Military madness

I just read that it costs $120,000 to train a soldier. How is that even possible? It costs 120k to teach a guy to shoot a gun and crawl on his stomach? Morons.

Of Wax and Relocation

Ok so i read up on how to remove candle wax from carpet. iron wax paper over it.
So now instead of candle wax embedded in the carpet, i have a sheet of wax paper embedded in the carpet. Splendid.

Jack told us yesterday that he bought a house and is moving out in a week. Matt and I are going to move as well - our place is way too expensive. We pay 1450 and looking online, 3BRs are going for around 1200. I think Matt and I are going to get a 3BR and try and find a 3rd roommate. My friend Val Sodano said she is going to move here in late March, so she'd take the 3rd bedroom. If she doesn't move here, we'll just find someone else. We need to move by Feb 1.

Car update

Just a quick update on the car. It's running fine, and really is in very nice condition, at least on the outside. Who knows about the tranny and whatnot of course.

So when I went in to buy the car, the guy convinced me to buy a $499 fuel-cutoff system, which is basically 2nd key that, when it is not in the car, disables fuel from going to wherever it goes, such that you cannot start the car. it's pretty neat, but, I didn't really want it. But when the salesman told me that it would cut my insurance down though, and I figured I'd save about 10% or $100 on insurance every year, which pays for the cost of the system in 5 years. Given that I'll probably have this car for 3-5 years, it lowered the cos tof the system to 0-200. So I said yes.

However, as it turns out, they lied to me (duh) and every Saturn since like 1999 already gets the anti-theft discount from insurance companies due to built-in devices. I also noticed that they charged me $549 instead of the $499.

I went back to the dealer and demanded my money back for the anti-theft system and the overcharging. he said he could do nothing for me, I'd already signed my name. The funniest part was when I pointed out that he had overcharged me. He said (this is a quote) "Maybe if you had noticed the overcharging before you signed the contract, I could have removed it."

Flabbergasted, I responded "So youre saying, if I caught you ripping me off, you might have agreed not to rip me off?" to which he look at me and nodded. I just walked away, amazed.

I came back the next week and sat down with the finance director. I had writen a pretty scathing letter, which I was prepared to send out to everyone in Nevada if I did not get my money back. In the end, he said he'd give me $130 back. With some regret, I agreed. After all, I did sign the contract, and I'm a believer that when one is stupid, one deserves what one gets. He didn't have to give me a cent.

Today I'm going to get a haircut from my friend Mary, then I am taking a high school friend who is in town (Christine Lopez) to the airport, then I have a job interview for what will probably be a shitty entry level job. I think that this is the link to the job but I am not sure, because the recruiter didnt describe it to me in this manner. Then I'm heading over to Mary's for a mini-X-Mas party.

The newest poker story

So about a week ago I decided to start playing cards again but with a very different goal and mentality. I was going to set a goal of winning $150 and then leaving. Having this goal made it easier to leave the table (which I have a problem with) and the first few days went very well - I won $300, $450, $500.

The next day, I wasn't feeling very well, and I stupidly went to play at the Orleans, where I promptly lost $200 in a cash game and then $100 in a tournament. I went home kicking myself for having played when I was feeling sick, but glad that I was able to walk away down $300 and not sit there all night trying to win it back.

This Sunday, I called Nick to see if he wanted to hang out and play some cards - he got paid and he'd been waiting to play for like a month. So we went to Red Rock and watched the end of the Giants game (they lost) and sat down at the 1/2 table with $200 around 3pm. Nick left around 9pm after winning $200, but I stayed, because after being up initially, I lost a couple of big hands and was now down and down big - around $400. I decided, I was determined, to get back to even.

The next thing I knew, someone ordered breakfast from the grill which opened at 9am. I thought it was like 1am, but apparantly, I had played the entire night without so much as getting up to take a piss. I had played amazing poker, I was back and almost even, down only $50. I seriously had never played better. I was hitting great hands, making great reads, bluffing people off of pots - I was really sharp.

I stayed around this level for the next 5 hours... that's right... until 2pm. I really hadn't had any cards to play, and I had about $500 in front of me... meaning I was down $100, and all I needed were a few decent hands, or one big hand, to finally get me out of this casino.

To be totally honest, I had had a couple of near-sleep experiences... My eyes got very heavy, I had trouble paying attention. But I was perfectly self-aware of this, and I told myself that if it didn't go away after 10 minutes, I'd leave the table right then and there regardless of whether or not I was even. But it never happened - I always found myself, 5 minutes later, fully awake, sharp, and aware of my opponents. For 24 hours I had kept a sharp mind and analyzed those playing against me, learning their betting patterns, how to goad them on, setting up an aura around me of "he always has the cards" (you do this by never showing your cards while betting people out of hands, and then sometimes showing them when you have dominant hands).

The players who had played with me the previous night came back and sat down again, recognized me, saw that I was in the same clothes, and I became the talk of the room. 24 hours. I set a goal and I was almost there. Just one hand. The pit bosses had been coming over. 24 hours.

At 2:06pm I was dealt 33. The pot was raised a bit preflop, to $10 each. The flop came 663, and I knew my time had come. I was about to realize the culmination of the last 24 hours - Winning my $400 back, getting back to even, and actually... I was going to be up, because there were 5 other players in the hand, and someone was bound to hand a 6 or a pair, and as such would want to play the hand. And I knew these players. I could manipulate them. It would be a great success. Setting a goal, grinding it out, staying sharp for 24 hours.

The first three people checked. The next guy bet $30 into the $50 pot, and I knew he had a 6. This was my target - the guy who couldn't let his hand go. I called the $30, and everyone else folded. I would have preferred it if others stayed in, but when I saw this guy's $300, I figured it would be enough. I knew at that point that I was going to leave after this hand, after a day of incredible play, up $200. Not much, less than $10/hr, but after what I'd just been through, it felt incredible. I felt vindicated, powerful, unstoppable, successful.

The next card, the turn, was a 9. My opponent bet $15. Into a $110 pot! I knew this was my time to shine. "Come on dude, $15? What kind of idiot do you think I am, what do you have, a pair of twos? What a joke. Here's how you bet!" And I went all-in. He thought that _I_ was the idiot (which is what I wanted him to think of course) He called, and turned over 86 - PERFECT! I totally nailed him.

One card to go.

The river was an 8.

66688 beats 33366.

I was totally deflated. I went home down $450.

I'm still flabbergasted. He had a 15% shot, but given the particular situation... well... it's hard to believe that some higher power doesn't set me up for these kidn of letdowns.