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Quite a few interesting things on my mind lately. I just got out of the hot tub and remembered a lot of conversations I've had with gf over the past few weeks. She is amazing, and particularly amazing at the way she can make me think about myself and do some self reflection. Last week she said that I am pretty hard on myself, which is something I had never really considered until she said it.

I think I am, and that is kind of weird to admit. I know through poker I've learned not to get angry on things outside of my control, so when that ace spikes on the river against my QQ v. AK all in preflop, I know it was a coinflip to begin with. It stings, I don't think anyone can deny that, but thinking you lost an 89% hand on the river, while technically you did, realistically it was a coin flip and you lost a 50% hand, big whoop.

I do get mad at myself when I play poker or any other game/sport poorly, and I had a good conversation with Tyler about this after racquetball this Wednesday. I told him how I was kind of laughing at myself and enjoying playing racquetball tonight, even though I was playing terribly. I had spoken with GF earlier in the week and said how I have a lot of fun at racquetball, but I've noticed that I am ALWAYS more chipper and talkative when I am ahead, and when I am losing I stop talking and focus on the game. This Wednesday I was down 0-8-9 playing cut-throat with William and Tyler, and I just kind of laughed at how poorly I was playing, instead of getting frustrated. I ended up losing 10-14-15 that game, and crushing them in the next game 15-4-2.

I was kind of surprised I made it to 10 in the first game, and I was just rolling in the second game, and I think my positive attitude had a lot to do with it. I also know how sucky it can be to play a sport or game with someone who is taking it too seriously, and I never really thought of myself as "that guy", but maybe I have been, and that is something I'd like to put an end to. I honestly don't care 90% of the time if I win a game, but I would like to play well.

Something about just sitting in the hot tub for 15-20 minutes is great for my creativity and productivity. I don't give myself enough empty time to think most days, I'm racing from school to video gaming so fast that I don't stop and think. Vow to think more outside of video game strategy or teaching! Two things I realized or re-realized tonight in the hot tub: 1) I am very happy teaching, I want to continue teaching regardless of where I am a year or two from now geographically; 2) I really love gf, and I want to make sure she knows this every day.

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Writing is hard. It is hard to get the motivation to write, even though I think about it a handful of times a day. Some random thing will happen and I'll think "that would be a great start to a story" or "that would make a good blog topic", but when I sit down at a computer I run through my routine of email checking, Facebook, sports highlights, news and video games. Writing is about number 12 on my to do list when I sit down at my computer.

I'd rather be playing a video game right now, but my conscience has guilted me into writing because I haven't blogged for a while now. Hmm, what to write about... I guess Jeremy Lin is the hot topic of the week. The first Chinese-Taiwanese descendant to play in the NBA, who is averaging about 25 points in his first three games with significant playing time. He also happens to be the cousin of my junior and senior year roommate, Stan Lin! Great to see Jeremy getting playing time due to the Knicks injuries and taking advantage of the opportunity he's been given.

Speaking of basketball, I attended my third ever middle school basketball game (since I've become a teacher), and of the three games I've attended I have filled in as a referee once and on Monday I filled in as the timer. Ah, public school funding! I had a blast though, and only once made a mistake in my team's favor. I blew the horn when the coach of my school's girls team was screaming for a timeout and the refs weren't listening... so play stopped when the horn blew and the refs were forced to give her a timeout, hah! It wasn't too blatant though, because my team had the ball and they were just dribbling it up the court.

I had a really good conversation with the coach of the opposing boy's team, who was doing the scoring for the girl's game while I did the clock and horn. He's been coaching and teaching for a few years and has tiny aspirations to join the high school basketball coaching scene, but says it is very competitive. Middle school is very loose with sports in public school, which is nice, but it will be interesting to see where my teaching and coaching aspirations take me!