No, I didn’t graduate.  However, I’m getting close!  Unless I go back to my old ways from a few years back, I’ll graduate in December.  My sister, Marla, graduated from LMU on Saturday.  She started at Colorado before she transferred there after one year.  She grinded like the 70-somethings at 4/8 LHE to graduate in a very impressive 3.5 years + summer school.  I have to say that is very impressive!  Mass was on Friday.  I hadn’t been to mass since I was in high school.  It was everything that you would expect besides the massive excess of incense that was let out throughout its entirety.  At one point, I thought they were going to have to call the paramedics.  This elderly woman was sitting in the handicap section and during prayer incense was shot out directly in front of her for at least 5 minutes.  My grandma, dad and I almost died of laughter as they very apparently struggled with the strong aroma.

Hailey and I concocted an alcoholic beverage for Saturday’s graduation.  She got the recipe from Cosmo.  The ingredients were cranberry juice, lemonade, 3 types of polmegranate and vodka.  It was quite the hit for those that drank it.  During the graduation, Marla made her way over to us before she was called up to get her diploma.  She was visibly drunk after having gone to a pre-graduation celebration at The Hacienda, a very good Mexican restraunt, earlier that morning.  Being the great brother that I am, I hooked her up with a bottle of it and she took it with her back to her seat.  Now if you know my sister, you’ll know that this is unlike her.  About 1,600 students were called to the stage and received a diploma.  Marla was the only student that ran up to the person that was to hand her the diploma and jumped into his arms in celebration.  They had 2 big screens showing the action from the stage so everyone saw it quite well.  It was hilarious.  And no, she didn’t know the person.  It must have been that extra kick of alochol that I had given her and probably a lot of bottled in excitment as well.  She was rightfully excited.  I’m very proud of her.

I played 2 sessions of cash games today and it didn’t go particularly well.  I lost 1,000 playing 100 & 200 NL.  I ran pretty terribly, but I’m very happy with one thing in particular.  In the last month, I’ve played 9-handed 400 & 600 NL when it’s running.  I was very cautious about game selection.  In doing so, I noticed that I was playing much differently at those tables and it wasn’t for the good.  I was playing overly cautious and at other times very stubbornly.  It didn’t feel very good at all.  I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately and in doing so I’ve lost much of the desire that I had previously to play at those limits online.  This is a very good thing and especially after losing 7,500 at Commerce the other day.  Things are really starting to line up for me I feel.  At this point, I’m in a position of great comfort playing 100 & 200 online and playing higher only in live cash games.  Lately, I’ve been playing in the later evening hours and I think I’m going to continue doing that.  This will allow for me to have more time to play live during the day and early to mid evening hours.  I’ll have to wait until mid-August to see how this schedule will go.  As long as I play regularly at Commerce and play well of course, everything should work itself out with the rest of the business ventures that I take part in.  I’m going to try my best to practice this type of a schedule when I’m Vegas this summer.

Tomorrow I have the second charity golf tournament of the year.  This one if for the high school that Matt, Russell and myself graduated from.  We’re also golfing with another grad from Chaminade.  This tournament is a shamble.  Each player takes their first shot, the best shot is chosen and each member of the team plays their own ball out from there.  I’d rather it be the scramble format from last week, but I’ll do my best to contribute in this format tomorrow.