CARDRUNNERS

Joey the pup! 

I had my hands full with the pup this week which has been a lot of fun, but I played a bunch of 25/50 nl and plo with some 10/20 and 50/100 and had a pretty good week.

Tonight a new bar is opening for a friend's birthday and they're opening it up early for our group so it should be a lot of fun.

I had some interesting hands this week so I'll make a longer post on Monday with some poker talk too.

gl!

Cole

The past month or two has been very fun and very busy.  I've been doing a lot of traveling with my girlfriend as well as hanging out in DC with our puppy playing poker.  Poker has been swingy, but overall good and this has definitely been my best year ever (hopefully I don't jinx myself with two months to go).  Life is great though and I'm very happy settling down in DC.

Our first trip was to London during the WSOPE.  I didn't get to play the tournament due to some scheduling conflicts, but it was great to explore a new city with my gf.  We did all the touristy stuff our first day, going to Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, Hyde Park, Harrod's, etc.  That night we double dated with Brian T and had way too much wine with some decent Japanese food.  It was a blast.  We stayed one more day for some poker stuff and then booked it back home.  London was a really cool city and I can't wait to go back.  It didn't hurt that we got absolutely amazing weather the entire time.  We stayed at the Dorchester, which I would highly recommend.



The next weekend we went to Jacksonville, FL.  One of our close friends is a cheerleader for the Jags, so we met up with her for the weekend and finished it off at the Jags/Steelers game.  The Jags lost, but it came down to the wire and sporting events are always fun.



A week later we headed west with a couple we are friends with from college to enjoy wine in Napa!  We are big wine drinkers and had been looking forward to this trip for a while.  I mostly enjoy big reds so Napa/Bordeaux are my ideal wine countries.  Our hotel was the Carneros Inn, which is beautiful and I would highly recommend.  We went to a lot of really small boutique wineries and indulged in some really amazing stuff.  Day one we all drank way too much and slept through dinner, having a lot of fun the whole time.  Day two we took it a little slower and really enjoyed experiencing the whole wine culture of Napa.

My two favorite wineries were Allora and Del Dotto.  Allora is a very small winery with the most beautiful grounds I had ever seen.  Very natury, and a cozy tasting room in the cellar where we drank and ate with the owner.  We were the only people there and I'd imagine that's how it usually goes there.  Del Dotto is bigger, with a really cool cave area where we tasted wines straight from the barrel.  They really pride themselves on the customization of their wines -- each wine is separated by the location and type of grape and barrel wood for a lot of different flavors.  These wineries are must hits.  Our other favorite Napa wineries that we didn't get to visit are Shafer and Quintessa, so we can't wait to get back.  I also love big French reds, so hopefully we can make it to Bordeaux soon.




After that was last weekend, which was my gf and I's anniversary.  I surprised her with a weekend getaway to Paris, which went amazingly well.  We basically only had one day there, but I swear we walked the entire city.  It's a great city because if you are up for a lot of walking, you can hit just about all the cool touristy spots (except maybe Sacre Cour) in an afternoon.  We went to the Grand Palace, Petite Palace, the Louvre, Notre Dame, the Eiffel Tower, and plenty of the other big spots.  That night we ate at Table de Joel Robuchon, which I was excited about because I had heard amazing things about his restaurants.  It was pretty good, I don't think French food is my favorite but if you like it, I'd recommend it I guess.



Our puppy Joey has been so much fun and he's a great companion.  He also gets me out of the apartment a lot and keeps me exercising.



and Joey sporting his 'Skins bowtie after a big win!



I used to lift weights and run a lot in high school as well as freshman year of college, but as I started getting really into poker I lost some motivation for it.  I never got out of shape really, just lost some muscle and tone.  But the past few months I've been running a lot with Joey and working out with a personal trainer three times a week.  I'm in better shape than I've ever been and that certainly makes everything in life feel better.  A lot of poker players (myself include) struggle with finding a balance in life and I think that I've gotten a lot better about that lately.

In an hour or so I'm leaving for Vegas to play some big live cash games.  I'm pumped!  I played a little lower online this morning, 10/20, but had a big win which is always a nice confidence booster and I hope I am still hot at the tables in Vegas.

I've also been working very hard on another major poker related project the past few weeks that I will be talking more about on Monday!

Good luck everyone,
Cole