Dealing with losses and moving on in life

I've grown accustom to dealing with losses over the years. Such is life. As many of you already know, my father passed away a few days ago and it's been pretty devastating. I've gotten an overwhelming amount of support from family and friends, though, and I really didn't realize how amazing they are. I love all of you and couldn't make it without all this support. Thanks so much to everyone for the well wishes. I think I'll pull through and move on with my life successfully. I'm weighing my options right now and I really have no idea what I'm going to do. It's a strong possibility I end up moving with my best friend in the world Kazu to his mother's huge house in Temecula, CA for at least a few months. His mom is the absolute nicest and most genuine person I've ever met in my entire life. His sister is also an amazing person and they are just, well...normal. Normality is something I haven't really experienced much of in my life. I'm really ready to move on and just be a normal person again. I think living in a nice household would be an amazing change for me. Eating dinner around a table with family is something I haven't done in years on a regular basis and it just feels so right.

I can even enroll in community college out there while still playing poker both live and online. I'm going to make some pretty huge life decisions coming up in the next month or so and I'm pretty excited. Hopefully everything turns out well for me. I think I'm due for some life run good soon! The funeral is tomorrow and I haven't slept very much in the past week or so. I've spent a lot of time getting closer to my family and I'm really glad I have. I have such an amazing family and they've been nothing but there for me every step of the way. Thanks again everyone and I'll make sure I keep you all posted on my progress.

-Brandon

Making Progress

The above picture can be clicked on to see the whole image. My setup is finally complete! Apple 30", 17" Macbook Pro, Logitech DiNovo wireless keyboard, Logitech Revolution mouse, Herman Miller Aeron chair, and a Bose sound system with a subwoofer.

I've been doing really well live since I started the stake. Definitely a mixture of Galen Hall rungood money and me playing extremely well in very soft games. I feel like my live game is extremely strong right now, maybe even stronger than my online game. I've built the patience and skills that are mandatory to be a very successful live player. I see a lot of online players making a lot of huge mistakes just because they don't realize how different the game is. Patience is key and one tabling full ring is pretty tough for most online players to adjust to.

I messed up my knee really bad playing basketball and I was out of commission for a week or so. I played live almost every day and was hobbling around on crutches. Not very fun! I'm feeling really healthy now, though, and I've gotten back in to the groove of things. I've been exercising again the last couple days and trying to eat as healthy as possible.

My friend Craig Bergeron came over two days ago after he got back home from Las Vegas. We did a bunch of gambling and ended up playing some HORSE and free throw shooting contests for money. I ended up winning $300, and he gave me his brand new Apple 30" monitor as I hooked him up with a favor in Las Vegas. He bought it about a year ago and never even opened it out of the box. Typical Craig. I'll tell some more stories about him in later blog posts when I have the time. He's one of my best friends and just a really epic person.

I just got done packing for Florida. I'm going from the 20th until the 1st of August. The Florida State Poker Championship is going on down there at the Isle Casino in Pompano. I'm landing in Ft. Lauderdale and staying at the Sheraton in a really nice suite with some of my good friends from Michigan. I plan to play the $1600 with $500 bounties, the $2200 6-max, and the $5300 Main Event. I'll be there for 10 or 11 days and I'm only playing 3 tournaments, so I plan to play a very large volume of cash games. According to some of my friends who are already down there, multiple tables of 5-10 uncapped have been running every single day. There have also been at least one 10/25 uncapped game going also which is apparently very soft as well. I'm salivating just thinking about it!

I'm pretty much putting real life on hold for the next two weeks. If I do well in Florida it will pretty much be 100% that I'll be moving. I'm unsure of where to, but I'm leaning toward just getting an apartment or renting a condo in a really nice area of Michigan. There's also a slim chance I move down to FL just because of the live action. Plenty of my friends have made the move and they love it.

Thanks for reading!

-Brandon

A Dollar And A Dream

Got a live backing deal from Galen Hall, and off we go! I'm a live pro starting now. I'll keep the blog updated with new developments.

Live Pro?

I'm seeking live backing. I already have a flight booked to FL for two weeks, and am considering moving there and taking some college courses. I'd move close to Ft. Lauderdale which has the best cash game action in the US. I'm mostly looking to play 2-5, 5-10 and some 10-25. I'm very experienced in live and have played an absurd amount of live cash. I feel extremely comfortable in the live setting. Here's the thread I put up:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/135/staking/seeking-live-backer-1048606/

I guess it's the life of a legal age degenerate now...

I'm going to start updating this blog again. I started it when I was 16 years old and only had 10 or so followers that I trusted. I mostly used it as a journal or something to vent and tell my story, as I really could not publicly without ramifications. I love having some kind of outlet to get my thoughts out, and I've never been the personal type. I also don't mind the attention, even though I don't deserve as much as I get. I'm far from a celebrity, but sometimes it feels like I am. A lot of my friends think I'm some rich superhero when really I'm far from it. People come up to me at poker games and say are you CompleteDonk, or a random friend's parent will find my screen name out and see my PokerDB and think I'm crazy rich, as it just shows cashes and not profit. I'm actually down according to real stat sites online, lol. In reality I'm up only around 100, maybe 150k.

Everything in my life is pretty good right now. I'm far from my peak in terms of wealth, but I'm happier than ever. I've been working on fixing everything I screwed up when I randomly decided to leave my high school for online and barely told anybody. I've built back all of my old really good friends, and have met some new awesome ones as well. It feels nostalgic almost. I feel like I'm being able to experience everything I missed socially by making the move I did. I had a girlfriend for a few weeks and decided to break up with her. It was probably pretty cold by me, but she was really in love with me and I'm not looking for anything long term. I'm way too young and teenage girls are much too hot, heh. I've been working out a bit and playing a ton of basketball/running. I'm way too skinny and out of shape and I'm quickly fixing that as well.

I'm pretty much convinced I'll be going to college by the latest next fall. I will graduate from high school in a couple weeks and finally will have that ever so elusive diploma, lol. I cannot go this fall as I'm graduating a bit late due to laziness, apathy, and some depression mixed in. I've gotten out of that funk I was in. I think Black Friday was actually an extremely good thing for my life longterm. I feel healthier, happier, and even though I'm poorer, I've realized money isn't everything!

Hopefully this post doesn't come off too braggadocios. Most of my posts (especially previous posts in this blog) are more dark. I'm just telling the truth about what's going on in my life, and hope it's interesting enough for at least a few people to read and enjoy.

Until next time..

Makeup

Makeup is one of my least favorite things in the world. This opinion is held by most staked poker players, especially backed MTT poker players. The day I got out of makeup was absolutely amazing. I never thought the day would come, being stuck 6 figures and nothing going well, but last week that's exactly what happened. I won the $11+R on Stars for ~$15K to cap off my amazing heater and finally get out of makeup. The funny thing is, it didn't come all at once or with a big score like I thought it would. I grinded harder than I ever have before, and only played very good value tournaments. I no longer feel the need to play tournaments I don't have a significant edge in. This means no more $1K's, no more tough $100r's/$200r's etc. I realized how large of a mistake it was trying to make a living playing MTTs staked and playing tournaments like those. Makeup builds fast and it's pretty hard to get out of a large hole. I never want to be in such a hole again which is why I'm taking the correct steps to prevent this.

A couple months ago Ricky came down to MI to hang out for a few days. He basically flew in to play the $50R homegame that was being ran, and to chill with yours truly. I doubt it was anything like he expected, as he ended up getting wasted off of various alcohol/drugs the second night he was there with a kid he didn't know at all before the trip. Nothing too noteworthy happened beside that. Ricky, Lance (LMONKEYH) and I did a ton of gambling on ridiculous stuff. I think I was stuck over 5K at one point to Ricky playing a combination of blackjack, throwing a ball in to a garbage can, and ping pong. Pretty standard I'd say. I think I only ended up losing a couple thousand but it didn't go too well for me.

I'm still staked by Jake 'psutennis11' Toole and things are going quite well. I've made him a significant amount of money in a short period of time and he couldn't be happier. He's a great backer and I've never had a problem with him at all. He's also a very good MTT player and is always willing to discuss strategy which helps my game substantially to say the least. I went out to State College, PA for the weekend to hang out with him, theczar19, Avril Sharapova, and a bunch of others. It was pretty fun beside the fact that I didn't bring my 30" monitor, and had to grind in a small space as there were so many people playing there. We didn't get out much as the weather wasn't too great and I only came in for a couple days in order to play FTOPS.

I booked my flight to CT for Friday morning. It's currently Wednesday night and I decided it'd be a great idea to not tell anyone beside for my brother that I'm going on a trip out of state for a couple weeks. The plan is to fly to CT Friday, and drive to Hilton Head, SC on Tuesday morning. I'm going to drive with Ricky down to SC where we'll be staying for a week or so. Geoff 'Geoffras22' Rasmussen has a house to himself down there so it should be a lot of fun. The weather is beautiful down there compared to MI so I'm definitely looking forward to it. Hopefully we'll actually leave the house and do some sight seeing or other fun activities instead of sitting around all day. Ricky is usually up for whatever though, so that will encourage Geoff (I hope!) to tag along with us.

Pretty exciting last month or two in my life. I no longer attend Annapolis High School, and am taking online classes to finish up my diploma. The diploma is no different and it's not a GED or anything like that. I had to pay tuition out of pocket for the classes but I'd say it's been 100% worth it so far. I really despised waking up every morning to go school 5 days a week when it's unlikely I'll go to college. This decision has drastically improved my life and I don't regret it in the least bit. I get more sleep, eat better, feel better, and can travel whenever I want. I see my friends less, but that's probably the only negative so far. I've had a ton of fun and don't plan on going back to the way I was living. I got off of a plane yesterday and am getting on another Friday just because I felt like it. Pretty exciting life for a 16 year old if you ask me.

I turn 17 in a month, and it's only a month and a year until I can start playing live poker! I really can't wait and have looked forward to being able to play live tournaments/cash for years. I really love playing live poker in my limited experience, and think it fits my style of play quite well. Deeper stacks are a huge benefit against tournament players who often are not very strong postflop players. The first EPT I'll play will most likely be EPT San Remo 2011 in early April. It's venue is very attractive (Italy) and the main event is quite large and draws a lot of terrible players and a huge prize pool. Hopefully I can bink the first EPT I play!

-Brandon

Update

It's been a while since I've last updated my blog. No real reason, just have been lazy and forgetful. A lot of things have changed in my life since my last update. I'm actually on a flight back home right now. I was visiting my good friend Kazu (TakeItBack online) for about a week. I've known Kazu for at least three years, and he's definitely one of my better friends. I stayed with him, his sister and his mother in Temecula, CA. It was a much needed vacation as thins have been a bit stressful on the home front. My dad isn't doing too well, and that was starting to get to me so I really needed to get away.

California was a ton of fun and super relaxing. As expected we didn't do all that much sight seeing or anything, but that didn't ruin the trip at all. Kazu's mom Jean is probably the nicest person I've ever met. She also happens to be an amazing cook/baker, so having home cooked meals for once was nice as well. Ben Wu (tylor_dii online) came to visit for a couple days as well. He only lives about 1.5 hours away so it was pretty convenient. I'd only talked to Ben a few times before the trip, but he was really cool. He gave me action on pretty much any degen type bet I wanted as well. The second or third night I was there we went to a park about 15 minutes away from Kazu's house. Playing basketball probably wasn't a good idea as I was feeling pretty sick to my stomach, but I did it anyway. We played up to 11 the first game, 2-on-2. I threw up when it was 8-9, took a five minute break and ended up coming back and hitting the game winning three. That was pretty awesome. I really need to start getting back in to shape and playing more sports. Poker is probably the worst thing for your body as you're constantly sitting at your computer and not really exerting yourself physically as much as you want to. It leads to pretty unhealthy lifestyles and I have to admit that I fell in to that for a short period of time. I've been trying really hard to get out of it lately though and have been doing pretty well.

The last full day before I came home we went to Del Mar beach which was absolutely amazing. The weather was perfect. I hadn't seen the ocean since I was around 7 years old in Florida, so that was high up on my list of things to do in California when I arrived. It was worth the hour drive each way to get to the beach. It was absolutely beautiful. I can't even describe how the ocean looked with words. It was absolutely stunning and the beach was perfect. We played catch on the beach for about 30 minutes which was a lot of fun. Afterward we picked up pizza from a small pizza shop right by the beach. I wasn't expecting much, but it was easily the best pizza I've ever had. It seems like everything surrounding the beach is just so much better. Maybe my eyes fooled my taste buds but it was great either way.

Poker hasn't been too bad either in general. I've been studying the game more than I usually do, and reviewing hand histories etc. I'm really striving to become much better than I am currently. I realized that the way to improve wasn't just to wake up and grind MTTs all day. Reviewing HHs, talking to friends about them, and just thinking about the game in general has helped me so much. I was in sort of a funk and not improving at all before the light bulb went off in my head. I was starting to hate the game as well, which I feared because of how much I loved it for the last 3-4 years. Luckily I was given advice from very smart and successful players which helped me more than I can describe. Thanks to those who have helped me in the past, and recently.

I'm backed by my good friend Jake Toole now for MTTs. The mement_mori deal really could not have gone worse. I don't think I was playing particularly bad, but I surely wasn't improving during those months either, or at least it didn't seem like it. After a few months I was in ~$150K of makeup and getting out seemed hopeless. I then received a PM from mement saying to send all my money back in my accounts as he was going to try to sell my makeup. He wasn't doing too well financially, and the ~$100K he lost staking me didn't help at all. I don't really have anything against Mickey though, he really was a good backer and a nice guy during our interactions. Lately he hasn't been as friendly to me, but it's understandable. It went as badly as it could've for him, and what happened after wasn't too great either.

Not many people nowadays are in the market for buying makeup. It's a very costly proposition even though it's very +EV in some cases. You may have to invest $50K in a new horse before he ever plays a hand for you. Dipthrong and PokerJamers have a huge stable of horses, and Dip has done very well in the staking business. He contacted mement about buying my makeup for a small fraction of what it was at. Before our first conversation, I didn't really know Dip at all. His reputation wasn't the best, but I knew he was at least trustworthy and wouldn't do anything "scummy" during our staking arrangement if it went through. I went in to a chartroom to negotiate terms with Jamie and Mark (jamers/dip) and things really could not have gone worse. I was treated pretty terrible during negotiations for really no reason at all. Dip seems to have a superiority complex that he can't get over, and I was talked down to etc. When I'm entering an arrangement where there's so much money, time, and effort on the line, I definitely am not interested in dealing with someone like that. I basically told them that I'd never play a hand of poker for them in my life. This obviously upset Dip, and mement wasn't the happiest either because if the deal went through, he would've gained much needed capital.

I was trying to talk to everyone I knew to get the makeup sold. Unfortunately, I really couldn't get in contact with anyone who wanted to invest a very large sum of money. I eventually talked to my friend Jake Toole (psutennis) and we struck up a deal with mement. Jake paid $20K, I paid $10K out of pocket, and I would start with $40K in makeup for Jake. This deal was obviously massive for me and I was extremely fortunate that it went through. Our deal started around 1.5-2 months ago and it's been going pretty well. Jake is very reasonable and a good friend as well. All transactions seem to be going very smooth.

A couple days after Jake signed me, Dip decided to make a thread on PocketFives outing me as underage. He did this purely because he had a grudge against me for what happened. Threads started on multiple other forums as well, including 2+2 in MTTc. I expected to be under a lot of heat from the sites, but really nothing happened at all. I was never contacted by any poker site, seemingly because I already have IDs on file on every major site, and have had to respond to underage allegations before as well. All of that is in progress of blowing over, but I doubt anyone will completely forget about it.

Right now I'm still playing for Jake and plan to for the foreseeable future. I've pretty much broken even over the last two months, but I'm at a point now where I feel it's a matter of time before I'm out of makeup again. I got 3rd in the $109FO on Sunday for ~$18k, and had a few deep runs last night to no avail. If I win a few flips things are a lot different, but "that's poker" even though I hate that saying more than any I've heard. Hopefully I'll be extremely successful in the future, and my next blog post has a happier tone to it.

My good friend Ricky (RonaldKosh) is flying in from CT on the 26th for a few days which should be a lot of fun. There's a homegame tournament that day he's going to be playing with us. I'll hopefully remember to update after he leaves. Thanks for reading.

-Brandon