Will Slusher.net

… and now, another (or a first) installment of poker as a metaphor for life…

Last night, a bunch of friends an I got together for a little poker night… It has been a while since I had played, but I started out pretty well…

About halfway in I was doing pretty well… I had been playing pretty conservative, the hands I really ‘played’ I won, and I was probably second in the chip count… I was cool… confident… more or less at ease in my game…

…and that’s when I they came along… the best two cards a guy can hope for before the flop… pocket aces… They were stunning… I knew from the first moment I saw them that this was going to be something special… It was all I could do just to keep my cool and play it slow…

I don’t remember exactly how things went down, but I played everything right… I bet well, but not so well as to scare everyone out of the pot… the flop didn’t seem to be any help to anyone… The turn paired a 4 and now it was down to me and one other player…

I bet and she raised, then I raised to put her all in… When we flipped over our cards she had pocket queens and I had my pocket aces…

… and then it happened… the dealer burned the top card and flipped up the river… and there it was… the queen of hearts… giving my friend a full house and me a lonely two pair…

… and so it goes with life some times… some times the most perfect and wonderful thing comes along… completely unexpected, but completely amazing… Then, just when everything seems to be going your way, and everything seems to be falling into place… BAM!, everything changes in the blink of an eye…

… sometimes, even the perfect thing just isn’t meant to be…

… I’m really digging the new Carbon Leaf cd… I’m not sure it’s as strong as “Indian Summer”, but there are some pretty good tracks… several which really seem to match my current mood…

…which (speaking of the mood), honestly, isn’t that bad… I kinda flip-flop back and forth between understanding/accepting and hurt/bitter… but I think that’s to be expected for a while… Really, I’m pretty much ok most of the time… It just hits me every once in a while when I find a little note, or photo, or something that reminds me of how good things were at one point…

In other news, I’m really digging my new iPod as well… I’m really enjoying the color screen, the video playback (although, due to some ergonomic issues my attempt to watch Good Eats (with my personal culinary idol, Alton Brown) at the gym failed miserably)… I even like the redesigned headphones… The new ones actually fit properly in my ear, which is a first for the little ear buds… My only complaint is that the nice, shiney, black surface REALLY show fingerprints… but if that’s the worst issue, I think I’ll be fine… :)

Anyway, back to personal stuff, I’ve decided I need to set a goal for myself… something to challenge me a bit… sooooo, I’m thinking I may try to run in a race next spring… maybe something in the 10k to half-marathon range… I haven’t figured out all the details yet, but it’s something I just feel that I want to do…

‘course, we’ll see if I’m still so sure in a couple weeks as I try to build up my tolerance for running again… :)

In other, other news, my friend Margaret and I tried cooking with tofu last night… It was an interesting experience and actually turned out much better than I expected… I think I may try experimenting with tofu a bit more… Last night we more or less just substituted for chicken in one of my thai recipies, basically just stir frying cubes of it with garlic and red pepper flakes… I think if I try it again, I might use smaller cubes… I also will probably drain and marinade it a bit ahead of time… I’m also tempted to try coating it with something to get it a bit crispy on the outside…

Anyway, I think I’ve probably rambled on enough… Back to the old grind stone…

Sigh…. Where to begin… let’s begin at the end…
This isn’t exactly the next ‘catching up’ post I was hoping to write, but I guess it has to be written…

Last Sunday Kristina and I decided that it was time to part ways… Well, that’s not entirely true… Kris informed me last Sunday that she’d been thinking about things and had realized that we just weren’t meant to be… I just kinda sat there in shock…

A week+ later, I’m still trying to suss out exactly how I feel about things… In some ways, I know this is the right thing to do… Then, at other times, something will remind me of the really great times we had together, of how right things felt, and suddenly I’m not so sure anymore…

But what can you do? Not much, other than just giving the heart the time it needs to accept and recover… Everyday gets a little better, a little clearer, a little easier…

Anyway, we should move on to happier topics… :)

Also last week my iPod decided to crap out… it looks like the hard drive died… On the surface this doesn’t look like a happier topic, but, given the fact that I’d already replaced the track wheel and main board in this iPod, and given the other events of last week and my need for a pick-me-up, I decided to order one of the updated 5.5th generation iPods… It should arrive today! :)

Of course, this lead to a grueling side project this weekend of going through my entire 4000+ song collection and updating all the album info and artwork so that I can make full use of the nice color screen… :) Pain in the ass (I spent the better part of a day on it), but worth it, in my anal retentive, OCD way of thinking…

Also, I did my first road test with the new version of my car computer last week… I don’t think I have any updated pics of the new computer yet, but the smoked plexiglass case turned out really well… It’s pretty sweet looking… and, I think, it might actually fit under the seat, once I trim off the support bolts in the corners of the case….

Anyway, for now the PC is sitting in the floorboards… And so far, so good… I’m testing out a front end application called Centrafuse which I’m really digging… It basically gives me a nice touch screen friendly interface to accessing my navigation software (which, I also got an upgraded version of) and for playing media (which I finally have a hard drive big enough to store)… I’ll try to get some update photos, etc up soon….

Hmmmmmmmmm…. I think that more or less covers the big things… Well, on big thing and too geeky things that help take my mind off the big thing… but, ya know… :)