Madden News

Shawn Alexander is on the cover of Madden 2007. Is anyone scared? More on Mr. Madden later in this post.

On Thursday, we ended up staying at the Bellagio for drunken $4/8 hold ‘em. Definitely not as cool as $2/4 HORSE but the tequila was flowing and I had my first hard alcohol of 2006. I definitely drank too much and I’m pretty sure that I like beer better than hard A. In fact, I’m seriously considering giving it up for good after Memorial Day weekend. I’d give it up before that if I could but my friends would never let me. Without fail, drinking alcohol puts me into “Superman” mode where I think I can drink any amount of liquor and I can’t be stopped.. Throw in my competitive one-upping nature and you consistently get a big, binge-drinking Asian if hard A is on the menu. At any rate, I’m 95% sure that I’m going to stick to beer after Memorial Day.

I ended up going to bed at around 6:30 AM and didn’t get on the road until around 2:45 on Friday afternoon. Traffic was god-awful through Vegas so I was even further behind schedule and ended up getting to the Diamondbacks-Giants game in the 3rd inning, with the score already 6-0 Giants. The Diamondbacks rallied to tie the game at 6 then blew it in the top of the ninth. I must say that the NL West is pretty bad. I saw some ugly baseball in most of the NL West games that I watched and I don’t expect any of those teams to do anything, The Giants did improve to 3-0 in games with me in attendance and Tim Worrell is 1-0 with 2 saves despite blowing the save on Thursday. I was definitely underwhelmed by Bank One Ballpark Chase Field. I was really excited to see it because I’ve heard great things about it but it didn’t live up to the hype. They tried to make it feel like a retro-park but they failed miserably. It felt like a cross between Safeco and the Kingdome. It had the green metal sticking out here and there but it felt like a cavernous concrete monstrosity. The 300 level has at least 50 rows and there is no view of the outside. At SBC PacBell AT&T Park they have the opening to McCovey’s Cove in right field and a view of a bridge (Bay Bridge?) in left. At Safeco there’s a sweet view of downtown in left field. At Chase all you can see are seats and walls. It seriously felt like the Kingdome and I don’t mean in the good nostalgic way.

BTW, I guess “underwhelmed” isn’t a word since Word has it underlined in red. It suggests “under whelmed” but is that really correct? Should I say “unimpressed” instead? “Unimpressed” doesn’t really convey the idea of being let down. Anyway, here are some pictures:


The Prius poses in front of a scenic viewpoint 


Look at that 300 level. Kingdome, anyone? 


View of Center Field 


View from Center Field 

I felt like it was time that the Prius got some face time. It’s been running great and I think I’m falling in love with her. I still feel bad that Sky didn’t get to borrow her but I guess he had to get a car at some point. I’m not sure if he has one yet so if anyone in Seattle happens to have an extra one of those, please hook him up.

This morning (well, yesterday morning I guess) Jimmy called me at 8:30 in the morning. While it was good to hear from him, I’d appreciate it if all calls came in later than noon. He was in Vegas one day after I left and we discussed the possibility of him meeting me and Dave in Chicago and me staying with him in Kansas City. I definitely don’t talk to Jimmy enough and I’m looking forward to seeing him next month.

The one positive that came from the early wake-up call is that I got on the road earlier than expected and I was able to drive further than I thought I would. At 9 AM I hit the Days Inn continental breakfast and again was severely “underwhelmed”. No pastries, no meat, no waffles. They had a loaf of bread, margarine and hard-boiled eggs. That’s it. I ate two hard-boiled eggs and a piece of bread and vowed to never stay at the Days Inn again. Today was a good day of driving and I made it all the way to Midland, TX, driving 736 miles in about 10 hours. I never felt tired and felt like I might be able to drive more if I wanted. I decided to stop in Midland and watch the M’s game on my computer. Yuck is all I have to say. I want to talk about the Mariners but I’ll wait for another day, when it’s not 2:40 AM.

The highlight of today was definitely dinner. I started to get hungry in the middle of nowhere so I asked my GPS for directions to the closest restaurant and it directed me to a restaurant called “Chuy’s Place” in a town called Van Horn about 20 minutes away. As I got off the freeway I saw a big billboard that said “Chuy’s Place: John Madden’s ‘Haul’ of Fame”. Well if you ever want me to go to a restaurant, tell me John Madden liked it and I’m there in a heartbeat. Apparently, Madden was driving through Texas in ’89 or something and wanted to watch the MNF game so he stopped at Chuy’s for dinner. He liked the place so much that he returns every year for their Chicken Picado. Picado is a fajita-like dish and obviously that’s what I had, even though it was like $3 more than anything else on the menu. It was definitely the bomb:


Yum Yum 

The way they describe the story on their menu, they see Madden coming as an act of god, sending Madden to Chuy’s so that he could spread the word about how good their food is. I found it pretty funny, especially after seeing the mural on the wall:


The Mural 

It’s a picture of Jesus blessing Chuy’s restaurant as the Madden Cruiser pulls up. Nothing short of awesome if you ask me. They had a director chair with Madden’s name on it and it was positioned right in front of the TV. I almost asked to sit in it but then I saw that instead of a game or Sportscenter they had the TV tuned to Fox News and the O’Reilly Factor. Ah, Texas. I decided to sit in the back, facing the Madden/Jesus mural.

I think that’s all for now. I only have ~320 miles to drive tomorrow so I should make it to Arlington in about 4 hours. I’m going to the game tomorrow night then hanging out with my friend, Evin, after the game and all day Sunday. The Mavericks are in town, playing Memphis and I might try to scalp a ticket for the NBA Playoffs. I’d love to see Mr. Cuban go crazy and watch Mr. Gasol and Mr. Nowitzki do what they do. Have a nice weekend, everyone.

Back by Popular Demand

I've never had so many requests for a new blog entry in the history of my blog. I guess a lot of people like baseball.

I left my apartment in San Diego last Thursday and drove up to Seal Beach to hang out with my friends, Amanda and Matthew. They're into skim-boarding so we headed to the beach and tried it out. I spent most of the time falling on my ass but I had a great time. We tried to get a good action shot but they were too embarassing so here's an artistic one that makes it look like I might know what I'm doing:


Skim-Boarding 

After skim-boarding we hit a local burrito stand then went back to their apartment to watch Cool Hand Luke and drink beer. I thought the movie was well done but ran a little too long. There were some heavy religous messages and I got the feeling that Luke was supposed to be a Christ-like character. I thought it was definitely worth watching and I recommend it to anyone. There's a line he says, after bluffing in a poker hand, that goes, "sometimes nothing is a pretty cool hand." It's now my dream to utter those words during a televised poker tournament.

On Friday morning I headed up to L.A. to pick up the Dodgers tickets from my friend Chris. He works for Ticketmaster and was able to score me 3 tickets to their suite. I took him out for lunch at a cheap Thai place and we were both happy. I had about 5 hours before gametime so I got a haircut and ate a Beef Bowl from Yoshinoya. Beef bowls come highly recommended:


Yoshinoya Beef Bowl 

It rained all day and I was worried that the game might be rained out. On the way to the parking lot the rain stopped for a bit and gave us a sweet rainbow over Dodger Stadium. Unfortunately, the traffic was thick and I couldn't find the pot of gold.


Rainbow 

Once I got to the stadium, I left 2 tickets at will call for my ex-roommate Kele and our friend, Bill, who were driving up from Carlsbad. Once inside, the suite was everything that I hoped for. The view was fantastic, they brought food to you, AND it was dry. I sat outside for a while and watched the grounds crew unroll and re-roll the tarp three different times. It looked like it was a pain in the arse but they were pretty efficient and definitely very professional:


Tarp 

The game was scheduled to start at 7:40 but the first pitch was at 9:37. There weren't a ton of people left in the stands but the few remaining let loose some great "Bonds Sucks" chants. He got one good swing on a ball and the left fielder ran it down on the warning track. I love nothing more than watching Barry hit a ball hard, start his little homerun strut, then watch the ball get caught at the warning track. It looks like he really misses his juice, the poor guy. It ended up being a great game that the Giants won 2-1. Kele isn't a baseball fan and was bored as hell but I love pitchers' duels. Here's a picture of the game from our suite. God, I love baseball:


I love Baseball 

I definitely tried to take more pictures this time around and did my best crazy Japanese tourist impersonation. Actually, I am a tourist, I am Japanese and I'm a little crazy so I guess I was made for the role. Here are a few more random shots from the game:


Dodger Dog and a Beer 


Bullpen Car 

The game was pretty quick and ended around 12:10. I wanted to stay in L.A. but my L.A. friends weren't answering their phones so I decided to drive directly to Vegas. I called my friend John and told him that I'd be showing up around 4:30 AM. With most people, in most cities, I would feel bad but it's perfectly acceptable in Vegas.

Over the past few days I've watched a lot of poker on TV and played a bit of poker at the Bellagio. The first day I played in a great $5/10 NL game and lost about $1K. I think the definition of a "good game" is one you get stuck at least a rack. Last night I played in a $40/80 mixed game. The rotation was stud hi-low regular, Omaha/8, and 2-7 triple draw. I have no clue how to play the stud game, suck at O/8 and feel like I'm pretty good at triple draw. I sat with Carl and Justin and we had a ball, discussing the nuances of each game and trying to get better. It's funny because even though the rest of the players were locals and play in the game all the time they played so bad at certain games that I think we had to be +EV as a whole. I was probably a loser in the game but the educational opportunity made it worth my time. Carl played really well but the locals definitely thought he was a lucky fish. When he cashed out, one guy offered to pay his rake if he stayed and another guy asked him if he ever lost a pot in his life. Those are some of the highest compliments you can get from weak nits and I was pretty jealous. I cashed out up exactly $100 and had a great time. I'd much rather lose $5K playing that game than grind it out at a $30/60 hold 'em game. I like to think I'm a pretty smart guy but I'm also lazy when my brain isn't challenged. I think learning new games is a good way to get my mind thinking about poker again and I'm definitely going to try to get better at all forms. The local nits played a pretty good O/8 game but were horrible at 2-7 and stud hi-low regular. If I could get competent at O/8 and stud I think I could crush that game. I'll definitely give it another whirl next time I'm in town.

Tonight we're going to go get loaded and play some donkey poker at the MGM. We're going to try to get them to spread a $2/4 HORSE game for us and they've been very accomodating in the past. I'm leaving tomorrow morning for the Diamondbacks-Giants game. I doubt the boos will be as loud as they were at Dodger Stadium but it should sill be fun. I wonder how many warning track bombs Barry will hit.

I want to give a shout out to my friend, Steve Day, for winning $88K in the big Sunday tourney on Stars. Congrats, Steve!

Dodger Stadium

I'm at Dodger Stadium for game 6 of the road trip, blogging on my Treo. My friend, Chris, hooked me up with suite tickets so I'm in the lap of luxury tonight. It's raining intermittently but I think they're going to get the game in. The Dodgers were my favorite team during the 12 years that I lived on Kauai because they were my Grandpa's favorite. He even took me to two games in the mid-90's during they heyday of Piazza and Karros. The stadium is just as beautiful as I remember it and my seats are much better. This is the second time that I get to see one of my fantasy pitchers start a game. Jake Peavy gave up 7 earned in 4 innings the first time, so let's hope Brad Penny does a little better. He's facing the hated Giants and their left fielder, He Who Must Not Be Named. I'll definitely have my booing shoes on. The game starts at 7:40 and I'll try to write about it in a timely manner. Go Dodgers!!!

I'm Alive

Wow, what a first week: 5 stadiums down, 25 to go. Dave flew home from San Diego on Sunday night, and I'm really going to miss having him with me. I don't know if I could have made it last week, being so sick and having to drive so much. It's been a lot harder than I thought it would be and I really appreciated having someone to help me. Hopefully things will be easier from now on and I won't get as sick again. I’ve spent the last few days sleeping a lot and watching a lot of baseball. I bought the MLB.tv package and I can watch every single MLB game over the Internet. It costs $15 per month and I’m going to have it for the 2 moths of road trippin’. I got to watch Felix last Friday and I got to watch a nice M’s win today. I also get to watch all my fantasy pitchers when they’re in games and I can decide who to keep and who to cut based on personal observation. It’s really awesome.


Safeco 

Monday, of course, was the Mariners' opener. I didn't write much about Safeco because it's my home park and I didn't really think about it. I can say with confidence that Safeco is one of the top two stadiums in the league. The fans aren’t the greatest but the stadium is absolutely gorgeous. I really like the fact that you can walk around the entire field and still see the game at all times. The bullpen is fully accessible to fans and you can watch you favorite relievers warm up while standing about 5 feet away. The stadium is built right next to the Seattle Amtrak station so trains cruise by and blow their horns a few times each game. I think it’s kinda cool. Lastly, Safeco has a retractable roof so we never have rainouts. I like it a lot.

At the game on Monday I bought garlic fries and requested extra garlic. “I don’t want to see any fries” is what I told the lady behind the counter. Well, as you can see, she definitely hooked it up:


Extra Garlic 

I generally like a little less than that but I made my own bed so I had to sleep in it. The fries were still delicious.

After the game I shopped around for minivans a bit more but never found one that I really liked. Now, on the trip, I get extreme minivan envy whenever I pass by a Honda Odyssey on the road. The Prius gets about 2x as much MPG so although I’m in a smaller car, I’m saving more money. On Tuesday, I picked Dave up from work around 1 PM and we hit the road. The opening stretch was exciting because I was finally getting the road trip underway but boring because I’ve driven that stretch of I-5 so many frikkin times. I was really excited when we got onto Highway 199 at Grant’s Pass, Oregon, and headed West toward the Redwoods. Sadly, it was 8 PM already and I didn’t get to enjoy the windy roads and tall trees. Honestly, it was pretty damn scary and I drove really slowly the whole time. We got to Crescent City around 9 PM and check-in time at the hostel ended at 10 PM. We decided to stop at Burger King for dinner and I had a chicken tender sandwich with more mayo than any sandwich I’ve ever had. It was pretty disgusting but I was starving and slammed it down. We got to the hostel right around 10 PM and got our room. The hostel is right on the coast and cost $20 per bed. They had a “private room” for couples with just one double bed for $49 but Dave and I passed. We were both tired and I was starting to feel pretty sick so we crashed pretty early.

Most people that know me won’t believe this but Dave and I woke up on Wednesday at 7 AM. 7 AM!!! There was a loop trail that started and ended at the hostel so we took that to wake us up.


Hiking 

It ended up being about 4 miles long and wound through the forest and onto the beach. It was pretty overcast but never really rained on us. The views were pretty nice and we even saw a banana slug:


Banana Slug 

Right as the hike doubled back toward the hostel we saw a Paul Bunyan so I took a picture with him. Check out Babe's massive testicles:


Paul Bunyan and Me 

After the hike we started the drive down to Oakland. I decided to take a detour and we drove on a 10 mile road that was parallel to the 101 but took you through the Redwoods at a slower pace. We oohed and aahed at the big trees then saw a sign that simply said “Big Tree (”. We couldn’t pass that up so we pulled over, found “Big Tree” and took some pictures.


Big Tree 

After the detour we pretty much drove straight to Oakland. We were craving a lunch buffet so we looked up Round Table Pizza on the Magellan GPS and after a few slip-ups found one on our way. I don’t know if it was just this Round Table but it was like $9 for the salad bar and a pop so we decided to split a $20 pepperoni and bacon pizza. It was the most expensive Round Table we’d ever encountered and we both swore never to return to that city again. I don’t even remember the name so I might accidentally go there someday. We got into Oakland around 5:30 and parked in the Network Associates McAfee Coliseum parking lot. We remembered the stadium as Network Associates and it was programmed in the GPS as Network Associates so we were both one year off. When I search for directions to stadiums I’m going to have to remember last year’s names. It might prove to be difficult. Anyway, the lot cost $14, which we thought was cheap compared to Seattle, and there were a ton of people tailgating. It looked like a fun crowd but I wanted to head into the game. We bought $10 seats because they were the cheapest offered for the Yankee series and ended up wandering around for most of the game. In Oakland, they covered the entire upper deck with tarps and decreased the capacity to 35,000 or so, making them the smallest stadium in baseball. I think it definitely was a good idea because they were selling less than 20,000 tickets anyway and it definitely feels more special when the stadium is at least half-full. The crowd was half-Yankee fans and half-A’s fans so there was a lot of good trash talk and if you heard a cheer while walking through the concourse you couldn’t tell which team did something good. I must say that the A’s fans were definitely loud and rowdy and I was treated to one of the best “YANKEES SUCK” chants that I’ve ever heard. The A’s run a promotion called “Dollar Dog Wednesdays” and they were selling hot dogs for $1. I was planning on trying something unique at every park but I couldn’t pass up on dollar dogs. McAfee Coliseum had the greatest selection of beers I’ve ever seen, from Sierra Nevada to Mendicino Brewery. It was awesome. They also have Jack Daniels and Jose Cuervo booths. Maybe that explains the rowdiness of the crowd. We were treated to a good game and the A’s won, breaking a 4-4 tie with 5 runs in the bottom of the 8th.


A's-Yankees 

After the game we drove to my Dad’s house. He lives about 20 minutes south of San Francisco in a city called Foster City and was nice enough to let us use his room while he was out of town. We found tickets on Craigslist to the Giant’s game on Thursday and arranged to pick them up in the city at 9 AM. At this point, my sickness was full blown and I was congested as hell and getting the fever chills at night. I tried to cuddle with Dave but he would have none of it. We ended up getting a good amount of sleep but I still felt like crap. We got to the guy’s house at about 9:15, bought the tickets, and boarded the N-line train which ran right by his house and ran right to the stadium. We got off the train at the Embarcadero stop and decided to walk up to fisherman’s wharf and check out the seals and other touristy things. After about 20 minutes we realized that we didn’t really have time to walk all the way up there and get back to the stadium so we turned around and headed back toward SBC Pac Bell AT&T Park. On the way we stopped at Safeway and shared a lunch of chicken strips and jojos. We also picked up some sour straws and apples to eat later. So much for eating healthy on the trip. We got to the stadium around 11:30 or noon and walked around the entire thing. A few kayak guys were already in McCovey Cove and there was excitement in the air. This was the Giant’s home opener and all the yuppies came out. I have to say that AT&T is right up there with Safeco and I might be persuaded that it is the best park in baseball. It’s pretty like Safeco and quirky like Safeco but it has so many extra things that Safeco doesn’t have. In left field there’s a big coke bottle that they converted into a slide for kids and somehow it didn’t seem overly cheesy. In right field there’s an open area, under the stands, where fans can watch the game for free through a chain-link fence. The fact that the stadium is RIGHT on the water is pretty cool and the kayakers definitely add a lot to the experience. Our seats were pretty good and we again saw another good game. The Giants rallied from 4 down to win 6-4. Barry was intentionally walked twice and the crowd booed and waved rubber chickens like terrible towels. It was pretty entertaining.

Afterward we were planning on hanging out for a while but we were too tired and caught the N-line back to the car. Dave convinced me to go to Lombard Street and drive down the super windy road so I obliged but that was the extent of our touristy experience in San Fran. We got back to my dad’s place around 7 PM and decided to drive to LA that night. The original plan was to spend one more night in Foster City and drive in the morning but because of traffic concerns we decided to hit the road at night. I was exhausted and couldn’t really think straight but I drove about 30 minutes before we stopped at Applebee’s to watch the M’s-A’s game that was in Seattle that night. The M’s won and leapt into first place at 3-1. I had the riblets and they gave me so many that Dave had to help me finish. That never happens. We were both scared by my driving from my Dad’s to the restaurant so Dave drove the first 2 hours toward L.A. He woke me up around midnight and I felt 8 million times better so I drove the rest of the way. We got to Chris’ apartment at 3 AM and he was still up, working on his taxes. Apparently he stayed up until 5:30 AM and went to work at 8:30 the next day. Ridiculous. Anyway, we crashed HARD that night and apparently I snored my brains out. Good times for all involved. At noon I had to move my car because of street sweeping so I stumbled out and found a spot that I thought was legal. At 1:30 we went for some teriyaki and I had a $45 ticket on the Prius. I parked on the end of a block and there were signs up and down the block but not on this particular strip. There were 3 other cars there, too, and we all got tickets. I think I’m going to try to contest this one. After teriyaki I parked at a meter on Wilshire until 3 PM when the street parking opened back up. At 3 I went to get my car and had left the lights on so the battery was dead. I called my friend Mariel but she was getting a manicure/pedicure and couldn’t meet me until 4 PM. I called some other friends but she was the only one with jumper cables so I met her at 4. We drove out to Wilshire and got my car jumped right before a meter maid gave me another ticket. Apparently they tow all cars there at 4 PM because of the rush hour traffic. Whew.

Friday night we headed down to Huntington Beach to meet some other friends and hit the bars. I still felt like ass so I only had 2 or 3 beers and acted as DD. The bar was quite the sausage fest and there was a huge line for the guy’s bathroom and no line for the women’s. Never a good sign. We got home around 2 AM and watched Anchorman until about 3:30. Dave is a working man so he got up at 8 AM and had to wait for everyone else to get up. They headed to Wendy’s for lunch but I refused to go and slept in until around 1:30. It definitely felt good to rest. I would have slept later but Dave and company decided it was time to wake up and called my phone repeatedly until I answered. I met them around 2:30 and we headed to Huntington Beach. It’s a pretty nice beach and they have 10-12 volleyball nets set up and five of us played a game on one of them. If you know me, you can probably imagine what a horrific beach volleyball player I am and we definitely stunk up the joint. We hit this Asian lady on the other court in the head a few times and she finally moved to the other side. The professional chicks two courts over doubled over in laughter on more than one occasion. Oh well. My chest felt like it was going to collapse and I was having fun. We quit after an hour or so and my body was pretty sore from diving on the sand.

Saturday night was the Angels-Yankees game so Dave and I left Adam’s around 5:30 and got to Angels Stadium around 6. Traffic was light and the parking lot was only $8. Score! Again, our tickets weren’t bad, on the 3rd deck, 3rd base extended and not too high up. A few people commented on my Johjima jersey but no one really talked too much crap. I think the Mariners are so bad now that no one yells, “Mariners Suck!” because it’s just too mean. I didn’t really like the stadium that much but they put together some killer video montages. Before the game they ran every Angels highlight in franchise history with “Calling all Angels” in the background and I almost got goosebumps watching highlights of a team that I despise. I didn’t realize that the Angels had so many highlights over the years. For some reason the 1995 season wasn’t on the montage. Muahahahaha. AGAIN, we saw a good game that the Angels won 3-2. So far on the trip, we had seen two Angels wins, two Yankees losses and two saves from K-Rod. After the game we headed to Newport Beach and a bar called Malarkey’s and it was a lot better than the bar in Huntington. There were a ton of hot women and the bar was huge. They played some old rap music and we had fun. Again, I only had 2 beers and aced as DD because I felt like crap. Here’s a pic from the place:


Newport Beach 

After the bar we drove to my old apartment in Carlsbad, about 30 minutes north of San Diego. We got in around 2:30 and crashed. I let Dave have the love sack and I slept on the couch. My old roommate has one of the huge love sacks and it’s wicked comfortable to sleep on. Dave owes me.
Sunday morning, we showered and headed down to the game. Petco is my second home park since I lived down here last summer so we found free street parking and walked to the game. The cheapest tickets they had were $12 and we sat in almost the same spot as we did in Angels Stadium. It was Mexican Opening Day so they sang the Mexican National Anthem before the game and introduced both line-ups in Spanish and English. It was pretty weird. I think Petco is really nice but it really doesn’t compare to Safeco or AT&T. They have a cool beach area in right-center and they sell a “Park Pass” for $5 where you sit on a grassy hill and watch the game on a big screen as their main quirky attractions. It’s nice and retro-new but a pretty high bar has been set and they weren’t quite there. We finally saw a crappy game as the Rockies pounded the Padres 10-4. I have Jake Peavy on my fantasy team and he gave up 8 runs in 4 innings so I was doubly pissed. After the game we went to Hooters in Mission Valley because one of Dave’s friends from high school works there. She wasn’t working but our waitress was Shavonda from Real World: Philadelphia. I had no clue who she was but Dave freaked out and had no one to share it with. It reminded me of the time I saw Peter North in Huntington and everyone thought I was weird for getting excited. I had a pretty good BBQ Beef sandwich and we headed to Dave & Buster’s. Dave has a dog named Buster so he bought some t-shirts for himself and his wife. It actually looked like a cool place, like an adult Funtasia, but Dave and I are both too cheap to pay money for those kinds of games. I took him to the airport around 7 PM and drove back to the apartment. We watched the Sopranos at 9 PM and I crashed early.

The past few days I’ve been sleeping and watching baseball. I feel a lot better and now I’m just hacking up phlegm and blowing my nose a lot. The dizziness is gone and the congestion will be gone soon. I think I’m going to see some friends in Seal Beach tomorrow and I’m headed to the Dodger’s game on Friday night. This weekend I’m going to Vegas and I’ll be there for about 5 days before heading to Phoenix. I’ll try to post more often so I don’t need to drop a mega-rambling nonsensical post on everyone next time. I also didn’t take any cool pictures because I wasn’t exactly in an inspired state so I’ll try to fix that for future games and future travels. Bless you if you made it this far. Go Mariners!!

Game 4

Sorry for the lack of updates. We've been pretty busy and I've gotten as sick as I've been in the last five years. What timing, what a bad beat. When we aren't driving or watching games, I'm trying to get sleep and drink fluids. Hopefully the congestion and lightheadedness will go away soon.

Right now we're in Angels Stadium for a Yankees-Angels game. We were hoping for Randy vs Bartolo but sadly the Angels are running Ervin Santana out there. At least I'll still get to boo Randy.

I'll get a full recap up soon, I promise. Right now I can hardly think so it's difficult to write anything of substance. Later.

Game 2!

Just arrived in beautiful Oakland, CA and drove directly to the beautiful McAfee Coliseum. It looks like an ungodly concrete monstrosity from the outside but it's actually not terrible once you're inside. I think that covering the upper bowl was a stroke of genius. This morning we hiked a bit in Redwood National Forest and along the coast. I'll write more about everything tonight, once I can use my laptop.

They have the M's game on TV right now and we're clinging to a 5-4 lead. I got to watch Mateo give up a 2-run bomb the minute I got here. Nice to see that they got a win last night, let's hope they hold on here. Later.

Mariners and Safeco

"1st inning highlights: Vlady hits a dinger off of Moyer for the 6495619th time and Colon strikes out the side. Your 2006 Seattle Mariners!

signs of life. Colon is on tilt. Moyer's pumped up. I heard this Johjima kid was good. I'll take an oppo dong and a nice assist as a pretty good MLB debut. And the game's not over....."

Those were the Treo updates from the game. Sadly this will be the only Mariners' game on my roadtrip. I had a lot of fun, even in defeat. The Mariners could be good in a few years, it all depends on how Future(Felix) holds up and whether Reed can ever learn to hit. I don't need a ton of production from my middle infield but I can't live with .250, 10 dingers and 50 Ribbies from an outfield spot, no matter how well he plays in center. Johjima looked real good, making a heady assist at 2nd and stroking a bomb the other way. My favorite moment though was when he battled Colon, fouling off pitch after pitch until Bartolo ended up hitting him to load the bases with none out and chasing lst year's Cy Young winner. It was a real, quality, MLB at-bat. It's just too bad that the Angels' bullpen is unbelievably sick and they slammed the door on us. God I'd love to trot Romero, Shields and K-Rod out there in the late innings. The only question in my head about Johjima is that it looked like the ump was squeezing Putz on the Figgins at-bat and that may be because of poor framing by Kenji? I hope someone reading this can chime in on that since I didn't have the greatest view from deep in left field. All told, it was better than getting our butts kicked but effectively showed us why we aren't in the Angels' class. It's definitely weird rooting to finish .500 but it's nice that we're doing it with youth and there's some hope for the future. Go M's!

I'm hoping to start the trip tomorrow but I don't have the van yet. I'm a little leery about buying it from a used car dealership on Highway 99 that has signs all over stating, "No Credito? No Hay Problema!" The van they have definitely feels like it might be stolen. I ran a carfax report and it came up clean but who knows. Buying a used car is so scary, especially when you have to immediately take the car on a 11,000 mile roadtrip. Bleh. I'm going u tomorrow to take one last look but the worst case scenario will be that I take my Prius. I feel badly for Kenny "Bones" because I told him he could borrow the car for the time I was on the roadtrip. Bones is coming up with me tomorrow to look at the van and help me drive it back down here if I decide that I want it. God I'm such a procrastinator.

I'm off to bed. Hopefully I'll be at Redwood National Park by this time tomorrow, in a used minivan.

Sunday, Bloody Sunday

Well I had chips in 2 out of 3 tournies today and managed a 12th place finish in the Paradise $200 rebuy and a 151st place finish in the Stars $1 million guaranteed. The day was good for a $3K profit, nothing to scoff at but nothing to get too excited about. Here are 2 fun hands from Dise:

Blinds have just gone up to 10K/20K and we're on a pay-bubble with 16 left, 15th will get $680 more than 16th. I have 193K in the CO and the button has 52K, SB has 149K and the Big blind has 93K. I'm usually going to jam any 2 here but I've been wondering if it's a mistake when they're like life support low. Usually my FE is huge if there's a smaller stack at the table but in this case, the button was the short stack. Anyway, I push 3h5h and the button calls all in with KsQs. The flop is Kd6c4h giving me an open-ender but the turn is the Jh and the river is the 9h giving me a beautiful backdoor flush. I started to think that this was going to be my day.

The second hand occurs just 7 hands later, we're 12-handed and I'm on the button with 280K after stealing a few blinds. MP with 192K pushes for the second straight hand and I repush with AQo. I type to my friend Damon, "AJ pls" and don't realize that the BB, with 276K total chips calls my overpush with KK. The original pusher does indeed have AJ and we flop an Ace, only to lose to a rivered King. The pot had over 700K chips in it and I would have been chipleader by about 200K with 10 left. Oy. I have 4K chips left and call all in on the next hand after posting my 1K ante. I had Q3 and I'm wondering if I can wait any longer. It seems like once the ante is 25% of your stack you should just put your chips in the middle. I know I got it in with 2 outs but it's still painful to lose to a rivered set. 3K for 12th is nice but 84K for 1st just sounds so much sweeter.

This weekend we celebrated Renee's birthday for the third time. Why do girls get a birthday week? We went to our friend CJ's house to play poker and I decided to push on every hand. The very first hand I got AT and got it in against AhJh. We flopped ATx with 2 hearts but a T on the turn meant he was drawing dead. Everyone was super pissed and started complaining about my pushing every hand technique so I decided to abort that mission. I limp in the very next hand with Ah3h and flop the nut flush against a set of 5s and a set of Js. Renee pushed and I overpushed and convinced the girl with the set of Jacks to fold. They play tournament style with rebuys for the first two levels and Renee and I found ourselves heads up at the end. She wanted to chop but I was ruthless and took home the $110 for first place. Muahahahahaha.

After the poker we went to Pesos and I consumed a lot of beer. Last night Duane, EJ, Davis and I went to see Thursday at a small venue called "El Corazon". The concert was awesome and I consumed a lot of beer. Renee and Erica came to meet us at Joey's after the concert and they were nice enough to give my drunk ass a ride home. I had a wicked hangover today and had horrible beershits during the big poker tournies. Believe me, it's not fun.

Tomorrow is a really busy day. I have to take the Prius in to the Toyota dealership because they have a recall on the 2003s, something about having to check the battery connections. I'm dropping the car off at 7:15 AM then using Renee's car to drive to a few dealerships in my final attempts to buy a stupid minivan. I have to get everything done by noon because we're going down to Mariner's Opening Day which starts at 2 PM. Hopefully the sun will be out and I can consume a lot of beer. After the M's game is the NCAA Championship. I'm not sure where I'll watch the game but odds are, I'll consume a lot of beer. Finally, Taking Back Sunday is performing at the Showbox tomorrow night but I think I might have to skip the show. I'm leaving for 2 months on Tuesday and it would be nice to have some clean laundry and some kind of plan. I can't believe the roadtrip is finally here. I'm insanely amped for baseball and can't wait to see the States. I'm going to try to hit up as many National Parks and historical sites as possible, starting with Redwood National Park on the way fro Seattle to San Fran. Please please please can I have the discipline to post here every day during this trip. If I were a betting man, and I am, I'd say odds are pretty long that I'll have a post up daily.

Talk to you tomorrow. Will I have a new minivan? Will I consume a lot of beers? Tune in tomorrow to find out, right here on the Life of Brandon.

Gooooooo Carl

I forgot to put this in my post yesterday but Carl was 13th in chips with 27 left in the Reno WPT event. The winner of this event gets just over one million dollars. There are now only 20 left and he's somewhere in the middle of the pack. Barry Greenstein is a frikkin cardrack and he's knocking people out left and right but Carl is surviving so far. If he makes the final 6 I think I'm going to fly to Reno to watch the taping of the final table. My favorite sites for updates are PokerWire and Cardplayer.

GOOOOOOO CARL!!!!!!!!!!!!!

UPDATE------1 PM:

From Cardplayer:
"Barry Greenstein raises to $25,000 preflop and both Jason Stern and Carl Olson call. The flop comes Kh-10d-4s and Olson checks. Greenstein bets $50,000 and Stern folds. Olson moves all in and Greenstein calls. Greenstein shows Ks-9s and Olson has Ad-Jd. Olson catches his gutshot straight on the turn in the form of the Qh. The river is the 8d and Carl "colson10" Olson doubles up."

He's so good it's scary. Hahahaha.

New chipcount:

Place Poker Player Chip Count
1 Barry Greenstein $ 1,140,000
2 Tom Schneider $ 600,000
3 Carl Olson $ 530,000
4 Burt Boutin $ 360,000


UPDATE------------1:50 PM

15 left, Cardplayer says that Carl has $430K and is in 6th place but he called during the break and told me $330K which would also be good for 6th place right now. Something tells me that Cardplayer is wrong but let's hope he forgot about a 100K stack somewhere.

UPDATE------------2:35 PM

PokerWire has Carl in 9th place out of 14 left. He has 260K chips with blinds at 6/12K. Plenty of time to find a hand and suck out on Barry. Thanks Sarah and Daliman for the comments. Gooooooooooooo Carl!

UPDATE------------2:36 PM

Whoops. Now he's 14/14 with 139K chips. Still enough time to suck out on barryg1.

UPDATE------------3 PM

Barry is gross. Must really be painful sitting at that table. Here are the updated chipcounts from Pokerwire:

Place Poker Player Chip Count
1 Barry Greenstein $ 1,400,000
2 Kevin Song $ 770,000
3 Jonas Norrman $ 530,000
4 Tom Schneider $ 510,000
5 Gary Jacobi $ 505,000
6 Greg 'FBT' Mueller $ 350,000
7 Burt Boutin $ 327,000
8 Michael Simon $ 315,000
9 Jason Stern $ 290,000
10 Fang Tian $ 250,000
11 Fabrice Soulier $ 175,000
12 Carl Olson $ 111,000
13 Dan Schmiech $ 110,000
14 Paramjit Gill $ 80,000

Sweating Carl online is extremely painful so I can only imagine how much it sucks sitting at work and sweating my sweat. Suck. Out. On. Barry.

UPDATE---------------3:40 PM

From Cardplayer:

Carl "colson10" Olson moves all in preflop for his last $98,000. Burt Boutin moves all in behind him for about $45,000 more. Everyone folds and Olson shows Ac-9d. Boutin flips over Kc-Jd and will have to improve. The board comes 9h-5c-2h-7c-4h and Carl Olson doubles up.

Fun times. The other guy looks crippled and might go out soon in 13th. That would mean Carl makes about $5700 more. I don't think he's too worried about that right now but ya know, $5700 is $5700.

UPDATE----------------3:47 PM

11 left. Here are the chipcounts:

1 Barry Greenstein $ 1,775,000
2 Kevin Song $ 760,000
3 Gary Jacobi $ 690,000
4 Tom Schneider $ 640,000
5 Fang Tian $ 530,000
6 Jonas Norrman $ 435,000
7 Jason Stern $ 350,000
8 Greg 'FBT' Mueller $ 310,000
9 Michael Simon $ 265,000
10 Carl Olson $ 120,000
11 Paramjit Gill $ 65,000

Here is the payout structure:

1 $1,052,890
2 $529,300
3 $256,115
4 $142,285
5 $113,830
6 $85,370
7 $71,145
8 $56,915
9 $42,685
10-12 $28,455

As I'm writing this, Carl doubled up again. Details to come.

UPDATE--------------3:52

This is why we call him "Coinflip Carl"
From Cardplayer:

"Barry Greenstein raises to $50,000 preflop and Carl Olson moves all in for $149,000. Greenstein calls and shows 7d-7c. Olson flips over Ac-8d and the board comes 8h-3h-3c-5h-10s. Carl "colson10" Olson doubles up to over $300,000 chips."

Barry still has all the chips. I'd love to see him give $500K to charity and let Carl take home the Mil ticket.

Update---------------4:02 PM

Pokerwire has the following chipcounts:

Place Poker Player Chip Count
1 Barry Greenstein $ 1,600,000
2 Gary Jacobi $ 780,000
3 Kevin Song $ 710,000
4 Fang Tian $ 680,000
5 Carl Olson $ 430,000
6 Jonas Norrman $ 400,000
7 Tom Schneider $ 385,000
8 Greg 'FBT' Mueller $ 365,000
9 Jason Stern $ 310,000
10 Michael Simon $ 275,000
11 Paramjit Gill $ 40,000

This event is over, they just don't know it yet. I have to run and get Renee a birthday present before we meet at 5:30 for dinner. I'll wait for one more update then I'm outtie. Let's go Coiner.

UPDATE------------4:19 PM

Carl just called. They're down to the final table of 10 and they're going on dinner break. here are the chip counts, courtesy of Pokerwire:

Place Poker Player Chip Count
1 Barry Greenstein $ 1,264,000
2 Gary Jacobi $ 790,000
3 Tom Schneider $ 600,000
4 Kevin Song $ 570,000
5 Jason Stern $ 560,000
6 Michael Simon $ 486,000
7 Fang Tian $ 428,000
8 Jonas Norrman $ 406,000
9 Greg 'FBT' Mueller $ 400,000
10 Carl Olson $ 390,000

Cardplayer has him with a few more chips but this looks more reasonable given the fact that Barry just doubled up 2 people. He said on the phone that he hasn't seen any big hands the entire tournament so let's hope he's due. They're probably close to hitting 10/20K so some big hands soon would be clutch. I have my friend Nordberg texting me if anything big goes down while I'm at dinner. Gogogogogogo Carl.

UPDATE-------------7:50 PM

Can you say chipleader? 9 left and he just had a huge doubleup with KK vs KQ. Here's Cardplayer:

"Gary Jacobi raised from late position and Carl Olson reraised $150,000 more the small blind. Jacobi pushed all in and Olson called. Jacobi flipped over Ks-Qc while Olson showed Kd-Kh. The board came 9d-2d-4d-8h-7d and Carl Olson doubles up.

"Colson10" is now the chip leader with over $1,100,000."

Carl just called, I guess they're on break but he said that the guy in the SB was a major donk and he was positive that the guy was pushing the whole way. Awesome awesome awesome. Apparently the guy just crippled himself by limping with KTo then insta-calling a decent sized push so apparently the donk may be gone soon. I think he has enough chips now to bust Barry. Let's find AA vs KK and let the AA hold up, OK?

Wow. I'm so damn excited right now.

BTW, dinner was fantastic. We went to Etta's instead of Campagne because Campagne's wasn't taking reservations and Etta's was higly recommended on the 25 for $25 website. They had this cornbread pudding that would have made me cry if I wasn't such a badass. BOMB.

FINAL UPDATE--------------11:30

Well I'm done crying so I can report that Carl went out in 7th, taking home $71,145. It's a weird day when that kind of money is a disappointment but such is the world of tournament poker. Good job Carl. As a silver lining, you saved me from having to buy a $350 plane ticket.

Breathe Again

Thank god UConn lost. I couldn't even bear to watch that game and I found it really difficult to follow any of the Elite 8 games. I just didn't care. Now that UConn is out I feel the excitement rushing back into my veins. I really hope that George Mason completes this run but I'm scared that they might suffer a letdown now that they've reached the Final Four. Luckilly my predictions have been unbelievably wrong this year so GMU will probably come out and kick butt. I'm intrigued by the LSU story and it would be really nice to see them knock off UCLA. I don't want to see Bill Walton chanting U-C....L-A ever again.

Something I really need to do before recapping the last few days is pimp some blogs. One of my favorite things that I do in the morning is logging onto bloglines and seeing what my favorite bloggers are up to. I never give anyone any credit and never post links so I'm going try to start doing a better job of that. This last weekend, a bunch of poker bloggers got invited to the Playboy Mansion to cover a celebrity poker tournament. Getting an invite to the Mansion is one of the main reasons why I'm playing in 17-20 WSOP events this year. I want make a TV tgable on ESPN and be cool enough to go to one of those parties. Anyway, about 8 bloggers lived the impossible dream, including two of my favorites, Dr. Pauly and Sir AlCantHang. They both have great write-ups already and have promised that their stories will be continued. They also have links to some of the other bloggers who got to go along. I haven't read those stories yet because the internet is excruciatingly slow here at my grandma's but I'll read them when I get home tomorrow. It's funny because I can read their blogs through bloglines but when I try to go to their real webpage, my Grandma's internet blocks them because they're listed as "pornography" sites. Awesome.

Two other great blogs are my friends Scott and Robert. Scott always has fantastic pictures from his life as a teacher in Japan and Robert always has fantastic stories about his life as a teacher in Africa. Scott's blog is more for the visual learners and Robert's is for the heavy readers. Check them out because they're both really really fanastic.

Like I said earlier, I'm going to try to do a better job of pimping the good blogs out there. There's a lot of really cool stuff that I read about every day and I'm going to try to make all your lives a little less productive. Hooray.

On Saturday, Renee's mom had a huge Korean feast for her birthday. About 8 of us went up to Lynnwood and ate until we were comatose. I'm at my Grandma's place right now but there are some good pictures of the spread that I'll try to post on Wednesday. We went back to Seattle and tried to go out but no one had any energy. It's really strange to know how crazy we are then watch us sitting on our asses, sipping beer, while our bodies tried to digest all the ribs and kimchi. A few people tried to go out but I just dropped them off and drove myself home because my entire body was sore from falling out of a tree on Friday night and landing directly on my tailbone so I couldn't handle being in a crowded space.

On Sunday I played in some huge poker tournaments and only cashed in one, making an $88 profit on Paradise. That didn't quite offset the $1K buy-in on Stars but that's life as a tourney player. I had a tough hand to go out in the 1K. It's in the middle stages of the tournament, blinds are 100/200 with a 25 ante and I have a pretty good stack of 8400. I raise in EP to 600 with JJ and only the BB calls. The BB has me covered. The flop is 643 with two hearts, he checks, I bet 800 and he shoves his entire 13,400 stack in. I don't think I can fold here so I don't but alas he has QQ and I'm gone. It always feels weird to commit 40 blinds with unimproved JJ but in these online tourneys you can't pass up on spots like this. Blinds rise too fast and his range is too wide. Oh well. $1K down the drain.

On Monday morning I caught the train down to Vancouver to help my grandma and mom move some heavy boxes and stuff. They needed help from a strong man but Cliff was busy so they had to settle for me. If you learn anything from this blog, learn this: DON'T LIVE YOUR LIFE AS A PACKRAT! THROW STUFF AWAY! DONATE STUFF TO GOODWILL! FOR THE LOVE OF YOUR GRANDCHILDREN! PLEASE!!!!!! It is absolutely unreal how many boxes I've hauled to Goodwill. 5 VCRs, 3 TVs, an ungodly amount of coax and phone wires. I love you Gramps and I miss you dearly but man my back is hating a right now. It doesn't help that my body's still sore from falling out of the tree on Friday. Yuck. Anyway, we've gotten rid of most of the stuff and my grandma's place is looking good. We're heading back to Seattle tomorrow to take the stuff that we want to keep back to my mom's house.

On the way up to Seattle I was supposed to pick up my Honda Odyssey but the deal fell through. I was trying to get the guy to give me the van for $6200 even though the BlueBook was $6400 because it looked like the tires might have to be replaced. He actually wanted $6500 because the van had custom rims. We were negotiating a bit when he got a call from someone else who offered $6700 for the van so he sold it to that guy. The ad on Craig's List was asking for $6995 so the guy probably thought he was getting a good deal by offering $6700. Bah. I was arguing over $200 frikking dollars and I lost out on a good van. I spent more than that drowning my sorrow on Friday night. I'm leaving for the trip in exactly on week so I better find something else soon. I'll definitely keep you posted.

Tomorrow is Renee's Birthday so i'm taking her to Cafe Campagne for dinner. There's a promotion called 25 for $25 that I'm going to take advantage of tomorrow. Basically there are 25 nice restaurants that offer a semi-fixed menu for $25 and you get an appetizer, entree and dessert. $25 seems a bit pricy to get all excited about but Campagne is a really nice French restaurant and you'd never be able to eat there for that cheap under normal circumstances. Cafe Campagne trip report coming soon. GO GEORGE MASON!

Wow

00Seriosuly. I wrote that weird post from the bar but the emotion behind it stands. Someone, anyone, who watched that game, please explain to me why we lost. If you log on with an excuse, the officials must be a secondary reason, I'm a person who will ALMOST never blame the officials. Before today the "almost" was unnecessary because I thought I'd never blame the refs but after today, I change my mind. I'm disgusted by the way that the game went down and I can't believe how bad we got jobbed. Call me a whiner, call me a sore loser. I'm really upset.

bullshit

I dare yoy to ask me about thod goame the woisrst officiating I've ever seen. good god can the officials be more in love with uconn. this is bullshit. fyi.

Go Dawgs

Well here's the weekly first paragraph apology: I'm sorry I don't update my blog more often. I'm a bad person and I don't deserve having anyone reading it. I really want to blog every day during my road trip and I need to get in the habit now. I'm going to try to enter something every day for the next two weeks, even if it's just what I had for lunch. Enjoy.

First off I'll answer Mr. Anonymous' question about food on the ship in Antarctica. The food was awesome and everyone ate way too much. They had options that ranged from King Crab Crepes to Salmon fillets to Ribeye steaks. There was a salad bar every meal with different soup options and fresh fruits. There was a dessert every night, usually some sort of fruit or pie with icecream. My favorite was the dulce de leche crepe. Dulce de leche is probably the greatest concoction of all time. We ate really well on the ship and most people gained a lot of weight. I hope that helps you a bit.

I'm in Seattle, finally. It's really nice to be home for good. It was quite the challenge, packing up the little Prius with all my belongings, but I found a way to do it. Obviously I left my bed, desk, and shelf in Carlsbad but they were all the cheapest stuff from Ikea so it isn't that big of a deal. Renee flew one-way into San Francisco and it was nice having a co-driver for the long portion of the trip. She tried to drive but got tired after 40 miles and had to switch back. She drove from Chehalis to Olympia, exit 69 to exit 109.

I love the NCAA tournament so much. After the Super Bowl, sports goes through a 6 week lull and then, BAM, the tourney jumps up and slaps us in the face with great college basketball games. I love college sports because these kids play with the emotion that I remember having when I played sports. Pro athletes always have that pretentious air about them and you can really feel the business side of things.

This weekend should have some great games. Today we have LSU - Duke and Gonzaga - UCL as the marquee matchups. I think LSU could pull off the upset but I think JJ will pull through when they need him. I despise Duke but he's just so money. My heart is pulling for the Zags but, man, UCLA looks really good. If Morrison is off again the Zags don't stand a chance. If he's dominant, I think they can beat anyone. I can't wait for these two.

Tomorrow is the big Huskies-Huskies matchup and as much as I love my Dawgs, I just don't see how we can beat these guys. Their front line is just too strong and I think we're going to get worked. I still don't have any faith in Jensen and I feel like the Illinois game was more of a knock on Augustine than it was an atta-boy for Jensen. Call me crazy but I won't let 10 minutes of defense erase 4 years of boneheadedness, if that's even a word. I wish we could put Bobby Jones on their point guard to make it difficult for him to throw entry passes but I think we'll have to put him on Rudy Gay since Dentman can't guard anyone but Marcus Williams. UCONN scares the crap out of me but I'll be at the bar tomorrow night in my Husky purple. GO DAWGS!!!

My favorite part of this year's tournament is the success of the mid-majors and the failure of the Big Ten. In 2000, at the Rose Bowl, I was getting continental breakfast at my Pasadena motel before the game with one of the worst hangovers of my life, wearing my Husky purple when two Purdue fans came up and asked, "Do you guys really think you have a chance today?" My eyes bugged out of my head and I was like, "A chance? You guys went 8-3 and got into the game because you haven't been in 30+ years. We're 10-1! We beat Miami! We're the favorites here, what the hell are you talking about?" He replied with, "Well, who have you beaten besides Miami?" I said, "WTF!!! We beat Miami, another 10-1 team! Do we have to list all our wins? What 8 teams have YOU beaten?" Finally he simply said, "Well, we're from the Big 10 so we're going to win." Unreal. Since then I've always relished in the Big 10's failures. Screw those arrogant bastards.

That game featured the greatest trash talking moment of my life. Purdue hadn't been to the Rose Bowl if like 35 years, and they were all excited. The Rose Bowl had the fans from each scool divided into sections and I was sitting right on the edge of the Husky section next to the rowdy Purdue fans. We had a stifling defense and Marques Tuiasosopo and we kicked their butts. In the 4th quarter, we ran the clock out by just smashing the rock down their throats, getting 4-yards on every carry and demoralizing the team and its fans. On one of the last first-down runs, the one that made it clear that the game was over, I turned to the silent Purdue section and yealled, in my obnoxious hungover Schaefer voice, "SEE YOU IN 30 YEARS!!!" The "oooooohhhhhhhhhhhh" from the Husky fans helped and there was nothing the Purdue fans could do but bow their heads and cry. You know you got someone good when you feel really bad afterwards because the person you're making fun of looks suicidal. Good times, I don't think there were any reports of Purdue fans killing themselves so I can feel good about it.

Poker has been going pretty poorly since coming back to Seattle. I feel like I'm playing well but the cards aren't cooperating. When I lose I don't feel like playing but I need to play to earn money for travel. Let's hope I stop losing soon.

I looked at a 1998 Honda Odyssey today and I'm probably going to buy it. It looks clean and has a new transmission so it shouldn't break down on me. It sure would suck to have a busted ass van in the middle of Texas or something. Texas....*shudder*.

The games are about to start. I'd like to see Duke lose and Gonzaga win. GO DAWGS!!!!

Antarctica

My mom wrote her own recap and since she's a better writer than me I'm just going to post that here. She keeps a great journal wherever she goes and it's a great resource for trip reports. I should learn from those wiser than me but unfortunately I've always been too lazy to update my journal when I've tried to keep one. Without further ado, here's mom!

-----------

Greetings!

I'm actually writing this message from the States. I'll be here until mid-April, then I plan to resume travels in South America until mid-May.

Two days into our Antarctic cruise, as Brandon and I were both bedridden with a severe case of seasickness, a crewmember came to tell me that I had a phone call on the bridge. I wasn't even sure what the bridge was, but eventually I groped and stumbled my way to the top deck of the ship and into the captain's quarters. The Russian crewmembers didn't even notice my presence, as they were keeping an eye on the rough waters which resembled a scene from the movie "The Perfect Storm". The only phone that I could see was a small plastic unit mounted to the wall. The receiver was dangling, so I picked it up and said a tentative "hello". After a trans-continental, trans-oceanic pause I heard a voice at the other end. It was my sister-in-law Kimberly, who had miraculously tracked me down in the middle of the Drake Passage. She was calling via satellite phone to tell me that my father had just passed away. Unfortunately, there was no possibility of Brandon and me returning to land before the ship had completed its 11-day cruise, so we spent the next week wishing we were home, yet completely captivated by the wonders of the southernmost, highest, driest, coldest, windiest, most remote continent on Earth.

So let's back up a few days. We flew into Ushuaia, Argentina, the southernmost city in the world. Ushuaia is the Yamana word for "bay that opens into the west". It is one of the windiest places in the world, where the indigenous people wore little more than a loincloth because it was so rainy that any clothing would get wet and lose its protective qualities. They smeared seal oil on their skin to keep them warm. And they had constant wood fires that gave this land its name, Tierra del Fuego, meaning land of fire. Fortunately for us, we arrived on the most pleasant summer day of this season, sunny, just barely warm, and not noticeably windy.

Our first morning was spent visiting Tierra del Fuego National Park, taking in the scenery and learning about the peat moss and three species of beech trees that grow there. At the bottom of 10-meter layers of peat moss there is coal, and Ushuaia is also rich in oil and gas. The Panamerican Highway, originating in Alaska, runs north/south through the Americas, ending here at La Pataia. The Andes also end here as they tumble into the sea, somewhat reminiscent of the Alps plunging into the Mediterranean in the South of France.

We soon boarded our "home" for the next 11 days, the Russian ship Akademik Shokalskiy. We had selected a tour that utilized a small ship, as we had been advised that the experience is much more intimate, with more frequent landings and Zodiac excursions, meaning more interaction with animals. The Shokalskiy has a capacity of 49 passengers, but there were only 25 of us on this trip, with 23 Russian crewmembers, a "hotel" staff of five, two naturalists, and our expedition leader/Arctic historian rounding out the count.

The first evening was pleasant enough, sailing out of the Beagle Channel toward the Arctic Peninsula, spotting seabirds along the way. Then came the dreaded Drake Passage. This stretch of ocean is notorious for rough seas, and we were "lucky" enough to experience the most severe storm of the season, which our crew characterized as a full-force gale with winds up to 60 knots per hour and waves, as I mentioned above, reminiscent of a Hollywood disaster movie. Our expedition leader later rated this storm as 11 on a scale of 1-12. I tried valiantly but in vain to remain "all natural" in coping with seasickness, by chewing ginger gum and munching on ginger altoids. But this was no 3-hour joyride to the Great Barrier Reef, this was a 2-day ordeal in a serious storm in the open ocean. I could tough it out in Australia with mind over matter, but was no match for the 45-degree swaying of the ship in either direction, first starboard, then port, and the rhythmic churning of my stomach acid and brain juices. Though it was hard to drag myself out of bed, let alone up the stairs and down the hallway, I went looking for the ship doctor to admit that I was ready for drugs. An innocent little adhesive patch of scopolamine helped immensely, though the nausea continued for another day.

The crew utilized the 48 hours through the Drake Passage to provide lectures on Arctic wildlife and history. I appreciated the good attitude of one of our naturalists who began his talk by inviting us to feel free to jump up and run out of the room if we needed to vomit. He said that happens frequently during his lectures, even those that take place on dry land (ha ha).

Then one day we awoke to the realization that we had crossed the Drake Passage. As if that weren't good enough in itself, we hopped into Zodiacs and had an early morning landing on a nearby island. Gentoo and Chinstrap penguins littered the shore where we landed...and stayed there as we hopped out and began to walk around. I can hardly describe the magical feeling of a place where animals have not learned to fear humans. Images of the Garden of Eden come to mind. And I can hardly begin to describe the absolute cuteness of these creatures in their black and white tuxedoes, surpassed in adorableness only by their chicks adorned in the finest fluffy down.

Then there's penguin behavior. The chicks were still somewhat dependent on their parents for food. Upon the parent's return from a fishing trip, the baby would act like any baby bird and beg for food. We must have caught the penguins during the weaning process, as the parent sometimes ignored the chick, resulting in the chick chasing the parent, which ended with the parent running from the chick. Try to visualize the comical image of these big, clumsy, tuxedoed birds running down snow-covered hills, tripping and sliding, and alternating between running and tobogganing (sliding on the belly). The parents were quite inconsistent and would end up positively reinforcing the seemingly undesirable behavior. After being pursued and chased and pecked by the chick, the parent would eventually relent and regurgitate some food. I'm sure there's an important adaptive reason for this behavior, but personally I would never regurgitate a jellyfish or a bit of krill after telling my kids 'no'.

A few more days and a few more landings later, we had spotted a variety of animals on the beach and on ice floes, including crabeater, Wedell, leopard, elephant and fur seals; Gentoo, chinstrap and Adelie penguins; skuas, terns, cormorants, albatross, snowy sheathbills, and other seabirds; and, most notably, whales! Not just the occasional spouting or dorsal fin far in the distance, but pods of curious and gregarious humpback whales that inspected our Zodiacs up close. So close that we were drenched by the water spouted by the whales, startled as the whales would disappear for a few minutes under the water and resurface no more than five feet away from our boats, and privileged yet somewhat grossed out to learn first-hand that whale breath is exceedingly unpleasant, conjuring images of a sewer in a waterfront neighborhood. We were absolutely mesmerized for more than an hour as the whales inspected us and cavorted around us. Words alone are just the tip of the iceberg in conveying the thrill, the excitement, the sheer bliss of spending time with these amazing giants of the open ocean. I am convinced that they trusted us, treated us gently, and enjoyed gawking at us. They could easily have capsized our Zodiacs, but they chose not to. What I can't understand is how whalers could have hunted and killed these intelligent mammals, these sentient beings, these gentle giants. But, then again, I'm a vegetarian, so there's a lot that I can't understand about hunting and killing...

The next morning it happened again, a close encounter with friendly and curious whales. This time the biologist guides absolutely flipped out, as in addition to humpbacks we spotted and cavorted with a Southern Right Whale, which is never found in these particular waters. All I can say is that it was just as playful as the humpbacks.

As if the animals were not enough of a highlight, there was the ice! Vast mountain ranges dripping with glaciers! Calving icebergs creating mini tsunami waves --sometimes right in front of our Zodiac! Spectacular sculpted icebergs, mind-boggling in size with amazing surface patterns! Vast expanses of ice chips covering the water surface after a recent calving! Glacial blue, glacial green, clear ice, dirty ice, whiteness! 70% of the Earth's fresh water is held in Antarctica in icebergs and glaciers! There is a glacier in Ross Bay the size of France!

I could go on and on about all that is spectacular and unique about Antarctica, but I have to stop somewhere, and you have to get on with your lives. Antarctica is so much more than "just the seventh continent", an item on the checklist of the Type-A traveler. It is endlessly fascinating, it is vitally important, it is almost absolutely pristine, it is inconceivably vast, it is stirs the imagination, and best of all it is real! And it was a privilege to have visited!

Love,
JoAnn

Going Going Back Back to Cali Cali

First off I want to thank everyone who posted their condolences. I really appreciate them and things like that do mean a lot to me. Thank you very much.

It's been a great weekend and I'm ready to go home. The Celebration of Life ceremony was really nice and I got to see a ton of family that I hadn't seen for a long time, 20 years in some cases. We decided to start some sort of annual or bi-annual family reunion so that it doesn't happen again. We're all on the West Coast or Hawaii so it shouldn't be too hard to put together. My vote is for Hawaii in '07.

I'm sorry for the jumbled bunch of pictures I put up over the weekend. I usually sort them into one post and talk about them but I've been using my grandpa's dial-up connection and words can't describe how frustrating it was to put them up even in the crude form that they're up now. I have no clue how people used, an continue to use, such a slow connection. I swear, I'll get a full Antarctica trip report up eventually.

I was planning on moving back to Seattle next weekend but I might put it off until the following week. I didn't realize that San Diego was hosting the NCAA tournament and now the Huskies are opening there so I pretty much have to stick around. Also, the semi-finals of the World Baseball Classic are next weekend so I might try to snag a ticket there. The WBC has been pretty cool and it's been successful in whetting my appetite for (a) the MLB season and (b) soccer's World Cup. I think national pride is rather petty in most cases but I think it's awesome in sports. I can't wait to chant "U-S-A! U-S-A!" in Munich. If anyone wants to fly down to San Diego it should be a fun sports weekend and I'll even drive you back to Seattle if you can only afford a one-way ticket.

In other sports news, Steve Hutchinson signed an offer sheet with the Vikings, giving us one week to match the deal or let him go without compensation. They way overpaid for him but I'd like to keep our lovely o-line intact. I'm sure Mr. Ruskell has his reasons but I'm baffled as to why they gave Hutch the transition tag instead of the franchise tag. Can someone who knows more about NFL free-agency let me know what's up? I'll do my own research tomorrow but tonight I refuse to surf using this satanic dial-up. The bottom line is that I have full faith in our player personnel guys and I think they'll do the right thing but to me the right thing is keeping Walteria and Hutch together.

In other sports news, the Sonics suck. In Mariners news, Mr. Beltre is en fuego at the WBC and he looks like he's in great shape. Let's hope he keeps ripping the ball during the regular season and he shows us the .330 batting, 49 dinger, MVP candidate that we signed up for. He was the NL MVP that year(2004) among non-Frankenstein candidates. I'd really like it if Bonds never played another game. By some cruel twist of fate I have the Giants 3 or 4 times in the first few weeks of my baseball road trip and I'd rather not lose my voice showering him with boos.

I've been looking on craigslist for my tough baseball tickets and I found a post from mlb.com saying that additional tickets were released so I logged on and bought Red Sox-Yankees tickets and Orioles-Red Sox tickets at face value, a major coup as far as I'm concerned. Those games were both sold out and I figured I'd have to pay a premium for tickets. I also found a Mets fan to go accompany me to Shea. Matt Matros is one of the main guys that I try to pattern my tournament game after and I've learned a lot from his blog, his book and some of his other strategy posts. I was lucky enough to meet him in Vegas last summer and I'm glad we've kept in touch. I saw the blog comments from him and now I fell all sorts of added pressure to put out somthing of quality in this blog. Sorry in advance for the meanigless drivel that I provide.

I'm also looking on craigslist for a good minivan and I found a few Honda Odysseys for $6-7K with around 100,000 miles on them. They're great vans but people are overpricing them because a lot of people don't check the BBV before buying. I'm going to try to negotiate for a cheaper van and I'll definitely let you know when I but one. I'm going to feel pretty lame driving around in a minivan but it really makes sense since I'll be on the road for 2 months and 11,000 miles. I took the Prius to Spring Training a few years ago and it's just too small for an extended road trip. I guess my new nickname can be Brandon "soccer mom" Schaefer.

I played some tourneys today and busted out pretty early in all of them. I played like crap for the most part and got a little unlucky in some spots and that led to no cashes. Full Tilt was especially frustrating as I got my money in with AA vs TT on a J87x board and watched a 9 fall on the river. There were still 300 left but I would have been 3rd in chips had I won. 2 hands later I still have 15 blinds and get it in preflop with AK vs AJ and a KQT flop sends me to the rail. It's funny because my grandma thought, when I told her that I was going to play some poker today, that I was going to sit for like 30 minutes and play. She was getting increasingly agitated as I tried to explain that I couldn't just get up and leave. About 2 minutes after busting from Full Tilt, my last tourney, she almost raised her voice for the first time ever and said firmly, "It's time for dinner, get off the computer!" The poker gods sure know how to make my grandma happy.

I think that's all for now. I'll try to bang out something about Antarctica tomorrow. Brandon "soccer mom" Schaefer, out!

Annie Yoshimoto 

Side view of same ICE-BERG! Alrightalrightalrightalrightalrightalrightalright 

Ship It 

What's cooler than being cool? ICE-BERG! 

Chinstrap Penguins 

Nice pic of a baby Gentoo Penguin 

Lotta Penguins....Lots. Of. Penguins. 

Mom in Tierra del Fuego 

Back to Reality

Antarctica truly feels like another planet. The animals are ridiculously tame and don't know that humans are evil. The scenery is so beautiful that it almost feels fake. The water and air are so pure that they can't possibly share this same polluted earth with the rest of us. I'll respond to all my email and post a full write-up at some point but this post is just to say hi.

Obviously the trip was unreal but we were informed on our second day that my gramps passed away. I'm still, a week later, pretty depressed about the news and I'm looking forward to calling my brother and going to see my grandmother. I arrive in San Diego tomorrow(Wednesday) at 9 AM and then fly up to Portland on Thursday morning in time for the "Celebration of Life" ceremony on Friday. I'm really grateful that my grandma decided to push back the ceremony so my mom and I could make it. It's not a tragedy because old people do pass away but it felt ridiculously sudden. I saw him on Christmas and again between the Redskins and Panthers playoff games and he was his old self, harping at me to go back to school and take care of my little brother. I think spending the weekend with family will do a lot to help me get over it and I'm really looking forward to hugging my grandma. It was really, really, REALLY frustrating having 8 days left in the trip and absolutely no way to talk to anyone. Ah well, it'll be OK soon.

I'm flying back down to San Diego next Monday and packing my things. I'm going to be back in Seattle by next weekend, hopefully by Sunday. I'm excited to be coming home and I kind of regret the fact that I didn't spend much time in San Diego but the travel that I've done has obviously been worth it. I'll try to post some pictures from Antarctica tomorrow before heading up to Vancouver.

R.I.P Mitsuru Yoshimoto. I´m going to miss him.

¡31 Hours of travel makes Brandon go crazy!

¡Hola, Amigos! I'm finally at the hotel in Ushuaia and it's midnight here, 7 PM on the West Coast. I left the San Diego airport yesterday at noon so I think that makes 31 straight houurs of flying/layovers. Not cool. I don't think I've ever felt this tired after traveling before. The good news is that it's naturally bedtime so I might be able to beat jetlag. Unfortunately, my mom was delayed in Buenos Aires and she doesn't get here until 5 AM. Crazy.

I got our itinerary and it looks ridiculously sick. Tomorrow we're going to Tierra del Fuego National Park in the morning then getting on the boat at 5 PM and setting sail for the end of the earth. I'm going out on a limb but I don't think we'll have Internet access so I'll try to keep a journal and drop a big post on y'all in about 10 days.

I'm wiped out and it's time to hit the hay. Thanks to everyone who responded to the last blog. I would like to talk about things more but I'm too out of it. Regarding alcohol, I've never felt controlled by it and I just felt like stepping back for a bit. It was mostly brought on by going to Seattle for the holidays and getting hammered every night and feeling like crap every day. Then New Year's came and it seemed like a good time to step away from the bottle. Don't worry, booze fans, I'll be back. Regarding blog apathy, I really do appreciate everyone pumping me up to keep it up. I almost deleted that first paragraph when I first posted that entry because I knew it would seem like I was trying to get sympathy or whatever but I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy all those comments.

OK bedtime for real. Until next time...

Who cares?

I've had a bit of writer's block lately. Everytime I start thinking about writing a blog entry I think to myself, "who cares?". Who gives a rip what I ate today or what poker related crap I did. I'm sitting on my ass all day long and I really don't feel like writing that for a week straight. "Well, today I sat on my ass and played poker and tomorrow I'm going to do the same thing." It's a good thing that I'm flying to Argentina tomorrow and I'll finally have something interesting to write about.

I don't know too many details regarding this trip. My mom set everything up and I just filled out a few forms. Hopefully I'll be able to hit y'all with an update while down there but at the very least expect a few pictures of me mugging with penguins in 2 weeks.

Poker has been swell and my poker+travel bankroll is pretty healthy. I won a tournament today for $5200 and now I only need to make about 10K more to cover all roadtrip/WorldCup expenses AND have enough to play in 17 events at the World Series of Poker. Idealy I'd like about 10K more than that but I'll be fine as long as I don't miss cashing in all 17 tournaments. That would be gross.

I started doing heavy planning for the baseball trip and even bought my Phillies tickets for May 4th. I bought good seats, recommended by Sir AlCan'tHang, and we're sitting 5 rows back on the first base line (well, actually on the line but halfway into right field) with a nice view of downtown Philly. Apparently it's college night, too, so the scenery should be great.

Speaking of Al, I was thinking about making an amendment to my New Year's resolution. I think I should be able to have a few special occasions where a few shots can be consumed. I think special moments should be limited to 5 or 6 per year and should be truly special. Al's love for booze is legendary and I think sitting in box seats with the SoCo king is special enough for yours truly to let down his hair. I'm also reserving the annual Memorial Day Weekend Vegas trip for my 2nd boozing of the year. 4 left, any suggestions? I'll save one for after I win my first WSOP bracelet. 3 left!

Well, I should finish my laundry and get my bags packed. Antarctica, here I come!

I’ve been playing a lot of poker the past two days. Yesterday I played almost forty $215 Sit n Gos. I started off insanely hot but cooled down toward the end, finishing my session with 6 straight non-cashes. Today I played most of the big Sunday tournaments. I blew a chance at good money on BoDog when I was the chipleader and made a move against the the guy who was 2nd in chips with 55 left. I figured he wouldn’t call without the nuts and I was wrong…he called with the 2nd nuts. I opened in middle position with KTs and he called from the big blind. The flop was Q73 rainbow and he check-raised my continuation bet. I figured he could fold a Queen and I’m still pretty sure he would have but he wasn’t folding a set of 7s and I crippled myself. Oh well, I live and die by these plays. I’m just pissed that I didn’t get a running straight. It seems like I always build a big stack by playing like this then go down in flames. One day I’ll find the happy medium. The winner in this tourney got $25K and I had to settle for $250. That was my only cash for the day which means I lost about 1K. Oh well.

I tried for a while to find a good program to host my World Cup and Baseball Roadtrip schedules online and I think I found one. Let me know how easy it is to get these files, provided they even work:

World Cup

Road Trippin'

If you have to register first, just do it and stop being a sissy. It's free and takes half a second. The URL contained in the body of the World Cup file is a map of the sites where the games are going to be played. I'm hoping to find tickets to 1 or 2 games but for the most part I just want to party with fans in the city that their game is being played. I think just being there and watching the games from one of the local bars will be great fun. I have a friend in Munich with a couch to sleep on and possibly a shower to get clean. Maybe the plan will be returning to Munich every 4 or 5 days to shower then leaving and partying for 5 days straight. Who needs a hotel/hostel during the World Cup? Do you know who I am? I'm really looking forward to checking out all of Germany's fine cities. We passed through last Spring but the whole stay was 2 days in Cologne, one day floating the Rhine, then spending 5 hours in Frankfurt's train station. I think there's more to Germany than that and this time I'm going to do it right. I'm still exploring the possibility of renting a car but I don't know how feasible that'll be. I don't know the exact dimensions but the country looks like it's about 400 miles x 400 miles so I won't ever have to travel ridiculously far. I planned my schedule based on the best games on each day but I also adjusted a bit for ease of travel. If you look at the map and try to follow my path, you'll see that I never travel cross-sountry and rarely even go halfway. I can drive 200 miles in my sleep, especially when I get to go 150 mph! Anyway, the trip would be more fun with a partner so if any of you are interested let me know. July 8-23 there's nowhere in the world you'd rather be and YOU KNOW IT! If someone came along I'd definitely get the car. If I'm by myself(likely) I'll just take the train. A lot of people think that I must be a soccer fanatic but I'm really just a casual fan who's obsessed with sports and has some money and free time. An addiction to travel doesn't hurt either.

I'm really stoked for the baseball trip and tickets are starting to go on sale. I don't want to pay Ticketmaster charges on 30 different tickets so I'll probably just pre-order the key tickets like Red Sox-Yankees, Mariners Opening Day and Cubs-White Sox. THe rest I'll try to buy at the door. I found out that the Giants game I was planning on attending is already sold out but I have a free day so I'll just go to the next one. If you live in a city with a MLB team and want to go to a game, let me know. I'll be looking you all up anyway but it'd be nice if you could holla back. I'm still trying to find a good van to buy. I want to go kinda cheap but I don't want it to break down, obviously. I guess I can pay a little more for a quality piece of machinery since I'm going to resell it. I just don't want to lose a ton of money in the deal since it's going to be a bastardized sort of 2-month rental. I found this on Craigslinst but it may be a little too nice. Maybe something with a few more miles and without the leather. Let me know if you're in Seattle and you know of a good deal on a minivan. I'm pretty set on driving a van since I might be sleeping in it from time-to-time and I'd just like a lot of room in general. I don't think I could handle living in the Prius for 2 months. I'd also like a legit minivan as opposed to an old Chevy molester van. The minivan is embarassing but the molester van would make me an outcast. It would be fun to sit on the side of the road and offer candy to little kids but I don't think I'm going to do it. This one might be right up my alley. Carl, can you run some cash over to this guy's house tomorrow? Thanks.

I decided to get a room on the Party Poker Million cruise even though I'm not going to play in the main event. I want to go on the cruise and I found a friend willing to share his room with me for a small price. I'm getting back from South America on March 8th then flying to Ft. Lauderdale on the 11th and returning on the 20th. I'll probably just pack my things and drive back to Seattle on the 23rd or 24th. Then the baseball trip starts on April 3rd.

I've been thinking of different things that I could do with the baseball road trip. I'd love to do it for a cause but I don't know how to do it. Maybe I could get people to pledge a certain amount of money for every thousand miles that I drive or something. I also think it would be fun to figure out some kind of sponsorship. Maybe this year I'll just do it by myself and make a little documentary and try to get more out of it if I want to do it again. Do any of you fine readers have ideas? I get ambitious ideas, like writing Toyota and getting them to give me a new white van that I could paint red "stitches" on and they could film me going to all the stadiums and make a commercial out of it. Major League Baseball could sponsor the trip since it's at the beginning of the season and have updates each week on Fox Saturday Baseball. But we all know that I'll never contact these people and I'll end up just doing it by myself and end up with 20 minutes of crappy footage. Oh well, at least I get to buy a camcorder.

Seriosuly, if you thik of something cool I can do with this trip, let me know. If you think I'm an idealist piece of crap then let me know that, too. It's 3 AM and I better get to bed. Laters.

I'm Back

I think this is the longest I’ve gone without a blog entry since starting this bad boy in August. A lot of people asked me if I was too depressed to write after the Super Bowl debacle but that’s not the case. The Internet crashed at the Red Roof Inn that we were staying at and the connection has been extremely shaky here in Carlsbad. The Internet has already crashed in the middle of two unsaved drafts and it’s a rather discouraging occurrence. I just downloaded a program called Blogger for Word and I’m writing my entry in Word so that the Internet shakiness won’t have any affect. It’ll probably improve my spelling and punctuation, too.

The trip to Detroit was a lot of fun. Anytime you get to vacation with your brother and good friends it’s going to be a lot of fun. It really frustrated me that we could only find 2 tickets to the game and I really owe Morgan and Cliff a ton for letting me and Renee go. The next time the Hawks go to the big game, I’m going to do things differently.

I don’t have a ton to say about the Super Bowl. It was very frustrating but there’s nothing we can do about it. The Seahawks executed like crap and they didn’t deserve the win. The refs didn’t help at all but the Hawks are good enough to overcome that if they just played their game. The Steelers D executed their bend-but-don’t-break strategy perfectly and the offense made enough big plays to get the W. The two calls that frustrated me the most were the Roethlisberger TD and the Locklear holding. The QB sneak was ridiculous because the side judge ran halfway down the goal line with one hand up like he was spotting the ball short, then suddenly decided that it was a touchdown. That was absolutely ridiculous and it made me want to vomit. The Locklear hold was an example of an official anticipating something that didn’t happen. In the Carolina game, on Steve Smith’s punt return, the official anticipated a block in the back then saw the blocker pull up at the last second so he picked up the flag. On the Locklear play, the official saw Locklear get his hand inside Haggans shoulders and anticipated he would hook him or drag him down. Neither happened and it was obvious. I would have loved to see that one picked up, obviously. 1st and goal from the 1, down 14-10. Pittsburgh’s shoulders were slumped, oh man….It hurts to think about how the game could have gone. I won’t even talk about the penalty on Hasselbeck because it was so freaking absurd but those 15 yards proved to be huge thanks to Randle El’s sweet pass.

OK, I realize I just wrote a lot about the officiating but I still blame the Seahawks first and foremost for blowing the game. I just hope that they use this memory as motivation for next year and come out determined to kick ass. I’d like to resign Shawn. I feel like running back is one of the most overrated positions in football but I think Shawn is very underrated as a running back. I don’t know if that makes sense but it does to me and he fits our offense well. Let’s get him locked up for a few years and Franchise Hutch if we have to.

I’m back in Carlsbad right now for about 2 more weeks and I’m loving the weather. It’s sunny and 70-75 every day and a nice change from the rain of Seattle and bitter cold of Detroit. Renee’s flying down next week for President’s Day and I’m definitely looking forward to that. I only have 2 months left before moving back to Seattle so I’m glad she’s getting one last chance for a vacation in the sun.

On February 23rd, I’m flying to Ushuaia, Argentina to meet my mom. I was supposed to spend more time in South America but my friend Will had his Ecuador trip cut short and I decided to just do the Antarctica thing. We’re catching a boat from Ushuaia to Antarctica and we’re going to spend a few weeks kicking it with the penguins. I’ll definitely charge the camera batteries for this trip.

In late March I’m going to drive back to Seattle then start the baseball road trip in the beginning of April. I’m getting so ridiculously excited for the trip that I can’t stand it. I promise to break down the trip and devote a whole entry to it soon. I think the Mariners could surprise some people this year. I guess after posting 93 losses last year and 99 the year before, a simple .500 winning percentage would be great. I’m amped for a full season of Felix Mania and I’m expecting great things from Mr. Johjima. The strating rotation should be better and Mr. Beltre will have a better year. Jeremy Reed is a year older and I think he’s poised for a breakout season. Only time will tell but I’d like to have a lot to talk about this summer. It’s so painful to root for a 90-loss team, I can’t even describe it. Let’s go M’s!

The road trip ends on June 2nd in Denver and I’m flying to Berlin on the 8th for soccer’s World Cup. I’m going to be there for 15 days and I’m going to try to be in a different city every day. I’m going to travel to the site of the best game for each day and try to actually attend 1 or 2 of the games if I can. Even when I can’t attend the games I want to be in a bar in the city it’s taking place in and party with the winning fans afterward. I’m going to buy a US jersey and a Japan jersey and wear those two shirts for the entire 2 weeks. They’ll probably be nice and ripe by the time I return.

The World Series of Poker starts on June 27th and I’m going to try to drive down to Vegas at some point between the 23rd and that day. Poker has taken a backseat in my life and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. I need to figure out how to get back on my game by the WSOP. I don’t think drinking 843862873 gallons of beer in Germany will help my poker game that much but there are sacrifices that we all have to make for the good of humanity. I’m just trying to do my part.

Well, blog entries after a long hiatus are usually about future plans. Sorry if there isn’t anything new or interesting in here. I’ll try to figure out how to host excel files on the Internet then put up a link to both my baseball road trip and World Cup schedules. Until then, remember my motto: “Everything in moderation, including moderation”.