Betrothed and Bedazzled

I'm what you might call a lucky bastard.

I asked, and she said yes.

Happy, happy, and more happy.

There's not much more to say! :)

10:57 PM - 8 Comments - 12 Kudos - Add Comment

Funniest Person In My Own Head

This post is mostly for my friends that either live far away, have busy lives (or just lives), or just couldn't get there on that Monday -- but here's a link to my set from the Funniest Person In Austin Contest! If you like it, forward it to friends (not over company email, idiots), as I'd like to get as much feedback as I can. If you don't like it -- for the love of God don't burden your friends with it!

Comics -- you probably either already saw my set or just don't give a flying rat's arse.

A little backstory which will explain my first comment from the set -- I was the last of 17 comics to perform that night. Strike one. The comic who went up right before me was struggling badly, and then 2 different jerkholes in the audience started heckling him, and he started insulting them back, and his whole set became about that. Strike two.

However, I think I brought some confidence and energy to the stage, deflected the mood in the room by acknowledging the mood when I got up there, then turned it around. I am personally very proud of this set. Solid double to drive the show home.

I do need to drop a few lbs. again, but my set wouldn't have been any better for it. I did not advance, but there were many great performances on my night.

All in all, I was happy with my performance (which doesn't happen often), garnered the respect of some of my peers whose opinion I respect, and had a good warm up for my feature spot downtown @ the Velveeta Room next week! That's right, a half-hour of Seanie!

Currently listening : Metallica By Metallica Release date: 12 August, 1991

11:43 AM - 3 Comments - 6 Kudos - Add Comment

Updates

Just finished moving into the new house with Dawn! After 1 1/2 weeks moving in and about 2 weeks setting up, we have a functional, cozy, and (if I do say so myself) freakin' cool place to live! Cohabitation is often a challenge for couples, but our proximity has done nothing but fan the flames of l'amour. C'est magnifique!

While my live game continues to pay dividends, the attack on online poker by the US Gov't has dried up an extremely lucrative side stream of income. Not only did they make it nearly impossible to get funds to and from online poker sites, they froze the assets of Neteller, a company which processed the transactions between banks and websites. If my money were in either my bank or my poker sites, that would have been fine. As it was, my entire poker bankroll got stuck with many others when Neteller was forced to pull out of the US market by our fabulous Dept. of Justice. I may never see that money again. I hope they break gavels off in their bungholes.

Just before I moved, my cat Shadow disappeared for good. He had gone on walkabout before, sometimes up to 3 days at a time. But once he passed 5 days as a no show, I started scouring the neighborhood and the shelter for him. No luck. He is gone for good. He was always a scrapper, so he may have finally met his match (grizzly), or maybe he just decided to hook up with another family. Either way, I still miss him tremendously. He was a good companion during many tough times for me.

Dawn has a cat, Zero, who is very cool. I just haven't connected with him totally yet. Think I still need some time to let Shadow go. Zero makes me think of him constantly.

Got a feature spot at the Velveeta Room coming up in April! Excited about that, great motivation to write some new stuff and polish off the old standards. With online poker out of the picture, it's time to use that time on becoming a stronger comic!

Sorry for the data dump, just wanted to get caught up!

11:23 AM - 3 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

For your reading enjoyment!

Please check out my latest online published poker article!

http://www.pokerpages.com/articles/archives/carey03.htm

On a side note -- my lady has mad poker skills. She played in the cash game with me on Wed night, and pummeled the table with bets until aggressive guys who started by calling her bets to try and bluff her later began to auto-fold when she opened the pot. She also relieved me of $120 when my flopped pair of aces went down in a flaming wreck to her flopped set of deuces. I have been assured of a free dinner to ease the pain. :) We both walked out healthy overall. Life is good.

8:42 AM - 4 Comments - 6 Kudos - Add Comment

Poker Article .2 is hot off the pixels!

http://www.pokerpages.com/articles/archives/carey02.htm

Check it out when you get a chance!

2:04 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

!En fuego!

The Roman philosopher Seneca, had this to say about luck --

"Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity."

Lately I have been prepared, and the opportunities have been there. . . took down a third big field tourney (270+ players) for a first prize cash exceeding any I've had thus far. I'm feeling very confident about my play (funny how positive results will do that), making smart, well informed poker decisions, AND the cards have been running my way. That makes for a tough to beat poker game.

To answer the obvious type question -- NO, I am not quitting my job any time soon. All it would have taken was one bad beat at the wrong time early in each of those tournaments and I wouldn't have seen dime 1 for my efforts. Just because I'm prepared doesn't guarantee the opportunity will meet me every time. I'll need to see a lot more consistency over time, and a lot more money stashed away before I'd ever consider making that move.

I'm lucky in more than one way. Not only have the cards been going my way, but I have been so fortunate to be surrounded by a few really good people who understand and support my forays into the poker world. My fabulous love Dawn, my friends Wade, Jeremy, and Natalie (and others) who often watch me play and live and die with some of my hands at the final tables, and my family are all directly responsible for a large portion of my recent success.

Without people who understand the ups and downs, support such an unorthodox means of improving ones lot in life, and really believe in both your potential and your ability to succeed in the moment, I don't think I could do it.

At any rate, watching dreams and goals manifest is a magical thing. I am blessed.

9:21 AM - 2 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Man's Christmas Weekend Rocks -- Film @ 11

Friday Night -- Began with a thwarted attempt to see the trail of lights when we failed to properly estimate the time needed to find a parking spot, felt bad because Dawn really wanted to go.

 Early show at the Velv was small but very very fun! Had a little passion for performing infusion, and I was happy that newer jokes that I merged into my set went over very well. Gutmann and Nancy Reed both had great sets as well. Then home for snuggles.

Saturday -- Lazy, lazy, lazy morning; it was a long week and I sorely needed it. Dawn went to bake more delectables for x-mas, and I spent a few hours hanging with my boy Jeremy (we've both been busy, not much time to chill).

I'm a beast of a X-mas shopper, I got almost all of it knocked out in about 3 hours. I keep my eyes and ears open in the weeks preceding, so when I do venture into the insanity of the final hour shopping season I know exactly where I'm going. The mall makes me extremely ill, so if I go in, it's a search and destroy mission, no occupation. A few well timed pieces of info from Mom filled in the blanks on the rest.

It's raining so hard when I leave the mall that I barely make it home safe, and get the call that the shows for the evening are cancelled. Bummer, right? Of course.

It's raining so hard that I don't feel safe getting from my place to Dawn's place to stay with her. Real bummer!

But, every exit is an entrance unto something else, and I decide to spend my xmas eve eve time doing, what else?? Playing cards! I enter a 773 person tourney, and 5 hours later I come out as the king of the hill! Another 4 digit cash, and almost twice as much as before. I'm starting to think I might have some genuine potential at this game. Since I've been writing poker articles, it's nice to have a little street cred -- I hate the adage that those who can't teach, and seek to avoid it as much as possible. Onward and upward; continuing to meet and beat new challenges in the poker world, and the time and focus I've put into learning the game is literally paying off.

Sunday -- Fun road trip with Dawn and Nola to Katy, bad-ass to see my family, and especially awesome to see my brother Matt who's been in Portland for close to a year. I miss him BIG TIME. We all hang out and have drinks and eat great food, and everyone, Mom, Dad, Matt, Colleen, me, and even Dawn(I am slowly luring her to the dark side, muhahaha) are hooked on playing Guitar Hero II!!! Sweet game, gonna have to pick it up so that there's something fun and interactive to do for folks who bust out on poker night.

Monday -- Presents opened, and I think I did a good job picking out stuff this year. People seemed to like their gifts! A fun quick visit with Wado and his family, which is always a blast -- I got his dad to shoot me the bird, sweet! Dawn snuggled with their new mini daschund, and a beer and good time was had by all. Back to pack up and head over to Uncle Rob / Aunt Sue's house -- they are amazing hosts, and we rock out on an awesome xmas dinner. Goodbye's delivered, get Nola back in the car, and jam out to some new Tom Petty and Radiohead in the car on the way home.

A fabulous end to the evening alone with my darlin', and a great night's sleep holding her close and a new soft blanket around us.

God bless us, every one. :P

7:18 AM - 1 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Tidbits and tidings.

-- Dawn has kept me happy with many delicious baked goods, she makes these peanut butter bon bons that I will punch people in the nose over. She hooked me up with Marvel Ultimate Alliance for the X-Box 360 (early "X"-mas present), so I will be happily swinging Thor's Hammer soon! (And no, that's not a euphemism. I don't think, anyways.) It's amazing how quickly and strongly we move through challenges together. A true partner.

-- Poker roller coaster. Sandwiched by some horrendous bad beats (including a 1 outer straight flush draw that hit and cost me $400), I managed to take down a $2700 1st prize in a 142 person tournament. Wicked sweet. My Jedi skills are growing.

-- Your mom reads my blog.

-- Yoga once a week has been both a challenge and a blessing. It's a good opportunity to do something really healthy and fulfilling physically and spiritually with my lady love, and also a good reminder to myself that it's not a competition. I'm used to getting good at things quickly, and this practice uses muscles and motions I simply have never developed. Zen mind, beginners mind. It's the sort of thing that keeps you young. :)

7:59 AM - 2 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Snapshots of recent events.

(click) Sean rubbing his belly after eating an awesome meal of stuffed porkchops, panseared green beans, and mashed sweet potatoes made by his lady love, a huge grin on his face.

(click) Dawn pointing out that there is fruit compote with whipped cream for desert, next to Sean with that pained but ecstatic look on his face that says "Oh, don't worry. I'll make room for it somehow."

(click) Sean being a trooper, muscles shaking during even the simplest pose, while all his classmates fold more easily than origami paper in a new weekly yoga class.

(click) Sean, after throwing his socks towards his pile of stuff at the beginning of yoga class and squarely hitting some flexi-straw of a woman's water glass, spraying water like a Jackson Pollack painting, sheepish grin on his face.

(click) Sean with eyes gleefully wide open, palms rubbed together, looking at a breakdown of his poker statistics, currently tracking at a +30% ROI (return on investment).

(click) Sean, Dawn, and Wade drinking mulled wine around a fire with Nadia and Shaun, listening to drums and didjeridoo(sp?) and generally getting an uber-wicked new-agey chill on.

(click) Jeremy in mid air over his couch as a Cowboys turnover turns into a Cowboys fumble recovery, with a lit-up face that reminds one of a kid racing down a hill on a Big Wheel for the first time.

12:14 AM - 1 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Bring on the critics!

Very excited, my first poker article is published online today!

Check it out if you're interested on http://www.pokerpages.com/.

(It's the featured article near the top of the page)

Now, I know that many people who I play cards with on Monday will read this and say, "Hey, you went out first last night!". :)

To them, I can only say three things :

1. I've won far more than I've lost on Monday night.

2. Dawn, my lovely lady who is absolutely crushing the game lately, plays the way I have outlined in the article even more closely than I do (except for bluffing early to build table image).

3. bpbpbpbpbpbtttt! (that's the raspberry noise, if you're phonetically challenged)

The reviews from this article, along with my next two, will determine whether I stay on board. Please cross your fingers that the poker public at large enjoys my work!

6:30 AM - 6 Comments - 8 Kudos - Add Comment