Have you guys ever played Blackjack? Novices at the game ask what to do when they have a certain hand and the dealer has another. Do I hit on 16?  What am I suppose to do?   The game is statistically solvable and outside of counting cards the above chart is the best options for you in every scenario of the game.   

My friends today went to Matrix in San Jose.  It is a pretty nice new casino in the area.  Lots of pretty waitresses and I guess my friends were bored. I don't gamble much.   My cousin's friend had 11 and the dealer was showing ten.  I told him that he was suppose to double down, but he would not listen.  I told him that statistically speaking he will come up in the long run and the books says double.   He reluctantly doubles and shows a 3.   He loses his hand and another bet, when the dealer shows 18.   

He was upset with me that I told him that he should hit.  He said he has a choice and I told him you can choose to hit on 21 if you want too, but that isn't what you are supposed to do.   

Later on my cousin has 15 and the dealer is showing a 10.  He chooses to be a rebel and the dealer reveals a 2 in the hole card and hits and busts with a ten.   

I learned something.   You can do the right things and you can still lose and you can do the wrong things and you can win.  

I am reminded of the story of Joseph in the bible.  Joseph was one of 12 brothers and early on in his life he always had dreams of grandeur for himself.  He would tell his brothers that he would one day reign over all of them and they would bow to him one day.   He would have these dreams and his brothers hated him so much that they plotted to kill him.  Can you believe that? They wanted to kill their own brother.

They had mercy on him and decided to just sell him into slavery.   So you can imagine being a slave you could just complain all day and tell your slavemaster that this as all a mistake, but he stayed a slave and when the housemaster wife wanted to sleep with him he told her it would be wrong.   She then told the slavemaster that Joseph tried to rape her and then he is thrown in jail.  He stays in jails for years, but long story short he finally starts to rise and becomes Vizier of Egypt,  the Pharoah's right hand man.   Through all this he is still happy and when his brothers come to him and bow before him for wheat during a 7 year famine, he welcomes them freely and tells them to bring their father who has missed him dearly.

Doing the right thing is hard and especially if you see others doing the wrong things and getting away with it.  Your character is being built every day and if you can be sold for a million dollars you can be sold for one dollar.   You can be bought in essence.   I gotta keep remind myself to do the right things again and again, and my day will come.    Life isn't about wanting things when it is not your time.  All good things come to those who wait ... hustle and continue to do the right things.  There will be no anxiousness in my heart.   I have faith that good things are unfolding.   I will not covet what others have which in my eyes they have done much less for. I do not know their story. I will not seek what does not belong to me.  What you eat does not make me shit.   

One day at a time. Come at me bro! Hit me!

I think I found my next blogging site.  

https://medium.com/about/9e53ca408c48

Has anyone heard of Medium?  I think I like it more than Quora and WordPress.

Your thoughts?

"It eluded us then, but that’s no matter — tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther.... And one fine morning —
So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past."

I finally watched the Great Gatsby and you all are right.  I wouldn't want to be him.   You can not have the world in your hands and expect things to end well.   I haven't talked with many others about the film and I did not enjoy the ending.  It spiraled so devastatingly wrong so quickly.   Gatsby takes the blame for hitting Myrtle when it was Daisy, Tom tells Myrtle's husband it was Gatsby that killed her and probably was the other man too,  Gatsby gets shot and dies, and no one attends his funeral.  My friend Gloria tells me that the ending is fine.   She says sometimes when bad things happen they happen fast and they spiral.   That makes sense to me.  We celebrate people's  quick rise to success or fortune, but we do not focus on the other end of the spectrum.   I guess I loved Gatsby too much.

Gatsby could have had some things, but he could not have it all.   He wanted the world and he believed like the American Dream if one works hard enough, then one can gain anything.    The thing here  is he was not able to attain Daisy, or at least attain her in the way he wanted.   He wanted her to tell Tom, her husband of 5 years, that she never loved him.   Gatsby couldn't take Daisy's plea to "run away together."  Gatsby wanted all of her here in this city, with all he had attained, worked, and toiled for her.   And in this scene in the movie at the hotel room is where Gatsby loses her.   

It reminded me of the scene from Closer.  Closer is also one of my favorite movies.  I believe the affairs of love are never Single Girl meets Single Boy, date, and are happy.   I feel like in the real world people are always connected to someone.  Courted or being courted in one way or another.  An old lover that we still hang out with.  A friend waiting in the wings.  Maybe it is just my world.   There is a scene in the movie at the very end, where Alice loves Dan.  She does, but Dan just has to know if Alice slept with Larry.   And then... 

ALICE: I don't love you anymore.
DAN: Since when?
ALICE: Now. Just now. I don't want to lie. Can't tell the truth, so it's over.
DAN: It doesn't matter. I love you. None of it matters.
ALICE: Too late. I don't love you anymore. Goodbye.

Just like that.  It ends.  And this scene has always stuck with me.  He loved her, but he wanted to know, but there was something about him wanting to know made this girl who has been madly in love with him just stop loving him like that.   Dan wanted too much and so did Gatsby.

Gatsby wanted it all and that was probably what pushed him to such grandeur in the first place, but I guess there are limitations on how fast we can run and how far our arms can stretch.  Maybe he never could have had Daisy in any timeline of his life.  He lost her in the past and he lost her in the present.   His hope drove him, but there is nothing more cruel in this world than false hope, besides maybe cooked rice stuck to the bottom of your socks at a family party.  Daisy with her whimsical, charismatic nature was able to supply enough false hope to probably ever guy in the ballroom. 

I am reminded that you can't have everything, but you can have anything you want if you are willing to pay the price.   But even with his life,  he was not able to attain his dreams with what he believed was the love of his life.   Daisy didn't want him in the way Gatsby wanted her.  

There are times when you can't have it all.  He had the world in his pocket and still was empty inside.  

Poor Gatsby.