GRE - School - Poker

It's been over a week since school started, surprisingly different from every year I have been to UCLA, nothing much really happened. I have always found the first weeks of the quarter, especially the fall, very chaotic.. but everything started out peacefully, even though I have not opened an engineering book yet.. partly because I do not have one. There is always this feeling of falling behind at beginning of the quarter, this quarter is no exception, but I have grown accustomed to it so it is no longer a big deal.

My networking class is the smallest class I have ever had in UCLA, smaller than even my English class 2 years ago, I think there are less than 10 people enrolled in my class; it is rather ironic now the internet has become so ubiquitous but there seems to be a degression of interest from it. Two years ago, networking was THE THING!

I took my GRE last Friday, driving to the test center in Culver City, I felt a strange pressure. I guess I hold in my heart the dream to be enrolled into one of the top grad. school I am applying, but the reality is pressing down on me that I have nothing to show as the ticket for admission, well nothing yet.. perhaps the only hope was on an excellent score on the GRE. I felt I really screwed up on the verbal, I ended up with a score of 630, which is a GOOD score relative to average in the GRE, but nothing exceptional, I feel I could easily get 700 if I perform well. The fact is, the test is 30 questions, how comprehensive can a test be in 30 minutes? For the entire assessment of someone's verbal skill, that is grossly biased in my humble opinion. I got my expected 800 on math. I was able to produce something for the two writing topic, I think I did well in argument, most likely no lower than 5, but my issue essay left much to be desired. The truth is, my writing skill leaves a lot of room for improvement, and you cannot all of sudden expect youself to produce an essay way beyond your current level, it is ACTUALLY a pretty fair way of assessing someone's writing ability.
All in all, I was still rather dissapointed, I do not see myself taking the test again unless I get a really miserable score on the writing (below 4.5). I have reverted to where I started, nothing exceptional to show for it.

Lian and I went to watch the UCLA football game on Saturday, just like everyone in Los Angeles Area and UCLA it seems.. The attendence was over 85k, that is insane. Bruins did not dissappointed, neither did Cal., of course, the most exciting result for us was that we won and stayed undefeated. The dramatic fashion in which game played out and the incredible Bruin comeback really deserved every bit of attention the game received. One of the most offensively entertaining football game I have watched live or TV, Pro or College, although both sides had a defense much to be desired.

On our way to the game, I let Lian drive, and when we were sliding forward into the parking place, she rear-ended someone's car. Since everyone was driving at like 5 mph, no human damage was done but my car front is a little crooked while we are still waiting for the estimate of how much it would cost to fix the other guy's car which had a few scratches from the collusion, nothing major and hopefully will not cost us much. This was the first Car accident I have ever been involved in my life, and it was my car.. only it wasnt I who was driving it. Although I was very agitated and am still cursing my bad luck that shit like this have to happen and why I made the decision of not driving, there is really not much to be done. Lian already feels bad enough so I do not want to say much.. I guess we'll just pay and move on.

We come down to the last topic of the day!! I bubbled two tourny today, one is the usual 20 PLHE, which i played well the whole way and had a stack of 13th/78 when it was down to around the money (45 pays), however I started losing chips left and right, AK ran into KK, TT got reraised all in and someone else calls, so I had to give it up.. So I ended up finishing 55th and outta the money, it was really sad. I also played the 10 rebuy, which had 1500+ players and a pool of 72000 dollars, the first place paid 16000, easily one of the bigger prize pool tourny I play in. I rebought 6 times and was in for 70, I had an above average stack most of the time. I got sucked out twice for big pots but I also won a coinflip for all my money. WHen it was down to 250 people (top 185 pays) and I was average stack, which is very good at the time. Somehow I overplayed my hand and lost all my chips in one hand when I could've easily lost only 10k ish (I had 42k). It was really really bad and I still feel like shit. To have played that long and hard and have a decent prospect of making it further, and I lose everything in one hand which I made key errors both preflop and on the flop. This was probably one of the most disappointing bust I have had, simply because I could have avoided it.
This tourny thing has really taken a toll on me, although I am making the buyin with SNG and doing quite well, the disappointment just keep building up with every exit deep in the tournament.. Everytime I end up with a headache and wonder about other things I could have done for the past 4-5 hours of my life.
I probably will take a break from it soon!