This blog entry is on the longer side. It depicts my 22 hour journey to Vegas from London:

I’m actually writing this whilst sitting on the plane to Vegas at New Ark Airport (New York). Today has been a pretty crazy day so far.
It started off with me waking up late at the Premier Inn near Heathrow in London and consequently having to pass up on breakfast. No big deal I thought, I could get something to eat at the airport.
So I proceeded to checkount and to catch the bus-transfer to Heathrow airport. I was informed the night before that I would be transferred to Terminal 3 and would need to proceed to Terminal 4 from there. This didn’t appear troublesome to me…
As I arrive at Terminal 3, after some brief intermissions envolving bus stops and bus driver switches, I immedeately locate the main entrance to Terminal 3 and walk in reluctant to find directions of how to make it to Terminal 4. Turns out things weren’t as straightforward as I had imagined and I end up getting sent back out of the building to a smaller building which reads ‚Transfers to Terminal 4‘.
Now this is where it starts to get ineresting. At Terminal 4 I head to the tickets counter of Continental Airlines. I remember speaking to Dodgy(ken) last year about getting cheap upgrades to flights before the flight leaves. At the time I was thinking 1-200 pounds for an upgrade that will increase my comfort and enable me to possibly plug in my laptop and watch some dvds on an 8 hour flight was worth it. I ask how much such a service wold cost and the lady at the counter replies ‚3000 pounds sir‘. I look at her mildly astonished and utter something along the lnes of ‚that’s a lot on a 300 pounds flight‘. The smirk on her face let me know there was a reason why business/first class was comparatively unreasonably priced…
Anyhow I made my way to the check-in counter where I had to deal with pre-homeland security. I input all of my details into the machine, and get my tickets printed. The next step is to put my luggage on the check-in belt. ‚Where are you travelling to?‘ I am asked. ‚Cleveland‘ my answer, but it was not well received. ‚Cleveland!?!‘ she exclamaited, ‚I think you are to late for that flight!‘ I check my watch and it reads 10.55. My flight is leaving at 11.40. The lady checks with her colleagues and informs me that they won’t let me through to the gate, even though I’m already checked in, as you have to be checked in atleast 1 hour before the flight leaves latest. After some more discussion with her colleagues the lady is advised to ‚take me out‘… of the computer and send me to the ticket desk to review my options.
Without being fully aware of the consequences of my delay in checking in, as I have never missed a flight before, I proceeded to the ticket counter. At this point I’m thinking of how random it was of me to miss my flight:
a) I wasn’t checking the time, because I arrived at the airport about 1hour 20 minutes before my flight was to take off.
b) I missed a transfer train on the way to terminal 4, resulting in a 15 minute wait.
c) I spent atleast 5 minutes talking to the lady at the ticket desk about flight upgrades. She later actually admitted that she should have told me to go and check-in.
As I approach the ticket desk for the second time, the worst and best possible outcomes are going through my mind. The best being no extra charges and a quick connection (possibly quicker than my previous one), the worst being me having to pay 600 pounds for a new ticket and possibly not leaving the same day :/.
We manage to settle for a flight to New York leaving in 5 minutes at an extra charge of 75 pounds. When I say ‚we settled for‘, I mean it’s the next flight she mentioned was leaving and given my previous analysis it sounded like a good call.
I rush back to the check-in to get everything sorted and 9 hours later I am in New York where it is my destiny to meet my friends, Homeland Security . Before you go through customs they give you forms to fill out. Some of the questions literally ask you if you are a former spy or terrorist.
Not quite done filling out the forms yet I reach the homeland security desk. Where the inquisition begins. I attempt to be polite and smile, but my efforst are not rewarded. ‚Purpose of travel?‘ I am asked coldly, ‚Where are you staying?‘, ‚How much money do you have on you?‘, ‚What are you doing in Vegas?‘, ‚What address are you stayng at?‘. Note how I am repeatedly asked the same questions over and over. At this point I am slightly frustrated, but I relaize that at the same time these tactics are commonly utilized to unmask frauds. It’s interesting that as I tell her I am a poker player she seems somewhat relieved and she says ‚So you are going to Vegas to gamble!‘, ‚Why didn’t you say so, that’s all I wanted to know.‘ I thought for a brief second about objecting as to me being a gamlber, but resisted. She gave me my Visa and I proceeded to the main area of New Ark.
Last year when I came to Vegas, Venessa aka Princessdonk picked up a pay as you go phone for me. Originally I only wanted a card, but she told me it would not work with my phone, even though it was an unlocked quad-band phoe. Turned out it actually really didn’t work which was surprising to me at the time. Anyway leading from there, I thought I might try and pick up a pay as you go card from the airport to cut costs early.
My mobile phone service provider doesn’t offer any roaming packages for the US sadly. So the costs of using my phone are enormous. I think I must be paying like 50 cents to send a text message. The sales-woman told me it would be 80$ to get a card plus 30 minutes credit.
As somebody who is a frequent traveller, this number immedeatly struck me as very high. In Europe you can get a pay as you go card for 20€ inlcuding 10€ in credit which is about 28$. The lady proceeded to ensure me that her pricing was normal, but I didn’t believe her, which she sensed and proceeded to be, let’s just say, noticeably less enthusiastic about me as a customer. At his point I think It’s needless to say that I was ecstatic about the occurences of the day so far.
I had about 1 hour left till my flight departed and I knew there was only one thing left that I could do to cheer me up…an episode of BlackAdder. When I at first started watching this series I was sceptical about it, but I have rather taken the liking to it. It’s also funny seeing Rawn Atkinson and Hugh Laurie in their earlier days. The imagery of Mr. Bean and Dr. House are so burnt into my head when I see them, that it is actually rather refreshing to see them in different roles.
And so this has been the story of my day so far. As I sit here writing this with my now very blunt pencil, completely nackered, it is about 3.20 am my time, but only 9.20pm New Yrok time. I can only hope for better things to come.

Ok so this is my plan for the time period after my exams, which will be starting on Thursday the 14th of May. I haven't been able to put in the hours I would have wanted to lately for poker, due mainly to Uni stress. So I came up with the idea that I will need to divise a plan to get the ball rolling again. Right now I have very little momentum in regards to playing poker and that's something I would like to change, but I know that to achieve this goal it will take a lot of discipline at first and dedication.
The basic goal for my plan is to play 4 short sessions a day, every day from the 14th-31st of May. Given the length of my sessions and amount of tables I play, this should approximate to about 36,000 hands, but note that I do not want to put an exact number on the amount of hands I want to play, because I want to be able to stop playing if I feel my game is off in any which way. What is important is that I try to get back into a rhythm that allows me to perform.
I think a lot about personal management and managing when and how I play my sessions is one of things I am constantly evolving. I've also been thinking about natural ways to enhance brain performance and increase motivation.
I really want to try and play from 8am-9.30 and from 9.45-11.15 as my two morning sessions and then from 1-2.30 and 2.45-4.15 as my afternoon session. I will then proceed to analyze from 5-6 and then be done for the day and take my brain away from poker. Now this is a pretty long day, but with a sufficient amount of breaks in my opinion that should make it possible.
Now that I see the numbers on paper though I think I do have to ask myself how realistic these goals are given my current life style. Earlier I mentioned motivation alongside performance. From my experience, for me to stay motivated during this time period, requires me to acquire some sort of balance. Balance to me includes mainly socializing and physical activity, but in this context would also include my pursuit of other secondary goals (self-development, learning other skill sets).
Now I think I could cram it into one day somehow, but that would leave me a) stressed plus b) would probably have negative effects on my sleeping rhythm which would again effect my daily routine.
I think I will need to get rid one session leaving me at 3 sessions a day with some to spare for analysis. This would also give me a better play/study ratio of 3-1 (this is vital to longterm success imo and neglecting this has gotten me into some trouble in the past as it can lead to falling behind the learning curve and diminishing profits).
I guess my adjusted plan would look something like this:

- Morning:
- session 9-10.30
- session 10.45-12.15

- lunch break 12.15-14 -

-Afternoon:
- session 14-15.30
- review/study 15.45-17.00

This leaves me with time to enjoy the weather and socialize in my lunch break aswell as more time in the evening so I can get some workouts in and maybe go for drinks with some friends, but I'm definetly gonna avoid heavy partying except for the 22nd, because there is a well-known Dj in Innbsruck from Germany.
That looks pretty good to me and more realistic to achieve. Realism in the achievment of goals is a crucial point. Too often have I lied to myself in the past about how realistic a goal was to achieve. One shold also allways ask oneself if a goal is reasonable. Forcing yourself to play 50000 hands a month may not be a reasonable goal if you play 25000 of them at a third of your winrate.
So what's next? I think for the meanwhile I will continue studying for my finance exam and start prepairing my place so it's a nice atmosphere to grind in. I'm gonna try and get the place tidied and restock some of my supplies. I will also watch my sleeping rhythm and try and keep it balanced so it's not hard to get into once my grinding period begins. On that note I will also end my blog as it is already midnight here.

Good night

I broke my foot jogging for the first time since the Winter about 3 days ago. The doctor said it was a fatigue break. All I did was run for 50 minutes then do sprints for 5 minutes and afterwards it was broken, I never fell or twisted my ankle.
The funny thing is I injured myself at the beginning of the last summer season aswell just by doing sprints. For the meanwhile I'm not supposed to do anything with my foot and rest. So no sports and I'm gonna be avoiding Uni, though I have agreed to go and see a famous German comedian tomorrow with a friend called Mittermair.

On another note I've already booked my new years trip with a friend of mine, we will be going to New York City and it should be fun. We originally wanted to go in the Summer time, but we would have missed the NBA season had we done so and the NBA is definetly is one of the main reasons we want to go to New York. Obviously food and partying are near the top of the list aswell.
I'm also probably gonna go sailing in September to Croatia. I've been sailing once before with a similiar crew to Corsica and Elba primarily and the sea was awfully unsteady, but Croatia is supposed to be the complete opposite. Also partying will be way more fun in Croatia.

I'm really doubting my balancing skills in real life lately. I've given up trying to keep up with the volume of hands I usually play when I have exams. It just distracts me from playing my A game and also from my Uni work so it feels like a lose/lose situation, especially when you add in hapiness ev. I find it a lot harder to deal with downswings when I'm studying at the same time and it's vital for a poker player to be able to do so well, as I'm sure a lot of you know and have experienced yourself.
I'll just have to make peace with the fact that I can't do all the things I want to do at the same time. I believe this should increase my productivity in all areas and also my sense of well-being. Mad respect for people who can juggle family/work/sports well.

For those of you who read my last post about sfiv, no I haven't quit the game. Interestingly enough since I've started to play ranked instead of unranked custom games, I've been doing a lot better. There still are some tough opponents, but I haven't faced any competition as tough as I was facing in the unranked games. Most definetly just coincidence, but it was very frustrating at one point. I've been playing Viper as my main and ran my battle points up to 700 today, but am hovering around the 500 mark right now.
It's kinda funny playing sfiv, because I feel Iike I go on tilt sometimes, which would be pretty bad when playing poker, but it doesn't really matter when playing this game, because it doesn't necessarily make you play that much worse and also there's nothing to lose besides points that are fairly worthless compaired to thousands of €. I also think that the main tilt factor comes from losing to people that are worse than you, but not being able to chop it up to variance, because there is very little variance in sfiv if you are a superior player (some people may say there is no variance, but there is variance on higher levels of play imo, because if people mix up their attack game then you'll get in spots where you'll have to estimate how to counter their move).

There should be a new video of mine coming out in the near future. I made a two part serious about LAG and TAG play. I really appreciate feedback on the videos I make. In the past I've received ratings, but without feedback, so it puts pressure on me to guess what people liked/didn't like.

On a final note, I found this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RzfJ1P3nUl0&NR=1 on Youtube by conicidence. I am half Nigerian and this is really funny if you know some Nigerian people. You may even find it funny regardless.

Daniell

I'm seriously thinking of quitting Street Fighter IV. It's been very fustrating playing the game since it came out. Don't take me wrong I think the game is really cool and has a lot of potential, but I find myself in spots where I'm getting beat up on so hard. To my defense I'm playing on a 360 controller and if I'm facing a bunch of people with fighting sticks that's naturally gg me. I feel I can compete somewhat against people with controllers, because the playing field is levelled, but people with sticks are just so much quicker it's absurd.
Competitive games are just a really bad idea for me (competitive games besides poker I should say). The reason is that I'm just far too competitve to want to lose with the frequency that I am in SFiV right now and I know it will take up a lot of my time to get better at the game. Plus I would probably need to buy a fighting stick to be competitve and those things cost between 100 and 300 bucks I believe. Thing is if I buy one then what do I do when friends are over? Just play on the controllers again? That would also suck imo. I would probably need two of them.
I feel that for me computer games should be relaxing and not frustrating/competitve. Feels like I should just stick to the odd racing game and football match and ofcourse wii tennis.
I'm also leaving money at the tables by studying sfiv instead of playing/studying poker so overall it's a very expensive hobby to have one could say ^^.
On a side note I just finished an exam for uni on wednesday and I have one more coming up in about 8 days and I've barely played poker this month :/. I'm gonna try and get in 15-20k hands by the end of the month and then hope for more free time next month. Sometimes it can be really frustrating when I know there are a lot of good spots for me to be in at the tables and I can't take them, because I'm studying for an exam, but I'm fairly confident that it's atleast neutral ev for me to get a uni degree from a happiness ev standpoint and a dollar ev stand point. The happiness ev is probably higher though, because I'm more socially involved at Uni then I would be if I were only playing poker. Though on the other hand if I were only playing poker I probably wouldn't be living here in Innsbruck and have more activities to choose from in another city.

Daniell

Today I bought a new headset and finally switched from stereo plugs to a usb plug. I think this should definetly improve the audio quality of my videos and also in general when using the pc. In the past I've had some interfering signals that led to high pitch tones in the background. These are now completely eliminated. It can also do cool stuff like function without having a sound card.
This is what I purchased
I paid about 50€ for it in the shops XD, but that's pretty standard. It will naturally be cheaper online, but I didn't think by this much. In Europe I could have ordered it for 14€ cheaper.

If you think about it you wonder how big electronic stores even stay competitive, but their sales still seem to be consistent (consistent in terms of turning a profit, I'm sure they have lost market shares with the Internet becoming more and more prominent). I believe this has to do with the average consumer not being very well informed. If you factor in opportunity costs of travelling somewhere and the fact that you will be paying more in a shop then why would anybody every by again in a shop?
Now this ofcourse comes down to what you are purchasing. Clothes will naturally allways be preferred in a shop or things that require guided advice on before bought, but to be honest, the advice people give you on electronical products is mediocre at best. There are a lot of great resources on the web with information regarding products. Off the top off my head i can name cnet.com and if your german chip.de. The reviews there are written by more qualified personal and on top of it are free. Another important point is that you can be assured to be informed about the most up-to-date product online, whereas in a shop they will often sell you products that are from the last series just so they can get it out of stock, but often times without reducing the price of the product and telling you that there is a newer product available.

All in all I think most people that are involved with LeggoPoker in someway will already be buying online for the most part or not caring about paying a little bit more in a shop, but if you think about saving 10$ on average for every medium sized purchase you make. That is a reasonable amount of money each year. Probably enough to finance a small vacation (depending on your level of ballaness).

Daniell

So I'm 6 days into the month. My plan is to place in the top 3 in the Unibet rake race as I posted in my last blog. I didn't get off to a good start to achieve this though. Started off on the first not playing at all, because I think I must have been very tired, which is standard and ok. On the 2nd day I played 3 sessions. (Note: that to achieve my monthly goal I will need to play about 80 sessions a 1h30mins. So my basic regime is to play 4 sessions a day when I do play and have 2 days a week where I can take off time. I could for example divide these over the week and play 3 sessions every day and 2 sesions on one day. I will try not to play more than 4 sessions a day, though if the situation arises were I feel I have enough mental stamina to do so, I will consider doing it). On the third day I played 2 sessions as well as on the 4th and the 5th.

Today I feel pretty tired due to staying up late at a friends house playing an equivalent of Singstar for the PC. So I likely won't play today at all and instead try and tidy up my place (something I need to do anyway) and play some xbox360 which arrived yesterday, yay :P. So to compensate for this I will need to play maximum on Saturday and Sunday, which would mean no partying. So I guess I am in a trade off spot here between poker and social life, but I think that my overall happiness ev is higher if I stick with my goal and play when I have time on Sat and Sunday. Note that I could also do stuff like go to bed now for a couple of hours and then get up and play some at night, but this is something I tried to avoid as much as possible. One of my ground rules is that it is better to take a day off of playing than to either force myself to play or to offset my sleeping rhythm to put in more hands.

So if I play 8 sessions on Sat and Sun then my weekly total will be 8+3+2+2+2=17 which is 3 sessions beneath my total of 20 that I should be aiming for, but not the end of the world. I think I should be able to make up for this next week. I might try and play 3 sessions a day and then 4 on Sunday, this would give me a total of 22 and leave me only 1 session behind, which I could easily catch up on. I think it's important I do these self-cchecks to see how far behind or ahead I am in schedule to keep me motivated and focused. I really wanna do this for March to finish of the 1st quater of 09 strongly and to give me a bolster for when I'll be playing less and studying more in early april. I think in April I'll try to shift to two sessins a day whenever I find time to play which sould be most of the time.

I must also not forget that I am still a student and should be doing fun things with my friends aswell, but I also derrive satisfaction from managing myself well and showing results.

The Unibet shop recently removed cash bonusses due to a new Prima policy (damn you Prima ^^). So that means they cut back on my rakeback by approximately 5% :/. However there are some discussions going on to whether or not we can get Amazon vouchers, which to me is the next best thing to cash, because you can either sell or consume what you desire which is fine by me as I wouldn't have a problem getting rid of 500$ worth of Amazon vouchers.

I am very hesitant to buy stuff with my own money as I have some financial goals that I am trying to achieve (mainly concerning savings and investments) and I also feel bad when I buy stuff that I don't really need, but are kinda nice to have (like an xbox360 ^^), but when you have no choice but to use them in a shop it's kinda a different story. So if I happen to have a PS3 next month, don't say I didn't warn you :P.

Gotta run to the shops to get some essentials and then I'll probably come back and take care of the disaster of a place I call my apartment (no it isn't that bad, but I feel that it's amplified, because my place is on the smaller side ^^).

By the way if you haven't seen Taken (96 hours is the German translation loltranslationaments) and you like action films, you should check it out. Liam Neeson seriously does some damage in this film.

Hi ya'all. Thought I'd post about my goals for march. Uni will be starting back off next week, but it should be fairly mellow at the beginning. My next exam is on the 14th of April, it's a basics course in Micro Economics that I have been postponing for way too long a time.
Anyway my goals for march are the following:

- Aim for top 3 in the Unibet rake race. 3rd place is 800€, 2nd is 900€ and 1st is 1300€. From my experience I can put in enough volume to place in the top 3, though the 1st spot is usually unattainable for me as that guy must be 12+ tabling for long hours. He won last month by +100%. I kinda feel like he doesn't even have to try to win this. I also feel like I have an edge in this by playing 2/4€ and above, because the rake is higher there and that is what goes into the calculation of who wins.
- Get off on a good start to Uni. By this I mean making sure I know when and where I have what courses and also doing my Uni work on time. I'm also gonna try and meet some more new people hopefully through my courses. This is really important to me as playing long hours of poker is tough I find as when I'm playing my A game I'm completely isolated from AIM etc., which is ofcourse a good thing, but when you play 6 hours a day and your just focusing on the tables infront of you and constantly thinking about how you could have played that hand better and how to exploit your opponents in the most optimal way, it takes it's toll. I feel like I'm pretty disciplined in this regard, but it takes a lot to keep motivation high when going through with it.
I try to take a lot of breaks and walk around and/or play wii tennis. I also try to go out for lunch with friends so I can talk to people before I go back into grind mode.
I've tried it the other way and I really just get frustrated when things aren't going my way and I know I'm not playing my A game so I kinda have no choice, but to focus.
- Try and keep my place reasonably tidy. This must be though toughest of my three goals XD. I've seriously been thinking of getting a cleaning lady for my tiny place. I really don't like it when I have to take 3 hours of my time to make sure everything in my place is fairly tidy. The money isn't the problem so I guess I should look around. I think my main concern would be finding somebody that is trustworthy.

Today I purchased my first two albums from the new Itunes store. I think it's really cool that they are now selling drm free music. I really don't mind paying for music as it is an important part of my life I find (keeps me going). When I have tough break ups or are am down for some reason I can use music to channel my feelings if that makes sense. Say I want to get hyped I'll put on some party Hip-Hop or party Electro/House music. If I wanna focus I can put on some mellow house music or classical music. If I just wanna relax I can put on something like Jack Johnson or Justin Nozuka.
Anyway I ended up buying The Carter III (Lil Wayne) and Ryan Leslie's newest album. I really liked The Carter III when I listened to it when I still had Napster in the UK. I think if you genuinely enjoy Hip-Hop music you will find this album entertaining.

I've got a ton of packages that should be coming in this week. One of them is my Xbox360 the other is a professional hair trimmer I ordered from Andis USA. The shaving with a blade thing didn't work out well for me, but it's cool I've made my peace with it. I've been growing my beard for the past two weeks to let the skin heal and once you get past that stubly look and the itching it's actually not that bad. My skin feels very healthy again and I think I should be able to get irritationless results with my beard trimmer. It can shave down to 0.1mm which is very low so we'll see how that works out. Maybe I'll post some pics :P.

Anyways that's all I have to say for the meanwhile.

Laters.

So I've been thinking a lot lately about whether I should get a PS3 or XBOX360. I already have a wii and a good pc. Anyways so I'm thinking about the pros and cons and have been talking to alot of people about it. One of the obvious pros of the PS3 is the fact that it has Blu-Ray and then bam I realised my notebook has a blu ray drive and a hdmi port and my tv also has a hdmi port... so practically I'v had a Blu-Ray player for 8 months and didn't realize it! So now I'm leaning more towards the XBOX360 ^^. I just wanna play Street Fighter 4! lolz

Having slight trouble getting back into full grind mode. It's not a matter of motivation, but more routine. Right now I'm playing like 1200 hands on average I'd say. Which is fine, but my aim is usually to get in 2000+ when I'm not studying, ergo on break.

However I think there are just some stuff that needs to get done, then I can more easily sustain a higher volume routine. I really need to get my place tidied up well for example. I think having a clean working area is the minimum you should do, then work on the rest of your environment from there. I think it really increases the quality of the work you put in, because you feel more "coordinated" when trying to get stuff done I find.

I also need to organize some things. I think I can be a procrastinator for no apparent reason as many of us probably, imo it's just about doing things regardless of if you want to or not and having some kind of reward system for yourself to keep you motivated.

I'm gonna go and grab some food with a friend of mine. We're gonna get some chinese food, my fav .

The exams that I have been studying for are now all over. I think I did pretty well in my last one which is nice. If i don't do well in them, I feel really tilted, because obviously when I am studying I am not playing poker, so I should make my time investment worth while.

A friend of mine who goes to Uni with me and also plays poker said he wants to go to a beach as a reward for studying so much at the end of the month. Naturally I was interested, but I'm not sure where we could go. He suggested Egypt, because it's close and warm at this time of year and also easily attainable. So I'll keep you guys updated on the developments.

Expect me to be more active on the forums now that I have more time. My participation on game theory and strategy has been kinda low, but now that my head is cleared up I definetly want to get back in the action.

Have to head back to my cooking now.

Laters