Happy Belated New Year, Blog Readers!

I have been very busy the last few weeks.  As I mentioned in my last post, I went home for 5 days for Christmas.  I spent a lot of time with family and got some good time in with friends.  We got 25 inches of snow while I was there, and it was kind of nice over Christmas.  Its been a long time since I have been "snowed-in."

I spent a couple days player poker and coaching when I got back into town. Poker didn't go well during those days, but the rest of December was pretty good, so I can't complain too much.  I'll get to more poker stuff later in this post.

On Thursday, I went to a party one of my best friends has every year.  As always, it was a blast.  He never disappoints when he puts together a party.  We had a good amount of people come in from out of town and a lot of people from around here.  Not much to say regarding details, but we killed it.

On Friday, my band played at The Fine Line Music Cafe in downtown Minneapolis.  It is a great venue and was a pretty fun gig.  We had a good turnout including some left-over people who came to town for New Year's.  My parents were even in town.  Of course it wasn't perfect as I broke strings on my primary guitar right away and had to play my backup which I don't play very often and didn't sound great as my equipment was setup for my main guitar.  My voice was also a little raw from the night before (lots of booz and hanging around a fog machine too long), but it wasn't disastrous.  As with any performance, most people probably didn't even notice.  I didn't feel great about it, but I had fun, and I think we sounded all right overall.

6 hours after the gig ended, I had to get up to drive 4 hours to Steven's Point, WI for my cousin's wedding.  I managed to sleep an hour and a half (I suck at falling asleep) before I got up and got ready.  We spent most of the day driving tired, but it was definitely worth it.  Growing up, I was very close to my cousin, and I couldn't imagine missing her wedding.  She seems very happy and her new husband is a great guy.

Now I am back home for 24 more hours before I leave for Florida with my family/wife/brothers' girlfriends.  I have a lot to do today before leaving, but then I get to take it easy for the rest of the week in Florida.  My mom is really looking forward to the trip, so I hope everyone is reasonable when we are out there so she can have a great time.  My mom lives for family trips, Disney, and just spending time with her children.  I will do my best to make sure she has a good time.  She has had a lot of stresses recently (that I would prefer not to discuss).  This should be a good break for her.

Finally, I should discuss poker in 2009 briefly.  It certainly was a successful year.  In terms of online cash games (by bread and butter), I had my best year to date.  I spent a lot on the variance-fest that is the World Series, along with a lot on other investments, life, and effectively "double-paid" my taxes last year.  The estimated payments I sent in in 2008 were substantially less than what I owed as they were based on 2007 income.  So I paid a large chunk at the beginning of the year and then started large estimated payments for 2009.

Basically, it ended up with me having quite a bit less in liquid assets than I would prefer.  As result, I have played a bit lower than normal at the end of the year.  I am building up my online roll again, though, and look forward to getting back into more 25/50+ in 2010.  I feel like I have a good shot at having a big year.  The extent of how big it will be is heavily dependent on how much volume I put in and variance.  Basically, if I run good in the right spots, I could end up playing a lot of 25/50+ right away.  Even if I spend a few months playing more 10/20 and 5/10, its still a very good living, so I am not sure how aggressive I will be with bankroll management.  We will see.  

Either way, I feel really good about my game right now.  I spent a lot of time last year working on my PLO game, and I feel like I have become very good while still improving at NL.  I also spent a fair amount of time playing tournaments, so I feel good as a donkament player as well.  I think I have a lot of options now considering I feel great in 6-max and heads up in both games along with my ability to compete in tournaments.  I probably won't play a ton of tourneys, but a good run in one is always a possibility that could give me a great bump in my earnings this year.

I have also gotten into coaching this year along with training at BlueFire.  BFP has been a great experience, and I look forward to continuing to push new content in 2010.  I have two concept series going that have gotten great reviews, and I plan to continue adding to them as much as I can find time too.  They always take more time, but I think the classroom-style videos are very efficient ways to teach.  As expected, as I continue to make videos, I think I am improving a lot as a teacher.  The same goes with coaching which I have really been enjoying as of late.  Talking about a game that I love with other intelligent/passionate players really is a great time.  It is awesome that I get paid for it.  I plan to continue making several videos a month, and coaching a few times a week throughout all of 2010.  It is a great way for me to diversify my ability to make a living through poker.  It is also very gratifying to help players improve.  Becoming successful at poker has improved my life so much, and I really enjoy watching others move up and have similar experiences to me.

I use the word "great" a TON when I write.  Maybe I should work on that along with shortening my sentences. :-)

I was going to post on other life goals for this year, but this post has gotten too long already. I will save that for another post.

Happy 2010 everyone.  Only 5 more years until we are living in the land of Back to the Future 2.  I can't wait until I get my hover-car!

-Jaxx