New laptops/tablets, TV shows, movies, and other media

Agh...sick AGAIN much of last week! Not as bad as the supercold I had a few weeks before, but had the sore throat/sinus/cough thing going on. I've never been sick back to back like that before. WTF!!! The weather has finally taken a turn for the better. I am really dying to get out on the bike.

Anyway,I forgot to mention the Craigslist find from a couple weeks ago. Got a Samsung model 300v5a-a05us laptop with Core i7 CPU and 8GB RAM for $300. Gonna sell my Toshiba ultrabook to cover the cost. Will likely even make a few $$ on the deal. I purchased a 120GB SSD drive off eBay and tossed it in. I got some benchmark software and it screams. Only thing is, it's creaky/noisy and I think I still like my Asus better even though it's an i5 CPU, it still seems just as fast. It's also totally solid as far as its construction. I still wish either had a backlit keyboard.

So, being on a perpetual electronics upgrade kick, I offered a kid (like 16-18) $150 for the Google Nexus 7 he was selling on CL, and he accepted. Nice little tablet! I've been playing around with it for a couple weeks now too. Sold the Kindle Fire for $100 on eBay. Not quite a free upgrade, but worth the few extra $$.

As for phones, I am cool with my S3, but the new HTC One looks sweet. My mom wants a new phone pretty bad so I am recommending this or the iPhone, although the bigger screen really wins out, especially for older folks. Did I mention my mom has lost a bunch of weight? She's been dieting and actually even exercising. Good for her.

I recently joined Amazon Prime which seems pretty cool so far, but I am still unable to watch some of my favorite cable shows without paying. I like Walking Dead, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, Louis CK, Californication, Homeland, Bates Motel, Workaholics, and Sunny in Philly. Walking Dead season just ended and Mad Men started last night. I was just saying how I never used to watch so much TV. Well, if the weather was better...One cool thing with AP is that you get free 2-day shipping on everything, which will pay for itself even before Christmas with all the business I do there. I rarely even buy electronics from Tigerdirect any more.

One item I'll be buying from Amazon will be the new Black Sabbath release coming out in June called 13. I've heard a couple snippets and it sounds good so far. First Sabbath release in 35 years with Ozzy. Looking forward to a tour! Sample here

Books! can't forget to mention the new book I'm reading. Recommended by TK and a few podcasters I listen to (Mysterious Universe, Paranormal Podcast). It's called John Dies At The End, and so far it's freaking fun. Movie is in my Netflix queue. There's a sequel that I'll pick up immediately after this one.

Speaking of podcasts, Bill Burr's Monday Morning Podcast is quickly becoming a favorite. It's just him ranting into a recorder, but his comedy is pure brilliance. Check it out!

Work is going great. Got a lab together a couple weeks ago, and got a ton done over spring break. I hope summer goes as smoothly. 

Sorry, no poker lately. Probably gonna hit the Shoe soon. Team tourney this coming weekend.

Weather

First week of April and it's been below freezing overnight since who knows when. No end in sight. We may hit 50 degrees this weekend. Meanwhile, every FB friend of mine seems to be vacationing in FL, posting pics by the pool, riding bikes, fishing, etc. I would love to be able to get outside year-round.

My friend Sean was in from DC last weekend. He was moving his mom back to town and crashed at my place Sat night. We just sat around talking all night and flipping channels on the tv. He had to head back to DC the next morning. He'll be back here on Friday with 1 band he's in, and back to Europe in a few weeks touring with Pentagram. Here he is from last year's tour. Rock and roll.

Finally feeling better

I'd been sick for over a week. Serious chest cold or bronchitis or TB or something. Really took the wind out of my sails. Meanwhile, it's still freaking snowing outside. We had 1 60-degree day. Did manage to get the dogs out for a walk, they loved it. Didn't stay out too long, I was still feeling awful.

Got to the Shoe over the weekend for a while, and it was almost a carbon copy of my last session, although my cards were worse.

I am soooo ready for a bike ride and nice weather! 

Winter sucks

I'm blaming my lack of posts lately on winter. It sucks. I'm really hoping for early spring. I've done almost zero exercise-wise since probably November. I'm ready to jump on the bike and pedal like crazy. Gotta love cabin fever.

Poker...lost 2 buy-ins at $1-2 last week at the Shoe. Played good for the most part, then got a couple hands cracked, and loosened up way too much later on.

Saw the movie Dark Skies...meh. Watched a strange one on IFC the other night... Valhalla Rising.

Hello Russians! They are my 2nd largest audience next to the US. Hmmmm.

OMG is this funny

Someone bought the website of Guy Fieri after his domain expired, and this is what he replaced the original website with. Hilarious. If you can't read it, this is the site http://guysamericankitchenandbar.com/

Road trip!

Took a bus trip to Presque Isle on Saturday. Played 3 hrs of poker, up $305, and about an hour of blackjack, up $90. Running good. :) Actually had a $5 BJ table running.

Small casino, 9-table poker room, food sucked, yada yada yada. Had fun either way.

Hollywood Casino in Columbus

Columbus Casino poker room report below, pasted from CPMG board. Was down there for the annual eTech Conference. Low attendance this year, but the sessions I attended were pretty good. Brought back some decent work ideas. Gonna work on some electronic tests for the computer teacher with Google forms,

I was also there on Sunday, being in town for work. Only waited about 30 min for a seat despite the wait list being 30 deep.

I concur with everything Data says here, but my table was not quite as soft. It was also a new table but the stacks got deep pretty fast. Several newcomers sat down and bought in for the biggest stack. There was some decent play at my table. Larry Fish hit one of the $100 random draws. Last one of the evening. I then took it from him when I turned a boat against his flopped nut flush.

I thought the dealers were decent, with the exception of 1 or 2 that sucked.

Fish and I split an $11 large pizza from OH!, one of the restaurants, and it was excellent. Priced well also. Their burger looked good, and word at the table said the club sandwich was the best. They have a fountain drink station just outside the poker room as well, if you get tired of waiting for the cocktail waitresses. They seemed a tad understaffed on Sunday.

Went back on late Monday afternoon, and the place was DEAD. Surprising since the place is so new. They had half the poker room draped off, as they were doing something with the lights and/or security cams, and the construction noise was really distracting.

No cage in the poker room was a negative, and there were long waits for chip runners to return if you had to re-buy.

Results:
Sunday
30 min of $15 blackjack:  +$80
6.5 hrs of 1-2NL:  +$13 ($480 deep, was up about $100, then down around $350)

Monday
2 hrs of 1-2NL:  +$231 on a single $200 buy-in. Was up $340-ish at one point, but wanted to wait until rush hour traffic cleared. Bad decision.

Saw quite a few familiar faces besides Data and Fish. Andrew (NJA) and James (from the Shoe) were there, along with several Show/Nautica guys that I recognized but don't know well.

This is definitely the best poker room in OH.

Car problems...just in time to eat up my tax return

Got my tax returns deposited yesterday. Went to get a $20 oil change at Conrad's during my lunch break, as well as get a slow leak repaired (nail). They gave it their basic inspection, and although most of the stuff isn't critical, the Jeep does need some work. Most of it is suspension-related, but it also needs new plugs, differential service, etc. The big one is the steering stabilizer, which causes the wheel to shimmy like crazy after hitting a bump.

Estimate is coming in around $1100, but I am guessing I can get everything done for $750-800 from White's Automotive in Elyria. They did good honest work for me a few months ago when I thought it needed a clutch.

I think I'll get the suspension stuff done first and the rest in a month or 2.

I am almost at my resolution goal  for putting money in the bank for the year, thanks to a nice run in poker and a little from my tax return.

I am gonna be checking out the C-bus casino this Sunday. I'll be in town for work, and me and Fish want to hit it up. I might even play a $5-10 limit game if they have a table going. We'll see.

Cash cash

Played a short while at Hip's last Tues night, lost with AQ to Colin's 66. Flop was AQ6. Few hands later, flopped a set to Rao's flush on the turn. Down $280, I opted for the Shoe. Played less than 2 hours on a single buy-in, and cashed $1138. Biggest cash game win there so far. I think my previous was around $340. So, made for a profitable evening. 

Last week's Craigslist find! Got a 37" Olevia LCD TV for $75! Some guy in Avon Lake was remodeling his man-cave, and just bought a nice 60" TV and didn't need the other. Brand new house. I was first to respond, gave it a good once-over, and plunked down the cash. The guy said he got like 60 emails about it. Yeah, because it was worth at least $200. Put it into Caprice's bedroom, and though we rarely watch TV in there, it'll be great for lazy movie nights or for the kids.

Super Bowl wasn't much fun, I was rooting for San Fran.

Tournament cash

Decided to check out the Monday $200 NLHE tourney at the casino yesterday. They started them in September and I hadn't entered one yet. The structure is definitely not the best, but besides driving out of state, you cant find a bigger tourney. Ended up being 162 players. I was expecting 50-60 and playing 4-6 hours if I made a final table. I left at 8:30, placing 7th and winning $1418. I'll take it. I was actually thrilled to just cash, considering they paid 18 spots, and at around 40 players left, I had 6-7 BB's left. Went on a little run, won 3 hands, getting lucky on only 1 of them, and made it into the money. On the lucky hand, I had KQ against A8, and rivered a K. Whew. That was the only all-in hand I got lucky on all day. I played some TIGHT poker and made a few good laydowns.

Early on, the older guy on my right was down to around 1900 and kept shoving. I was just waiting to bust him. I finally get JJ. He shoves for around 2000 (blinds were like 100-200 at the time). I had about 7000 chips, and with only 1 player behind me, I made the mistake of JUST CALLING. Guy behind me decides to call HALF his stack. Flop is QQx. I check. Player behind me shoves. I have to fold. He called half his stack with Q10 suited. Nice hand sir. I was steaming for a bit, but managed to maintain. I ended up getting it back fairly quickly. Oh, and the first all-in guy had 99.

I don't think I won a hand at the final table. Couldn't catch any cards. I managed to wait out a few other players and bumped up in the money. First place paid $7000+. Woulda been a nice payday.

Anyway, the players were really soft in the tourney I played yesterday. I hope they are that soft all the time. I guess they have to be, I mean HipHop has cashed in like 4 of them, so if he can do it, ANYONE can.  :) Tight, solid, ABC tourney play is the way to go.

Ran into Karl Tsu, L'il Fag (hadn't seen him in a couple years), Mike Kennedy, and John Davis, whom I also hadn't seen in a couple years, yet he oddly still had one of my business cards in his wallet. Must be saving it for a rainy day. I guess LF is a doc at the Cleveland Clinic and has a kid on the way.

Just unveiled today at the SHOT Show

Supposed to be out in Q2 this year. I am getting one! I opted to not get the .45 XDs and waited patiently for this model.

I'll probably have to sell my PT99, but that's OK too.

Another chili cook off ribbon

I took 2nd out of 13 entrants on Sunday at Lorain AmVets. Won a $20 gift card to Fligner's Market. Gonna spend it all on bacon. This batch of chili was actually very good. First place went to the wife of the local AmVets prez. Ah well. Contest wasn't very well organized. Few that I've been to are. The original contest at work was done well, and our CPMG contest is great also. We get a panel of judges, they use score sheets and score various criteria without knowing which batch they are testing, etc. In yesterday's contest, everyone got to vote. They got 5 vote tickets, and you could stuff the ballot box of whichever batch you liked the best. Oh well, I'll take 2nd, no problem.

G Love show Thursday night was great. Probably best show I've seen him do. He played almost 3 hours. Graham and Kara crashed at my place. Me and Graham stayed up going through a big box of old pics. Relived some great old stories. I've started scanning all my old pics. I had a couple packages get water damaged somehow and lost many of them  :(   I'll post some of them later on. 

Excellent weekend for football. Couple of amazing games, and not a single black and gold uniform to be seen. Browns got a new head coach. File that one under WTF??? I'm gonna play the percentages and predict he will be out of a job in 2-3 years after winning 8-10 games total. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

Getting sick but feeling good

Coming down with a cold, ugh. But, the last few colds I've had have been shorter and less severe than in the past. Certainly due partly to quitting smoking I'm sure. I've also been taking zinc supplements, which I think are helping too. I've been eating healthy the last 10 days. Lots of fruits/veggies. I'm down 5 lbs, sleeping better, dreaming crazy things, and I've been feeling creative, like my brain is firing on all cylinders, like it's supposed to. I'd been feeling so foggy and sluggish. I'm now taking down notes on some great ideas, mostly for the food truck. I'm not looking to do this overnight. Gonna stash some cash, build a plan, schmooze some investors (friends), and try to actually do it right. Although it's not going to make me rich and I don't plan to quit my job, I think it does have potential to grow into something very cool.

I am also putting a list of stuff to do on our west coast vacation this summer. Scrapped the PCH road trip all the way to Seattle. Just gonna do it from LA to SF.

Another vacation I'm taking is going to be this.

I am 100% dead set on doing this. Sounds like a total blast. Caprice probably can't get the time off, so I may have to recruit Fish or someone from the poker group, but I want to do it. Only thing that worries me is that it will probably get chilly at night and starting off in the mornings might be tough for me in the cold air, but I'll figure something out.

G Love and Special Sauce show tonight at HOB! Looking forward to it.

Casino loss

Went down to the Shoe Saturday. Hadn't been there since November 7th. Played for 6 hours, lost $280. Folded about 90% of my hands, which were complete crap. If I'd had better hands, I probably would have busted much sooner. Just couldn't catch a break. Got some big pairs busted. The few made hands I had yielded small pots. Started off slow, got down to about $120, added on, then got back on the plus side almost $40. I SHOULD HAVE LEFT THEN. My little man was screaming at me to go home, but the guy on my right was doing his best to give away the $500 stack he built, so I stuck around. He gave chips to everyone but me. So, my stack dwindled over the next couple hours. I was down to my last $60, got AQ suited, and shoved over top of the guy raising to $20 with pocket 7's. No love for me.

I've been brainstorming ideas for my food truck concept lately. Menu items, equipment needed, truck layout, kickstarter project, business plan, etc. I may try to get 5-10 investors at $1000-2000 each. Will have to work out the details on that. It would mostly be weekend work except for prepping, which I'm guessing I could do in 8-10 hours a week, if that. I'd have to rent a local commercial kitchen (possibly even AmVets) for prep work, and maybe rent some fridge space.

I've managed to lose 2 lbs in 5 days, despite totally falling off the diet on Friday night. Tried to make up for it yesterday. See below.

This week...G Love and Special Sauce! Graham and Kara are coming to town.

My top 10 movie list

These are not in order...

Goodfellas  
LOTR trilogy
Matrix
Pulp fiction
Caddyshack
Rounders
28 days later series
Chainsaw massacre
Shawshank
Private Ryan
Fight club
Silence of the lambs
Seven
Color of money /the hustler
American history x
The shining
Platoon
Forrest gump
Sneakers
Enemy of the state
Full metal jacket
Good Will Hunting
Night of the living dead
Stand by me 
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Zodiac
Jason Bourne series
The others
Interview with the vampire
No Country for old men
True romance
The doors
Children of men
Cuckoos nest
Ferris Beuller
Blue velvet
Usual suspects
Big lebowski