What's up, Broseph?

Wow, it's been 2 weeks since my last entry. I'm not sure why I just quit blogging but I think Vegas took its toll on me and I just felt lethargic every day. I finally left Vegas on Sunday, spent two nights in LA, and drove up to the Bay Area last night. I'll be here at my dad's house until Friday when I start the drive back to Seattle. I'll probably stay at my Grandma's in Vancouver, WA on Friday night and get back to Seattle on Saturday afternoon. Hallelujah. I've been thinking about a lot of things so be prepared for a bit of a braindump.

The Mariners are officially done. They were as close as 3.5 games out of first as recently as 2 weeks ago. Then we ran into our eternal nemesis, the Oakland A's. Tonight's loss marks the 15th consecutive time that the A's have finished a game with more runs than the M's, tying a major league record for consecutive wins against a division rival. Throw in a 4-game sweep by the Rangers over the weekend and the M's are now 12 games out of first place. TWELVE! Doce! Gross. I'll still be attending a lot of games once I come home but I'll probably be drinking a lot of beer and razzing a lot of visiting centerfielders from the beer garden. I never expected the M's to be 3.5 games out of first place at any point this season but it was nice while it lasted. Wait 'til next year.

Football season is officially here and I'm ridiculously amped. I think the Hawks look better on paper than they did last year and I think their defense is going to be nasty. Julian Peterson is no small upgrade. Obviously losing Hutch hurts but I'll take the tradeoff. I don't think we'll go 13-3 because the schedule is pretty dang tough but I think we can get 11 wins and take down the division. Everyone is on the Cardinals' nuts but they were supposed to be a sleeper team last year too. Screw the Cardinals and the rest of the NFC West. We own it. My friend and fellow Superfan, Curtis, wrote a great analysis of the Seahawks' draft that I meant to post earlier but here it is anyway:

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What I keep hearing about the hawks '06 draft is "TOO SMALL!" To those who
would criticize our selections based on the players physical size I would
offer 3 words, or names actually...

1. Chuck Darby
2. Leroy Hill
3. LOFAAAAAAAAAAA

Pick # 1 -

So Kelly Jennings only weighs 178lbs! Are we forgetting about his 40 time &
40 inch vertical leap?! Jennings is a true cover corner who may not be the
flashest pick but he has shown that he can bring his A-game EVERYGAME in a
solid football program. No disrespect to Matty Hass or Pat Ross (Seahawks
new 3rd string center) but playing for Boston College is not the same as
succeeding with the Canes. I know that everbody would have loved Hali or
Lawson but it didn't go down like that. Beside, the Mount Nittnay Lions of
Penn State are a soft program these days. Lawson would have been legit
though. Same unit as Super Mario. Bottom line solid pick if not flashy and
someone who can come in and play NOW. Adjusting to the speed of the
Hawks/NFL game won't be as hard for a guy out of Randy Shannon & Tim
Walton's Miami's defense. BTW- The Canes have had a 1st round pick for 12
years running

Pick # 2 - Darryl Tapp, Virginia Tech.

It's a little tougher to be undersized on the line but he's getting a little
shortchanged. He's keeps getting listed as 6'1 but he's closer to 6'2. One
inch isn't was got him selected @ pick 63 though. Sure he can rotate
through w/ Wistrom & Fisher but you don't use a Round 2 pick on a
releaver!...or do you. **See also the rotation of Darby, Bernard and
another early pick Mr. Tubboat** Seemed to work out pretty good didn't it
and EVERYBODY knows that Darby is WAY TOO SMALL. Now we could have 6 SOLID
guys to play 4 defensive line positions. Crazy?...or draft day genius? I'm
also thinking immediate impact on special teams. Tapp had a blocked kick
both his Junior & Senior year. Rotating him through will leave him with
enough gas to pick up a couple more blocked kicks for the Hawks.

When asking Holmgren what any Draft Day plan is he usually identifies a few
areas of need but says that the Hawks will take the best player available.
I'm not entirely convinced that is what happened this weekend ESPECIALLY
with Sunday's picks but let's think of the near dynasty of the recent New
England Patriots. Not very many of those Pats were stars prior to the first
couple of superbowl but New England put together a work ethic/winning
culture that I believe is what Seattle is building too. Sure we'd all love
to have Mario Williams but I am defiinitely happy with our #1 & #2 cuz they
really are career guys.

Pick # 3 - 4th Round Rob Sims, Ohio State.

Obviously he's no Hutch but Guard isn't the most demanding position either.
He's played some Tackle as well. I would hope for him to develop his
versitility into a Pork Chop sort of player. Animal in the weightroom but I
won't expect him to compete w/ Spen-dogg for Tobeck's position as some
speculate. This is the last year of Tobeck's contract and similar to the
Mili/Stephen scenario, the job is Robby's to lose. If we could ever get two
blocking backs & Chris Spencer at center, maybe Matt could finally go to the
Shotgun from time-to-time to find Warrick downfield. Holmgren's probably
not interested in that scenario.

Pick # 4 - 5th Round David Kirtman, USC.

This was a favor! Did the Hawks forgetting about Mack's contract and that
he's just getting better? No need to draft for the future because of the
Carson-Newman rising star that is Leonard Weaver. So now people critisize
the difference in pedigre between Carson-Newman & USC but Weaver is WAY TO
MONEY to have somebody trash his small town program. If we can remember the
2005 preseason, Matt was shaking Mack's hand on the sidelines while they
both watched Leonard run like he was 50lbs lighter. Matt told Mack, "it's
been nice workin' with ya."

I think this was a reach and I still haven't called out who I think this was
a favor to. Has anyone noticed where Kirtman's parents address is???
That's right folks, David's parents are Holmgren's neighbors. Shakey Pick +
Friends Nextdoor = impared 5th round judgement!

That's it for now. I should probably get some work done. GO
HAWKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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If you didn't think that was awesome then you aren't my friend. Thanks, Curtis!

Check out the Seahawks' road schedule: @Detroit, @Chicago, @St Louis, @Kansas City, @San Francisco, @Denver, @Arizona, @Tampa Bay. The three division games are automatic ally assigned, obv, but the others are pretty sick. Soldier Field is never easy, The Chiefs don't lose at home, The Broncos have a sick home field advantage and Tampa won't be a cakewalk. The only soft spot is opening day at the Lions but we looked like crap the last time we played at Ford Field. *cry*

The UW MBA program emailed me about two weeks ago and basically said, "write back if you still want to come because we don't want to admit waitlist people who already have plans." I wrote back and they told me that they can tell me their final decision as late as September 15th. I'd really like to get this damn MBA and I'd like to do it sooner rather than later.

If I don't get in this year I have a pretty sweet backup plan. First I'm going to take some undergrad business classes this Fall to strengthen my application for next year. After Fall quarter I'm going to resubmit an application and take off for a while. My friend Ivan got a job in India and is living there now. Two other friends, Scott and Matt, are going to visit him from December 26th until January 6th and I'm going to tag along. On January 6th I'm going to fly from Mumbai(formerly Bombay) to Melbourne. There's a big poker tournament in Australia that ends on the 19th of January. I'll probably stay in Australia for a while longer then fly to Vietnam around February 1st. I'll stay in SE Asia for a month or so and fly back to Seattle around March 1st. Sounds fun, huh? Seriously, I'd rather just get my damn MBA and work from there but travel could be fun too.

As far as poker is concerned, I'm playing a lot of 5/10 and 10/20 NL cash games and I'm really enjoying them. I still suck and make a lot of dumb mistakes but luckilly they suck worse and make more mistakes. My bankroll has grown from around $7K at the end of the Main Event to its current value of $22,679.87. I think I've run pretty good but I also think that my resluts will get even better as I learn to stop making ridiculous payoffs and hopeless bluffs. I've probably given up about $5K making terrible calls and terrbile bluff attempts. $5K in obvious mistakes that I look at in retrospect and shake my head at in disgust. There are probably a lot of smaller mistakes that I'm making too. Gross. Anyway, I think NL cash games are a great way to make money and I'm going to continue to build my bankroll through them(only when I'm outside of the State of Washington of course). I'd like to get the roll up to $100K so that I can take shots at the 25/50 NL regularly. I'll keep throwing random bankroll updates on the blog and hopefully I'll stay motivated and play as much as I have been over the past two weeks.

There were a few things that happened that got me into cash cames: (1) Spending a lot of poker money on travel and expenses, (2) Dropping most of the rest of my poker money on the WSOP, (3) Living with some of the best NL cash game players in the world. I really believe that a few of the guys I was living with in Vegas are the some of the best players out there. One of them is 20 and the other is 18. Years old. Ridiculous. Anyway, they don't give a crap about money because they make so damn much playing cash games. One day, on our way to dinner, Smokey, the 20 year-old, gave one of the best one-liners ever: "I'd kill myself if I only made $100K a year". I'm pretty sure he didn't literally mean "kill himself" but to hear that kind of stuff from a 20 year-old is unreal. I'd like to make that kind of money and I think getting really good at NL cash is one of the best ways to acheive it. I'm fairly certain that I wouldn't ever treat money the way that they do but I'd like to have the funds available to abuse if I so chose.

Here's an article that my man ADB sent me via email. It's about the online poker laws in Washington. I think it encourages people to play, especially quotes like this:

----In Washington, other than a handful of cease-and-desist orders issued to billboard and radio advertisers that promote illegal gambling sites, the state has not busted a single person for illegal Internet gambling.

"Our enforcement does not focus on individuals," Arland said. "We respond to complaints."-----

Arland works for the Washington Gaming Commission. Not focusing on individuals is good news. I'm still not going to play unless I'm out of the state. Obviously.

I've bought almost nothing of real value since the big tournaments that I won. I bought some Bose headphones for $300, my Treo phone for about $550 and I can't think of much else. While at the house in Vegas, three guys bought watches and the cheapest one was a $9K Jacobs. I think I'm going to buy a nice watch as my first major purchase. The watches that the guys bought were really amazing but I'm probably going to go with a "cheap" Breitling for about $3K. Cliff is my official fashion consultant and he loves the Breitlings. I don't know why I included this paragraph but it's my braindump and I can write what I want.

Speaking of Cliff, he moved to Germany on Monday. I'd really like to go see him soon but I'm not sure when I can do it. Maybe for a few days on the way to India?

It's 3 AM and things are going down the tube. Who knows how much longer I'll ramble. On September 23rd I'm flying to Philadelphia for a charity poker tournament/boozefest called Bash at the Boat. This is the seventh annual Bash at the Boat and I think it started as a crazy party then evolved into a charitable crazy party. Obviously it's something put together by AlCantHang and I'm excited to be a part of it. He's promised to hold the 1st Annual Brandon Schaefer Beer Pong Championship so I better get some practice in while I'm at home. We played a lot of beerpong at the house in Vegas and I got pretty deadly by the end. We played 10-cup with teams and in one game I went 7 for 7 and our team won with 8 cups left. Smokey and Bushman may be great poker players but I own them at beerpong. I've never gone 7 for 7 before and I'm pretty sure I'll never do it again. It was just one of those Jordan vs the Blazers moments when you shrug your shoulders at the commentators and the cups look as big as peach baskets. Carl actually ruined me a few times during the trip but he flew home early and missed me when I was in my groove. He's going to enter the WSOBP and I can't wait to hear stories about how good other people are. Supposedly the great players use a fingerroll technique that I tested for a while. It seems like the fingerroll gives a better arc but I was having a hard time controlling distance and accuracy. Anyway....

I'll Florida from September 2-8. Renee and I are flying into Tampa on the 2nd and watching the Devil Rays play the Mariners on the 2nd and 3rd. Then we're renting a car and driving down to Miami for a few days. We're going to stay on the beach and hopefully it'll be a nice vacation for her. She's very excited about the trip because she has a real J-O-B and doesn't get to do crazy things like yours truly. I'm not saying that I'm not excited to finish the stadium tour and take a vacation with a pretty lady but I've been around the world ya-ya-ya, I've been playa hated, I don't know and I don't know why, why the want us faded. I feel like the travel schedule has jaded me a bit and I can't really get too fired up for any domestic travel. "I don't need my passport? Pssssh." Anyway, if any of you loyal readers know anything about Tampa or Miami or parts inbetween please leave a comment.

I wonder if I still have any loyal readers. 2 weeks is a long ass time to go without updates.

I'll be in Seattle on Saturday afternoon but I'm heading to Cle Elum with Renee on Saturday night. I think my first time kickin' it will be at Kangaroo & Kiwi on Monday night. Darts? Wings? Mongoose IPA? Holy crap I can't wait to get home. Seattle, the greatest place on earth. Except I can't play poker while in Seattle. Only when out-of-state. Obviously.