Another 12 months are done and the year
2014 now lies in the past, left behind like an empty cookie jar.
There were some delicious treats in it, a lot of disappointments and
many ups and downs. Basically, it fits very much to the last few
years that brought a lot of uncertainty, surprises and whatnot's. The
end could have surely been better though, as I had to go through some
legal bullshit in Germany and illness also played a certain role.
This may sound very rich given the
interesting opportunities I experienced, but as avid GrumpyCat fan
and natural born pessimist the dark side of the mood is far more
appealing most of the time. It helps as well to keep the expectations
in general rather low and thus lessens the overall disappointment.
By the middle of January I only had one
live event guaranteed, everything else was pretty much in the open
with the efforts of my usual employer reduced to almost zero. I then
received an invitation for Dublin and Tanger to kick off the
reporting duties slowly. A return to Morocco was due in September and
that was one of the pleasant surprises of the year, as I can practice
my French over there and soak in a completely different mentality.
Apart from beating a dead horse
part-time, things eventually took a turn for the better during the
EPT Vienna when I was covering the Eureka and EPT High Roller events
for Pokerfirma. Chad Holloway, one of the PokerNews bloggers and
senior writer on the site, suggested to apply for the World Series Of
Poker in the summer. I was given a trial run at EPT Sanremo shortly
after and snap-called the offer to work my ass off in Las Vegas for
six weeks.
A few German bracelets in Sin City
provided some additional exposure, but a late and totally unexpected
birthday present would be the cherry on top of the cake. PokerNews
hired me to cover the World Series Of Poker in Melbourne and I didn't
have to think twice before accepting. Australia was always on my list
of countries to must visit, hopefully it wasn't the last time either.
I returned to the beautiful island of
Sint Maarten for 10 days of work followed by four live events almost
in a row in November and December. Pretty much exactly one month on
the road with two days back home after two back-to-back coverages
left the brain almost empty and the facial expression almost as
priceless as the two GrumpyCat plush toys that I received from dear
friends. One simply cannot not smile when you see this cat.
Was it a lost year? To a certain degree
this may have been the case, as the future is still rather uncertain.
I made some progress with regards to taking pictures and several
shots were used in print media, one of them in a book and even on the
cover of a German poker magazine. It is still a long way to go though
and I am painfully aware of the lack of consistency.
The biggest disappointment lies with
myself though and that has nothing to do with being hard on yourself.
I am eating more healthy and the last drop of alcohol stems from
April 2012, but that's not the problem. Nor are the three kilos that
I gained either. The laziness and fact I wasn't doing fitness as
often and regularly as I could will be one of the crucial goals to
improve for the upcoming year 2015. And finding some happiness, as
that tends to be sold out on eBay and Amazon.
Ah well, we don't always get what we
want.
# GrumpyZed
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