Two commercials that make no sense:

1. ESPN for their fantasy football draft guide - “Find out who will be this year’s Ryan Grant.” Ryan Grant was a no-name at the beginning of the season who came out of nowhere to put up really good stats. Therefore, ESPN can’t know who will be this year’s Ryan Grant, because no one knows who this year’s Ryan Grant is. If they did, he wouldn’t be this year’s Ryan Grant.

2. In a commercial for freecreditreport.com, there’s a guy singing about how he wishes he would have gone there and he could have avoided identity theft. He sings “Shoulda gone to freecreditreport.com, I woulda seen this comin at me like an atom bomb.” … You can’t see an atom bomb coming towards you, and even if you did, you couldn’t do anything about it.

Whew.

I’ve only gotten punched a few times in my life. Turns out, one of the benefits of mastering double-speak and possessing an IQ higher than that of posterboard is that you can frequently talk your way out of situations that would normally find you receiving bodily harm.

The thing about getting punched is that no matter how recently the last time it happened to you, and regardless how vivid your recollection is of that time, you’re still never ready for the entirety of the situation when it happens again.

This is what I realize at the end of every WSOP.

Now, probably more than 95% of the media, I love going down to the Rio everyday and walking the floor and giving a fist-pound to some famous pro I know (half because I whole-heartedly wish them well and half because I want people around to know that I know them… a little bit more of the latter with Shannon Elizabeth). I love getting there before everyone else and parking in the secret empty parking lot and taking the secret door in (you know, the one that I found out about ten days ago). I love helping create something that I think is legitimately the best of its kind in poker.

But seriously, 45 days is a long, fucking, time. And it takes getting up on day 45 (well like 41 in this case since we have to leave early to go cover Bellagio Cup), to really remind you what a punch actually feels like.

I feel like got a lot done this summer. I really think I helped take the show, along with Ali Nejad, to a new level. We didn’t really start doing anything new or groundbreaking; we just got really good at the things that make the show good. Of course, without Ali, Joe, Gavin, Court, and all the guests, what I do is just a bunch of bulletpoints highlighted in different colors and geniusly organized into sections and subsections in a Microsoft Word document - but still, the show was great week after week and I like to think that enough of it was done with my help that I can take some substantial pride in that. I also had an Asian kid ask for my autograph and picture with me - that’s happened before but this time the person didn’t think I was Mike Matusow.

On a larger scale, I covered my third straight WSOP for my third different media outlet. I’m not sure what that says about me or the poker industry or both. I think at the very least it says that hopefully I’ve built up a skill set that will never leave me jobless in this volatile industry. I also moved into a smaller apartment (again, one of those push-pull accomplishments - proud of myself for getting through a move at one of the busiest times of my life? Or sickened that I had to move into a smaller apartment since I’m poor?), and played in my 2nd, 3rd, and 4th career WSOP tournaments (with a combined success level still far less than my first). I went to a strip club for the first time other than on my sister’s 21st birthday (not recommended, btw), and I lost over 50 lbs and continue to follow my doctor’s orders and not drink any alcohol at all (after a December freak seizure at Bellagio).

After you get punched, there’s about 3 seconds where your brain and your body decide to totally forget where and when they are. It’s probably the most devoid of conscious thought your brain will ever be. Then you realize where you are, and that you just got punched, and then you just kinda go from there. Nothing hurts yet because of Adrenaline.

So how was my WSOP overall? Well, I have no money, my new apartment is full of boxes and piles of clothes, and I just busted the last $40 in my Full Tilt account (after cashing out about $600, don’t worry mom). On the other side, all my shorts from last summer are too big for me, I’m down to two Ativan a day, and there’s a chance I might actually be able to pay my rent on time this month.

Not that any of that matters though, I won’t be able to feel anything for another week or so.

I was going to talk about my vacation with my family in Laughlin this past week and my two tournament beats,but after logging on and reading Ryan’s blog today there is noreason to tell you another bad beat story or the story of my vacation when their is so many other more important issues going on in the world.

I have never met Ryan and I commend him for being a great son to hs Father. I have written stories before about “Perspective” in life and we all sometimes forget the wonderful gift we have of being here with friends and loved ones.

Ryan if there is anything I can do for you and your family,please do not hesitate to ask.

I will let all 5 of my readers know about my vacation later next week, in the meantime please say a special prayer for the Schmelzer family.

Take care…Be safe….

Roughly 10 days before the start of the WSOP this summer, Gary and I were talking and he asked me if I would be interested working with PokerNews to do chip updates for them. It’s something that I really wanted to do and I knew I would enjoy the time I’d be working. It also would have given me the opportunity to make some connections in the industry incase I decide to dabble in it after I graduate.

I got in contact with Garry Gates, who did some work for this site in the past, and we discussed how everything would work. It was short notice, but things could have worked out with just a little planning (living arrangements, transportation to and from the Rio, etc.).

One thing made me think declining the offer might be the best thing though. If you follow my blog (sadly my entries have been scarce lately), you might remember that last summer my dad was diagnosed with brain cancer. His tumor started growing again this spring and was successfully operated on again. The fact that I never knew what would happen and when led me to decide it was best that I don’t move across the country for a month and a half.

This ended up being the right choice. On what I think was day two of the Series, we found out that my dad’s tumor once again had started growing and had moved into a new location. To make matters worse, the area it moved to is inoperable.

He just started a new study program on Tuesday. He has to get an IV every Tuesday and take a pill everyday. Like everything involving brain cancer, this is in the experimental stage and has no guarantees. All we can do is pray and hope this is the answer.

I hadn’t been playing much poker this summer till a week or two ago. Things were going just OK. However, I recently picked up limit Omaha hi/lo and it has been going well for me. I have always liked the game a lot, but I always felt I had a better edge in NL hold’em. I have only had one losing session in Omaha in roughly 5 sessions. My loss was kind of sick. I had tripled my buy-in and ended up a loser. I wasn’t too happy with that. I played earlier today and lost my first buy-in and ended up fighting back and ended up a buy-in.

All I have for now. If any of you played in any WSOP events, I hope they went well. If you are playing tomorrow in the Main Event, best of luck to you!