Other than that, how was the play, Mrs. Lincoln?

I have never thought to myself, "man, I'm glad that weekend is over," but welcome to my Monday. Here's what happened.

Starts out great. I get the chance to play golf at the tournament course for the upcoming Wachovia Championship. Mind you, the tourney begins Thursday, so playing it the Saturday before is fairly spectacular. It was a great day with the weather, good company on the course, and other than me playing like a mope, it was enjoyable.

After the golf, I get home, watch the NFL draft for a little while, watch to see where my teams make their picks (nice work by the home town team , by the way), and then it's time to go off to the minor league baseball game with the kids and Mrs. Chipstack.

All is well, until we get to the parking lot at the stadium, when the parking attendant tells us, "you're leaking gas badly."

Huh?

Well, turns out the fuel line in the back of our newly acquired van (and those who know me, know what the purpose of the van is), had come loose--and it was the 2nd such incident on vans made by this company. Well, the fuel doesn't get to the motor with no fuel line connection, so, what to do? We're stuck like Chuck.

Call the van company. No answer. Call our friend Volsfan. She drives to the stadium to pick us up. Call the van place again.

On a Saturday night, someone picks up the phone. Wow.

They tell us what we need to do, and that they are covering all repair work/towing expenses under their warranty. I tell Volsfan, and the family to go inside, I'll get a ticket, and meet them inside once the tow truck comes. All these conversations, mind you, are taking place before the game begins.

By the time the tow truck has come to the lot, rolled the van onto the hauler, locked the keys in the van (not joking), and then unlocked the van to get the keys out, and driven away, the game is in the top of the 7th inning.

And beer sales end at the bottom of the 7th.

Managed to slug down 2, before the game ended. Volsfan took us home (a deed for which I am eternally grateful), and Mrs. Chipstack and I had a cocktail before going to sleep.

Sunday, call the repair place to find out the status of the van--no word as of 10:20 a.m., but they will call me. After not hearing back from them, I decide to call them at 1:20. The voice on the other end says, "it's ready!" We go pick it up, and life, as we know it, returns to normal. That whole 3 hour time frame waiting for word was brutal. We are thinking the repairs are going to take longer than.....well, a long time. We're making contingency plans for the week ahead, yada yada yada....turns out, we didn't need them.

So yeah, that was my excitement. Did manage to get in a shorthanded card game on Sunday night, as we had 5 current league members, and a prospective member over to talk about the league, changes we can make (and there aren't many), and then played some hold 'em. I was elevator boy for much of the night (including a rebuy). Was shortstacked in the small blind (blinds 400-800, 100 ante), and pushed with AQ suited. No callers, I scoop. Then get QQ next hand--shove, get called, and double up. Manage to make 2 pair with KQ later, only to be beaten by a flush. 3 handed, in SB, I look down at the A of hearts. All in.

Call, says the BB. Volsfan has 88.

Night night.

Still, good ideas were shared, fun was had, and in the end, I was able to forget about a Saturday night that could have been a whole lot worse than it turned out to be.

Cards for me will be thin for a while. Hell month has begin. Golf all this week, then 2 weeks of NASCAR.

Oh, and July can't get here fast enough.

~M

Stopping short of a week....

I'll drop an entry on ya.

Nothing nice to say about my play in the league event this past Saturday.

Fastest bust out EVER for me (and probably in league history). My KK runs into AQ suited. I raise pre-flop, get called. Q high flop, with 2 clubs. I bet, get re-raised, I call. Turn is the K of clubs. I shove, get called, see the bad news, and go broke.

Game over. No Player of the Year for me. Yeah, I was fairly sick for a few hours after that.

No, I don't wish to re-analyze the hand. I've thought about it a million times, and the only way I don't get busted there is if I check the flop, and try to control the pot that way. Still, even if I check-call there, the gin card hit both of us, which would have gotten all my chips into the middle. Bah.

Did play in the Pub Poker quarterly tourney, and as it turns out, a $10K seat in the WSOP Main Event went to the winner.

No, it wasn't me. Something with KK was bad for me, as I went broke with that hand in the Pub tourney too. All in for my last 2400, get called by A-J off, Ace hits the river. Game over. No WSOP seat for me.

I did manage to have some fun--it didn't suck. I love playing cards, dragging pots, table chatter, all of it. I just didn't get to do very much of those things this past weekend.

Next game for me? No clue. Irish Jim is playing tonight (bashtard!), and I was thinking about doing something this Sunday, but that isn't looking very promising at the moment. After this weekend? Not another clear date until May 31st.

Say it with me.....Powerball....Powerball....Powerball.....Powerball.....

Good luck and good cards,
~M

PS-Sorry for the lack of pics. Not feeling very photogenic lately.

Hello, friends...

Long time, no blog, but hey, I don't get paid for this thing! Seriously, sorry to have been gone, but the vacation was...well...as you see the pic below... A BLAST! Corny, but true. The family enjoyed a wonderful time at Disney, taking in Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios. We hit H-wood on Sunday, but rains forced us inside after a quick visit. That park wasn't all that great, so I don't feel like we missed much, but then again, when you don't see all of it, how do you know? I wasn't disappointed to not go back.

Of course, the Magic Kingdom is mother of all parks there, and we actually made 3 (or was it 4) separate trips to see it all. It was fun. Going between all the sub-parks (from Tomorrowland to Fantasyland to Frontierland) means it's going to be a long day, but rather than do the entire park in a day, we broke it up, and that was much better. Park during the day, hit the pool in the height of the heat, come back at night...props to Mrs. Chipstack for that idea--worked like a charm.

Animal Kingdom was a fairly cool park--although it was more zoo than park. Not much in the way of rides and coasters, but if you like animals, it was perfect to get an up close view of tigers, elephants, gorillas, or even a meerkat (seen above). We took a couple of rides through "safari-like" places, which was neat, and the other kinda cool part about Animal Kingdom is that the sub-parks are broken up into continents--there is the Asia park, Africa, etc, and all offer something unique based upon the part of the world they are from.Now, I did say Animal Kingdom was thin on rides, but it did have a doozy (as told to me by Mrs. Chipstack--I'm not a ride person). The Mount Everest coaster rolls through the above pic (although you can't see the track from this, in my opinion, very cool angle above). It was described as "steep climb up, then roll to a stop, roll backwards, get chased by a Yeti, and then drop." Sounds fun. Someone else can go ahead of me.

We saw fireworks, enjoyed parades, beat the heat with ice cream and dips in the pool, and most of all, tried our best to relax. Granted, 2 kids, one of them in a wheelchair, and a mother-in-law isn't exactly the recipe for relaxation at a theme park--or in this case 4 theme parks. Still, the smiling faces of the kids made it all worth the pain in my legs, the sunburn on my arms and ears, and the dent in the wallet.

Now, there are 2 more pics to share--it was my quest to get a really nice picture of the leader of the club....Mickey Mouse. I tried on several occasions for the perfect shot--in parades, or in shows, or anywhere that darn mouse was hanging around. I was watching one of the shows with our wheelchair-bound kiddo, and thought, "this is gonna be my best place--good sight line, good lighting, this is it." Grab the camera, set up, wait....wait....wait for the perfect moment...and SNAP IT!!!!

Damn mouse blinked! I did manage to get this one snapped off, and this ended up being the best Mickey pic I got.

All in all, a great time was had by all.

Of course, this is supposed to be a poker blog, but with no poker played, no poker to talk about. Poker After Dark continues to be in re-runs, the National Heads Up tourney began coverage on Sunday (nice), but most of all, the regular season finale for the league is this Saturday. For me to win the Player of the Year title, I have to finish no worse than 2nd, and the leader has to score 0 points. Even if it doesn't happen like I hope it will, I am pretty happy with my season overall. Couple bad mistakes hurt my chances to being the points leader coming into this one, but at least they were mistakes, and not bad beats. Sure, mistakes can get me down, but at least they are fixable, once identified. Bad beats just hurt more.

Anyway, good luck, and good cards!
~M

I'm a bore, I know.

Work, work work, work...and no poker to speak of.

Welcome to my world of late.

Apologies for those of you looking for stories of a great read and laydown, or a ram and jam hand. Won't find them in this blog entry. Truth is, I'll be lucky to sit at a table before mid April.

While I hate that feeling, I also know that it's not a big deal. Sure, I miss playing as often as I have in the past, but right now, cards aren't in the cards.

So what is in the cards?

DISNEY! A planned vacation during Spring Break. Mrs. Chipstack, Gramma Chipstack, and the kids. It will be fun, and I am looking forward to it, but I may not appear it on the outside, because of what is going on at work.

For the first time since arriving at my current job, I am not going to a major sporting event to cover the story. It is a weird feeling, because I am used to being the guy to go. NFL playoffs, NASCAR, Final Four (which is this weekend), you name it, I've been to it, and covered it. And I have loved every minute of it.

When we planned the trip, it was August. No idea that one of the teams in our state would be playing in the Final Four at the time of the trip.

Did I want to go to San Antonio? Yes. I love being at major events, and being the guy that the station looks to for the coverage that we have provided over the years.

Am I sad that I am not in San Antonio? No. Had we not had this vacation planned for months, I would be there. I would have volunteered for the trip at the final buzzer of the game that made our coverage necessary. For the first time since I've been here, I couldn't raise my hand and say, "I'll do it."

By no means is that liberating. It's my job, and I love my job and all that it involves. It's not the first time in my career that I have been away when a major story broke. For instance, in 1997, I was preparing to marry my first wife, and we were in Chicago visiting family and friends for a week. While we were there, legendary basketball coach Dean Smith announced his retirement for North Carolina (I was working in North Carolina covering that school). Biggest story to hit the state since I arrived, and I was 800 miles away. That was a sick feeling. That was also something that was unforseen (at least at the time). Stuff happens.

This Final Four trip also happened. Stuff happens, and while I hate the feeling of being away from it, I also know that taking our first family vacation is more important to me (and Mrs. Chipstack), than me being away covering the tournament.

I hope that the folks I work with understand why I am not there. It's not because I don't want to be there. It's because I simply can not be there. Something inside of me feels like I am letting them down, and I hope I am not.

I would feel worse if I let my family down, so I am glad that I can live with my professional guilt. It will be worth it once I see the kids faces at the parks next week.

To my fellow rounders, I wish you a great week--there won't be another blog entry for at least a week, and when I get back, I'll be chomping at the bit to get back to the table.

WAIT--I DO HAVE SOME POKER NEWS!

The friends at the Pub Poker Circuit contacted me. Remember, a few of us from the league played in at the one local establishment, until that establishment (notice I am leaving out their name) chickened out and pulled the games? Well, turns out I acquired enough points to earn a seat in the First Quarter Prize Tournament! The tourney is the day after the league event in April, so it will feel like a continuous session. I am stoked.

OK, off to bed, and then one more day at work, and then a drive to FLA.

I'll say hey to Mickey and Minnie for all of you, all the while thinking about peeking down at a wired pair of aces.

Good luck and good cards,
~M