Wednesday, August 24, 2005

Poker on the Backburner...I'm sick with the TRAVEL BUG!

Maybe I'm just a moron but I can't figure out how to put a picture up in my profile. I can send pictures and use them in posts but I can't put one up as my permanent picture. All my picture files are too big and I can't figure out how to shrink them. Oh well. Plain blog.

I'm in the middle of 3 weeks down here in Carlsbad. It may sound crazy but this is the longest stretch of time I've spent here since moving down 5 months ago. I really do like it down here and I'm excited for the late-October through early 2006 stretch of time when I'll be here for a couple of months straight. I wanted to play a lot of poker during these 3 weeks but my deposits have taken a while to go through and I used all my online money for the WSOP. I'm putting 20K back online and I have 30K in reserve for emergencies. I'm only going to 2-table the 20/40 and 30/60 for a while until I get used to playing again. I feel like I've been on an insane 4-month vacation. It's been awesome but I need to get back on the horse and start making a living again. Sadly, it won't be happening until late October since I'm leaving on September 7th for nearly 2 months.

I'm so ridiculously excited for these next few trips. On September 7th I'm flying to Jacksonville to met 3 other SuperFans(Will, Sean and Kenny) for the Seahawk's 2005-2006 opener. The game is on the 11th so we'll have a few days to hang out at Will's uncle's place. Supposedly he has a fat pad and owns a big boat that he takes to games and tailgates with it. Hmmmm, tailgating on a boat, sounds like hell. The first night will be at Kenny's aunt's house since Will is flying in on the 8th. She's promised some down home Southern cooking so I'm looking forward to that.

On Monday the 12th, I'm flying to Barcelona for a 4,000 Euro poker tournament. PokerStars is sponsoring me in this one so I'll be wearing their gear. I think wearing a logo is worth the $5,000 tourney entry, $1K travel expenses and 3 nights in a 4-Star hotel, don't you? The main event is on September 16th but I'm going to play in a smaller(1,000 Euro) tourney on the 14th to practice and try to gain some points in the European Player of the Year rankings. I'm 18th right now and the top 10 get Professional Poker Tour cards. The PPT has 5 free tournaments a year, paying 500K in prizes for each tournament. It's a very exclusive list and getting a PPT card would be sick. It's a bit of a long shot but I want to give myself the best chance. There's another 1,000 Euro tourney on the same day as Day 2 of the Main Event but hopefully I'll still be alive in the big one. I'll bring the cash just in case. I don't know if I explained this well and, due to the fact that I can't figure out how to cut and paste into this page, I'll put up links to what I'm talking about on the side bar under "Links" until they no longer become relevant.

Will and his girlfriend Kat are accompanying me to Barcelona so I'll have some friends to do non-poker stuff with while I'm there. I'm pretty excited to see the Spanish riviera and check out the nightlife. European Playa of the Year, Noah Boeken claims that Barcelona has the best nightlife in the world. Hopefully he'll share some of his pimpjuice with me.

I'm leaving Barcelona on the 20th to and I get to spend 2 days back in Carlsbad. On the 22nd I'm flying to the homeland, JAPAN! I've never been and I can't wait to go. I'm going with one of my best friends, Kenny Barron. He's a definite groomsman in my wedding(if that ever happens) and a serious candidate for best man if I didn't have such an awesome brother....but I digress. He speaks Japanese as well or better than he speaks English and has friends and family scattered all over the islands. He'll be the perfect tour guide and I am excited beyond belief. I'll probably write more on this later. We're still trying to hammer out the details and I'll post updates here.

The one thing I know is that I'm coming home on October 20th. I want to chill for a bit BUT, the EPT is in Dublin from October 29-30 and I'm definitely going for my last chance to add to the European rankings. So, basically it will be 3 months at home until the EPT Copenhagen from January 25-28. I'll definintely write more about the EPT in future blogs. Those 3 months should be a good time to put in work and see if I have the ability to put in serious poker hours. The only snags will be Thanksgiving and Christmas but if I can limit myself to 2 weeks of vacation over the 3 months I'll consider it a success.

OK! That covers future travel plans. Hopefully my entries will be about day-to-day happenings from now on. Goodnight!

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Very interesting article. . I also visited Barcelona and really liked this wonderful city. Most of all I liked Gaudi's masterpieces. They are really great and awesome beauty. They are visit card of Barcelona and whole Spain. From many Barcelona hotels I chose one, about 5 minutes walk from the Ramblas. I fell in love with Barcelona and its beautiful architecture, there is so much to see and could have stayed for longer, however, you can get to see a lot in a day as it is not that big and is easy to get around.

Unknown said...

Hi Schaefer,
You are really keen on playing poker! Me too!!
But be careful, do not let courage swallow you and your money. When I was in Barcelona, I lost all my money playing poker. Thanks my friends, who were with me and give me some money.