HAPPY NEW YEAR

I wish all of you a happy and successful 2009 !


2009 -

Begin 4 years of countering republican arguments about politics with the sentence "It was Bush's fault, Obama's just sorting out the mess" as payback for 8 years of "It was Clinton's fault, Bush is just sorting out his mess".

Decide whether my poker should be just for fun or something better, which is mainly dependent on how much time I want to give to it.

Decide what games I should be playing. Cash games are boring but profitable, SNG's are profitable but lack a real feeling on satisfaction, MTT's are satisfying but not profitable this year due to lack of time to play.

Give up smoking for more than 10 weeks.

Blog more often.

Watch my friends get married.

Go to Vegas, preferably at the time of a blogger gathering.

Get some up to date qualifications for work.

Get laminate flooring down in my flat.

Plumb in new bath / shower.

Sleep better. Eat better. Exercise. Get a girlfriend.

Spend more time with my parents, siblings and godparents.

Remember to enjoy the moments

Choices

Just seen a mate "O" in town who I went to school with, he was one of my best friends back when we were 17. He crashed my first car 3 weeks after I got my driving licence and it didn't matter. Our group got wasted together, chased girls together, and generally pushed the boundaries of life. O was one of the really intelligent guys I knew, unfortunately that meant that he got bored with a lot of things and would do stuff just to make his life less boring. Whenever we got really drunk on a bottle of JD he'd tell me that none of this really mattered and life was just a game.
The few choices we all made as young adults then took us down different paths. Some of us worked hard and partied hard and shone on the career & qualifaction path. Others like me did what was required but never went the extra mile to excel at anything in particular. O got juvenile detention which led to further bad choices and a prison sentence and addiction to heroin, now I think he's on methadone. He's out of prison and looks much better than the last time I saw him, he's running a small business organising building projects, has a girlfriend and is going on holiday in January. It always amazes me when I look back at specific moments how one decision or one outcome could have changed my life completely, and how easily it could have been anyone of me or my friends that was in Os shoes now. Its great to see him doing so well now and we're going to meet up when he gets back from holiday.

I played the Jersey game last night and got my JJ rivered by AK. I also played the $5 15k gtd & a $4 180, kindly sponsored by BurnleyMik of the raisetheriver forum fame but had two tricky (?) hands early and went out. I have another 9 180's and one shot at the 15k to play on a stake + 50/50 profits agreement, keeps me ticking over anyway and hopefully I can make a little bit of cash for Mik with some luck.

Tonight's free blogging crapshoot is NLH and I'll be at a friends house so I'm probably going to shove and go big or go out early.

No Limit Hold’em December 18 14:00 ET (7PM GMT)

See you there.

Lottery

I didn't win the lottery, but I did get outdrawn by a group of 20 people working on the floor below me. Each persons share will be 27,500 Sterling. Nice return for a 5 pound investment.

This is unlucky for the following reason... they bought their tickets from the same booth we did. When you buy the tickets you get a block of 100 and in that block you are guaranteed twenty back from the scratch bit. So everyone gets their 20 back and buys another 20 random tickets (not from a block of 100 which run consecutively. The winning ticket wasn't from the block, it was from one of the random 20 they got back after trading in the scratches ! Could so easily have been us !

PKR Trnmnt

I'll begin with the slightly depressing and surprisingly honest announcement that I've blown my roll down to busto at both fulltilt and pokerstars now. Fulltilt's been empty for months but now pokerstars has joined it. This means friends that on friday some of my paycheck will be going towards a reload. The first reload in approx 2 years. I'm ok with that. The bust was due to bad bankroll management and after withdrawals I'll still be slightly up.

* I might be a long term losing player, but we don't have the stats to prove it just yet *

Because the 2 busy sites are empty I fired up PKR.com (that's the 3d, footprint heavy software in case you've never seen it) It's a different experience though a lot of the 3d stuff is wasted if you actually want to play. For instance they have a first person perspective view of the table but because you can't see to your immediate left/right it makes it difficult to follow where the blinds got to and position. I end up playing on the overview mode so I can still see the whole table at one time.

Anyway, after waiting 10 mins for a download and install update (they added santa hats and festive graphics) I regged for the next decent looking tourney. It was called the $15 Deep and Fast - Yeah, I know. Sounds like something you get from a crack-whore coming to end of her shift at 5am in a Vegas carpark. Fortunately this lasted a little longer but was just as dangerous. Players start with 5k chips and blinds of 10-20 but the blinds go up at a rocketing 5 mins per level, and because of the 3d stuff hands get dealt and played slower than at a standard site. We were lucky to get 5 hands in per level.

I managed to double up early which bought me time and the other players seemed to be terrible. I don't know if it was the advancing blinds or that they were just plain bad. No hands really stood out and I havent worked out hand histories on the site yet even if they had but when all was said and done I cajoled my way through the 182 player field to finish in 19th place for $40. A very noticeable thing was that many of the players pushing and calling ranges were way off, with short stacks letting themselves get to 3 BB's before shoving and big stacks folding even in the BB even when they should have been calling with just about any two cards.

I enjoyed it though and I'll play there again but next time will look for a Deep and Slow structure instead.

Tonight its the Jersey online game at Uncover Poker with $500 added to the prize pool :o)

Omaha wbcoop

Easy tournament, self inflicted defeat

The standard of play was pretty awful, I was able to add 7k chips to my 2.5k starting stack in the first hour (remember this was a POT LIMIT game) everyone was desperate to ship 'em in.
Then half way through I took a crappy beat against one of the loose guys who was hitting the deck :

Dealt to TanOrpheus [9s Qh 8h Qs]
jrmriga: shows [7s 7h Kd 6d]
Allin Preflop
*** RIVER *** [4d 2c 2d 5c] [3s]
jrmriga: shows [7s 7h Kd 6d] (a straight, Three to Seven)
TanOrpheus: shows [9s Qh 8h Qs] (two pair, Queens and Deuces)
jrmriga collected 10290 from pot

Sickly but it only busted me back to an average stack, unfortunately I then went card dead and couldn't get the chips back. I crippled myself with this hand which has been bothering me since the moment I played it. The hard part is not knowing if there's anything I can really do here.

78 left, an "M" of 3.6 and people not really going out quickly. I think I have to play this hand preflop, and in an ideal world we get it all-in preflop so then I don't have to worry about anything else. Guess really since I wanted to be allin I should ship my remaining 1500 chips in on the flop anyway. Arrrgh, just a really annoying, crappy hand played poorly. I do not think I could have folded into the 72nd spot though and the decent prizes were far higher up than that.

PokerStars Game #22949087585: Tournament #124189658, Freeroll Omaha Pot Limit - Level XVII (500/1000) - 2008/12/15 16:58:22 ET
Table '124189658 19' 9-max Seat #5 is the button
Seat 1: Tom Bayes (28005 in chips)
Seat 2: Artanis11 (28784 in chips)
Seat 3: marc_26 (5245 in chips)
Seat 4: hawaian15 (12550 in chips)
Seat 5: raunoo (18121 in chips)
Seat 6: TanOrpheus (5460 in chips)
Seat 7: Arvid2k7 (23500 in chips)
Seat 8: BurnleyJoe (13762 in chips)
Seat 9: AlexFSK (22280 in chips)
TanOrpheus: posts small blind 500
Arvid2k7: posts big blind 1000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to TanOrpheus [5s Ks Kc 6s]
TanOrpheus said, "ruhroh"
BurnleyJoe: folds
AlexFSK: folds
Tom Bayes: folds
Artanis11: folds
marc_26 has timed out
marc_26: folds
marc_26 is sitting out
hawaian15: folds
marc_26 has returned
raunoo: calls 1000
TanOrpheus: raises 3000 to 4000
Arvid2k7: folds
raunoo: calls 3000
*** FLOP *** [Ah Qd 2s]
TanOrpheus: checks
raunoo: bets 2000
TanOrpheus said, "ruh roh again :)"
TanOrpheus: folds
Uncalled bet (2000) returned to raunoo
raunoo collected 9000 from pot
raunoo: doesn't show hand
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 9000 | Rake 0
Board [Ah Qd 2s]
Seat 1: Tom Bayes folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: Artanis11 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: marc_26 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: hawaian15 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 5: raunoo (button) collected (9000)
Seat 6: TanOrpheus (small blind) folded on the Flop
Seat 7: Arvid2k7 (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 8: BurnleyJoe folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: AlexFSK folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Finished in 77th place

I did have some great support from Professional Railer BamBam so the night wasn't a complete waste of time ! Thanks Bam

Tonight is our local christmas lottery draw so all things being even I should be about 400k richer tomorrow morning (you won't believe me if the next post is me describing winning on my one ticket that I've got) Ha!

Blogger Lotto Starts Here

Pot Limit Omaha December 15 14:00 ET (7PM GMT)

I'll be gambling it up in this UK-friendly time tourney tonight, see you there ?

Weekend had it's ups and downs, changed a tyre in the rain on Saturday, but then had a birthday meal for my sister so ended on a high :o)

Omaha content to follow.... !

The Edge of Tilt ?

"Apparently we will be drinking @ the MGM should anyone wish to join us. Yes, I realize it's 4:30 in the morning." about 2 hours ago - thisisnotapril

"grubby getting texts from strippers he fingered at the rhino. lucky man." about 4 hours ago - taopauly

"Couldn't wait for @bobbybracelet. BJ cherry thoroughly broken. Awarded $100 for my stellar effort. No ball cuppage occurred. G'nite." about 6 hours ago - maudie

I am going to have to gamble a lot tonight :o)

Torture

Getting into work at 9am UK time.

Logging in.

Reading twits posted 30 minutes ago such as

"uh oh kat sucking face with chicks again. donkey puncher popped a woodie" - TaoPauly

"just won $100 from iggy playing paper-rock-scissors" - ProKenoNeilF

"they are making me go to the IP... Booo. But glad to start the party!!!" - thisisnotapril

Weaker degenerates might go on tilt from such things, not me !
For me it's motivational stuff !

Instant Variance

Finished just inside the money again in the $5 15k last night 413/4176. Got allin with QQ vs AK and doubled up. Very next hand got allin with QQ vs KQ and was sent home by the King on the flop. Tournaments are so enjoyable !
Played the fishhook poker "local" game for "local" people online last night. I don’t think I've ever seen a game with so much ABC poker before. Like straight as a die - if I bet I've got something if I check I don’t, no bluffing, no calling when people are short stacked, very straight play. There's money to be made if I could ever be bovved to go out and play live. Having to deal ourselves and the screwed up rebuy structure kinda puts me off though.
It doesn't make sense to me to have a rebuy tournament with a £20+2 buyin (for 3k chips) but only £10 for rebuys of the same number of chips. Anyone ever played in a tourney with a buyin like that ? It just doesn't sit right with me, though I can see the appeal of it encouraging rebuys.
*** Intermission ***
WTF is going on in Europe…
*** /Intermission ***
Good job I didn't book flights to vegas yesterday. Gatwick was frozen over this morning so I wouldn't have made it from Jersey to London and wouldve been stuck ! ( Yeah at one point last night I was craving it so much I actually worked out the connecting flights ! )
dD - Yeah the wbcoop has a week of qualies which you can play all of, top 72 I think go through to a "main event" wbcoop final. It's not the sale of the century but anything free is worth a shot :o)
Bam - Love the diary from the last trip, now I wanna go just to bust some moves at the slot machines :o)
Have fun in vegas y'all, I'll try and win something big in the meantime...

Vegas Dreams

I was allin with A-Q vs Q-9 on a Q-T-3 -5 board in a $200 cash game last night when a 9 hit the river to felt me. The villain apologised saying he thought my allin was a bluff. I felt sick, the poker room seemed bigger, the casino emptier and I felt small and insignificant. I stood up to walk away from the table, and then I woke up.

That was the last part of the dream I had last night about being in Vegas. I was gutted about the bad-beat, but I was really gutted when I realised I wasn't waking up just 5 minutes away from a chance to make it all back.

I have been bombarded with thoughts of Vegas in the past 3 weeks. One colleague is soon going on the road trip that Hooks, Twister, Peacock and I went on in 2005. Driving from SF to LA to Vegas. Another colleague is spending Christmas in Vegas, it's his first trip but he's a fine poker player and will certainly make some money there if lady luck isn't in a foul mood. Finally there is the peak of posts from every blogger who's off to the WPBT Winter Gathering this weekend. If you cut me I'm sure there would be a tinge of green in the blood there is so much envy in me right now.

There is one illogical and one logical solution to all this.

I could illogically max my credit card get on a 'plane and be in the MGM Grand in about 24 hours, jetlagged and regretting my impulses.

Or I could go for the logical solution of target setting, with the target being June next year. Any tips on images, stories, etc to keep me focussed on the goal will be greatfully received ! Two of my best friends, Action Rich and Tension Girl are getting married next year. If I can just convince AR to have his stag do in Vegas…..

And finally,

I am lucky. Sometimes I forget.

In the midst of the current financial crisis we've had our end of year results at work and the impact on me is a definite tick in the win box. Christmas and more importantly next year are going to be a much easier ride thanks to this piece of news. Working for the same place for so long does have its benefits.

Oh, and finally P.S.

Scott has launched www.tilteddreams.com, a friendly new poker forum, so if you like forums why not sign up and be part of the birth of a new one :o)

Resistance is futile (pt 3)

couldn't resist...

I'm a Lotus Elise!

You believe in maximum performance and minimum baggage. You like to travel light and fast, hit the corners hard, and dance like there's no tomorrow.

"Take the Which Sports Car Are You? quiz.

A Lesson in Aggression

As suggested, last night I sat down and played some $4 180s with the main aim of finding spots to be stealing/restealing from. I had mixed results on various hands with no chashes but at I definitely learnt some things. The most obvious of which are it has to be read dependent, as I've said before many times, always have a good reason to put chips out there. The next most noticable element was that I do have a very hard time applying these moves when I've got trash cards. Even when I *know* the move is likely to be successful.

I'm considering playing one of these with my hole cards covered up just to force me through the mental barrier of making the right play with J2o or whatever. That'll be the lesson for tonight.

End result was 5 games played with no cashes so -$20 and I then ended the night with 2 SNG's, one of which I won and one 3rd place, which paid for the education.

Acceptable

$4 180 : Dealer: TanOrpheus finished the tournament in 32nd place - Booo

$6 $15k gtd : Dealer: TanOrpheus finished the tournament in 347/4383 place - $15

$4 180 : Dealer: TanOrpheus finished the tournament in 173rd place - with an allin preflop on the 3rd hand, my KK v TT v A8 - the TT was the worst call since there was a ton of action culminating in 2 allins before him. But he spiked a T on the flop so meh

$4 180 : Dealer: TanOrpheus finished the tournament in 7th place - $25 - with 12BB's or I shoved from the SB with 99 over the buttons standard raise, unfortunately the button had JJ

Dealer: TanOrpheus finished the tournament in 14th place $8 - classic race but got outflopped.
TanOrpheus: shows [Qd Qc] (a pair of Queens)
grimmace420: shows [Ac Kc] (a pair of Kings)

Below was my most enjoyable hand of the night, my preflop and flop play aint amazing here but before the turn hit I had said to myself that thumbsmawho would bet 3k and that his 3k bet was a bluff which I would reraise. Still baby steps but lots of little moments like that breed confidence.

Today I will be mostly re-reading Hoy's posts about resteals and then tonight I will be mostly trying to get a resteal to actually work !

Free hand converter brought to you by CardRunners

Seat 1: thumbsmawho ($24224)
Seat 2: jbarn ($12374)
Seat 3: TheGreenBox ($16041)
Seat 4: buttonrazor ($2220)
Seat 5: crane all ($6276)
Seat 6: beckstr2 ($31594) -
Seat 7: TanOrpheus ($20254) -
Seat 8: DICKBURLASKY ($33610) -
Seat 9: zimo54 ($19456)


PRE-FLOP:

TanOrpheus posts small blind $500
DICKBURLASKY posts BIG blind $1000
Dealt To: TanOrpheus


ANTE thumbsmawho ($100)
ANTE jbarn ($100)
ANTE TheGreenBox ($100)
ANTE buttonrazor ($100)
ANTE crane all ($100)
ANTE beckstr2 ($100)
ANTE TanOrpheus ($100)
ANTE DICKBURLASKY ($100)
ANTE zimo54 ($100)
CALL zimo54 ($1000)
CALL thumbsmawho ($1000)
FOLD jbarn
FOLD TheGreenBox
FOLD buttonrazor
FOLD crane all
FOLD beckstr2
CALL TanOrpheus ($500)
CHECK DICKBURLASKY


FLOP:

Pot: $4900
   

CHECK TanOrpheus
CHECK DICKBURLASKY
CHECK zimo54
BET thumbsmawho ($1000)
CALL TanOrpheus ($1000)
CALL DICKBURLASKY ($1000)
FOLD zimo54


TURN:

Pot: $7900
     

CHECK TanOrpheus
CHECK DICKBURLASKY
BET thumbsmawho ($3000)
RAISE TanOrpheus ($9000)
FOLD DICKBURLASKY
FOLD thumbsmawho

TanOrpheus collected $13900 from main pot

SUMMARY:
Total pot: $13900 Rake: $0

Final Board:
    

Seat 1: thumbsmawho folded on the Turn - Net Gain/Loss: ($-5100)
Seat 2: jbarn folded before Flop didnt bet - Net Gain/Loss: ($-100)
Seat 3: TheGreenBox folded before Flop didnt bet - Net Gain/Loss: ($-100)
Seat 4: buttonrazor folded before Flop didnt bet - Net Gain/Loss: ($-100)
Seat 5: crane all folded before Flop didnt bet - Net Gain/Loss: ($-100)
Seat 6: beckstr2 button folded before Flop didnt bet - Net Gain/Loss: ($-100)
Seat 7: TanOrpheus small blind collected 13900 - Net Gain/Loss: ($11800)
Seat 8: DICKBURLASKY big blind folded on the Turn - Net Gain/Loss: ($-2100)
Seat 9: zimo54 folded on the Flop - Net Gain/Loss: ($-1100)


Free hand converter brought to you by CardRunners

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Baby Steps

Not a bad night for shaking off the cobwebs. 522/4212 in the $11 $30k gtd on stars meant I got my buyin back +$6, I was just inside the money. I should have gone deeper in this but bottled a read when a shortie shoved and the LAG on the my right reshoved. I had pocket 6s and figured I was at least ahead of the LAG but folded and he had Q-10.

Busted 12th in a 45-man $6 game too, when I pushed the nut flush draw on the flop, was called by two pair - turned my flush but got rivered by a full house. Damn river ! It is not a finish inside the money, but was satisfactory for a first date in a while.

I have a new trick for my alertness too. I have stopped drinking coffee before 5pm. Tea with no sugar has replaced coffee with 1. Then at 5/6pm I have a coffee and instead of the old evening coffee crash I have a coffee high that gives me the kick to get me through a poker tourney.

And finally thank you for the kind words in the comments. The kindness of you folks who I've never even met always amaze me.

Tonight

Poker.

Poker.

&

Poker.

The fun starts here ! I have been reading bad beats all day to get me back into that "to live accept you are already dead" mindset and now have the calm acceptance of a man who knows the result will not matter, it's how you play that counts.

I will either be very happy or mildly disappointed tomorrow morning.

Resumption

My Uncle passed away 3 weeks ago, hence the gap in posting and activity. He was a funny, lovely amazing man who kept his razor sharp sense of humour right to the end, through battles with misdiagnoses and mistreatment of his tumour. At the cremation as the coffin rolled away and the curtains came across they got stuck half way, and everyone laughed because they knew that Mick was there with them, having another joke about things.

So that’s where I've been really, in a more important head space than the whims I usually write on here from day to day. I also had last week off work and did very little apart from veg about and have loads of time to myself, just recharging the batteries I guess you would call it. I don't know when I'll next play poker but I expect after I've caught up reading everyone's blog posts I will be reminded of the passions that make it a game worth spending some of our precious time on.