It's been so long since I've posted anything and since it's a slow one at work, here goes..

I had been thinking a lot about the relationship that I should be having with poker for a large portion of 2009 and about 3 weeks ago, I came to the conclusion that I would take a vacation away from the game to recharge just as I would with my 9-5. Amazingly, I have not missed playing a hand of poker at all. I feel fantastic. I'm never moody, never pissed and best of all, I'm sleeping so much better. I actually feel a weight has been lifted off my shoulders and I'm actually feeling so good that I'm not sure if I will make another deposit online ever again.

I came to the conclusion that my current life isn't 'set up' for a big poker lifestyle. I'm married and both my wife and I have good careers. We even talk about having kids in a couple years. I just can't imagine myself coming home from work and holding my kid in one lap while grinding away hands. Or if my wife is out and our kid is crying like crazy and I'm dealt aces...what do you do (I guess I can open shove ) ? I started playing volleyball or hockey every saturday and I'm going to start playing softball every Thursday over the summer months with all my close friends. I'm 28, and I feel there is so much more to life than going to work, then coming home to work some more. I'd be missing out on everything in life that's interesting me and it just really isnt' worth the extra money.

I do make enough money from work and from investing in the stock market, so the money isn't *needed* even though I always want more. And coming home to think about what I want to eat, who I want to hang out with is so much better than thinking about who I should be c/r with bottom pair. Sure I could play casually, but variance would be even worse, so why bother?

I guess you can see my point. I'm just older with a different lifestyle and poker just doesnt' fit very well with it. I've met some amazing people and I"m sure I'll continue some friendships that I've made through poker. I thought I'd never say this, but there are more important things than an extra few K a month. (phew, I almost puked on myself for saying that)

I have been reading up a lot more on the stock market and forex. So I'm sure that 's the side job that I'll be doing. The big difference is that I can do these things while I'm at work and I don't have to take it home with me. It's like what they say in those infomercials..."Set it and forget it".

Anyways, I'm off on my delayed honeymoon this Saturday. I'm leaving for Shanghai, then to HK, then to Seoul for about 2.5 weeks. It's going to be great since lots of my friends are already vacationing there. I was initially going to Thailand, but I cancelled it 2 weeks ago because of all the riots and protests in Bangkok. It should still be great, but to me, nothing's the same as fresh fruit, hot chicks, and good food along the beach.

Anyways, take care. Hope everyone's crushing.

Thanks for reading.

After going on a massive rush last week, I have lost all my earnings and some in the past 5 days. I'm now -$800 for the month. Over the past 100 hands of my session this morning, I am $1100 below EV (yes, I had to check), so I'm obviously not happy about that. It was looking like a promising month for me, but I"m disappointed again.

I'm going to move down to 100nl and maybe stay there for a while. I haven't had a winning month this year yet and I really need to make that happen soon before I start to feel I have no chance in hell at this game again. And if I move up again, I may just skip 200nl this time and go straight to 400nl. I know, it's stupid, but 200nl just seems like such a strange limit where everyone tries to open up their game and misapplies techniques (myself included) which makes reads much more difficult to figure out. I dunno, I'm probably just a fish.

Thanks for reading.

I finally reached platinum star this morning, and I lost 4BIs in the process. I'm down 7 BIs over the last couple days, so I'm now approaching another break even month. How ****ing awesome.

I was brought to pokertableratings yesterday and I can't believe how successful some of hte shortstackers are. I have thought they were all fish but little did I know , they were hauling in some serious cash. Sure, they're playing a few hundred K hands, but they're still making monies. It's something for me to think about I guess.

Thanks for reading.

I played for a couple hours today and I had good results. I think I do play better with 8 tables rather than 4 because the action is twice as fast, so there's not too much time to get all emotional about a bad beat against a retard shortstacker. I think I'm going to keep this up, and when I build my roll up a bit more, I'll start 12 tabling. And if I go beyond that, I'll prob need to ditch my 2 20" monitors for some 30s.

Here are today's results:



I *may* get in another session tonight. I started watching the movie Milk last night and I couldn't stay up long enough to finish it. It's a decent movie so far. Hopefully I can finish it tonight and that the movie has a great ending .

Thanks for reading.

It's been a while since I've last posted. I've been having longer than normal days at work, so I haven't had much energy to post any updates after playing.

Here are my results over the past 6 days:




Possu this one's for you. It happened to me today and it just made me lol thinking about your last blog post (hmmmm converter's not working properly):


BB: $200
UTG: $153.30
MP: $46.65
CO: $50
BTN: $251.05
Hero (SB): $201

Pre-Flop: 9 9 dealt to Hero (SB)
4 folds, Hero raises to $7, BB calls $5

Flop: ($14) Q 3 9 (2 Players)
Hero bets $7, BB calls $7

Turn: ($28) 9 (2 Players)
Hero checks, BB checks

River: ($28) K (2 Players)
Hero bets $187 and is All-In, BB calls $186 and is All-In

Results: $400 Pot ($2 Rake)
BB showed and LOST (-$200 NET)
Hero showed 9 9 and WON $398 (+$198 NET)

I like getting paid with quads.

Thanks for reading.

I turned 28 today. Another year older and another year wiser. I feel like I'm in the twilight of my poker days compared to all the other hardcore online grinders out there. But meh...

A group of us went paintballing for my birthday last night. It was the second time that I've ever been. It was in an indoor field and I thought the conditions were sub-par. My first time was for my bachelor party and it was on an outdoor terraine which completely spoiled me. It was just incredible with how open it was and how it made you feel like you were really going into battle. Anyways, one of the games we played last night was called Iron Man. Because it was my bday, I was chosen to be the Iron Man. So, it was 1 on 19. I was indestructible and could respawn an infinite number of times, but my enemies couldn't. One shot and they were done. The only way that I would lose was if I surrendered from the pain of all the paintballs nailing me from all directions. I lasted about 1 min of being showered by paintballs before I dropped to the ground and cried out for the game to be over with. We all had semis, so for every trigger press, 3 paintballs would fire out.

So now my body is sore, my body is patterned like a cheetah from all the bruises, and I'm off to a buffet to heal my wounds. I hope the lobster keeps coming tonight.

Thanks for reading.

Up another 2 BIs:



Hopefully I can keep positive posts from now on.

Thanks for reading.

I played a short session yesterday where I won a 500bb pot. I'd post the hand, but I'm at work. But this is how it went down:

BB stack: $~420
CO stack: $200
Hero: $~400

CO raises, I call in the SB with 33 and BB calls. Flop comes A32cc. I donk half pot, BB raises 3x, and CO 4bet shoves. I shove overtop CO's shove and BB calls! I was a bit worried about the CO having AA, but I wasn't too sure what BB could've had, but I probably had him beat on the flop. He would've at least 3bet preflop if he had AA. Anyways, my hand holds and I win a monster pot. BB had AKo and CO had QJcc and was praying to catch a club.

I spewed on a hand which costed me a stack. Villain was actively 3betting me and has been in the past. So I decided to take a stance against him. I had ATs in the CO. I raised and as usual, the BB 3bet. I decided to 4bet shove, and he called with QQ and I lost. Pretty upsetting with my play there as I should just let those hands go, or just not play against villain.

Anyways, up 2Bi last night. Hopefully I can get back into winning form. Now, back to work

Thanks for reading.

...and I"m seriously considering again for it to be my last....




Ugh, the converter's not working. One hand, we're bvb. SB raises, I raise 4x, sb calls. Flop comes A87dd. Villain donks pot, I shove, and villain calls with 85ss. turn, 4. River, 6.

I'm very tired of these beats and I'm especially tired of running below EV. I'm not saying I'm an awesome player, I'm not even saying that I'm a good player, and I don't consider myself to be a donkey. But in a zero sum game, in order for people to be profitable two things have to happen to losing players: a) always being outplayed by better players b) running below EV for a very long time regardless of what you do. In the world of probability, b) has to happen to a lot of people considering the number of poker players out there.

I'm not really sure what to do anymore. Poker's making me very unhappy the past few months and maybe that's a telling sign that it's time to pack it in and that it just didn't work out for me. The dreams of being the next Brian Townsend or hell, even being able to make 100k / year from poker are completely squashed for me right now.

Thanks for reading.

I dropped 4BIs in last night's session and it really never should've got beyond 1BI. It was one of those days where I couldn't get back to even. When sessions run like this, I should be looking to stop asap. But I kept playing and donated a bunch of stacks. I'm really disappointed with myself.

February results (all Stars):



I also cleared the $250 deposit bonus on Stars as well as getting $150 for some gold cards on Cake.

Pretty pathetic results.

Thanks for reading.