http://i.imgur.com/eSUrpaM.gif
I went around northern Japan for a month, in my little K-car. The 2011 Tsunami struck the North east coast of Japan hardest, reaching 42m run-up height in places. I wanted to see the damage for myself, and also get a feel for how the rebuild is progressing after 4 years.
http://i.imgur.com/sstIzYz.jpg
The height the Tsunami reached on this apartment building. Most damaged buildings had been cleared, but this one was left as a monument. Standing beside this building you struggle to imagine how much water was flowing through it.
http://i.imgur.com/HUKNi3C.jpg
My little car which I "borrowed" from an expat acquaintance. It's a K-car meaning it is tiny and has a 600cc engine, but its 4wd and light, and I don't care if it gets damaged because it cost me $300, so I can take it anywhere.
http://i.imgur.com/wvRbYTc.jpg
This train station near Matsushima has been abandoned since the Tsunami cut the train line. The rebuild of the new raised concrete track is slowly reconnecting stations, this one will be next.
http://i.imgur.com/cQ2xLwu.jpg
Modern Japanese construction is earthquake safe, but otherwise fairly flimsy from a structural point of view. The old style of construction found in this shrine however, was much stronger. Left standing with damaged roof tiles while the houses around it were washed away (I think that the gravestones were re-placed since the disaster)
I have more photos but many of them didn't capture the scale of the destruction. Or the massive size of the new sea walls and towering concrete overpass bridges that are being constructed across valleys. (Japan government response to the disaster has been to pump cash into major public works in the region - a coast expressway for one)
Stealth Camping
In Japan it is generally legal to camp in public parks, roadsides or forest parks (though campgrounds are encouraged). Even though my Japanese is OK, rather than searching for guesthouses, booking, then checking in checking out and all that, it is much easier to go without an itinerary and see where the road takes me for the day. Japan has a very safe feeling, even more than New Zealand, I don't feel I am going to run into any angry people here, so summer camping is fine. And there are many Onsen (public baths) for luxurious cheap bathing. But still, I would rather not draw any attention. The hardest part is finding a place where my car will not be noticed, either blending in or hidden from the main roadways, then either reclining the drivers seat in my car, or... http://i.imgur.com/JNN9BFW.jpg
Hennessy Hammock. It's a tent. That hangs from the trees. Great for forest camping as you don't need clear ground and can camp on a mountainside, where it is very unlikely anyone is going to notice. I stayed for 3 nights in the mountain at the center of a busy tourist town, Hakodate, left my pack and hammock tent in the mountain while I was out and about having basically the same overall experience as a tourist that pays $150 per night for a hotel.
http://i.imgur.com/9UVqwbG.jpg
Hotel plebs are still driving to get to prime photo-taking locations while I am enjoying the morning light and still air at Matsushima Bay because I slept on the mountain.
Superzoom http://i.imgur.com/tfH4pWv.jpg
The Nikon P610. 60x optical zoom. I bought this before my north Japan tour, took all the above photos with it. have never had a decent camera before. I say decent, it is actually a glorified point and shoot with a huge lens and fairly cheap at around $500, but its fine for my needs.
http://i.imgur.com/Tz6fodk.jpg
The port of Akita city. I meant to red square this, but there is a brown sawdust mountain at the factory at the top right, right? http://i.imgur.com/764jLuN.jpg
Zoom in with the camera and this is what is there.
In a week or so I'm planning to visit the Nuclear exclusion zone in Fukishima, and sneak in if it is at all possible. (I'll only be there for a short time, not enough to get radiation sickness or risk cancer. Relax I have a physics degree!) So I'll see how that goes and maybe post a few more pictures.
First off, know that stars will be able to be played in Pennsylvania, with partnership with a casino inside the state. Which makes this quite exciting for me.
Email #1:
Weekly Update from Rich Muny, VP of Player Relations
Things are getting interesting for online poker in Pennsylvania. It started with last week’s rejection of Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf's tax plan by the Republican-dominated House. Without consensus, but with a budget deficit looming, both sides have been thrust into a dash for revenue. And, perhaps not surprisingly, given the push for online poker in the Keystone State this year, our game now figures prominently in the debate.
PA House Speaker Mike Turzai [R] and PA House Majority Leader Dave Reed [R] are suggesting authorizing online poker as an alternative to raising taxes. Reed gave gaming expansion a prominent place in his list of priorities, saying that exploring the possibility should come before lawmakers consider raising taxes.
Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati [R] said gaming bills may not have seemed like a great idea months ago. But with massive tax increases and the government's partial shutdown at stake, perspectives should change. "All of a sudden," Scarnati said, "gaming doesn't look that bad."
Gov. Wolf says he is “open to a conversation” on online poker in the Keystone State.
PPA will keep up the drumbeat for poker throughout this debate.
Take Action
Let’s send prefilled, fully editable tweets to PA House Speaker Mike Turzai (here) and House Majority Leader Dave Reed (here) thanking them for identifying licensed online poker as a good way forward in the budget debate. Let's also vote in an online poll and make & like pro-poker comments in an article on this issue.
Poker Advocacy with Rich Muny Webcast
On this week's Poker Advocacy with Rich Muny?, I was joined by Campaign for Liberty Senior Vice President Norm Singleton. Norm, who served as former Rep. Ron Paul's legislative director right up until Dr. Paul left Congress, and I had a terrific discussion on the House Speaker race, his organization, poker legislation, and liberty. You won't want to miss this!
Directly downloadable MP3 file (right click to save, left click to listen)
Free iTunes download
Play Now
Poker Advocacy with Rich Muny airs live Tuesdays at 8 pm ET/5 pm PT on OnTilt Radio. Each show features great guests and the best discussion on poker legislation. Please be sure to tune in every Tuesday evening at www.ontiltradio.com.
Social Media
For the most up-to-date news, follow us at:
Twitter: @ppapoker and @RichMuny
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Google+: theppa.org/googleplus and google.com/+RichMuny
Thank you for your continued support!
Proud to play,
Rich Muny
playerrelations@theppa.org
----------------
Email #2
Ryan,
I have good news to share with you. Your state legislator is now an outspoken proponent of licensing Internet poker and iGaming! This represents a huge opportunity for us, as they serve in a leadership position and will be very influential going forward in the contentious budget negotiations between the legislature and Governor.
Serving as your representative in the formal discussion, your legislator is actively calling for the licensing of Internet poker and iGaming as a way to help close the budget gap without increasing taxes. He needs to know that poker players like you appreciate those efforts.
Please take just 60 seconds to send this pre-filled, fully editable email thanking him for his leadership on the issue and for supporting licensed Internet poker.
We’re closer than ever to having a licensed Internet poker market in Pennsylvania. With continued leadership from your legislator and an active player base, we can make this a reality.
Proud to play,
Judah Rosenstein
Pennsylvania State Director
Poker Players Alliance
ONE TIME !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 1 MF TIME PLZ LEE ONLINE STARS!!!!!!!
#Game No : 775402563
***** 888poker Hand History for Game 775402563 *****
$0.02/$0.04 Blinds No Limit Holdem - ***
Table Gijon 6 Max Real Money
Seat 4 is the button
Total number of players : 2
Seat 4: mrbig_1973 $1.89
Seat 6: Hero $4.17
mrbig_1973 posts small blind [$0.02]
Hero posts big blind [$0.04]
Holecards Dealt to Hero [ ]
mrbig_1973 calls [$0.02]
Hero checks
** Dealing flop ** [, ]
Hero bets [$0.06]
mrbig_1973 calls [$0.06]
** Dealing turn ** ]
Hero bets [$0.15]
mrbig_1973 calls [$0.15]
** Dealing river ** ]
Hero checks
mrbig_1973 folds
** Summary **
Hero did not show his hand
Hero collected [ $0.48 ]
kinda getting back into hearthstone as well, M5ive#1688. currently running maly rogue, haven't played in over a month but won around 10 straight starting at rank 20.
I'm gonna be streaming a lot, just have a lot going on.
Prolly get started around 10 EST Tonight.
I live in a Duplex House, we share internet, when they play xbox1 I turn the stream off, rest of time its on. Haven't got a hand in yet today.
Should be back streaming tonight.
Ibn Abbad, from my understanding, was a spiritual man born and raised in Spain that moved to Morocco to study and practice Islam in the 1300s. If anyone wants to know more Google it or go to a library or something. (The Holy Man Abu Abdallah Mahammad ben Ibrahim ben Abbad ar Rundi)
So, this passage is described by a friend of Ibn's who is ALSO NAMED IBN. FUCK! (Ibn Qunfund).
Man, I do not even know how many translations it went through because this passage is from a book by Thomas Merton titled "Raids On The Unspeakable." Thomas Merton, from my experiences, is dope as fuck. He just went off to Kentucky to live in a Catholic Monastery and express himself. Raises questions to is that a viable way to live life? Not sure if I would be cool with that but then I am watching Game of Thrones and Arya is progressing into No One and that shit is brackin'.
Anyways, from "Raids On The Unspeakable," by Thomas Merton, pp. 147:
Letter to a Sufi Who Has Abandoned Sufism to Study Law
Well, my friend, you prefer jurisprudence to contemplation!
If you intend to spend your time collecting authorities and precedents
What advice do you want from me?
I can tell you this: each man, today,
Gets what he wants,
Except that no one has discovered a really perfect
Way to kill time.
Those who do not have to work for a living
Are engrossed in every kind of nonsense,
And those who must gain their livelihood
Are so absorbed in this that they
Have time for nothing else.
As to finding someone capable of spiritual life
Ready to do work that is clean of passion
And inordinate desire
Done only for love of Allah-
This is a way of life in which no one is interested
Except a few who have received the special
Mercy of Allah.
Are you aware of this? Are you sure of your condition?
Well then, go ahead with your books of Law,
It will make little difference whether you do this
Or something else equally trivial.
You will gain nothing by it, and perhaps lose nothing:
You will have found a way to kill time.
As you say: you prefer to spend your time doing things you are used to.
Drunkards and lechers would agree:
They follow the same principle.
I got my new computer set up with OBS, gonna be hosting ZooM Twitches often & Talking DFS + Life.
10/12 : Tonight I am Twitching the $15.50 20k MegaStack and $8k Heads up at Bovada.
10/13-prolly a long time: Will be streaming cashgames from around 1-3 starting to pm-1-3am.
Music + chatting through hands (Mostly stuff like Kaskade, Tiesto, DeadMau5 etc.
Lil rap sometimes.
I Play a lil better when I'm talking hands out often, I'll try to keep the stream going. (Lets Face it, its boring sitting quiet so often)
Reality check, Agression, balls, swingsby LikeASet, October 10
Last night playing at my local card room, 2/5 most people at the table sitting 1500+ deep, floorman gets called in next to take the new open seat at the table. Friendly guy, bald white middle aged father looking like the typical run of the mill middle class dad, wearing a mickey mouse sweater. Played with him several times before but the thing was he was always playing with house money because he would play during his shifts if the game was close to breaking. At first when this guy sat down he bought in for 500$ about 3 times i think and ran into 3 bad beats then something is this guy switched. He started iso'ing big, squeezing pretty often (like 240 preflop when like people call 30-40 preflop), making bottom pair calls (vs fish which ended up being good), big turn raises, etc. and he must have swung back up like 3-4k. While he was playing pretty agrro I started to feel like there was the fish, and then I became more like a baby shark, and then there this killer whale. There was a huge dynamic between the floor man and this one recreational fish and one reg fish who were all ateast 1.5k deep.
Somethings I learned, got reinforeced that night. Floor men aren't what they seem. Don't play so big that you started playing bad.. Shiet I kept spewing at my half ass attempts to bluff when the villains were close to folding but my bet sizes were on the pussy side relative to the pot.
Playing live games around 1k stacks effective is around my comfort zone. Once it starts to reach 1.5-2k stacks effective I start to become like a little girly and wet my panties. I think recently the highest bet I did as a pure bluff was only about 500-600. When someone makes it like 200 or something on the turn I doubt I'll have the balls to make it 700 without it being some sort of strong semi-bluff.
Ended up grinding up about 1700, then donking off like 1300 because I was being an idiot and playing for way too long being all tired and tilty.
Then to cap it all off I went to the 1k minimum buy-in 5/10 PLO game and played 6 handed, cuz I wasn't giving a shit about anything at the moment. Luckly nothing bad happened I just made like 300 bucks at the plo table, it was super late at night and we were all laughing at eachother cuz we were all playing like nit babies limping double suited aces and kings preflop.
Lol another side story a fellow reg at the casino who recently decided to grind plo exclusively was down about 50 bucks before plo broke. I then rail birded him as he went to the black jack table to get unstuck and he was eventually making 2500$ bets lol. Eventually he went to being down 50 to 4k lol. He's a degen but he'll be alright cuz he's an above average grinder that's skilled enough to play in the 5/10 games nl and plo,
So wanted to throw this clip up for you guys. And let you guys see me fail lol. I was supposed to do a set of 10 with 200. Instead I accidentally had put on an extra 10lb plate on the left side. So it turned out it was an off balance 210. When I unracked the weight I felt it pull to the left but since this bar had no knurling on the middle I thought I was just off center. (even though it felt right since I had positioned my hands first to gauge the middle. But instead of checking I just corrected for the imbalance and continued. Anyway since getting to watch the video. I found a big problem with my squat. I am letting my elbows drift too far back with this new hand positioning. I brought my grip in tighter recently and havent had a lot of time to play with it. So didn't realize my elbows were drifting so far back. Making it harder on myself to stay tight and upright. Because my lats arent as engaged. Will have to fit but all in all. It's important to pick your technique apart constantly and see where you can improve.
EDIT: here's another video shot with my cellphone. I used the same stance as last time and same setup (btw my belt isnt actually on : P i was about to get to my heavier weights and it occurred to me to just do a set pausing at the bottom so i never latched it.)
Good Discipline + Life Entryby Nitewin, October 06
Proud of a non-shove I made. Button and I (SB) were about 2x deep. BB was 1x. HH does not show it. Normally in a spot like this, I'm very inclined to shove and take down the pot pre or flip with a dead $40 in the pot but that's definitely the high variance route. This time I sensed danger and got out pretty cheap. In tourneys, this is usually how I lose too.
Broke up with girlfriend once again, probably not getting back together this time unless she really apologizes and cuts the nonsense out of the relationship. She only 22 and hasn't really had her slut partying phase yet so I get it. But cheating, lying, and playing dumb/being nonsensical is a deal breaker for me.
Back to square 1. Home living with parents, grinding poker, gonna save a bit and probably go sublet in different cities and see where life takes me.
Video up! The A's for your Q's.by DooMeR, October 05
Before I forget. If you like the video. Give it a like .
I really liked the questions. Definitely a lot of them I wouldn't have thought to make a video about. So it's nice to know I can cover topics that are closer to what you guys actually want to know. A lot of times some questions can be answered really quickly and wouldn't warrant a whole 10 minutes. So I would just naturally skip over them and not bother. But in this format I can dial it in to specifics of what someone might be struggling with, and hopefully point them in the right direction. If you guys have more questions ask away. And tell me what you guys thought. Btw. It's raining outside so the apartment was a bit dark ;P.
getting hero called liveby traxamillion, October 05
playing 1-1-2 with a bunch of fish one of whom is nice enough to kill it to 2/4 almost every hand. I'm playing relatively tight/solid pre haven't showed anything out of line in 3-4 hours.
Fish who kills it is button this hand so he is not allowed and the blinds remain 1-1-2.
Me SB $400
Old Azn $250
Young white fish kid who 3bet/called off 60bb with 72o (yea) $200 or so
Young opens 4, Azn calls 4, I raise to 24 in the SB.
Flop Ax5c3c (pot $66)
I lead 25, young folds, Azn snaps (no raise consideration or anything I already have his range narrowed very heavily to shitty aces. In a previous hand he was the PFR and bet flop 4 ways IP, I was the only caller on 942ccc, turn comes a red king I check he bets 65 (near pot) I check shove putting him in for 90 more and he folds.
Turn As5c3c10d ($116)
I lead 50 and he again calls very quickly; I expect him to peel this bet way wider than he should but to generally have to fold on most rivers.
River As5c3c10d5d ($216)
I shove 150 and he goes into the tank for 4-5 minutes which is forever in this game but I don't like calling the clock on my opponent when in the hand with him; I generally just sit stone and don't give off anything. He finally flicks in a chip for the call which is somewhat annoying because i probably could have used a little chat on the river to get him to lay it down; call out his hand or something but I never know if that is going to backfire. He flips up the A7o to rake the pot of course.
Standard I suppose but what is tilting is that he caught me with literally my one bluff there. This game is so soft with a bad rake structure that drops 2 pre without a flop and 4 more after on any flop that I play in a way that is on the tighter side pre as light defense and steals often make no sense. From the small blind there my 3betting range (kinda like raising limps in this game as it is 4 to go pre but still technically a 3bet) is A10s/AJ/AQ/AQ/99+/KQ. Especially with the BB at the time I call everything else even up to QJ/KJs (or if i raise them I don't throw them in and overbluff the runout). Just trying to smash good top pairs to valuetown fish otherwise play a smaller pot OOP. I'm not even always cbetting KQ; sometimes just giving up but for the sake of argument assume I bluff them all (even KQcc which I may not actually want to barrel turn). Well that leaves me 16 bluffs, I do ship all good aces so assuming he has an ace that still leaves me with 27(aj-ak)+6(a10)+1(AA). I don't c/c river vs this station so u can't discount either. 15:34 is about the right ratio for that river jam.
everytime i run a big bluff in these low stakes games I am reminded how bad I am
Alright so I've been struggling for video ideas today. And was thinking I should just do a Q&A with any questions you guys might have. What im going to do is collect some questions here. If you have questions about exercises, programming, or any sort of workout related question. I'll be answering it in a video. And what I'll do is try and blast through as many as I can while still giving a (hopefully) good answer. And then if anyone has any further questions about something. Or thinks I need to go more indepth into something. Hopefully having a big range of topics and some answers will lead to more questions. Thus giving me more topics . Hell. Even if you dont have a question. But just want another opinion on something let me know. I'll try and give something like a minute to each question/comment. And make it around a 10 min video. Lets see how this works out.
Oh and if for any reason someone wants to ask a question anonymously. Thats fine too just PM me. I'll include it in the video but without your ID.
I’m pretty sure that every one of you had to go through periods of emotional burnout. The sense of dissatisfaction with your efficiency, concentration problems, lack of motivation to do your work. While it is not exactly a pleasurable and desirable condition, if it’s approached from the proper angle, such upset mental state may allow us to look back and observe which decisions have driven us to the wall.
The conclusion of my in-depth analysis is that my will to play and motivation have begun to noticeably suffer around the 2nd half of July (this blog is an attempt to boost it, somewhat). The state I was in had been partially concealed by taking a 2-week-long vacation. I managed to recharge my inner batteries, but in August my A-game already started to appear far more rarely than I had hoped for.
Work - Life – Balance
In my opinion, keeping right balance between playing poker and other areas of life is essential, especially if someone considers poker a career path rather than a hobby, or only an additional source of income. In his podcasts, Jared Tendler points out time and time again that the majority of poker players don’t even realize how much mental energy is required to play this game. I’ve experienced it firsthand numerous times, and I recognize now how important it is to routinely take the time off.
My current work system looks as follows: I take 4-5 days off at the end of each month and then also an 8 to 12-day-long vacation every quarter. In addition to that, I don’t play 2-3 days a week, and I spend that time on improving my mindset, working on the tactical side of the game and also I do all sorts of non-poker activities. The period of complete breakaway from poker is necessary for the mind to recover before the another cycle of regular grind.
The ultimate goal, however, should be the pursuit of the utmost satisfaction resulting from doing your work day by day. In the end we spend 1/3 of our lives working or thinking about it, which is why we should seek to make this time as enjoyable as possible.
` If you're interested in 'balancing' work and pleasure, stop trying to balance them. Instead make your work more pleasurable.` Donald Trump
Keeping it Real
Another important skill is setting realistic objectives for yourself. In the past, after a particularly good month I sometimes found myself counting all those ‘hundreds-thousands-millions’ of Buy-ins I won, only to overhaul my goals (and dreams () later and deal with frustration during the revision period.
I acknowledged that wanting too much too soon usually led to discouragement. I failed to see progress, despite the fact that it was happening all along. Instead of taking joy in improving my skills on day-to-day basis, I was blinded by some distant targets and overblown ambition.
Why?
I believe this is the question each of us has to ask themselves in the first place. Why exactly do I work in this peculiar field? What is the driving force behind my actions? What are my life expectations or my goals, and how will achieving them eventually affect my life?
As a person deeply fascinated with the personal growth, I’m familiar with works of the majority of the most influential people in this area of study. I’ve learned a great number of curious patterns and metaphors which definitely enriched my life. The person whose work has had possibly the biggest impact on me was Tony Robbins. When I read his body of work, or above-all watch seminars and presentations, I can see the man who really practices what he preaches.
‘I'm the ‘why’ guy. I want to know why you do what you do. What is your motive for action? What is it that drives you in your life today? Not 10 years ago. Are you running the same pattern? Because I believe that the invisible force of internal drive, activated, is the most important thing. I'm here because I believe emotion is the force of life. ‘ T. Robbins
The picture
It`s hopefully the last time this year I`m posting my graph. Last month I managed not to check my winnigs for the entire month, and it had a great impact on my mental game.
To sum it up, if we treat experience in a proper fashion, we might be able to reach conclusions which can allow us to become more efficient at work, and make us feel more fulfilled as human beings in the end.
‘It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate,
I am the captain of my soul.’
‘Invictus’ William Ernest Henley
On September 30 2015 15:05 RaSZi wrote:
How is this just assume ddouble AA?
You don't think this is double AA a huge amount of the time if this is two .5/1 regs? And even if it's 2 randos, one of them probably has AA and the other guy likely has a really stupid hand which either fucks us or helps us about an equal amount of the time.
I think it should be OK between the deep stack possibly 4b folding, good equity in the main pot and fine equity in sidepot... But I'll be honest and say I haven't done much work on spots like these with different stacksizes involved <_<
EDIT:
I'm honestly not sure how to calc this, since we need to know how often we'll win the sidepot when we lose the mainpot, right? And I dont know a way of finding this out... I've got things setup to calc ev of multiway semi-bluffs which is similar to this spot but not identical...
If we do it really, really basic... Giving the 100bb stack a range of AA,KK$ds and double suited 5-span connected hands (this is fairly loose but it's an assumption that hurts us so I don't think that's a bad thing), which leaves him with AA a bit under 1/3 of the time (29% but for simplicity)... Meaning on average our equity in the sidepot vs deepstack is 47% and 34.6 in the main.
But I feel like this is a gross oversimplification and if anyone wants to share how to properly calc the EV of this (multiway, varying stacksizes, how often we win mainpot but lose sidepot etc) I'd be grateful.
Contact Users: 328 Active, 0 Logged in - Time: 20:21
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. Hell. Even if you dont have a question. But just want another opinion on something let me know. I'll try and give something like a minute to each question/comment. And make it around a 10 min video. Lets see how this works out.
