First Real Post of 2009!

Alright, I've been super lazy about blogging so far this year but I think it's about time I wrote up something real. First of all, Bahamas trip report:

PCA was way more fun than I ever thought it would be. I'm not sure why I wasn't as excited about it as I should have been from the start. 2 years ago when I went I was just starting to meet people in the poker world. I had a great time and met a lot of friends for the first time. Last year I didn't go at all since I just did Aussie so i didn't know how much better they had made the resort. But more importantly I just didn't have all the friends in the poker world that I do now. First let me get the poker stuff out of the way though. I ended up playing the $25K and $5k tournaments and busting both pretty early with not much going right. I wasn't super motivated to play either, in fact I wasn't planning to play either of them when I woke up the respective mornings but that's what ended up happening. I certainly don't regret the decision though in retrospect I'm sure I would have had more fun rocking the lazy river and hanging out with whoever I happened to bump into out there. Once I sit at the table though I am into the game and I play as close to 100% as possible.

Alright, so what really made PCA so great was just bumping into everyone, and I really do mean almost everyone, that I'm friends with in the poker world. Over the years I've made a lot of friends through poker, but seeing most of them in one place and randomly bumping into different people every day and having a great time no matter who it was I bumped into that day really solidified in my head how amazing these people are. I only get to see them a handful of times a year, and other than that I only get to talk to them periodically online, but yet so many of them have become true friends. We all have so much in common that we seem to just get along so easily when we see each other, it's really quite amazing. So, for all of you that are reading this, even though you probably won't hear me say it very often in person, you are all so awesome and I'm so happy to have friends like you.

Moving along, every January I usually do a recap of my previous poker year and set goals for the new year. The 2008 recap is remarkably easy: I accomplished basically every single one of my poker goals that I had set for myself last year. In fact I blew them away. I don't feel like going through all of them right now, but if you're interested it's easy to find the post archived at sirwatts.blogspot.com. I ran insanely good from the Bellagio Cup onwards through November, and even booking a decent loss in December didn't put too much of a dent in the year overall. On the one hand I need to remember how lucky I was in 2008 and keep my expectations reasonable or I will likely be setting myself up for huge disappointment in 2009. On the other hand, you gotta dream big.

So, moving along to 2009. I have one of those good problems when it comes to setting goals for 2009 in that I need to completely come up with a new set of them. I still enjoy playing tournaments but I'd be lying if I said I had the same fire and drive to play them as in 2008. That's not to say I don't care or find them interesting anymore as I certainly do, but I think it's pretty normal and understandable that it's just not going to be the same now that I've had "the big score". Of course that being said, the group of people who have won two major tournaments is significantly smaller than the group of people who have binked one, so that does motivate me quite a bit. However, as anyone who reads this blog regularly is aware, I've definitely caught the PLO bug, in particular the high stakes PLO bug. Obviously I have to be a bit smarter about the games I play, but I would very much like to be an extremely successful high to nosebleed high stakes when the games are good PLO cash player in 2009. I feel like there is just so much money potentially to be made in these games and I want to get a piece. No doubt this will probably be the hardest goal I've ever set myself but I guess a challenge is always a good thing.

However, most importantly for 2009, I want to do better at all things outside of poker. Continue to try to get back in better shape, get back to playing a lot of golf and possibly other sports, buy my own place, continue to meet new people and make more friends, and spend more time hanging out with the ones I already have. I'm sure this list could go on a lot longer but you get the point. When it comes down to it there are a lot more important things than poker in life, and I know the better I balance all these things the happier a 2009 it will be for me. It's certainly not an easy thing to do, and I don't expect to completely change the way I live or anything, but I will try to keep making small improvements as I go. All the best to each of you in 2009, I've got a flight to Melbourne to pack for.

Mike