Poker in the Rear

I've wanted to do this for a long time but have always been too lazy and probably a bit embarrassed about posting a vid publicly. I've made a lot of vids for friends to watch and give me advice, but I've avoided posting them here in the blog. My GF thinks that it's a bad idea cause then people will know how I play and can take advantage of me, but I think I'm such a small fish in a large pond right now that no one is going to bother to use this video against me, and I'll get a lot more help from this than I will have it used to hurt me.

So, here's the link:

http://www.driveway.com/l9a4b3d6v1


PLEASE WATCH THE VIDEO AND PAUSE AFTER INTERESTING HANDS AND POST COMMENTS HERE IN THE BLOG!!!

I've had a few friends do that for me in previous video's and the help has been invaluable. I realized that I have been getting a lot of helpful comments in my blog from LP guys that might be kind enough to give video advice too, but I never ask em for it. So now I'm asking and hope you guys hook it up =)

0 votes

Comments (17)

So I had a friend over tonight who was just learning poker and I played some .01/.02 and some .10/.25 and man, god, lord, oh heaven, it was EZ

I wish I could make money by playing those games. Stupid games getting harder. NL100 is kicking my ass lately. Well, breaking even.... but I wanna be winnin! Oh well. I've become a much better player in medium/small pots, but I've lost my balls to get value. Midian pointed that out to me and he's so damn right - I took his advice to heart today and really got hardcore on some mediocre hands tonight and got so much more value than I ever would. It was amazing.

It's weird to play microstakes games again. Kinda fun since it's so easy, like going on bnet and playing BGH. I hit a seriously horrendous 30 buyin downswing (about 70% bad luck and 30% bad play) during february and decided to pull out some money to cover basic expenses. Now sitting at $2,600 and slowly rebuilding as I'm not running hot like I did in January. Talk about a wake up call! But it's good. I think I've really learned a lot more about poker, especially how to fold when you have a loser! And how to minimize losses on a strong hand that isn't best.

So I'm totally rambling and I'm not even gonn make an effort to post a sweet pic to get more comments this time. Just drunk and need to ramble. You have no idea how many times I had to hit "backspace" and correct my mistypes.

I still love poker. I am still confident that I know what I'm doing. And I know without a doubt that I have so much to improve on, and that I CAN improve. I know I can learn all these new levels of poker and keep becoming a better player, and I will continue to put all my heart and soul and effort into making it happen. Gotta throw another shoutout to Midian and Snider for their help, and thanks to soAh for starting to help on coaching (though we're yet to have our fist lesson, we're working it out and I have a good feeling about it).

Ok, off to find more alcohol and hopefully some cigarettes!

0 votes

Comments (9)

February has been a bad month and I've wanted to just give up at so many things at so many different times in so many different ways... heh. It started with about 10 really hard days of moving into a new place with my GF. What made it especially hard was that we'd been crashing at the rents place since coming here from India, so we basically had clothes and a bed to move into a 2 bedroom apartment, which meant there was a lot of stuff we had to buy. Of course we had a very small budget and therefore spent a lot of time on Craigslist hunting for bargains. They were long days and I didn't play any poker, and the stress of moving caused a few fights which just compounded the misery.

Then we finally get pretty much settled and I start playing poker again and go into the worst downswing of my career. I've had 2 winning sessions this month out of 20,000 hands played. The losing sessions are getting smaller but I think that's more because of the help I've been getting from LP members on hands that has enabled me to plug some leaks in my game. The luck definitely hasn't turned around though.

And to top it all, off, I got deathly sick with what feels like strep throat. Fever, runny nose, a horrible cough and a sore throat that completely immobilizes me at times. Last night after losing another session and then running to the bathroom cause I was coughing so hard that I started to puke, I felt like giving up. I just wanted to throw in the towel. But then I caught myself being a bitch and decided I'd use all of this BS being thrown my way as a reason to keep going, cause I wasn't going to let it beat me. So I went and posted more hands, reviewed my losses, and studied a bit more poker, and then hung out with the GF and had a good time (wink wink).

But seriously, it's easy to be positive and happy during the good times, but the real skill is to enjoy life during the bad times. I've honestly been getting spoiled lately cause my health has been good, I've had a great relationship, I've been doing the work I wanna do, kicking ass at poker, and everything else was basically going well. Yet I wasn't as happy as I should be, and any little thing going wrong and I'd get upset. I was chasing happiness always thinking "once I do this I will be happy" rather than just being happy in the moment and appreciating what I had. Losing a big chunk of my BR, my health and so much of my usual peace of mind has reminded me how good I had it, and how good I STILL have it.

About a year ago I was so good about taking a bad situation and finding the silver linining. I was great at seeing something go bad and laughing at it and moving on to a solution quickly. I really believed that when one door is closed on you, another door is opened, but most of us spend too much time staring at the door that closed to see the one that opened. I've been staring at closed doors lately and missing all the new paths and great things that have opened up to me. It's really bad and I'm sad to see how much joy I've given up over the last few months.

So I'm not giving up at poker. This is without a doubt the hardest downswing I've ever faced and has tested my confidence to the bone, but I am not giving up. I am not going to tilt it all away. I am going keep opening up the tables and making the best decisions I possibly can, and eventually it's all gonna turn around in my favor again. I know it will. And even though I'm losing left and right, I'm going to enjoy my life. Cause things WILL work out. And things WILL get better. And things aren't really that bad anyways - I've got a lot of things to be happy about.

2 votes

Let me preface all of this with one big point - I definitely am much worse at poker than I thought I was!

At the same time, I do still think I am a winning player. Just harder to win without the heater at your back.

After about 3 weeks of consistent losses with occasional winning spikes it is clear that I need to do something to turn this around and it won't just happen by itself. Of course a heater would be great, but I think I'm playing poorly overall and even when I get a bit of a heater I don't take full advantage of it. This has lead me to my new approach which I started today.

Super short sessions. That's the ticket. I realized that in the past I played my best while 4 tabling, so I've gone back to that. I also am doing very short sessions, 250 hands to 500. If I hit 500 I get ready to quit. Usually I quit before 500. I try and do lots of these short sessions throughout the day, with nice breaks in between to eat, exercise, maybe watch an episode of a good TV show or read up on some forums. Also study hands or watch CR vids.

I realized that I am by far my own worst enemy. I have been tilting much more easily but haven't been getting away as quickly as I used to. Now I'm trying to end the sessions before I get lethargic and before too many bad beats can hit me and break down my anti-tilt defenses. And if the session goes especially painfully before 500 I'm out real quick.

So far it seems to be going ok. I think I'm still not playing my best poker, but the amount of mistakes has drastically reduced. I'm also picking up on betting patterns and timing tells a lot better and making some good plays using them. I still feel like a noob in 3bet pots but it's getting better, and there's been some good help from people on the medium stakes forums about them.

The other thing is that I haven't looked at my BR all day. I'm avoiding looking at how much I've won/lost and trying to strictly focus on good decisions/bad decisions. It's nice walking away from these sessions feeling good or bad solely dependent on how I played rather than how I did monetarily. I'm just going to put full faith in the fact that if I keep playing well I will win money. Checking my BR to see minor wins or big losses after long sessions was just killing my moral.

Thanks to everyone who's been giving advice and help. Couldn't do this without you and the support of LP.net!

0 votes

Comments (5)

It's so much harder to make a blog post while losing rather than winning. For me at least. When I'm winning or even just having minor losses I enjoy posting up a storm, but in a downswing the last thing I want to do is air thoughts on the blog. I guess I'm ashamed of my losses or just feel overall shitty and have no desire to share those feelings with others.

Of course the fact that I'm making this post makes it clear that I am winning. The last few sessions have gone OK with some minor wins. Then last night I finally started running hot again but I was upset cause I squandered it by making several stupid all in mistakes. I came out winning a bout 2 buyins when it could have been 4 or 5, so I wasn't too happy with myself. Today went much better as there was only 1 big all-in mistake and otherwise I made a bunch of good folds. The downswing has taught me that I really need to start making more good folds, cause during the downswing it felt like my biggest source of profit was avoiding spew.

I also am getting back into my routine of exercise and poker study. Big thanks to sniderstyle for his help with advice and doing some sweat sessions together. Hopefully my new found hotness will transfer to you as well! But yeah, shout outs aside, moving into this new place really killed my poker routine. To top it off the only poker I played was mass multi-tabling to try and get FPPs to buy a TV in the pokerstars store. I really wanted that damn thing to finish off our living room. I made the FPP's but lost about 8 buyins in the process, which was basically the cost of the TV. Stupid.

Throw the loss of focus and mass multi-tabling on top of running cold as shit, and it lead to my biggest downswing ever. About 15 buyins at the bottom and I've never gone past like 8 or 9. Luckily I'm very deeply rolled for NL100. The biggest hit was to my confidence and overall happiness. Eventually I got control of my emotions and learned how to still enjoy life during the downswing. I think that has helped me recoup. I've also started to remember the basics that I'd forgotten and how to make GOOD FOLDS. God, the good fold has eluded me like crazy in Feb.

So, let's do a halfway through the month status check that will show you how much I do NOT crush NL100... But hopefully the dozer is coming back and when I can get going on that 10K goal!

Notice how I've become tighter as I lost more and more - haha, such a wuss.







Anyway, the house is looking good. I will take pics soon and post em up ^^

0 votes

Comments (7)

So it's "Super Tuesday" and I'm endorsing Barack Obama (haha as if I'm someone who matters! lmao). Why? Cause I'm a poker player. Because I'm sick of the "Bush-Clinton-Bush-Clinton" cycle that is at risk of continuing. Because I think Bush and the Republicans have turned a great country into a joke country. Because I know that Hillary will unite Republicans against her and create more hatred than healing. Because I want change. Because I believe he is genuine, honest and true.

For those of you who care, I'll bother to go through and list my reasons for all of those things.

Because I'm a Poker Player:
When you look at all of the Presidential candidates, of the front runners Obama is the best for poker. Mcain and Romney are strongly against it because they want to appeal to the conservative cockmongers. Hillary is in the middle and not strongly either way, but does have a history of attacking video games and other internet based entertainment. But Obama, now he is actually a poker player, and supposedly pretty good. He's openly talked about poker and told stories about playing. He understands our game and would by far be the most poker friendly president.

Because I'm Sick of the Bush-Clinton Cycle
Think about it... in the last 20 years 2 families have run the USA. What's up with these dynasty's? We had Bush senior, then Bill, then Junior, and if Hillary wins we'll be right back into the cycle. How can she be a candidate for change? And how can she be such a champion for health care when she already tried once and failed, even with full presidential support? There were good things about the Clinton era but at the end of the day it was more of the same political BS. The way Bill handled himself in South Carolina shows us how they really feel... he even said that this wasn't dirty at all, and if you're comparing what he did to the days of old, it was nothing. But that's the point - we're sick of the old BS and want SUBSTANCE rather than attack ads. But the Clinton's don't get it. And if they can't control Bill right now, how the hell will they control him when he's in the White House, again? I don't think he's going to sit around baking cakes.

Because I think Bush and the Repub's Have turned the USA into a Joke
I travel a lot. I've been to over 10 different countries as a 23 years old. When I was younger during the Clinton era and I traveled I got nothing but "You're American, I love America!" type of comments. Now I get things like "What, are you here to start a war?" and non-stop resistance from anyone I try to work with cause they think that I'm just another American asshole who wants to impose his will on everybody else. We're not respected anymore and it's very sad. We don't lead on world issues but rather become outcasts. We create more problems than we fix. I know that we have done a lot of bad shit in the past, but rather than going away from it and becoming better, the Bush Junior years have lead us to doing worse things than we ever did before. Iraq was a huge mistake, we abandoned Afghanistan, and I sure as hell don't think we're any safer than we were before. I've written papers on this issue and don't want to retype them here, but if you wanna hear my in depth reasons PM me and I'll send ya my reports.

Because I know that Hillary will unite the Republicans and Create Hatred
Republicans hate the Clintons. Why do you think that there was sooooo much drama around the Monica Lewinsky shit? Cause Bill had been pissing the Republicans off for years and they'd been waiting for any chance to tear him apart. They caught a thread and tried to pull it till the sweater unraveled, as Weezer said to do (hold this thread, as I walk awayyyyy). There are already groups out there who are preparing attack ads aimed at Hillary, doing research trying to find any little thing they can use. If Hillary gets the nomination the Republican party will unite against her. If Barack gets it, there will be more people willing to give him a chance and work with him. This point is so important. We have to understand the hatred they have for the Clinton family. The best way to get the Republicans to unite and fight together in the general election is to give them Hillary to fight against.

Because I want Change
A black man with 4 years of Washington experience sounds a hell of a lot better than a woman who's been sucked into DC for the last 16 years. He worked on the streets helping people who lost their jobs instead of doing everything he could to make the big bucks when he was younger. As a kid he got high, got drunk, and partied, and then he grew up and got over it, leaving that behind. He understands where we're coming from but also managed to do it without becoming a drunk driving coke head like Bush was. And he was honest about it from the start, never throwing any "I didn't inhale" lines out but admitting to what he did. He has been true in sticking by a new style of politics focused on message, vision and hope rather than cynicism, hatred and tearing each other down. He isn't in any lobbyists pockets and doesn't owe any favors as he is new to Washington. And he listens to what the people want.

Because I believe he is genuine, honest and true.
Obama came to Colorado a few days ago and for the first time in my life, I voluntarily went to a political rally. I wasn't the only one as there were lines for blocks in 2 directions going away from the hall. Inside it was like a party as people danced and cheered, and a huge amount of people there and on his staff were young folk like me. And for once they were young people who cared enough to do something. When Obama came out you could see on his face how much he believed in what he was doing, and how much he appreciated our support. He was strong and confident, yet humble and honest. He was visionary and while he said the obvious things that any good politician should, he also took it to another level and said the right things even though a politician often shouldn't. After reading his site, watching his speeches, and then seeing him in person, I am convinced that he is for real and that he intends to carry through with everything he says. And what he says is awesome.


Obama is changing the political map by bringing people like me out to the polls. I am not a big voter but tomorrow night (or tonight depending on when you read this) I am going to Caucus in Colorado. I'm excited to go and meet other Obama supporters, and I really hope that the precinct I go vote in becomes a win for Obama. He's getting lots of first time voters out to support him. But we gotta get out there. The old farts are great about voting cause they have nothing else to do, and they understand that their vote does affect their lives. We're young and think that it doesn't matter. If Bush has taught us anything it is that it DOES matter. And for once we're being given a choice for a real person in the white house rather than just more of the same. If there was ever a time to get out and vote, it is now. If you're with me and support Obama, please get out there Today (TUESDAY) and cast your vote. It counts.

Here's Obama's Site where you can find the location to go vote in your hometown:
http://www.barackobama.com/index.php

GL @ the tables guys

1 votes

Comments (13)

I'm in the process of moving into a new apartment. It's going pretty well considering out limited budget and resources. For one, no truck or SUV to move stuff with. No money to rent a truck. So we spent 2 days driving around in my step-dad's 54' Ford pickup truck which is rust-stained to shit and way before power steering. There's a million things wrong with it and let's just say driving that beast is a constant rollercoaster at a subpar amusement park where you don't trust the tracks at all. We're about halfway in which means a couch and coffee table but no entertainment center, TV or end tables. It means 1 bookshelf in the office but enough books to fill another 2 sitting on the ground.

So we've got a few more things we need to go pickup but not sure how to approach it since gas for my step-dad's truck is ridiculously expensive but I'm not sure renting a truck would be much better. I guess a bit easier on the heart since I wouldn't be having so many near heart attacks. We're scouring Craig's List and flea markets ($15 for our coffee table, whee!) and doing occasional runs into Target looking for the cheapest things we can find. Despite our tight wallets we've done quite well and the place is starting to look very nice, especially thanks to my GF's photo's that we've hung all over the walls. She has ambitions for professional photography and worked for Cosmo a bit... no, we don't have pic's of models everywhere. When she lived in India she took many great street portraits and they make for great eye candy along our walls.

I'm losing my focus here...

Haven't had much time for poker over the last few days. I normally read every post on the forums and am sitting around waiting for someone to do a new blog or post a new hand. Now I have no clue what the hell's going on anymore but that's ok cause I've spent some time in the real world with my lovely lady (as I like to call her). Talking about her, here's a few new pics that I haven't posted yet (pics in spoiler):

+ Show Spoiler +

I got wood...


Halloween and she's Cleopatra!


I'm a priest... BUDDY CHRIST!


Old pic from India and we're so in love...ahhhhhhhhhhhhh


I got her a fancy haircut/coloring for her bday

Anyway, moving on to moving in, har har. It's very nice to be in our own place again as we've had to crash with the 'rents for the last few months. Originally we thought we'd be moving to Costa Rica in September to do some work down there, but it got delayed to January. Then in January things got canceled which is good with me cause Colorado is where I want to be. I travel a lot and this is where I like to come home too. Plus, for the first time in my life I have a woman I love and we're dedicated to each other, while I'm also making enough money to live comfortably doing what I want. Finally real independence... and it's great.

Once I get fully moved in we'll do some pics and show it off a bit. Till then I'm gonna be kinda scarce though I need to get back onto the poker train ASAP to make some cash to finance all the millions of little things you need when moving into a new place. Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you what this place is like... it's a 2 bedroom townhouse. The bedrooms are upstairs along with a full bath. Downstairs is a large living room, a half bath and a full kitchen with a dinning area. We even have a basement with a washer/dryer down there (installing tomorrow). Pretty spacious and by far the best place I've ever lived on my own. It keeps getting better and better as we furnish it and I think it's going to be pretty pimp by the time we're done.

That's all for now. GL @ the tables mates (shout out to FruityPro)

PS - Sadly I'm posting this @ 1am so it will probably get 0 views and be bumped from the front page before any of my friends see it. That's life isn't it?

0 votes

Comments (12)

I'm happy with the overall profit and so on, but I'm not happy with myself. I started the month off amazingly well, playing a lot and very disciplined in combination with a great heater. The last 10 days have been pretty shitty though as I got my ass kicked in NL200 and then have played mediocre @ NL100 since that. I've been mass tabling... at first just cause NL100 seemed easy. Then I added more cause I wanted to get FPP's quickly to use to buy a TV. I've lost about 3 buyins over the last 10k hands of mass multi-tabling. Definitely making mistakes and am gonna stop doing that shit. So yeah, I'm happy to have done well but I didn't hit my goals for the month and I think it's more my fault for being stupid rather than the cards fault for not treating me well enough.






I know I had a good NL100 month, that's for sure. But I know I could have done better. I'm not complaining about the result so much as I am about the way I handled myself over the last 10 days. I don't think I gave it 100%... I think I got impatient. I think I tried to rush things. I know I can do better!

0 votes

Comments (7)

So still playing more hands. Decent session with a few mistakes but not very many, and the biggest loses were definitely coolers. So that's always comforting. But got a handful of situations which I THINK are standard, but I'm not sure. Seeking confirmation!

+ Show Spoiler +

+ Show Spoiler +

+ Show Spoiler +

It's fun playing these 1,000 - 2,000 hand sessions again. I kinda stopped doing this much a while ago cause my brain just couldn't handle it. @ 7 tables it goes pretty fast and I get to do so many more situations. Big problem is that if I get too zoned out I start playing tight. At one point I realized that I was playing like 16/14 and several tables and my loosest table was about 21/19. That's not my norm at all. I think the tables were pretty loose too, which lead to me raising a bit less since I couldn't open as much.

Well, things are still going fine and just gonna keep fighting my way to 10K. I think that at some point along the way I will do an hour 4 tabling NL200 and make a vid to post and ask for advice. Also still need to go through all the hands I played @ NL200 and post the ones I still haven't asked questions on.

That's all for now.... oh hell, might as well put a graph otherwise this will be a super boring post.

0 votes

Comments (6)

After reading the comments in my last blog post I realized that yeah, I haven't really put that many hands in @ NL200, so how do I know I'm losing there? I played NL100 for a bit, rebuilt some confidence, and gave it another go. It went ok the first session taking in about a buyin. The second session kicked my ass and I lost 2 buyins, down 1 buyin for the day. But it was nice cause I played with much more confidence and I mainly ran badly in races and didn't actually lose much due to my own mistakes.

I googled "Confident" and found this, haha

0 votes