My motorhome, my family, my adventures, my life.
Copyright 2003-5 Randy Charles Morin
On Wednesday night, I entered a Texas Holdem tournament. It was my second tournament ever. The previous time, I lost on the 3rd hand. This time, I did much better. I made it to the final table, placing 7th of 39 gamblers. On the last hand, the blinds were 300-600 and the pot was 2100 before it was my play. I had AQ and about 6000 chips. I raised to 3000. Everybody folded, but the last person (sitting to my right) called. The flop came out 9-8-2. I had played this guy for the last hour and knew he could've had any two cards. He raised all-in. I had about 3000 chips left and the pot was already 11,000. I called and found I had the best hand. He had JT suited. He hit 7 on the river and I was goodbye. I was one card away from being chip leader on the final table of 6 players.
Today, I purchased tickets for the Pennsylvania 500 (August 3rd). A 2-day pass was only $150 to park the RV in the infield with three kids, my wife and I. That's pretty good value. It's about 7 hours from Brampton.
I've been trying to stump my daughter with words that she doesn't know how to spell. Just now, I tried daydreaming. She got it perfect. BTW, she's 4 years old.
Yesterday, I started to drain the icerink. It took a bit of work to prime the hose, but eventually it started. It's been draining now for 24+ hours and I think it'll take another day or two.
Taken today. With all the snowfalls lately, I've had to dig out the rink several times this week. The rink was well used today and the temperature got near zero (-3), so the ice was horrible by nightfall.
This winter is the most beautiful in Brampton, since I moved here years ago. We are getting lots of snow. More than ever. And the temperature has been very good for my backyard icerink.
Brayden scored 2 more assists this weekend. Today, he played defense and they played the top team in the league. After falling behind 4-0 in the first half of the first period, I told the defense to start taking chances and rely on their goalie to make some saves. They lost 6-3. Brayden assisted on their 1st two goals and was on the ice for all 3. He's now got points on 8 of their last 9 goals and been on the ice for all 9. If you add the hat trick he scored in the mini-game on Tuesday, he now has 4 goals and 7 assists in his last 3 games. In league play, he's got 2 goals in his last 4 games and 7 assists in his last 2.
BTW, the reffing is so frustrating. I know they have a hard time getting refs, but I just cannot believe how bad they are. In truth, some refs are good and some are bad, so I'm only talking about the bad ones. The team my son played today is very dirty. They hook, slash, trip, bodycheck all game. At one point, a player on the dirty team tried to bodycheck a player, but he fell to the ice and the player he hit kept on skating. The ref called the only penalty of the game, interference against the player that got hit, not the player that initiated the contact. I was floored and started laughing. You can't really say anything because there's a real lacking of reffing everywhere, so you gotta take the bad because the alternative is no refs at all. Still, I'm amazed how bad they were.
Today, Brayden scored a goal and got five assists. His team won 6-2. He scored on a one-timer from the doorstep. Our backyard icerink was destroyed by the weather this last week, so I was a little upset at myself that I didn't get him more icetime. I'll have it fixed later today.
On Adelaine's 10th birthday, we went to Rainforest Cafe in Toronto (Yorkdale). This place is expensive. The kids like to go, so we got a membership. We saved $5 on a $100 meal. They also spam us a bunch of $5-10 off deals every month, but the deals are not valid with othe offers, so you don't really save anything cause you already get $5-10 off.
This morning was the 10th anniversary of my fatherhood. Yep, my eldest is now 10 yrs old. Tonight, I'll take her to soccer, then we'll have supper at a restaurant of her choice. Yesterday was her party; they did pottery and a karaoke party.
Brayden scored a goal again yesterday, but a split second after the ref blew the whistle because a player was hurt. They rarely give assists in his league, but they gave him one, he should've had 2 or 3.
More pics of the backyard icerink. These are from earlier today during our first daylight skate. If you have any ambition, this was easier than I thought. Basically, I put bought 6 sixteen foot 2x12s. I attached them with industrial screws and some extra wood pieces. Then I put a tarp overtop and tucked it underneath the outside. The tarp is folded over (2-ply), since it was more than twice what I needed.
I built my own outdoor hockey rink this year. Tonight was the first night that my kids tested the ice. They didn't get out till it was already dark, so the pics are VERY DARK. I'll take better pics next time. One of the pics is of an outdoor thermometer my parents bought me years back and I only installed this week, to monitor the ice condition. Today, it climbed to almost zero Celsius, which is about as warm as it can get before the ice starts to soften and eventually melt. The ice was real hard as the temperature the previous few days was ten to fifteen below zero. Great skating ice.
Brayden scored another goal today in hockey (his 2nd in this his 1st year of hockey).
The ref was really good in this game; he gave out assists like candy, helped the players understand the game, called penalties. I like it when the refs give 2 assists on every goal (even when it's obviously unassisted). A few very happy players on Brayden's team had their 1st points of the season and many had 2-3-4 points.
On the other hand, the teams in my son's league are very unbalanced. This week, they won something like 8-0 (they don't show more than 5 goal leads). Last week, they lost by a similar score. When they tried to balance the teams earlier in the season, the team that is killing everybody resisted and actually wanted another good player from my sons team.
Yesterday and again today, we went fishing. We've had 2 rods forever, but have never taken the time. Yesterday, we spent most of the time learing how to thread a rod, cast, reel and didn't catch any. Today, we went immediate to work and caught 7 fish (we put them all back). Adelaine caught 3 and really likes fishing. Brayden caught 1. From yesterday, I learnt the fish like hotdog skin on plain hooks and no sinker. I'll post pics later. Maybe you can help me identify the fish family.
On December 20th, we went to the Leafs v. Lightning hockey game and stayed at the St Peterburg KOA. We liked the KOA so much we stayed an extra 2 days. A friend at the campground found us a ride to the hockey game, saving us the two-way hockey ride, which may have been $100. He also got the stay to fix for free the door step, which has broken on us a day earlier. The staff was extremely friendly all-around. Wifi was great (not free). They also had a dance (beer was $1 per can/bottle). The campground was located about 1 mile from the Gulf of Mexico (Madeira Beach), but it took 2 miles to walk (Americans hate sidewalks and walking period). They are located within an industrial zone (weird). Most of the permanent folk were retired Canadians.
We stayed one night at the Okeechobee KOA this week and I didn't like it. It's a golfing resort, not a regular campground. The facilities for children were unkept. The picnic tables were littered with bird droppings. It was about 5 minutes from a Super Walmart, which was nice for my wife. We ate a local Pizza Hut, which didn't have many items on the menu. A McDonalds was located cross the street. If you are older, retired and a golfer, than I'm sure you'd appreciate this place. They have 700 sites and it's a little expensive. Permanent spot sell for $30-70k. They had good WiFi.
This year we stayed at two different lots in the 300 loop at the Fort Wilderness Campground in Disney. It's the cheapest resort at only $50/night. You just need a camper. They also offer both WiFi (free) and at the campsite wired-Internet ($10/d). Both were quite unreliable, but available if you are prepared to work for it. I usually forget the site numbers, so this time I took pics of the posts.
Last week, I stopped by CampingWorld to buy a new sewer hose. This time, I bought a good kit; ezCoupler Sewer Hose Kit. Well worth the higher price. I've always screwed around with parts. This hose is 10 feet with a 10 foot extension to make it 20 and the connectors are great. I feel stupid having screwed around with cheaper kits.