So lately, I've been playing some hands, the results of which have basically been this:
Full Tilt Poker Game #14285833297: Table Stock (heads up, deep) - $25/$50 - No Limit Hold'em - 16:52:45 ET - 2009/08/26
Seat 1: LOLOLOLOLOL ($5,000)
Seat 2: BadBankroll ($5,099.50)
LOLOLOLOLOL posts the small blind of $25
BadBankroll posts the big blind of $50
The button is in seat #1
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to LOLOLOLOLOL [Qh As]
LOLOLOLOLOL raises to $150
BadBankroll raises to $550
LOLOLOLOLOL calls $400
*** FLOP *** [Qc Jh 7c]
BadBankroll bets $505
LOLOLOLOLOL has 15 seconds left to act
LOLOLOLOLOL raises to $1,250
BadBankroll raises to $4,549.50, and is all in
LOLOLOLOLOL calls $3,200, and is all in
BadBankroll shows [4c Jc]
LOLOLOLOLOL shows [Qh As]
Uncalled bet of $99.50 returned to BadBankroll
*** TURN *** [Qc Jh 7c] [4h]
*** RIVER *** [Qc Jh 7c 4h] [Tc]
BadBankroll shows a flush, Queen high
LOLOLOLOLOL shows a pair of Queens
BadBankroll wins the pot ($9,999.50) with a flush, Queen high
LOLOLOLOLOL adds $5,000
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $10,000 | Rake $0.50
Board: [Qc Jh 7c 4h Tc]
Seat 1: LOLOLOLOLOL (small blind) showed [Qh As] and lost with a pair of Queens
Seat 2: BadBankroll (big blind) showed [4c Jc] and won ($9,999.50) with a flush, Queen high

weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

Then I won all that back except a bit playing 1knl and 2knl. It's pretty frustrating trying to move into 5k because if you lose a stack, it's so hard to get your losses back playing another game that runs that isn't against the same player pool... anyways, I'll get there, I'll probably have to race away the standard 8 buy ins or so to pay my dues and whatnot.

All hilarity aside, Last weekend I went with some friends to go indoor rock climbing in Greensboro. We arrived at 1pm only to find that the gym wasn't open until 5pm. We looked around for something to do to kill some time and finally settled on indoor go-karting. These are legit racing go-karts on a legit course. There were a good mix of clueless people (like us) who had all played mario-kart and maybe raced a bit as kids, and there were also people who raced professionally all around. Needless to say, I held my own within the clueless groups, but the pros just completely crushed me. Here's a picture of two kids destroying me with their custom helmets and racing gloves, BAH!

I did smoke my dad the entire time, except for the last race where his best lap time was better than mine by 0.08 seconds... so sick. It's surprising how intense and how draining racing can be.

Once we finally got to the gym, it was insane. There was a smaller room for bouldering, where basically all the lines took you close to vertical, and the bigger room... well here's a picture:


Once we were belay certified, we went to it and I was doing a decent job I think for being fairly clueless, technically speaking. I asked for some tips from people who worked there and they were very nice and helpful. I'm also going to a class on Tuesday nights at a smaller wall that's in my gym across the street from where I live. I actually am meeting my trainer there in about an hour and he's going to kick the shit out of me since I've only been rock climbing the past few weeks. One time, I was trying to climb an overhang that was about 35 feet off the ground (epic fail, obv) while my dad belayed me. Little did I know that a lady who worked there informed him to leave about 6-7 feet of slack in the rope so that it wouldn't pull me off the wall while I was on the overhang. I fell off just under it and free-fell for about 7 feet, which wasn't a lot of time, but it did scare the shit out of me. It was pretty funny after I knew I was alive.

I also have a new video coming out soon. It's me 4 tabling 200nl on FTP. I'll be doing the audio later today, but I played it a while ago. I remember one pretty hilarious hand that I'm sure you guys will enjoy as much as I did. I wanted to do 200nl because I think that seeing me play and explain what's going on at that limit will help my students out the most. I should have a coaching page up soon, so definitely PM me before that if you're looking for some lessonizing. See you in the video, sirs.

-Reid

Hello LeggoPoker!

Since one of you guys posted that you don't know who I am (where have you been, seriously?), I'll just make a post that let's you know where I'm coming from and how I roll, more or less.

I've always loved games and getting very good at them. I played chess when I was very young then moved on to Magic: The Gathering, including a Junior Super Series run and some scholarship money for my college, Wake Forest University.

After all the semi-nerdiness associated with the above games and the attraction to the fact that Chris Moneymaker could win money in poker, I was hooked. Everyone in school was playing little $5 tournaments and it wasn't long until my personality led me to reading books like The Theory of Poker and all the other Sklansky books about Limit Hold'em. I limit-donked for quite a while, a year or so. I borrowed $50 from a friend, casino whored that up into a limit roll, started beating 3/6 limit and a friend showed me the light of NLHE cash.

I got to play party 200nl for about a month and knowing nothing of how to play NL, crushed it. Obviously, I felt like a huge retard for not seeing how awesome NL is sooner, so I got a little bit of a late start learning.

The next year, I met Craig at a random underground game at school that had the most ridiculous rake, I think $6 / hand at 1/2 and 2/5NL full ring games, and $40 buy in tournies here and there. Craig and I won a lot of the time and it was a ton of fun. He introduced me to Greg who couldn't be bothered with such low stakes bullshitting at the time and I was amazed how he was beating 1knl.

Over the year, I came by Greg's place to sweat him and talk about poker whenever he would have me. We all roomed together after that and that's pretty much when I gradually started to consider being a professional poker player.

You have to understand that in my family and the path that I was on during high school had basically nothing to do with this and even I was having some trouble dealing with the gambler's social stigma. For this reason, I still avoid table games.

I've played around with the idea of becoming a high school teacher. My degree from WFU is in philosophy, so I would really like to teach a humanities class of some type. Now, I can't stop until I'm regularly beating 5knl at least (ha, as I say that I'm thinking how the goal always changes) and get some money in the bank for the future.

However, it's seeming pretty easy now for me to dick around traveling all month and not play much to post a $20k month. Chances are high that I tilt buy something epic pretty soon because I've just been saving up my roll and really only spending money on food (note: this is a lot of money given the places I prefer, sirs) and traveling.

Anyways, I've been pretty happy to finally get around to making a video because I love the teaching aspect of the game. I've been coaching for quite a while and basically everyone I'm finished coaching is at least raping 1knl. So if you have any questions about that, PM me here for certain as I could stand to pick up a few more people to teach how to win lots of money pokering.

Here's a graph of something random to quiet the haters... take care guys, see you in my new video forum.

-Reid


Linked from pokertableratings.com

I expect the graph to be a lot more awesome pretty soon.

SO, the car that I wanted to get, after many many calls and messages and bank visits and loan cosigns... got fucking sold. I didn't even hear about it until I called them after not hearing anything for 4 days straight. Huge fucking disappointment because it was going to be awesome.

Realistically (who cares about that?), it was probably for the best that I keep saving up, get rolled for 5k, start smoking fools there and buy some apartment complexes from which I can make a static income, etc etc happiness or whatever. I have seen some pretty cool looking nice used Mercedes around the west coast (red obv) that made me think about that, praps if I can find a 'reasonably priced one,' whatever that means.

Speaking of the west coast, I just got back from San Francisco, Cali and Portland,Oregon. San Fran was pretty cool, I got some sushi with sir Djsensei aka Dan "the man" Morris and saw RiverBoatKing aka Jonas do some drunken stand-up comedy. The whole stand-up thing was cool because it was a while since I've seen stand-up and I've never seen open mic stand-up. Overall, don't do it... you can guess why and you'd be right.

Portland is one of the coolest places I've ever been. The weather was awesome, mid 70s during the day and high 50s at night. The food was great and there are so many new and different places jam packed around the city. I went to the Rose Gardens at Washington Park, which was pretty cool. Here's a random pic of it that I didn't take (I'm great about bringing my camera along places, just not using it).


Had a little picnic around that area and now I'm back home in Winston-Salem. It's pretty great to see all my friends here and actually start to be able to pretend like I play poker for a living. I still have only played like 200 hands since I've been home (+$4k obv), but I've gotten to do a TON of coaching and helping out with some friends.

That brings me to the climax of the entry... I'm finally doing a leggo video! So all of you guys can see how I call down with ace high and stupid things like that that hopefully make you think about ranges and maybe squirm in your seat some (if you're like any of my MSNL student body). Really though, I'm quite excited for this video to get out because I think that there a lot of very cool spots in it. There is also a TONNNNNN that I just scratched the surface of in this video, so hopefully I'll be making more in the future. Spam the hell out of the comments section and holler if you want some coaching because I should be getting a pretty full (fuller) schedule for that pretty pretty soon.

Good night everyone, I hope to see your comments and various beratings / adoration soon.

-Reid

PS - I was ultra dehydrated from being slightly hungover and it really shows at the end of the video, so unless I have to redo the audio, it should make for good times.

So a bunch of great things have been happening lately, and the best one's don't even have to do with poker! I have been helping a few students and they're already showing lots of improvement and winning more... sweet. I've been making about $1.75/hand in my last 40k hands, which is pretty close to what my "ultimate goal" has been for some time.

I use the quotation marks there not like someone like Greg would use them (I have a reason), but because there is no ultimate goal for people like us, motivated poker players. I'm going to become extremely comfortable with 2knl and 2k deep and eventually not so freaked out when I take shots at 5k. Anyways, I don't want to talk about poker so much in this blog post other than saying that it's going well and I'm feeling good about my game, still discovering new things to talk about with my close poker buddies.

My girlfriend is coming to stay with me very soon. She lives in Australia and it's been waaaaay too long since I've seen her. I have some surprises in store for the occasion that I can't mention because there's a decent chance that she may read this! Only one more week and we'll be hanging

I'm about to go down to Chapel Hill to help my friend from high school, Greg (different Greg than mynmsgreg), break down some of his crappy old furniture to toss out because Good Will won't take it. After that, Greg, hopefully mynmsgreg, Jon, Will, and I are going to Greg's lake house. The pics I have of this place are on my old old lap top, so who knows where that's at. Suffice it to say that this place is like heaven on earth. It's a huge 7 bedroom house with a gym, a pool, a deck, a guest house, plasma tv in every room, a meteor room, a room in which to play music (sound proof obv), a sick 6-handed poker table (tyty), a pool table, jet skis, speed boat, tubes, it's on the water... I could go on. I'll definitely take some pictures when I'm there this time because I can't just tease you guys with a few words about how awesome it is there. I also have some friends who have a house around there, so praps some major partying is in order?

Like I said in my last blog post, I've been reading some of the Four Hour Work Week, it's a pretty interesting read that challenges lots of the preconceptions about the social status quo, but we wouldn't know anything about that (right?). So needless to say, some of it is definitely about what we've all been working towards, freedom to do whatever we want, whenever we want, however we want. The most interesting take on the whole rat-race is that it's often associated with being rich as hell. It makes me realize that the lifestyle I currently live, I basically do anything I want to do all the time and still have plenty of extra money in the bank (because I've been saving up to invest in some real estate).

So the grand finale of this entry is that I'm saying fuck you saving and buying a used Maserati Quattroporte, a 4.2L V8 6-speed beast.


So hopefully things continue on pace with how they're going now. I figure worst case, I'll sell it. But this is basically my dream car. I'll have plenty of money after buying it, it'll help build my credit history, something that's a nightmare to get started for the self-employed, and it's going to be freaking great. I toyed with the idea of a custom plate, but I think that would just lead to keyings and bricks being thrown. I'm going to try to make an official offer on it in about 3-4 days, so *fingers crosses* and I'll see you guys soon to update you on how all these great plans unravel!

-Reid

Was cruising along and trying to put some hands in for this month since I was in vegas and Grand Cayman with the fam for a few days (pix soon I hope).

Anyways, just had AK < 62ss for 300bb pot, AK < AA 200bb, KK < set in rr pot 260bb, AT < 97 on T78fd 2o for 320bb (to the same guy as the 62ss, who then leaves ldo)... very annoying month so far, my all in EV is giving me nightmares... sec, some 2k hu action...

Meh, just made 3k... nothing special happened, a few soul reads in small pots. Not sure if I got bluffed in one of the last hands, but it always seems whoever I'd play at 2knl hu sits the moment I'm closing out all my tables.

So NOW I'm up for the month, which is soooo much less depressing for whatever reason. It's not a huge loss or anything, only about 4k playing mostly 1knl, but it just sucks to lose like 4 ~250bb pots (so thats 10k?) when they're just sick spots like that. It always gets to me just a bit, until I walk away from the computer for a bit.

I seem to be getting worked at 1k in the past few days, and I'm wondering if it's because I don't take it as seriously now? I think most of it has to do with playing too many tables, so I'll tone that down.

New Harry Potter tonight! ship ship! I'm not a huge fan (seen all the movies, read 0 books) but I love awesome movies and this one promises to be just that.

I read these recently:



and a real estate book. The Holmes story was pretty awesome. I picked it up in the airport before our 3 day beach extravaganza and finished it in all it's glorious 240 pages in the car on the way back from the airport. The language was very colorful and descriptive and the plot is quite captivating. With little details being revealed chapter-by-chapter, it kept my attention pretty well. I usually read philosophical essays or texts or something else that's a similar grind and use TV for entertainment and mindlessness, so this was a pretty refreshing change o' pace.

The RE book was introductory, but I found it interesting that the author's main point was outsourcing a lot, almost all, of the work. He talked about hiring people to manage the property, do the landscaping, do the carpeting, etc etc. That got me thinking about this book:



My friend Jon read it and said that it was interesting discussion about outsourcing business tasks to other, cheaply paid, people and the increased (or decreased) productivity it allows. Having been considering real estate investing for quite some time now and the state of the real estate market, some of this could come in handy, especially if I have to interview / call people for about 30 different things if I end up buying an apartment building.

Also, ironing takes FOREVER if you have a lot of shirts and cleaning is a huge grind. Thankfully, all of those things are done now and I went through all my mail and got groceries. All these things had become so daunting a task that it's a huge relief they're all finished. Rambling aside, I'm thinking about hiring both a PA for the real estate stuff and a made to do a weekly / bi-weekly thorough clean on my place.

I read the PA thread recently on 2p2, seems pretty cool overall. (made another 2k just now playing hu with no showdowns in about 60 hands, fun times)

I think for now, I'll read up on the 4hrWW, maybe a little halo 3, some dinner (ty whole foods!), and then Harry Potter and out with friends to get some beers! A littttttttle pokered out for the day, but I'll see if I can find an hour for a little more sometime... crap, I still have to gym.

Take care guys, I hope that you enjoyed my rambling nonsense!

-Reid

http://www.1027now.fm/streamer/streamer.html

This station is so amazing and so repetitive that we actually started propping on what songs would come on next, with pretty good success rates.

I'll TR some nights in Vegas when I'm not about to pass out, as well as some terrible quality pix from my iPhone, so get ready for that! I know you can't wait.

Craig seems to be doing well in the ME still, googogogo craig!@

-Reid

Yoyo! It's your boy Reid aka Shootaa aka Mr. Hydration. Just winding down after a long day of going to the hospital and Leggopartying (grinding life imo).

I woke up this morning almost certain I had a fever of at least 100degf so I begged someone to take me to the Dr and my friend Ruby obliged. We borrowed Fee's S5 and took off. Everytime I'm in that machine it just makes me want to tilt buy a maserati... alas.

So $150 co-pay later, I found out that I only have what everyone else in our house had (I know, surprise surprise!) AND, more importantly, that my newly somewhat infected lip ring isn't spreading to my blood and killing me. I was pretty glad to hear that news and just talking to the doctors and nurses made me realize, just by orating things I suppose, that on the whole, I'm destroying my body here in Vegas with bad sleeping habits, drinking, terrible eating (mostly just spacing of when I eat, like once a day sometimes... LOL).

So I pounded a ton of ibuprofen, felt tons and tons better, and decided that I'd check out the Leggo party. It was pretty sick overall. I met a ton of nice fellows and saw some thick ass waitresses as provided by aejones, sick life? Greg got in and some other people who are going to stay in our house. Hopefully I can kick this sickness before the main event, because if I have to skip it again, it would be sad.

I played about 1k hands of 2knl when we got back and got coolered and sucked out on by people calling 72dd oop vs me 100bbe and ck calling two big bets versus my top set and donking pot on the river repping nothing cept a naked fd that check called twice. An orbit later, I ran tptk into his 43o that turned two pair. I had KK < AA when I flopped a fd and got it in 150bb deep by checkraising the flop. Basically, must be nice... I still made like 850 though, which is insane because situationally, I ran like absolute assholes. So, other than complaining and airing it out etc, the point of me saying all this is that I'm very excted that it looks like I will be pwning 2k in the future.

I'm going to get some rest and grind an episode of True Blood. GN guys.

-Reid

I'm going to get some

So I haven't really been blogging that much / at all lately. I'm not really sure why, I think it's because I was trying to foster some poker discussion here and become a leggopoker video maker or just kind of get my name out there.

Barring some FTP sponsorship, I basically stopped caring about both of those things completely for a few reasons on which I'd rather not elaborate.

Anyways... I had my best month this June, pulling in just over $40K. $2Knl is going well and I can certainly tell that most people who play it are terrible, including myself. So it's exciting to be playing at what is the highest limit running on stars and FTP a lot of the time and still see much room for improvement across the board. It really makes me want to learn more.

Another cool thing about that is that I used to just watch 3-4 videos of other people playing a week, and now I play most of those guys and realize that everyone just learned from everyone else and so they spatter off the same things everyone else has already said.

That said, Phil Galfond's videos are amazing and have certainly helped me get better and, more importantly, know how to get better.

Yesterday, was the 5k buy in 6max event here in Las Vegas and I feel like I played pretty great except for a few tiny bet sizing mistakes because to be honest, and it's sad, I get excited when I'm about to double through a Euro donk deep stacked and live. In the tourney, my first table, on which I was the one seat, featured none other than Rich, aka nutsinho, in the 3 seat. It was pretty funny because he and I had just met on this trip and had been hanging out a decent amount with a lot of the other guys in my house. He sweated me in some drunk and goes and I've sweated him online some. So I think we both had a tiny idea about how the other one played, even though we'd never played online cash together, and he probably didn't think that I knew too much about his game. We ended up staying out of each others' ways mostly and tried to take advantage of this German dude who was 3 betting probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 25% and opening tons, who people know, but I don't because I basically never follow the donkament scene.

There is a pic of this guy on my twitter (shootaaa for those interested). He was reading fairytales the entire time and it was pretty obvious to both of us when he had what he had I would imagine. I tried to float and then bluff some stars pro guy who ended up checking and calling trips twice on the turn and river versus me after he opened utg on T63r T 2. So that was sad and I was down to about 5k at 100/200. I 4 bet shoved KQo over this Belgian guy who was playing ok, but he kept telling me how scared money he was and that he satellited into the event. A great guy, but definitely not the best thing to tell someone at a tourney and not adjust to it IMO. After that, I restole vs the stars guy once and Rich busted in the meantime. The gentleman who replaced Rich was a most welcome replacement (because Rich is good and this guy was godawful). He was limp calling tons and obviously the German dude was having a field day with him by isoing him preflop tons.

The hand: at 150/300, the fish open limps, German guy makes it 800, good knowledgeable younger dude who looked like he was from Northeastern US makes it 2300 and I jam A5o in the SB for ~9k. It folds to the German who is basically giving me a look like lol I have 88 you bastard and I know what you're doing, but it's a lot of chips and he folds. Then the other dude hems and haws for probably about a minute and a half, both shuffling his cards around and grabbing his chips, indicating his indecisiveness. Finally he calls with TT, whoops. A in the window... weee.

I'm up to around 23k and see a flop in a reraised pot vs the donk with KQ on KQ9 rainbow and he bet/3 bets AQ into me. A turn, he screams and runs around. I shake his hand and give him the obligatory 'must be nice' and say gl to everyone.

It was sooooo disappointing to bust there because the table thought I was the hugest donk of donks and anytime I had a pair I was going to get some insane value, especially with a stack that would've been about 2x average at the time.

Other than that, I'm waiting for my Aussie GF to come give me a visit, I've got the Fee's aids I think and I've been trying to rest up (I just slept 13hrs!?), and I decided not to move to San Diego with Craig. My decision about SD was mainly because I didn't know the area well enough to move there. It's a pretty nice place that Craig and I went to visit a week or so ago, but I just don't think I'm ready to commit to anything like that. I still have at least 2 more months at my place in NC. In the meantime, I think I'm going to be scoping out places with Greg (the mymnsgreg). I really think Tahoe is a great option because of it's beauty, size, the fact that some of it is in Nevada (taxes wee), and that we could go snowboarding a ton during the season.

I'm really looking forward to boarding with all the guys a ton this Winter, in fact, I probably chat about it too much! I'm hoping to hit up Switzerland, maybe New Zealand, if I can get a few buds who are willing to cope with that flight, and Canada. Colorado and Vermont are also pretty solid options.

I still want my Masserati Quattroporte, but first things first is that I'm going to get into some real estate investing. I plan on using a ton of my bank role now for traveling expenses and to play 2k and hopefully 5k by the end of the year, if things keep going well in the next few months, But I think getting into the market, especially now, with 20 or 30k down on a place or two would be a pretty solid idea.

It's certainly tempting to insta ship a sweet car and decent place wherever (being nearly busto afterwards obv), but I'm sticking with my plan. Somebody was giving me crap about being a life nit (lol) the other day and I just wanted to say that I've seen some people more aggressive with poker move up and be fairly successful, having pretty huge swings overall since they may not have been totally ready for that limit, and I've seen plenty of people fall by the wayside and try to regrind their roll back at 200nl. It's been a fairly consistent climb to where I am now, and all I'm hoping for now is that it continues and I'm beating 5knl in the next 4-5 months. GL guys, thanks for reading this. IDK if I'll be updating semi-regularly, but it's entirely possible since I'm in Vegas now and hilarious shit always happens here.

Take care & GL.

-Reid

I'm selling up to 6k, PM me for details / stats / whatever you want to know. Craig (craigthedeac) and I discussed rates and what we believe to be a fair markup.

I currently play and beat heads up and 6 max No-limit at 1k and 2k buy ins. Let me know if you need some more info / references.

-Reid

hey