Meant to write a lot. Had one planned called "leaving Las Vegas," which happened more then 10 days ago. Had a video blog I did with my best friend, Bach. But that got erased before I could host it on youtube. Nuts I haven't done a blog in a month - I really like blogs. Either way, I want to make something clear, although it wont make sense:

I am an incredibly competitive person. I do not take losing well. Some could say I hate to lose. If I am playing a game - be it athletic or academic - and I am going to lose, I go a little berserk. I've become quite numb to a lot of things (desensitized, largely, to losing money for example) but losing just will never become apart of my nature.

Funny, but I've been staying w/ Dave, and he's seen me play Chess. I've flipped out after some losses, and he's told me he has never seen me get upset in that way about poker. He's right; I think I've outgrown my emotional fits with regard to poker. This was how...

I used to rage with regard to tilt. It wasn't so much the cards that fell ("I cannot control what they do, I can only control what I do") but rather when I misplayed something in poker. In many ways, perfectionism is an undoing, since it's hard to come to terms with the fact that in poker, you are going to make mistakes. It's just not a solved game.

4 years ago (wow, has it really been that long?) I lived in California. At the time I was using a T42, which was an IBM laptop. IBM had a great support staff, where if you "broke" your laptop, you could send it back, and they'd ship you a completely new laptop.

This was probably very negative for my growth in the tilt department. I destroyed - yes, destroyed - 5 laptops. If I had a particularly tough poker day, I would smash my keypad first, then shatter my screen, and maybe throw my laptop against the wall. Or, what was left of it. I often cut up my hands on my keys, since I would just punch right through the computer. On the phone with support, I wondered when I told them "I dropped it," and they got this completely unrecognizable metal chunk, what sort of drop must have occurred. Err, a 50 ft. drop from a mountain onto spikes, maybe?

I cut this behavior out when the warranty ended. And, I nearly scarred my hands because I punched glass and slit them with deep cuts. Essentially, it was a rational decision when I realized that destroying a laptop would cost me ~700$ or so. Was the release of pent up anger worth spending that much to buy a new computer? No, it wasn't. So I stopped acting in that way.

I went to a sleep away camp when I was little - went there for 7 years. I loved it! (8 to 15) It was in the Adirondacks, which is truly upstate NY. There was this game, of sorts, where every camper was integrated into a "tribe". There were 5 tribes (Seneca, Cayuga, Mohawk, Onondaga, and Tuscarora) which were loosely based on the Iroquois tribes. (I believe Tuscarora were actually ~Tennessee or so Indians, but who cares about details when you're 11 years old?) and I was on the Seneca. We wore yellow.

Every ~week there was an indian event. Man, they were fun. (Some, better then others though) After the first event, there would be a tribal council, where you elect officials. There was chieftain, assistant chieftain, medicine man, and treasurer. (Treasurer was called something else) There were also the female equivalents (sages, I believe, although I'm not positive that was the word. Definitely starts with an "S") My final year, I was one of a few seniors, and had been there a while. I had a lot of experience with the strategies for upcoming games, and frankly, deserved to be the chieftain. So I ran for chieftain, of course.

I didn't win. My friend - a person named Chris Reinkeins, probably spelling that poorly, won. He had been there just as long as I had, frankly, and there weren't really any compelling reasons for the random Seneca people (ranging from 8 to 15 in age, I guess, about 40 people) to vote for him over me or vica versa. The main thing I remember about Chris Reinkeins is he had magic cards but didn't play, whereas I used to be into them. Not in the Zeejustin or Polyballer "top 5 in the world" type of way, but in the "I have a bunch and think I'm pretty good at this game" kind of way. He had a mox ruby, which is an incredibly rare, old card. (One of the few that still has value, although I could be wrong about this... I haven't looked at M:TG prices or cards in at least 10 years) At that point, it was worth 150$ or so, and I knew it. I bought it for 10. (To this day, I still have that card)

I was pretty astonished that I lost. Everyone said, "Well, you can just be assistant chief!" That didn't fly. I didn't want to be the assistant. I wanted to be chieftain. I declined. So, a kid named Jacob Itzkawicz won. (Definitely spelling THAT terribly) He was a friend of mine, too. My main memory of him was that he insisted people call him "nature boy". And his gf throughout camp (for like 3 years) was a girl named Zoee. Zoee was OK.

We went on to win that year. I acted like the de facto Chief at every event. I orchestrated who ran which specific legs when there was the race, (forget the name for it, but it was an awesome event) our strategy in the final war game (lots of fun, you throw socks filled with flour at people) etc. But I didn't get any credit for it, because I had lost the actual election.

I like to think I'm over that bit of disappointment. But it took me a while.