Monday, December 31, 2012

Four Years Later, Still Talking Poker

To say that it's been a while would certainly be a gross understatement.  It's been more than four freaking years since I last gave this blog a little love, and it is much overdue for a little poker talkin.  I was actually surprised that my Blogger account and all my old posts had been preserved, even though the domain that I had redirected this through had long expired.  Nothing was public on the actual web, so it must have seemed as if the whole thing was dead and gone, and I suppose I subconsciously believed that to be true as well.

Obviously I could go into a lot of detail about what's been going on in both my personal life and poker life over the past four years, but I think I'll spare you all the novel and go with more of an annotated timeline of what's been going on and why I decided to make this phoenix-esque return.  Here goes:

  • December 2008 - Teaching.  Coaching.  No free time.  No poker.  I have a blog?
  • 2009 - Mostly busy with the same things.  Squeeze in a little online poker but not much.  Meet an awesome gal in late October.  Sh*t get's real.
  • 2010 - Most time spent wearing teacher, coach, or boyfriend hats.  Make a short-lived run at getting back into the online grind during the summer months.  School year starts up and poker again takes a backseat to everything else.
  • April 2011 - Black Friday whaaaaaaaaat?  I want my monies!
  • May 2011 - Give up on getting said monies.
  • August 2011 - Tired of being awesome gal's boyfriend, make big romantic proposal and lock it up.  Sh*t gets even more real.
  • September 2011 - Decide I deserve an engagement trophy of some sort as well.  Drop some dollars on fancy new poker chips and poker chip addiction official begins, many thanks to ChipTalk.net.  Also happen upon other Maryland members and discover the wonderful world of home games in my backyard.
  • October 2011 - With online poker virtually dead, the new grind becomes occasional (2-3 times a month) small stakes home games, which turn out to be much more socially satisfying than sitting at a computer.  Who knew!?
  • Early 2012 - Ups and downs in the home games.  Also squeeze in a trip or two to AC, as well as several stops at Delaware Park as the lucky lady and I plan out wedding things in DE.
  • July 2012 - With table games in Maryland coming back into legislative discussions, I decide to use my summer vacation to take my poker enthusiasm to the web once again with my new site, Maryland Poker Connection.  The sweet smell of Maryland poker is in the air!
  • August 2012 - Bachelor party in AC!
  • October 2012 - Officially the luckiest man in the world.  Spectacular wedding and honeymoon with the coolest chick on the planet and all of our amazing friends.
  • November 2012 - Return from honeymoon to sweat out Maryland gambling expansion on election night.  Question 7 passes!  Poker coming to Maryland!  Not to mention Greg Merson, a Marylander, takes down the WSOP Main Event!  Everything's coming up Milhouse!
  • December 2012 - Still likely several months away from casino poker in state.  Still splashing around in home games when I can.  Still teaching at the same school and coaching on the side.  Still married to an awesome gal and loving every minute of it... particularly lucky in that she likes playing a little poker herself and enjoys baking sweet treats for when we host games here.  Still working on her grasp on gap theory and implied odds :)

So that's about it in a nutshell, up to the point now where I decided that just operating the one website isn't enough to quench my thirst for everything poker.  I'm hopeful that I'll be able to put more time into TPTM in the coming year and expand the blog to include other nuances of my obsession with poker.  I have plenty of things to share just from the four years that I took off, and will hopefully have many more goodies in store now that Maryland casinos will be serving up live poker action in the near future.

For now though, it is time to start getting ready for a little night on the town with the wife.  Happy New Years to all, and best of luck at the tables,

Bo