nice to see the running, artmaking, and pokering are going well. I'm heading back to Vegas for a short trip in a week--crazy that it's been over two years since I've been there. Also running a half marathon in February. Can't imagine doing an ultra. But fortunately I can live vicariously through you!

Red Rock Casino



Blacklight Art at Area 15



Doggy Skater



Classic Car



It's been NFR week so tons of cowboys all over town. It's always fascinating to witness the various demographics descend on Vegas for a block time whether it’s the tech nerds for CES or the ravers for EDC.

Starting to reflect on this past year as we approach the new year in a couple weeks. Pondering course corrections and time/energy allocations. It's always depressing when I tally my shortcomings but I guess everyone has their faults and room for incremental improvement.

I just want to feature one last painting that I did this year and pitch my 50% Off Holiday Sale one more time. Art makes the perfect gift to friends and family! Sale ends Dec 23rd. All orders this month include free shipping and a bonus item. I'll hurry to fill orders within a 24 hr turnaround time since it is crunch time for holiday shipping.

Snowflake Pattern Art Feature



Here is one of my paintings



Yep, trying to stay on track doing what I do. Cool dude, would be down to say hi when you're out here. Awesome have fun at the race, 13.1 miles is pretty good on the elation to suffering scale!

2021 Goals

[838.5] Run 1440 miles
[150] Work out 180
[338] Eat healthy 324
[17] Upload 72 vids
[203] 360 hrs art
[467] 360 hrs music
[1124] 1440 hrs poker
[3] Date 6 girls
[1] Make 6 friends
[5] Volunteer 12 days
[1] Travel 6 new places

Love Red Rock

The Strip



Black Mountain



Rawr



Happy Holidays all! Time to start brainstorming goals for the new year.

Ren Fair Las Vegas 2021



Here is one of my paintings



Definitely a well run poker room. That whole area has seen a lot of development with Downtown Summerlin and the Knights' facility. I want hit up one of the baseball games this season at the ballpark across the street.

2021 Goals

[867] Run 1440 miles
[155] Work out 180
[348] Eat healthy 324
[18] Upload 72 vids
[209] 360 hrs art
[476] 360 hrs music
[1163.5] 1440 hrs poker
[3] Date 6 girls
[1] Make 6 friends
[5] Volunteer 12 days
[1] Travel 6 new places

Little Red Rock



Downtown



Hazy Valley



Happy 2022! Time to refocus and attend to some of my shortcomings of last year.

I'll run through my updated goals for this year in my next post.

2021 Goals Review



Here is one of my paintings



2021 Goals

[911] Run 1440 miles
[160] Work out 180
[362] Eat healthy 324
[19] Upload 72 vids
[217] 360 hrs art
[505.5] 360 hrs music
[1200] 1440 hrs poker
[3] Date 6 girls
[1] Make 6 friends
[5] Volunteer 12 days
[1] Travel 6 new places

I took a little break from posting but I think I'll get back to blogging.

Heading to Arizona this weekend to run a half marathon along Lake Havasu, stoked. Ran at a few new trails so far this year and making a point to explore new ones around town.

Went to a basketball game at Orleans. It's been pretty busy out here for March Madness.

Just finished a pretty intricate painting. Still a lot of derivative patterns in my head that I want to get try in future pieces.

Been on a couple fun first dates.

I have been fascinated watching the media coverage and public discourse on the invasion of Ukraine as juxtaposed with the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the hypocrisy is astounding.

2022 Goals



Here is one of my paintings



2022 Goals

[229] Run 1440 miles
[37] Work out 180
[90] Eat healthy 360
[2] Upload 72 vids
[48.5] 360 hrs art
[141.5] 360 hrs music
[287] 1440 hrs poker
[2] Date 6 girls
[ ] Make 6 friends
[ ] Volunteer 12 days
[ ] Travel 6 new places

London Bridge, Lake Havasu



Valley of Fire



Floyd Lamb Park



Lake Havasu was a really cool spot, all kinds of boating and water sports. The race was fun, flat fast course. Rode the ferry across the lake and went to see Parker Dam. Not a bad drive from LV, would like to visit again sometime.

Michigan is supposed to be joining the liquidity pool of WSOP.com this year, that’s good news. More tables to select from is always better.

Looking forward to a show this week Testament, Exodus and Death Angel. I've seen them all live before separately over the years. Zetro is back on vox at Exodus since I last saw them in the Rob Dukes era. Testament recruited Dave Lombardo to take on drum duties, he is quite prolific I've seen him gig with Slayer, Suicidal Tendencies and The Misfits. All of their latest albums are pretty solid so I am stoked to hear the new songs along with the 80s classics.

Suicide Silence and Jinjer at House of Blues



Here is one of my paintings in progress



2022 Goals

[258.5] Run 1440 miles
[42] Work out 180
[100] Eat healthy 360
[2] Upload 72 vids
[54] 360 hrs art
[141.5] 360 hrs music
[323] 1440 hrs poker
[2] Date 6 girls
[ ] Make 6 friends
[ ] Volunteer 12 days
[1] Travel 6 new places

Testament



Exodus



Frenchman Mountain



View from the eastside



The show was pretty sick, awesome to see the guitarists trading off leads. They played a handful of new songs and a ton of classics.

Hiked Frenchman Mountain with a friend. It's a trail I've been meaning to get around to. It's about a 4 mile round trip, fairly steep climbing almost the whole time. It was a little breezy but not too hot. Would like to come back again for more vert training.

Went on another first date at an indie coffee shop. Not compatible, but always interesting to chat for an hour and give serendipity a chance.

Here is a vid of the second exhibit I've been to at Area 15. There are a few more exhibits there that I would like to check out sometime. Great off strip destination for tourists and locals alike.

Wink World



Here is one of my paintings



2022 Goals

[285.5] Run 1440 miles
[48] Work out 180
[110] Eat healthy 360
[3] Upload 72 vids
[78] 360 hrs art
[141.5] 360 hrs music
[355.5] 1440 hrs poker
[3] Date 6 girls
[ ] Make 6 friends
[ ] Volunteer 12 days
[1] Travel 6 new places

San Diego







Went down to San Diego with my buddy for a quick trip. Put in a couple sessions at Oceans 11, checked out sunset cliffs, watched the surfers for a bit.

Little behind on my art and miles pace, going to focus on these this month before trying to play a ton of hours during WSOP next month.

It was cool to see a confluence of a bunch of the biggest social media personalities playing high stakes on the Hustler livestream. Probably the most outside awareness brought to poker in a long time. Props to Feldman for refining the medium, production value has gone up massively.

Lake Havasu



Here is one of my paintings in progress



2022 Goals

[305.5] Run 1440 miles
[53] Work out 180
[120] Eat healthy 360
[4] Upload 72 vids
[81.5] 360 hrs art
[141.5] 360 hrs music
[406] 1440 hrs poker
[3] Date 6 girls
[ ] Make 6 friends
[1] Volunteer 12 days
[1] Travel 6 new places

RIP Trevor Strnad, vocalist of The Black Dahlia Murder. It always sucks to lose someone to suicide. So many people are struggling with mental health, anxiety, depression etc. It’s a complex issue. One thing I know is we should all try to be kinder to one another.

I've been observing the crypto and stock market nosediving this year. I like researching and learning about economics. It's pretty remarkable how the US government was able drive the markets to record highs by cutting rates and suppressing bond yields. But just like going on a drug induced bender, eventually you have to sober up. With those policies now reversed it's no surprise that asset prices are returning to Earth. Pile on the complete breakdown of diplomatic and economic relations with Russia and tenuous trade relations with China a global recession seems inevitable. I sold out of my high p/e momentum stocks at the beginning of the year, was concentrating on single digit p/e stocks for the first couple months of the year. After the full scale invasion in Ukraine I figured that would be a very negative catalyst. Sold all index funds and flipped into some inverse ETFs: SARK, SH and RWN. I am not adept enough to trade options yet so I figured that’s the easiest way to short the market until the dust clears and the S&P p/e returns to 17 or so.

I had a little bit of bitcoin and a handful of the top altcoins, but sold them all as we are clearly in a downtrend. I was amazed by the implosion of UST and LUNA, 35 billion in market cap obliterated in under a week. I think Tether is the next crypto that may face scrutiny. I may not quite completely understand it, but bitcoin has a constrained total supply but Tether can create an unlimited supply of their stable coin which can be used to exchange for bitcoin or other cryptos to potentially manipulate their price. Tether currently has an 80 billion market cap and nobody knows for sure how big or the composition of their actual reserves are if there is a run on the bank. Interested to see how this drama plays out. There are an insane amount of scams and thefts in the crypto world, I think a lot of these issues will have to be addressed before mainstream acceptance.

Valley of Fire



Here is one of my paintings



2022 Goals

[344.5] Run 1440 miles
[59] Work out 180
[130] Eat healthy 360
[5] Upload 72 vids
[97] 360 hrs art
[141.5] 360 hrs music
[456] 1440 hrs poker
[3] Date 6 girls
[ ] Make 6 friends
[1] Volunteer 12 days
[1] Travel 6 new places

Temps cracked 100 for the first time this year ready for the long hot summer. Lake Mead water level is also extremely low, this draught in the southwest is no joke.

Been cranking out the volume online this month before shifting a bit more to live in June for WSOP. I'll hit elite as opposed to silver status this month, only the second time I've done it. 25% more rakeback ain't much, but I'll take it.

My roommate just had a deep run for a 5 fig score, stoked for him! He's always tryin to talk me into firing tournaments. I'm still a steadfast cash grinder for now.

Hope some of you travel out here to partake in WSOP, feel free to say what's up if you see me around.

Exodus and Testament



Here is a close up of one of my paintings



2022 Goals

[376.5] Run 1440 miles
[65] Work out 180
[140] Eat healthy 360
[6] Upload 72 vids
[102] 360 hrs art
[141.5] 360 hrs music
[523] 1440 hrs poker
[3] Date 6 girls
[ ] Make 6 friends
[1] Volunteer 12 days
[1] Travel 6 new places

Grind on da mind, WSOP season is upon us.

Just trying to log those hours. I like the new setting. Auto shufflers and brand new chips.

GL to all those firing this summer!

WSOP on The Strip



Here is one of my paintings in progress



2022 Goals

[444] Run 1440 miles
[76] Work out 180
[169] Eat healthy 360
[7] Upload 72 vids
[108.5] 360 hrs art
[141.5] 360 hrs music
[684] 1440 hrs poker
[3] Date 6 girls
[ ] Make 6 friends
[1] Volunteer 12 days
[1] Travel 6 new places

View from the Westside



View from Hendertucky



Mojave Yucca



Cavalera



Happy Thanksgiving all! Took a little hiatus from writing in this blog, maybe the longest since inception? Anyhow I'll try to get out some of the things that have been percolating in my head. I'll have to reserve some for future posts.

Props to all those who engineered the move of WSOP to Paris and Ballys (soon to be Horseshoe) convention space. Things went way smoother than I expected and I like the new location. I loved the feel of the freshly minted chips. Also great to have shuffle machines at the majority of cash tables.

From the poker grind to the coffee grind. I took on my first employment I've had in more than 10 years. I was working for 5 months at a coffee shop on UNLV campus before leaving a couple weeks ago. I got to learn how to make espresso drinks and work on my social skills a bit, made a few friends. It was interesting hanging out with a lot of 18-22 year old college kids. When I was that age I was on a different route: enlisted in the Army, slinging bud, gambling at Indian casinos, bay area cardrooms and Vegas, county jail. Spending time at UNLV kind of circled back and filled a gap in life experience for me.

As for running, I had signed up for the Red Rock 100k to take my second crack at it. Training was going well, was doing more trails and practicing the cadence of gel intake on my long runs. Unfortunately, I sustained a back injury right before race day so I emailed the race director and he was nice enough to let me defer my entry to next year. One interesting note is Alex Honnold of the movie "Free Solo" ran the 50k this year. Good chance I'll run into him at one of our local races.

This whole FTX train wreck is even more fascinating than the Luna and Celsius debacles. So many sports stars, politicians, youtubers were feeding into the con and the tentacles of the money trail of shell companies, tax havens and corruption are truly immense. Crypto is a shady underworld.

On the music front, got the see the Cavalera brothers along with Possessed's lead guitarist perform my 2 fav, quintessential Sepultura albums "Beneath the Remains" and "Arise". Just like Danzig performing classic Misfits, this is a line up I was delighted to be able to witness.

Here are 3 modern metal bone-crushing ablums from the last year I would highly recommend. Technique and production value are all off the charts.

Mire "A New Found Rain" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1kMpN5y3dro

Arch Enemy "Deceivers" https://youtu.be/A_9X4v1SZMI

Soulfly "Totem" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bVcFCxxeyc

Holiday Sale 2022



Here is one of my paintings



2022 Goals

[831] Run 1440 miles
[116] Work out 180
[318] Eat healthy 360
[7] Upload 72 vids
[165.5] 360 hrs art
[175] 360 hrs music
[965] 1440 hrs poker
[6] Date 6 girls
[2] Make 6 friends
[1] Volunteer 12 days
[1] Travel 6 new places

Was the coffee job to help pad the roll?
How was that gig available btw ? ... when I was in college any type of service job on campus would be auto-filled by a college girl.

Main reason: after 10000+ hrs grinding poker I am really not enjoying the process a lot of the time. It's time to start exploring alternative ways to potentially make a middle class income that I enjoy more. I'll probably make a video expounding on this shift soon.

I just went to a couple jobs fairs at the brand new convention hall expansion. Background checks only go back 7 years so my record is now squeeky clean besides *gasp* citations for playing my guitar on the Strip.

word of advice... make the income first, then play poker.
true story

As ever, wishing you the best Carl... Actually walked past you playing guitar in March. Didnt want to stop your jam to say Hi.

Would you consider doing a beginners jujitsu class? I've tried almost every sport and none have the atmosphere of BJJ. Really think you could quickly make some friends there. The post session chats are everything.

always appreciate the updates, Pure! Glad to see you're making progress on all fronts.

#trooth

Awesome. I'm glad to see this number increasing.


Love your artwork, photos and attitude.

F1 racing is developing the land between Planet Hollywood and Virgin Hotels that had sat vacant for a long time. The Oakland A's are also poised to follow the Raiders to Las Vegas. The Aces our WNBA team won the championship this year, nice even though I don’t really follow WNBA. It's cool that Vegas is maturing and attracting major league teams.

Stations casinos sold off the land of the defunct Fiestas, Texas Station. They are constructing a brand new casino on Durango just south of the 215 beltway. No word on if they'll have poker yet.

I've read a few books this year.

This was a great book assembled by the host of my fav podcast right now. Great artifacts and commentary from bands that played these shows.

NYHC A Flyer Oral History Vol 1 (1980-1989) https://www.amazon.com/York-Hardcore.../dp/0578881055

I also read a couple biographies of 2 figures in the investment world. Their approaches were on opposite ends of the spectrum so it was an interesting juxtaposition. Jesse Livermore, who made and lost millions speculating during the early 1900s markets which were very similar to the crypto markets before sweeping federal regulations of the 1930s. John Bogle, who popularized extremely low cost passive index investing and founded the 8 trillion AUM behemoth Vanguard. They both experienced triumph and tragedy.

Reminiscences of a Stock Operator https://www.amazon.com/Reminiscences.../dp/0471770884

The House That Bogle Built https://www.amazon.com/House-that-Bo.../dp/0071749063

I've been messing around with an inconsequential amount of money in a brokerage for fun. My portfolio was 50% short the index in June and I decided to gradually sell out that position and flip long. Closed all my remaining short positions at the end of Oct and started averaging into VTI again. The index is still a little above it's average historical CAPE ratio but a lot of the excesses have been truncated this year.

Here are my current stock picks: heavy energy, industrials, logistics and few banks and car companies.



Huge change from my last batch of picks about a year ago 8/18/21 stock picks

I made a vid about my mindset shift going forward regarding my objectives with playing poker. Title is a little hyperbolic but whatever.

Quitting Poker



Here is one of my paintings



Wise words

TYVM. Cool, glad you caught a bit of my performance. I don’t mind when people stop me to say hi briefly.

I am a little averse to engaging in combative sports but I definitely respect the discipline and fortitude they take. My only peripheral exposure is hearing Rogan and his buddies talk about MMA. I'm not opposed to visiting sometime and seeing first hand what it's about.

Cheers, glad to see you have kept up your routine updates as well.

Progress is a little slow on many fronts but hopefully trudging in the right direction toward the light.

Thanks, I'm am not very outgoing so it's not easy for me to muster the time and energy maintain relationships but I know establishing allies is a critical component of a fulfilling life.

Much appreciated

2022 Goals

[835.5] Run 1440 miles
[117] Work out 180
[339] Eat healthy 360
[10] Upload 72 vids
[169] 360 hrs art
[184] 360 hrs music
[1047] 1440 hrs poker
[6] Date 6 girls
[2] Make 6 friends
[1] Volunteer 12 days
[1] Travel 6 new places

Good luck transitioning out of poker!

I've probably suggested this in the past, but being a guitar dood, have you ever thought about getting a job at a guitar/music store? Might meet some like minded people, be in a cool environment that you're interested in, etc.

Ggogogo!,imoG

JuJitsu really isn't like most combat sports. Its very easy to avoid injury as the "fight" ends the second you tap out. Also you could just go for the lessons and avoid the rounds at the end completely if you wanted. I think if you did just 1 beginners class you would enjoy it... Anyway, goodluck closing out 2022

wrt quitting the poker, do whatever makes you happy.

the end of an era

I bet you would be a great writer. there are many online gigs you can get as a writer and they request writing samples so if youre good, youre in.

Social Distortion



A Little Snow on Mt. Charley



Dino



Happy winter solstice. As we are winding down 2022 starting to think about next year.

Got to see Social D for the first time, they were great. Keeping rock n roll alive.

Wanted to mention one last time I am running a holiday art sale, 50% off all items through Dec 25th. I will also be giving away an art print to 3 winners, all you have to do to be entered in the drawing is publicly subscribe to my art focused youtube channel: Unconventional Paintings

Best Caesars Hotel Rooms Ranked



Here is a couple vids featuring some of the art I produced this year







Yeah I've thought about it, there are a couple guitar centers around town. I certainly have the gear knowledge. Having the patience to hear "smoke on the water" and "stairway to heaven" butchered over and over might be another story haha.

Thanks, I'll keep that in mind.

Thanks, if you don't get intrinsic value from an occupation it's time to start searching for new avenues.

Thanks for the suggestion.

2022 Goals

[853] Run 1440 miles
[122] Work out 180
[349] Eat healthy 360
[15] Upload 72 vids
[176.5] 360 hrs art
[193] 360 hrs music
[1087] 1440 hrs poker
[6] Date 6 girls
[2] Make 6 friends
[1] Volunteer 12 days
[1] Travel 6 new places