It never ends

So now the van has died. Alternator as far as I can tell. So basement full of water. Wife's business dead. Van Dead. Other car already in for service. If there's erectile dysfunction today, then I'm gonna need a bell tower and a sniper rifle. Or viagra.. whichever.

SQUISH!

That would be the sound you don't want to hear at 7am when you run down to the basement to change a load of laundry. Monday morning after calling out of work because of a nearly sleepless night, I get woken up again by my wife because she went downstairs, couldn't turn on the lights, and heard squish.

During the night the GFI that controlled both the basement lights and the sump pumps had popped. Over the course of the evening ground water slowly inundated the entire basement. Two days and gawdawful man hours later, we've managed to get about 100 gallons of water off the floor and sucked out of the carpet. We've gotten all the furniture and whatnot moved. And now I get to spend the rest of the week removing the carpet so we can chuck it.

Ah.. Joy of joys.

Poker Poker Poker Mushroom Mushroom

So last year was a mess all the way round. Two years ago, I ran $150 up to a $1000 online bankroll and pulled $3000 out. So $150 into $4000 at low limits. Nice. Last year, my bankroll dropped back to $200 and I pulled out a net $100 from my poker accounts. The suck was large.

2005, 20% cash rate on tourneys. And a 50% final table rate of the cashes (I only consider it a final table if I'm also in the money). 2006, I don't think I saw a final table, unless you count SNGs. And cash rate? I couldn't tell you, my carefully built tracking spreadsheet got encrypted, then my PC freaked out and tada.. unreadable.

That's what personal turmoil will do to your poker game.

So now, 2007. I still don't have good tourney tracking stats and lost poker tracker to my PC as well, however, I do have results. This week 5 tourneys, 2 money finishes. The week before that about 10 tourneys, 3 money finishes. Live play, came in 8th of 38 in my first live tourney. Just short of the money. And I had a healthy chip stack when it went south. My bankroll is moving up. My cash game is profitable again (barely). Life is grand, now if I can just my bankroll to a grand I can pretend 2006 didn't happen.

One more time round the horn

Okay I'm going to try this one more time. The last two times I tried to blog, my life promptly fell apart. Now, this could mean I only feel the urge to express myself when life is already going to pot. However, this could mean that I have bad timing. Only one way to find out.

Three's the charm, right?

Atheism vs. Critical Thinking

So, my 6 year old got me again. First, she utters a Greater Clausian prayer back in November. Now she's messing with my head on the God front.

About a month ago, she came to sit next to me while I was playing World of Warcraft. When she plopped down she set her copy of the "Precious Moments" bible on my desk. (I'm carefully ignoring the irony of using the phrase "Precious Moments" while referring the that bloody book.) I asked why she brought it in and she told me that she was reading it. I asked her what she thought, and while I don't recall the exact phrasing, I recall getting the impression that she "knew" she was supposed to believe it, but wasn't enjoying the story much. Typical of a child to assess the literary merits of a religious tract.

After hearing her comments, I said, quite simply. "I don't believe in that book." She tried to defend the idea of Jebus as high and mighty muckity muck, but she's six. She hasn't learned to ignore reality while arguing faith. She also hasn't learned to attack anyone who disagrees to deflect the discussion from actual thought. Thus, the conversation ended.

Fast forward 2 weeks. Out of the blue she comes up to me and says. "I don't believe in God." My thought was "Hooray, oh crap!" No, really.

Thing is, I wondered if she was simply mimicking me. So, now I have a crisis. Which do I choose. Do I choose the Atheist side of me and simply say... "That's right, dear! Good Job.", or do I choose Critical Thinking, and demand to know why? And if I ask why, do I correct her logical flaws and potentially make her a believer again? Atheism is easy, parenting is hard.

Ultimately, I chose to ask her why she believed this. Like any good kid, her response amazed me. "How could God be the King of Everything, before there was anything? That's just silly." Nearly broke my heart to point out that she'd misunderstood the script. I told her he was the "King of Everything" because he made it all, according to that book that I don't believe.

She said simply, "Oh."