Well, the time has come once again for the World Series of Poker. It's hard to believe, but this will be my fifth consecutive summer in Vegas playing the slate of events. Earlier this week, my roommates and I checked into our summer rental house. It is, in a word, breathtaking. The inevitable pain that comes from busting event after event will be eased by just how wonderful it'll be relaxing at this place.

I'm really geared up for the series this year. I feel like I'm playing really well right now and I can really focus on poker now that I got school out of the way. Maybe this will be the year that I capture the bracelet that has to this point eluded me. As usual, I'll be playing 25+ events. In fact, there's only a handful of events on the schedule that I won't consider playing at all. Most days there are events that start at Noon PDT and also at 5 p.m., so I'll play at 5 on any days where I bust the afternoon event. I expect to be playing 70 hour weeks for the next 6 weeks or so, but I know what I'm getting myself into, and I love it. It's pretty draining, but I like the idea of really grinding it out and pressing value for a couple months then hopefully not having to work very hard for the rest of the year. 

I'm at a point where I just don't really have the drive to post tournament recaps of every tournament I play this summer as I've done in every year past. I will however be updating my twitter page, twitter.com/shannonshorr each break of every tournament that I play. It's just much easier that way. I'll still blog every now and then, I guess. 

In the time since I last posted, quite a bit has been going on. Nine days ago I graduated with a degree in Business Management from The University of Alabama. The completion of my degree comes a full 81 months after I first began college in August 2003. I took a 3 year hiatus and spent 3 separate semesters co-oping, so I'm not exactly the Van Wilder of The U of Alabama. I almost cannot find the words to express how happy I am to have finished school. When I walked across the stage to accept my diploma, all the memories of grinding school work all my life sort of flashed through my head. It's hard to believe that all of that hard work led up to this. Obviously, my life has taken quite a different path now as I don't intend on using my degree. 

I do strongly recommend finishing school, if at all possible, to any poker players who may read this. I'd also recommend going straight through as opposed to taking time off like I did. The last 21 months I spent in Tuscaloosa were much different from my first stint in college. I was a couple years older than my classmates and was still kinda immersed in poker. I didn't really get too involved on campus or anything like I had been the first time around, but that's something that wasn't that important to me, and I'm at peace with it. I still had a whole helluva lot of fun, met a ton of great people, and enjoyed experimenting and learning a lot about myself during the time I spent in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

A poker player like me returning to school isn't as rare as you might think. Off the top of my head I can think of at least half a dozen poker players who've had success and still returned to finish undergrad or attend law school. I think those people are probably a lot like me. For me, it was about finishing what I started and continuing to challenge myself. There have been times during my career as a professional poker player that I really didn't like the game and wasn't sure if it's what I wanted to do, so that was another reason I found myself back in Tuscaloosa. I'll add that the social experiences one gets from college, alone, might be a good enough reason to go back. Even if one intends on making all C's, partying all the time, chasing girls all the time, and smoking weed all the time, the experiences you'll take away can't be matched by grinding online poker 50 hours a week instead from age 19-22.