Good morning from San Diego! The view off the deck of my new place in the Banker's Hill/Hillcrest area:




Since the last entry, things have fallen into place quickly and easily out here. The cross country move actually turned out to be pretty easy - my computer, monitor, and skis all arrived here without any damage to them and my roommates made moving everything out of storage super easy. Since then, I've settled into a pretty solid routine. My roommates this time around are all fitness-oriented so despite the 24H Fitness being about a mile or so away, it hasn't been particularly hard to motivate myself to get into the gym. The only downside to this gym is that it's slam in the middle of Hillcrest (the gayborhood in SD) and my shoes are sparking more conversations than I was looking for LOL:




When peacocking goes wrong! I match the LGBT flag a little too well I think... Haha

Post-gym, I've gotten into the habit of grabbing a quick sandwich from one of the great places in the area (by far the best part about this spot in SD is that it's absolutely packed with delicious restaurants) and then making my way over to the Palomar Card Club, which is a tiny card room in SD that happen to run an enormous 300/600 mix game that in my 3 weeks of playing in has gotten as big as 600/1200 and usually plays 400/800 by the end of most nights. The everyday mix of games is: Badugi, Pot Limit Omaha 8-or-Better, Badacey, Badeucey, Stud 8-or-Better, 2-7 Triple Draw, 2-7 Single Draw and Pot Limit Omaha (not in that order). Its been a bit of an adjustment to suddenly have poker put me into an everyday schedule but the game starts at 12:30 or earlier M-F and you're shut out of the game if you get there late. After the summer's beating I was really looking to regain some poker dignity and I've been doing just that. I guess that I've only played 15 or so sessions so far, but I've been doing very well. The game, despite being regular, is a very good one, and I figure to continue playing while the opportunity sticks around. Already, we are seeing guys like Daniel Alaei, Eli Elezra, Tim Phan and others coming in town and making the games tougher so I gotta get the grind in while I can! Gotta keep trying to build mountains:




I'm a child I guess. For some reason I still find it really fun seeing how high I can stack the chips! Usually a sense of modesty kicks in though and I find the embarassment of being the idiot taking a picture of their stack outweighs the desire to do so.

So yeah, things on the poker front are looking good. A bunch of my friends have either moved to Canada or found other ways around the online poker ban, but I'm honestly pretty content grinding it out at Palomar, actually enjoying the majority of the company at the tables, and finding myself getting better and more confident at playing live poker. Otherwise, my time in SD has just been spent with friends that I really missed during my time in Boston - just golfing, lounging by pools, having drinks, playing with dogs, and all in all living the easy life..

Just to throw in a few more pictures, here's a shot from the highest point in San Diego, on Cowley Mountain, from a hike a few weeks ago:




The hike actually turned out to be tougher than expected; I definitely recommend it for those in the SD area looking to get out and hike a bit, since sand hikes onto local beaches aside, hiking spots are pretty lacking in SD.

And finally, I decided to upgrade my whip. I gave my old car away to my brother during my time in Boston since it was just sitting around doing nothing at my parent's place in NJ and my brother's then-current car was in bad shape. All in all a good deal for both of us since I now get the everyday pleasure of driving this:




Life is good :)

Hope you're all well, thanks for reading.

Cheers,
Mike

(follow me on twitter @gordolikeafox)