point of therapy, so I'm excited that I'm learning. The Dr. recommended a book, "Reposition Yourself" by Rev. T.D. Jakes, a mega-church preacher in Atlanta. Some of the stuff I have to kinda side-step some of the ideas b/c they aren't applicable to my life right now. However, the vast majority of the stuff in the book is really good. I'd recommend it for anyone that might have (or even had in the past) any problems with depression, or anybody that might feel like they are in a rut.

On a small sidenote, I went out with some old high school friends to Taco Mac tonight. If you guys aren't familiar with it, Taco Mac is renowned for their beer selection. However, I was the only one that didn't drink! Might seem like a small deal to some of y'all, but I was proud of myself. I've said that "drinking is the root of my relationship problems" and I'd quit for a little while, but whenever these types of social situations would come up, I would slip, so this is something that I'm pretty proud of.

ONTO SOME POKER! I don't know why people hate playing short stackers. I mean, I do... it limits your weapons as far as bluffing, stealing, semibluffing, blah blah blah. Basically, most people feel like their edge is smaller. However, I feel like the VASSSSST MAJORITY (almost 100% at low stakes, I'm not playing with 40putts here) of short stackers can't play for crap, so the lowering of edge b/c of their stack size is AT LEAST accounted for with their lower skill level. I saw some shorties playing .5/1 HU PLO with 20$, so obv I sat and printed the money.

Another reason I think that I don't mind short stackers... hit&runs don't tilt me at all. I see a lot of people, even high stakes pros, getting tilted more b/c of hit & run than anything else. I don't get it. The way I see it, if you have an edge, the fish will always be there, so whatever.

As for hold'em, I haven't been playing a ton lately. I'm at home with my parents on their shitty Dell laptop (I've already had to type this blog twice b/c of their ghetto computer), and haven't had as much time to play lately. nl50 players still don't like money. I think the way that they play is similar to a short stacker. You are a bit limited in some of the weapons you can use b/c they don't ever fold, but their lack of skill more than makes up for it.

Another reason that I haven't been playing as much is that I've been babysitting my nephew, Kaden (http://img529.imageshack.us/img529/8776/kadenchristmas2007oq2.j pg). He has a double ear infection and a case of croup (http://chil dren.webmd.com/tc/croup-topic-overview). He's a stud though!!! He's 20 months old and can count to ten (if you say "high five!" he says "six..." LOL), pick out letters, and a bunch of other cool stuff. I gave him my cell phone the other day and he put it to his ear and said "Hello? Hey! How are you?..... Otay, bye." Obv it's not very articulate, but it still makes me happy.

Anyway, THANKS AGAIN!!!! for all of the advice and kind words. Please keep 'em coming.

First of all, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU to those who posted with advice, kind words, or just simply to let me know that you were pulling for me. I really REALLY appreciate all of the things that were posted. Please keep 'em coming, it's awesome!!!

So, I decided to wait a few days. She's at home with her family now, and I think that will be good for us both. We had a long conversation last night, that culminated in me saying the following:

"I am excited about the future. Yes, I know I screwed up a lot in the past, but for the first time in a long time I'm excited for the future. I know I have promised you that I have been getting better in the past, and that was good enough. However, I don't want you to commit to anything now. I want you to MAKE ME prove to you that I'm getting better."

I am gonna try and hang out with her as a friend and just have fun. I've always skipped the "friends" part of my relationships, and I think that might be my downfall, so I'm going to attempt to start from scratch (as much as that's going to suck b/c she'll be dating around, etc.) but I'm kinda going with the "If you love something, let it go. If it comes back to you, it's yours. If it doesn't, it never was" mentality.

In related news, I went to see my shrink yesterday, which was AWESOME for me. I always leave the psychologist's office feeling stupid. Sounds weird, but I always have a sense of "damn, why didn't you think about that before? how stupid!" However, I think that's the point of therapy, so I'm excited that I'm learning. The Dr. recommended a book, "Reposition Yourself" by Rev. T.D. Jakes, a mega-church preacher in Atlanta. Some of the stuff I have to kinda side-step some of the ideas b/c they aren't applicable to my life right now. However, the vast majority of the stuff in the book is really good. I'd recommend it for anyone that might have (or even had in the past) any problems with depression, or anybody that might feel like they are in a rut.

On a small sidenote, I went out with some old high school friends to Taco Mac tonight. If you guys aren't familiar with it, Taco Mac is renowned for their beer selection. However, I was the only one that didn't drink! Might seem like a small deal to some of y'all, but I was proud of myself. I've said that "drinking is the root of my relationship problems" and I'd quit for a little while, but whenever these types of social situations would come up, I would slip, so this is something that I'm pretty proud of.

ONTO SOME POKER! I don't know why people hate playing short stackers. I mean, I do... it limits your weapons as far as bluffing, stealing, semibluffing, blah blah blah. Basically, most people feel like their edge is smaller. However, I feel like the VASSSSST MAJORITY (almost 100% at low stakes, I'm not playing with 40putts here) of short stackers can't play for crap, so the lowering of edge b/c of their stack size is AT LEAST accounted for with their lower skill level. I saw some shorties playing .5/1 HU PLO with 20$, so obv I sat and printed the money.

Another reason I think that I don't mind short stackers... hit&runs don't tilt me at all. I see a lot of people, even high stakes pros, getting tilted more b/c of hit & run than anything else. I don't get it. The way I see it, if you have an edge, the fish will always be there, so whatever.

As for hold'em, I haven't been playing a ton lately. I'm at home with my parents on their shitty Dell laptop (I've already had to type this blog twice b/c of their ghetto computer), and haven't had as much time to play lately. nl50 players still don't like money. I think the way that they play is similar to a short stacker. You are a bit limited in some of the weapons you can use b/c they don't ever fold, but their lack of skill more than makes up for it.

Another reason that I haven't been playing as much is that I've been babysitting my nephew, Kaden (http://img529.imageshack.us/img529/8776/kadenchristmas2007oq2.jpg). He has a double ear infection and a case of croup (http://children.webmd.com/tc/croup-topic-overview). He's a stud though!!! He's 20 months old and can count to ten (if you say "high five!" he says "six..." LOL), pick out letters, and a bunch of other cool stuff. I gave him my cell phone the other day and he put it to his ear and said "Hello? Hey! How are you?..... Otay, bye." Obv it's not very articulate, but it still makes me happy.

Anyway, THANKS AGAIN!!!! for all of the advice and kind words. Please keep 'em coming.

-- Keith

Dear CR,

This probably won't be easy to write, and will probably be pretty lengthy, but please indulge me. I have a great deal of respect for the people that read this blog. Not only at the table, but away from the table, I feel like this community has a great deal of integrity. So here goes.

In the summer of 2006, I started dating someone. We started off amazingly. I could see myself marrying this girl one day. However, during that fall, I was diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder (http://www.webmd.com/depression/default.htm). One of the primary symptoms of this disorder also puts it in a bit of a Catch-22: you are unmotivated to do many things. I was unmotivated to get better. Well, it was weird. I wanted to get better, but was unmotivated to work toward it. So while I was prescribed medications, I kinda sorta took them when I remembered, and didn't do much of the talk therapy that was recommended. As a result, the depression got worse. At first, I turned to alcohol to make me feel better. When that didn't work, I unfortunately took out a lot of my frustrations on my girlfriend, manifesting in some pretty bad emotional times for both of us.

See, when Prozac is mixed with alcohol, it causes some really adverse effects (http://www.webmd.com/depression/news/20061025/new-warning-effexor-overdoses). For me, I got angry, lashed out, and didn't remember it the next day. This continued for much longer than it probably should have, and I always apologized very convincingly, and I said that it would be the last time. Unfortunately, I was just too stupid to make myself better, and it turned to a vicious cycle.

Now, you are probably thinking "this shit's over, man". However, these were failrly isolated incidents. In between these times, we were amazing together. If it weren't for my personal problems, I would have proposed to her by now, and I've been told by her that she would have accepted gladly.

So, almost a month ago, this happened again. I was finally getting to the point where I was going to go get better, but I got some bad news unrelated to her and, I guess you could say I relapsed. I barely remember going to her apartment, much less anything else. Needless to say, she broke up with me that night.

The next day, that was my legitimate "light bulb" moment. I made appointments with both psychologists and psychiatrists, got information on anger management, and stopped drinking. I feel like I am finally making HUGE strides toward being the type of person that she originally fell in love with. The best part is, I'm not totally doing this for her. I feel like I owe it to myself to fix this once and for all, which gives me a great sense of power, something I've been lacking for a while.

So now we're on Christmas break. She has dated 1-2 guys like once, but nothing has come of it that I can tell. We went out once as friends about a week after we broke up, which was great until the end when we had a long tough conversation. At the end of that, I admitted to not deserving her. She agreed, and said "when you feel like you deserve me, come see me."

It's been about 3 weeks since that night. I feel like I deserve her again, as I am getting EXCELLENT remarks from doctors and such, but what is my play? I've talked to some of my friends about this, and the common consensus seems to be something like this:

Ask her to take her to brunch. Show up early, and with flowers. Take her somewhere medium nice (I was thinking of http://www.einsteinsatlanta.com/home.php). She doesn't know that I've stopped drinking (which I think was the ultimate source of our problems), so that would be something to definitely talk about. I'd tell her during brunch how I felt, and the steps that I have taken to get to the point where I deserve her again.

If things go well, we'll do something interactive. Either go to a museum (http://www.woccatlanta.com/), the GA aquarium, (http://www.georgiaaquarium.org/), or something more personal like horseback riding or just walking around a park. I don't want to go to a movie or something because I want a chance to talk to her and thus show her the "new" me.

I'm not worried about AFTER brunch, but I'm EXTREEEEEEEMELY nervous about the "speech". I need help with this. I'm not good at picking my ass up off the ground and proving myself to her, to be honest. I need to know how to be humble without seeming desperate, being confident without coming off as cocky, and to get her back, hopefully.

No matter what happens, I am very proud of myself for making this change. I know it will be huge for my own personal growth. However, as proud of myself as I am, I am 200 times as ashamed of what I screwed up. Please help!

Thanks for indulging me and reading this novel. It means a great deal to me.

-- Keith

So, just a quick update. I haven't had time to play a whole ton because of finals... bleh. BUT now I'm done with school for a month finally.

I'm convinced people at 50NL just don't care about money. I have been looking at some of the other games just for kicks and I think the players at nl100 are worse. Sucks, b/c I wanna do this right, but these guys don't do well for my style. I like putting pressure on, which doesn't help when guys are like "hmm.. AQ4 board, I have JJ, I'm all in" all the time.

Anyway, nl50 players suck. School sucks. My boss @ the high school where I work is being weird, and it's making me a little scared for my job. Yeah, and my ex of 1.5 weeks just spent the weekend in TN with a guy she just met. I run like Stephen Hawking in real life too.

On a positive note, I just got 2 new students :)

-- Vint

I'm playing good poker today. Running at 7bb/100 over the 1800 hands i played today. i love it. i feel like i have played well other than like 2 hands. if i can find the phand things i'll p[ost 'em.

i would be curious to see what you guys t hink about 3betting oop. do you always continuation bet??? i almost always do, but whats the conditions?