our house caught on fire

Last week our house caught on fire.............

I live at the beach house with my brother for the summer, but this weekend the house was pretty packed. My parents were here for the month, and my sister and niece had come down for the weekend, along with my sister's friend and her little girl. My brother was out of town for the weekend, so my sister's friend Gale, and her daughter Macy slept in my brother's room.

I went to bed early, I was extremely tired. I fell asleep at around 12:30 AM, which if you know my schedule is realllly early for me. At around 4 o'clock I woke up. I was wide awake for some reason. I was tired but was sitting up wide awake. I tried to get back to sleep. 4:20, I'm laying in my bed kind of still awake, and the fire alarm goes off. The fire alarm had gone off a few times earlier this summer because of the batteries. Sometimes it would go off in a minute by itself, or else we'd change a battery or something. So I layed there in bed for a second getting ready to get up and go see what battery needed to be changed. All of the sudden I hear, "SOMEBODY PLEASE HELP US, THERE'S A FIRE!!!!" It was Gale. I jump up from my bed and sprint down the hall. When I got to the room I could see it was filled with smoke. Macy, Gale's little girl was crying. My dad had gotten there just before me and was helping Gale put out the fire. A battery pack for a DVD player that was charging had overheated and exploded, and set on fire. It was real smoky but Gale had pretty much gotten the fire out. I went over to the window to open them up since the room was filled with smoke. All of the sudden there was a huge BANG! The other piece of the battery pack exploded and set off another fire that shot up about waist high and set the carpet on fire. I grabbed the blankets/mattresses and pulled them away from the fire so they didn't all set on fire. My mom yelled for me to call 911. I ran in the other room and grabbed the phone to call 911. I picked it up to dial and it says, "searching...". I hung it up and tried again, "searching...." WTF. For some reason the phone wasn't working. I sprint down the hall and grab my cell. I dial 911 and literally as soon as I finished saying our address to the operator I can hear sirens. Ridiculously fast response time. I run back in the room to see if my dad needed help with the fire but he'd kind of started to suffocate it when I went to call 911 and he'd been able to put whole thing out by the time I got back in, but we weren't sure if anything else was going to blow up or catch on fire, so we took the kids outside.

Luckily there wasn't another fire after that. The firemen came in with some sort of device to make sure nothing was hot behind any of the walls since some of the stuff that went shooting across the room from the battery pack could have gotten in a wall or something, and also the wiring could have been affected. The head fire guy stuck around for a while to take pictures, etc... After everyone finally cleared out, my dad and I spent the next 3-4 hours cleaning out the entire room. We had to move and clean everything since soot was everywhere. The damage could have been a lot worse, but the carpet was ruined and the wall was pretty messed up, so the carpet had to be replaced, walls painted, etc... The closet door actually had plastic from the battery pack that had shot over and melted onto the door. There were pieces of it all across the room. After we got done cleaning I blew my nose and soot came out.

It was around 9 am or so. I thought maybe I'd try and get a couple hours of sleep, but the adrenaline from the fire was still kind of going, so I figured I might stay up for the day. Nothing like a small house fire to start off the day. At some point while we were cleaning Macy wanted to come in and look again at the damage. Since we were in the middle of cleaning and there was still soot we didn't want her to walk around in there since she might get soot on track it around the house. She started walking in and I told her to wait a while.

Macy: "why"
Me: "we're cleaning in here"
Macy: "why are you cleaning"
Me: "because it's still dirty in here"
Macy: "why is it dirty"
Me: "because there was a fire, we're still cleaning it up in here. you can come check it out in a little while"
Macy: "why was there a fire"
Me: "because the battery pack exploded"
Macy: "why did it explode"
Me: "i dunno, good questions though, I like where you're head's at."
Macy(looking confused): "thanks"
and then she walks away.

Luckily no one got hurt. I was gonna send my brother a text message that said, "hope you're having a good time. p.s. your room caught on fire." My mom told me not to though since she thought he'd stress out.

lil tourney action, lil sidebet action

There's a March Madness style heads up tournament that I'm involved in right now. 64 players, $250 entry. It's pretty cool since a lot of the players in the tourney know eachother, so it's more of a fun tourney than anything else. Here's the bracket:

http://www.bracketmaker.com/tmenu.cfm?tid=236092&tclass=SSNL%20HU%20Tourney%202007

I've played 2 rounds so far and gotten past my first two opponents, so I'm into the Sweet Sixteen. Each round you play a best of 3. Here's the payout structure:

1st = $5.25k
2nd = $3.5k
3-4th = $1.75k
5-8th = $750


I also have some side action on the tournament. I'll probably end up having around $1,000 in side bets once the tourney's over. One bet is with "gimmetheloot" for $250. We each picked 6 horses for the tournament, both of us keeping ourself, so basically 5 other players. We picked like a draft so once we selected someone they were off the draft board and unavailable for the other person to select. Here's how it ended up:

my horses:

carrotsnake, idonkedyoo, 23act, nirzhar_k, sputnik3000 and myself.

gimmetheloot's horses:

danj, nuggetz87, pbjaxx, nolves, fonkey and himself.

So if one of our guys wins the tournament that person wins the $500. If none of them win then nothing gets paid out.


I have another bet with nirzhar_k that's pretty much the same type of bet. We're betting $200. Here's our guys:

me:

carrotsnake, sputnik3000, pbjaxx, idonkedyoo, 23act, me

him:

0evg0, danj, nuggetz87, mused01, kaz2107, him

I gave him 1.1:1 odds on this bet. He didn't know the guys very well.

Also did a bracket bet where a bunch of us put money in and filled out the whole bracket and based on a points system winner takes all.

golfing

Been golfing a decent amount lately. Trying to become a decent player again. I used to golf all the time one summer in like 8th or 9th grade, and became a pretty good golfer, but over the last 9 years or so have only played a couple times a year on average, so I'm not very good.

I decided I want to become a good golfer. I went to a well known golf store(I think it was called GolfSmith's or something like that) and I spent $1,300 on new irons, driver, etc.... it was sweet cause they have a place set up to test out the clubs, so I got to hit a ton of balls with a bunch of different clubs to see which ones I liked best. My clubs were pretty old and I decided I should have an upgrade if I was going to get back into it. Since I play poker for a living, I have a lot of free time to do whatever I want, and since I live in Arizona most of the year I'll be able to golf all winter, which will give me a chance to become good, especially since there's a golf course a few blocks from my house so I won't have any excuses not to go play.

I went golfing on Thursday with my Dad, and I hit more houses(2) than fairways, so I have a long way to go. I'm pretty sure that was a personal record though; I don't think I've hit 2 houses in one round before.

If I decide I'm definitely going to go all out and get good at this crazy game, I'm going to hire a golf pro for some lessons. Golf is a lot like poker. It's extremely frustrating at times, and very fulfilling at other times. Probably the biggest similarity is both are definitely addicting.

vegas: the day at the venetian continued........

I get down to the table and Garrett decides he'll quit for the day and start drinking with me. As I'm waiting for Garrett to finish playing up to his blinds, guess who walks by me. You guessed it........... Jamie Gold himself, 2006 WSOP Champion. He heads in the back room for a 50/100nl game that's going on. A couple other players I recognize back there are Phil Laak and Gabe Thaylor. I walk back and check out the table. Jennifer Tilly(the actress turned poker player) aka Phil's girlfriend is sweating Phil.(she was in "Seed of Chucky"- the crazy doll; and a bunch of other movies) I'm like the only one standing around watching the game. Jennifer looked over and I'm pretty sure she was undressing me with her eyes. I'm not sure. I went to see if Garrett was done cause Phil was there and I didn't want it to get awkward.

Garrett is finished. He cashes out and we go look for some drinks. We walk around, check out some sick, sick photos. They were like huge professional photos of beaches, islands, things like that. They were all lit up and it seemed like you were actually there they were that sick. I'm definitely getting a bunch of them when I get rich. We are walking around drinking, and decide we should play some blackjack. We are just kickin it playing blackjack, talking with other poker players at the table(basically everywhere we went there were other poker players who came to Vegas for the WSOP, so was pretty cool)

Quick interruption/funny story:

We are eating in a nice little place in Venetian earlier in the day for lunch, and we are eating at a table next to some basketball players.(not sure who they were) Anyways, a couple waiters are asking them about basketball or whatever at their table. Our waiter asks us if we play poker. No clue how he knew.(He said he thought we "looked like poker players.") I dunno how you can look like poker players but I guess you can. One minute later we are getting wayyyyy more attention than the basketball players. It was funny/odd. Our waiter told his waiter buddies that we were pros. A bunch of the waiters came over and were asking us about being professional poker players, etc.... Was really weird. The basketball players were left waiterless. Was funny in an odd way.

So anyways, we're hangin out with some other poker players, playing blackjack, ordering drinks every time we see a cocktail waitress. I am ridiculously drunk after a while of this, since I had already drank quite a bit before we started playing blackjack. Fast forward an hour or 2. I dunno what time it is, but some chinese girl sits down next to me and starts playing. It's kind of blurry from there but she tried to make out with me at the blackjack table, and turns out she got kicked out by the Venetian security. Garrett made sure to remind me of this and make fun of me in the morning, and many other times throughout the day. I don't remember getting back to the room.(I left before Garrett) I remember doing really well playing blackjack, but don't remember cashing out my chips at all. Did the chinese girl take them!?!? Did I leave them at the table??????(ohhhhhhhhhhhh shiiitt there was some poor dude who kept celebrating for me when I won hands and asking me for money. he rob me on my way out??) Who knows. When I woke up I quickly looked for my wallet. I opened it up and it was filled with money. Sweeeeeeeet. I was so relieved. As I jumped back into bed ridiculously tired and hungover Garrett starting counting out a bunch of money and handed me a big stack of $100s. Turns out I had lent him thousands of dollars the night before and didn't remember.

Good times.

vegas: the day at the venetian

So we decide to try the Venetian out since we haven't played there yet. Finally we get called into the must move game and it's 5 nits, myself and Garrett(ya, I dunno why they took so long to call us either) So we've been playing for 10 minutes or so, nothing too exciting has happened. Older man who has raised pre-flop before and folded to a 3 bet, decides to try raising pf this time. I have A2 on the button, and I 3 bet him. The sb cold calls $120, and everyone else including the older guy folds. Heads up to the flop:

Flop: K-T-3

He checks. I check behind.

Turn: J

He checks. I bet $150. He calls.

River is a blank. He checks and I fire $300 into his ridiculously obvious QQ. He thinks for a while and finally folds. I flip up my cards and show my bluff, trying to get some action going at this very nitty table. He says, "bet you can't guess what I had." "QQ," I said. He is impressed, strokes my ego and lets me know that I am correct.

Then, instead of pushing me the full pot, the dealer attempts to take $42 out of my pot for a time pot. When I tell her that I just sat down, and that no time pot was announced she called the floor.(Normally when players sit down they either, A. pay the time($6), B. pay half time($3), C. don't have to pay time since they just sat down, and are often allowed to play until the next time) None of these options include paying everyone else's time in an unannounced time pot that we definitely wouldn't have agreed to playing with 5 nits.(self-explanitory, but I'll explain this in a second) So this floor guy comes over(younger guy) He asks what happened and the dealer said everyone was doing a time pot. I tell him that I just sat down and never heard of any time pot/and wouldn't have agreed to a time pot anyways.(when time pots are being done, players either agree to them, or they pay the time- since we had just sat down we did not know any time pot existed- so obviously we wouldn't be a part of a time pot that we weren't there for) He says in a condescending manner, "sir here's how a time pot works- what happens is instead of paying time, the person who wins a certain sized pot will pay the time for everyone. see thats how it works. does that make sense to you?" If I dislike anything, people talking to me like that is definitely up there. I politely explained I knew how a time pot worked, but we were new players to the table, so IF we had to pay any time, it wasn't a time pot for everyone that we knew nothing about. He was still talking to me like I was an idiot, but finally realized that he was actually the idiot and agreed that Garrett and I could pay time.

Quick tip for when/when not to be involved in time pots: the table we were at was full of nits.(nits for those reading who don't know the poker lingo are very, tight players. meaning they don't play a lot of hands, and don't put a lot of money in.) Garrett and I would attempt to run over a table like this, and so this would mean that we would be paying most of the time pots just between us. So instead of paying $6/ 30 minutes to play poker there, one of us would probably end up paying $42-$60(depending on # of players)/ 30 minutes to play there, because we'd be getting involved in most of the pots, and winning the majority of them over the course of a session. So we could easily end up paying $500 in rake instead of like $50. If it's a full table and everyone's doing a time pot it's usually the friendly thing for everyone to do the time pot to keep the game moving, etc... If it's a shorthanded table with guys who are never going to have to pay a time pot because they are waiting for aces it's a horrible decision to be in a time pot. If I were a very tight player, I would love to be in time pots, because it would mean I could play poker for free without having to pay time until I woke up with a huge hand.

I probably explained it way more than I had to.......so anyways..............

Finally we get called from the must move game. I rack up my chips, grab my phone, water, etc... and head over to the other table. I put everything down at my new seat and the player who just left there says he wants to stay there now. Floor says, "okay, you can stay." I have to go back to the must move game. wtf. So I'm repacking up my stuff, and another seat luckily opens up that I can take. So instead of having to go back to the must move the floor person tells me I can take that seat. Sweet. Now some other guy comes over and says, "no this is my seat." Floor guy had told him he could have it first. WOW. They send me back to the must move game. WTF. I had heard good things about the Venetian Poker Room, but seriously these guys are idiots. They probably are good, let's just say it was variance, but wow. Left a bad memory about that room to me.

I'm as close to life tilt as I can get right now. I finally sit down and get my first hand: AA. That's one cure for potential life tilt. Some younger guy raises it up to $50. I make it $200. Folds back around to him and he calls. Flop is: 9-Q-3, 2 spades. He checks. I bet $250. He shoves. arhhhhhhhhhhhhhhg. Live players can have anything, so I really don't have a range for him since it's my 1st hand at the table. He could have a set, KK, AQ, KQ, flush draw, straight draw, etc... I call. he flips over 99. He scoops the $4,000 pot. Life tilt. I get up and go for a walk. You can't walk off life tilt. I decide to drink it off. I find a bar upstairs and ask the lady to make me her strongest drink. She does. I text Garrett and tell him I'm done playing for the day. I come back down to the poker room............

more vegas......

Figured I'd post a bit more about the trip in Vegas:

One night we are playing some 5/10nl. Some guy comes up to the table with a girl and says in a really foreign accent, "do you mates mind if the lady watches while I play." We say of course not, and I grab a chair that was behind me for him so his girl can sit down. He says, "thanks mate."- in the awesomest accent ever. I think he was from the UK. A lot of the guys playing the cash games in Vegas were from other countries because they were in town for the WSOP. Often the majority of the table was made up of foreigners, and only a couple people from the US. I start talking to him(David), and he is wasted. Every other word he's swearing. It's pretty funny. Not in a negative way, just randomly in sentences. We are playing at the MGM, and they are the most hardcore poker room ever about not swearing. The dealer mentions to him to stop swearing. "Was I swearing?" he asked. She nodded. "Ahhh fuck, I didn't even realize it," he said. I'm sorry, I'm just so fucking pissed," he said with a big smile on his face. I said, "you seem pretty happy to me." Turns out pissed where he's from means drunk. This guy was the happiest guy ever. Everyone's loving this guy, as he continues to accidently swear a couple times per sentence.

He asks his girl if she wants to play. She wants to. "Are you sure you know what you're doing?," he asks her. "I'm really good," she says. He reached in his pocket and gave her $500 to play with.

So, after the first few hands it's pretty obvious to everyone at the table his girl has no idea what she's doing. "What the fuck are you doing!?!?," he says after she loses some more of the money. He's saying it in a drunkenly friendly manner, but it's pretty funny because anything she does he's doing commentary on it. She limped in every hand, which is pretty terrible as you know if you play poker. "Why are you LIMPING???? Raise!!! I'm going to raise you just to show you how bad that is," as he raises it up. He literally did this like every hand, while swearing at her in his crazy accent. The table was loving it. Since this guy showed up the table was in such a good mood, we decided to order a round of shots for everyone. I'm pretty sure he swore lots to find out where the cocktail waitress was since she was taking a long time. The poker room manager came over and asked him to leave. He pleaded with him to stay, and said he wouldn't do it anymore. He said, "no," and said she had to go. The whole table pleaded with the manager so that David and his girl could stay, cause they were a blast to be around. Finally the manager agreed to give them one more chance . "Fuck, thanks guys. I don't even mean to swear I just do." "Don't fucking swear, or we're going to get fucking kicked out of here," he said to his girl as the manager was walking away. Luckily he didn't hear him.

We finally got our drinks, and I pick up AK. There was a bunch of limpers to me, and I think I made it $100. Somehow I got like 6 callers, one of which was obviously David's girl, who played just about every hand, and somehow still had a bunch of money in front of her. The flop was K-K-6. The pot was around $700 and his girl donked out $50 first to act. David just about falls out of his seat laughing. "What the fuck are you doing!?!? You're not going to scare anyone betting $50!," he says to her, continuing to make fun of her in his awesome accent every hand. There's 2 hearts on the board, so I decide with another 5 people behind I'm just going to bet my hand hard. I reach next to my chips and grab my stack of money. I pull off 7 bills and throw them out into the pot. Everyone folds back around to the girl. She quickly and confidently takes the rest of her chips and pushes them into the middle before flipping up AQ. Obviously this was followed by David telling her how terrible she is and everyone at the table laughing hysterically. The dealer pulls the money into the pot and deals the Turn: T. Burn card. River: J. She hits a straight, and scoops the $1,700 pot as the table goes ballistic. I couldn't even tilt, we were having such a good time. She said, and I quote, "it was woman's intuition." Solid.

No way I could get mad at her. She was very good looking and a lot of fun to be around. She even reached her hand out after to shake my hand. haha. I love these foreigners.

Anyways, fast forward 30 minutes and all the money she had in front of her was gone. She said goodbye, and left. David kind of ran off and talked to her for a minute as she was leaving. He came back and we started talking some more. Turns out, he didn't even know her. He met her in a club that night, and got drunk with her, and decided it'd be a good idea to stake her to play poker.

By far one of the most fun nights of poker I've played.

update

more posts on the way. i'll post a lot in august. had lots of family visiting and had other stuff going on like looking for my golf balls in the woods.

i'll post updates soon on poker, the duplex i'm buying/trying to buy, more vegas stories, upcoming trips, etc...

stay tuned