Live Session #40 (A Good Start To July)

I've titled this post "A Good Start To July" because even though today's session was in June, I have already done a June update - so this session will actually go towards my July tally.

I arrived at The Empire at 7PM with £350 in my pocket but chose to sit down with £300 in chips. There was a very loose player two seats to my left and a tight player to my right. Sprinkled in with these two was another fairly loose player to my immediate left and a few student types who talked the talk and initially looked like they knew what they were doing but, as it transpired, were not really that great; we're talking stuff like raising to £5 from the small blind after about 5 or 6 players have already limped in!

Early doors I just play tight and limp a few hands only to fold to raises. There are a few hands where I raise in late position and these come to nothing but I do notice that the loose player (two seats to my left) likes to call me and just seems to want to get involved with me - I think he has me down as "weak/tight" and, judging by his glances and body language, I also believe that he thinks he can push me around. (We'll call him "Rotund South-East Asian Guy" or "RSEAG" for short.) I fluctuate around my £300 starting stack for ages and then get to the only key hand of the evening:

Key Hand Of The Evening
It's folded around to me in the hijack seat and I look down at A 10 so I bet £8. Of course the RSEAG calls on the button and there is also a call from the big blind (one of the very soft and dodgy student-type players). The flop comes 10 9 2 with two clubs. Dodgy student-type guy checks and I'm happy to raise it to £18 with what I'm sure is the best hand. RSEAG calls and the dodgy student-type folds.

The turn comes a Jack. I'm still sure I have the best hand but I check to show weakness with the intention of calling his raise. His predicted raise is about £25 which I duly call. The river then comes another Jack. This is quite a good card because it means he is unlikely to have another Jack himself - and, due to his very loose play and my read that he is just trying to raise me off the pot, I do not put him on overpairs. I check - and feel sure that if he bets it will just be a steal attempt. He Hollywoods a little bit and then throws in about £78. I figure that this is just NOT the time to ignore my instinct or my read and I say, "I think I have to call" as I match his £78 call bet. He declares that he only has ace high so I show my A 10 for the two pair and to take down quite a large pot which puts my stack onto about £440.

Interestingly, quite a few players at the table (mostly the student-types who have around £70-£100) are surprised at my call but I just tell them that I knew that the villain had had his eyes on my chips for a long time and that I felt he was stealing with any two. I guess they're just not versed in the wobbly-way. Any road, with my image (as someone not to be messed with) and my ego puffed up a bit, I then fail to capitalise and proceed to fritter away about £35 with true, bog-standard weak/tight play. With the time at 10:15PM and not wanting to make a late night of it, I rise from the table and take me leave with a stack of £405 and £105 to the good.

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As I say, although the session did not take place in July, this will have to be chalked up as a July session - A mighty fine start folks!

Give With One Hand... Take With The Other

I know I've written about this before but it really does annoy me and now it's got to the extent where I'm seriously debating whether to deposit any sort of meaty sum into my PKR account at all. I refer, of course, to the hidden exchange rate charge that comes when withdrawing dollars from the online poker sites. For example, here is the sum (in $$s) that I would need to have if I wanted to withdraw £1K from PKR today: 

So far, so good. However, here is the sum that I would have to deposit (in ££s) if I wanted to put the exact same amount of dollars into my PKR account:

In short, I have to deposit £1060.64 to put in X amount of dollars BUT I only receive £1000 when I take the same X amount of dollars back out. Now I may not have a degree in Advanced Maths but even I can work out that all this means that a whopping 6% is being taken away from the player every time this transaction is made. (To spell it out: in this case it's a loss of £60!)

Now PKR always maintain that it's not their fault that these charges exist and that it's the banks who set the rates - but it is as plain as day that some sort of rip-off is at work here - and I'm not convinced that PKR have entirely clean hands in all of this either. Who knows what sort of deal the online poker sites have struck with the banks so that the banks get this sort of traffic in the first place? Some organisation (or organisations) is/(are) making a freakin' fortune here and it's the lovers of the game of poker that are paying up.

Some people wonder why, after Black Friday, $$s are STILL being used as the common currency on the Euro sites. (Maybe it's so that this rip-off can carry on?) I'm sorry but I just can't help feeling a tad resentful for being scammed for £60 just because I want to play a bit of online poker. Isn't paying rake enough!!??

The only redeeming feature that PKR have in this, for me, is the fact that I do get a 30% rakeback deal from them. However, although I do look forward to the odd crumbs that get thrown back my way from time to time I can't help feeling that they get sneakily taken away again with this totally extortionate charge.

JUNE - UPDATE #6

With the last day of the month upon us, we are now half-way through the year. You can visit this post for a brief round-up of my first six months. Today I may or may not play poker but as I want to get my update out there, any more poker I play today will have to go towards my July balance. Before I throw out my update for June I would just like to post a month by month break-down of how my year has gone so far:

MONTH--------LIVE POKER---------ONLINE POKER------TOTAL(MTH)---RUNNING TOTAL

January----------   + £960   ----------------   - £520   -----------   + £440   --------- + £440
February---------  + £740   ----------------   + £60    -----------   + £800   --------- + £1240
March------------   - £230   -----------------   + £810  -----------  + £580   ---------- + £1820
April---------------  + £70   ------------------   - £700   -----------   - £630   ---------- + £1190
May--------------   + £370   -----------------   - £90   ------------   + £280   --------- + £1470
June-------------   + £340   ------------------  + £440   ----------   + £780   ---------- + £2250

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With April being such a disaster, I guess I have to be pleased with the way things have turned around. In saying that, by mid-June, I had made over £1K for the month, was feeling really good about the game and was on target to make it my best month yet this year. Unfortunately as is so often the case in this game, due to that bad beat on the river in my last hand of the month, the rug was pulled from under me yet again and this contributed towards me dropping over £300 in my last 3 live sessions :-(

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As we move into July I'm feeling good about life overall: I have a day off work right now as I'm typing this; I only have 3 weeks left at work before I get my 6 week break; it's the height of summer and it's a beautiful sunny day outside. I even still have Vegas to look forward to this August. Furthermore, with 5 poker-free days behind me (apart from that very brief dabble) I feel in the mood to play me some A-game poker! But before moving on, here is my June update:

ONLINE: JUNE  +£440 /  YEAR: 000

LIVE: JUNE  +£340  /  YEAR: +£2250

TOTAL: JUNE  +£780   /  YEAR: +£2250

Strike Action

Tomorrow, the school where I work at will be closed due to strike action by the NUT over pensions. It means, of course, that getting out of bed tomorrow morning won't be quite so important as usual and consequently a live poker session this evening looks very tempting indeed. I know I wrote in an earlier post that I wanted to keep off the poker tables until the new month but, with the missus still being away in Amsterdam - probably smoking her marijuana on a house-boat somewhere, the opportunity just seems very ripe indeed for a visit to The Fox, Vic or The Empire. If I do hop on the bus and head into town tonight, I'll let you know, as usual, how I get on.

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P.S. I stayed at home, played computer games and watched The Apprentice.

Wackattack Done

I was getting a bit bored of blackjack anyway. Actually, truth be told, after dropping to $81, I withdrew the £30 that I started with and then just freerolled with the last $30. I ended by playing a bit of poker for about £15. I got it all-in good (on the flop) with Top Pair/Better Kicker and then saw the villain hit his runner runner flush to take my last £14 or so:

What a load of balls!

P.S. As this was "freerolling" money won from my blackjack stint, I'm not going to take it away from my online balance, so there. It woulda been nice to have doubled my initial deposit and gotten to £30 though :-(

Oh well.

Blackjack Wackattack: Day 3

Greetings to all from my front room. Well, I can't say I've not been tempted to place a cheeky little deposit into my PKR account to play poker today but I guess I can put it off for a little while longer; especially as my blackjack project is keeping me busy. With 3 days into this project now, I'm starting to see the allure of mechanically placing bets, ad-infinitum, on the same old thing over and over - Christ, I'll be on the slots next!! But seriously, after mashing buttons for hundreds of times, and placing bets of between 10c-$3, I've managed to push my initial $52 deposit up to $89 for a $37 profit! Here's the table at the close of play today:

It just makes you wonder what might have been had I put in $5200 dollars and played the higher stakes table instead! I woulda had to have bet 100 times as much each time but I woulda been up to $8900 for a $3700 profit!! But let's not dwell on that eh? If I can get my balance up to around $100 or so, I'll be able to withdraw £30 and rinse and repeat the process again - and go for another £30! What fun!! Hurrah!!!

Approaching The Half-Way Stage

With the end of June looming up fast, we are approaching the half-way stage of our little journey together. After an enthusiastic start, at the beginning of the year, there have definitely been a few hairy moments on the ride with some violent dips that have made me feel like jumping off. However, with a determination to keep on chuggin' it's looking increasingly likely that we're going to make it to the finishing line as a team.

Admittedly, the online game has been a disappointment. I kind of knew that the online game was getting tougher but I never thought I'd only be able to break-even after 6 months! On a positive note, I still believe that there are enough soft spots at the $1/$2 6-max game to make it profitable. Playing a huge volume of hands is just not a possibility for me but I still reckon, that with careful table selection, I can still turn in an online profit by the end of the year. It looks like I may dabble a little in the PKR cash game battlefield come July.

My Las Vegas trip, in August, is a huge boost to the blog and certainly comes at the right time to give it a good kick. My only uncertainty here though is how I can access the internet, on the strip, on a daily basis so that I can write up daily trip reports. (I also want to review all 20 poker rooms as well but I may have to make notes while I'm out there and write these reviews up when I get back.)

Finally, I have to admit that the live game has been a great and pleasant surprise. It's often said that the live game is softer and I have to say that, from personal experience, this has certainly proved to be the case. With a live game profit of over £2K for the year, after nearly 40 sessions, I have to say that I regularly pine for the real tables and often resent not being able to get stuck in more often.

Anyway, that's my round up of how I view things and how things are going at the half-way stage. I'll still try to keep away from the poker tables (real or virtual) until the month of July so this evening I guess it'll just be a whirl on the weird and wonderful, wobbly and wacky blackjack wackattack!!

The Blackjack Wackattack: Day 2

Just to let newcomers to the blog know, my blog is usually about poker but after a bit of a dry spell at the felt, I've decided to have a break from the game and to try my hand at a bit of blackjack instead. Now I'm well aware that blackjack is a loser's game and that in the long run the money just gets hoovered up by the house. However, to scratch my gambling itch I deposited £32.07 into Paddy Power Poker and I'm going to see if I can spin it up a little bit.

£32.07 got me $52 and, using optimum strategy, I'm placing small amounts on each hand - and larger amounts when I get the feeling. (Total bollocks, I know, but it's all in the name of fun.) Now this originally started at bets of 10c - $1 but after getting into a bit of a pickle I've had to place a few $5 and $6 bets to dig myself out of a few holes. Luckily, the game rewarded me at the right time and my balance now stands at $70 which is a $18 profit. Here is the table right now at the close of play today:

I will continue with my weird and wonderful, wobbly and wacky blackjack wackattack tomorrow (as part of my ongoing attempt to avoid the poker tables) and will keep you posted of my progress. Between you and me, it's probably only a matter of time before I go busto, BUT if I can double my bankroll to about $100, I'll be able to take out around $50 (£30) and can then start again with a bit of freerolling. Oh yeah!

How's The Weird And Wobbly Blackjack Wackattack Going?

Ok, the missus is off to Amsterdam tomorrow with an old friend (it's ok, it's a female friend and the missus assures me there'll no lesbotic shenanigens going on) for a 4 day trip while staying on a house-boat - it's the life of bleedin' Riley for some people! Which means it's gonna be easier for yours truly to nip off to play some live poker. However, with the demons of the last hand still lingering and haunting me from Friday, I think I'm gonna just wait till the new month before I get back in the saddle.

Consequently, to while away the time, I have been (and hopefully will be through the week) employing my Weird and Wobbly Blackjack Wackattack method at the online blackjack tables. This involves using optimum strategy and placing varying bets of between just 10 cents all the way up to around $1.50 at the tables (but placing those bigger bets at moments when I've had a bad run and when it just feels right to place a big one). Lame but great!

After about 50 hands or so, this afternoon, I feel proud to inform y'all that I am up... wait for it... $2!! Here is a screenshot to show the state of my balance at the close of play:

I might have another session later today and I'm sure you'll all want to be kept informed of my progress so I'll keep y'all posted. It's a sunny Sunday afternoon and the day is beautiful. Now where did I put those cans of Fosters?

Top 48 Indie Games On Steam

I have already posted and reviewed my Top 24 Indie & Casual Games that are available on Steam but that was way over 5 months ago and I have purchased a lot since then. As I've added more to my ridiculously large collection (I've bought 115 games now!!) and I'm feeling a bit bored I thought I'd post my Top 48. Steam is a reputable and trusted site where you can download various games. They do allsorts, including the big budget games from the more well-known companies as well as a great selection of quality games from the lesser known, independent makers. These games all cost around a fiver but you can pick a lot up for just 2 or 3 quid:

 There's lots of variety here with plenty of types to choose from. Let's do a quick rundown:

1.    Amazing Adventures Around The World----------Hidden Object.
2.    Atom Zombie Smasher---------------------------Top-Down/Rescue Citizens From Zombies.
3.    Axel & Pixel--------------------------------------Point & Click Adventure
4.    Azada--------------------------------------------Classic Puzzles
5.    Blue Toad: Murder Files--------------------------Classic Puzzles
6.    Braid---------------------------------------------Platform Puzzler (Difficult)
7.    Chainz 2------------------------------------------Match 'Em Up
8.    Clones--------------------------------------------Lemmings Type Game
9.    Crayon Physics Deluxe----------------------------Doodle Game
10.  Death Spank--------------------------------------Diablo Style Hack & Slash
11.  Defense Grid--------------------------------------Tower Defense
12.  Diamond Dan-------------------------------------3D Platform Puzzler
13.  Drawn: The Painted Tower------------------------Puzzle Adventure
14.  Dwarfs!?------------------------------------------Top-Down Dig 'Em Up
15.  Flight Control-------------------------------------Top-Down/Flight Path Control
16.  Hamilton's Great Adventure-----------------------3D Platform Puzzler
17.  Hoard--------------------------------------------Isometric Shoot 'Em Up (With A Twist)
18.  iBomber Defense---------------------------------Tower Defense
19.  Magicka------------------------------------------Diablo Style Hack & Slash
20.  Misadventures Of PB Winterbottom--------------Platform Puzzler (Difficult)
21.  Mole Control-------------------------------------Glorified Minesweeper
22.  Monster Mash------------------------------------Tower Defense
23.  Mr Robot-----------------------------------------3D Platform Puzzler (With A Twist)
24.  Mystery Case Files: Return To Ravenhurst---------Hidden Object
25.  Obulis---------------------------------------------Puzzle (With A Twist)
26.  Oddworld: Abe's Exoddus------------------------Platform Puzzler (With A Twist)
27.  Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee------------------------Platform Puzzler (With A Twist)
28.  On The Rain Slick Precipice Of Darkness-Ep1----Turn Based RPG/Adventure
29.  On The Rain Slick Precipice Of Darkness-Ep2----Turn Based RPG/Adventure
30.  Osmos--------------------------------------------Asteroids Type Game/Absorb Blobs Get Bigger
31.  Professor Fizzlewizzle-----------------------------Platform Puzzler
32.  Chuzzle-------------------------------------------Match 'Em Up
33.  Plants V. Zombies---------------------------------Tower Defense
34.  Professor Fizzlewizzle and The Molten Mystery---Platform Puzzler
35.  Puzzle Bots---------------------------------------Platform Puzzler
36.  Puzzle Dimension---------------------------------3D Platform Puzzler
37.  Sol Survivor--------------------------------------Tower Defense
38.  Swords & Soldiers-------------------------------Tower Defense
39.  Toki Tori-----------------------------------------Platform Puzzler (Difficult)
40.  Tommy Tronic------------------------------------Platform Shoot 'Em Up
41.  Trine---------------------------------------------Platform Puzzler/Shoot 'Em Up
42.  Unwell Mel---------------------------------------Match 'Em Up
43.  Venice--------------------------------------------Top-Down 2D Shoot 'Em Up (Easy)
44.  Voodoo Dice-------------------------------------3D Platform Puzzler
45.  Wik And The Fable Of Souls---------------------2D Platform Puzzler
46.  World Of Goo------------------------------------Control Blobs
47.  Your Doodles Are Bugged------------------------Doodle Game
48.  Zombie Pirates------------------------------------Tower Defense

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Ok, a leaning of favouritism towards platform puzzlers and tower defense games for sure but that's my preference and there it is. A slightly anal post, perhaps, but I'm glad I've got it written down and kept a record of it.

First Blood

In my previous post I whittered on about my switch to playing blackjack for a bit. Now I know I've made some dodgy posts in the past but this just might be one of my most pointless - but hey, I'm gonna post it anyway! Yep, I'm gonna show you my first blackjack hand of my Paddy Power blackjack campaign.

 

I place 23 cents in the circle and look down at A2o. My opponent shows a 6. I throw in a double bet for another 23 cents. The flop comes down a king and I'm feeling ok about my hand. The dealer then turns a 6 and a 4 with a 6 on the river for a busted draw. I take down a 92c pot for a 46c profit AND I'M BACK IN THE GAME BOYS!!

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NOW FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS GOOD AND HOLY AND TRUE AND RIGHT IN THIS WHOLE WIDE WORLD: LET'S DO THIS AND TAKE THIS ONE DOWN! - NOW COME ON!!

Wobble's Wobbly and Wacky Blackjack Wackattack!!

With my yearly poker balance taking a little bit of a tumble last night, I've decided that it's probably best to have a break from the game until the end of the month. (That's the intention anyway, even though it may not be a reality.) However, with a spare £32.07 knocking around in my bank balance, I've decided to put that into Paddy Power Poker. This means I have $52.03 to muck around with. With this money I intend to play a little bit of blackjack. Here it is waiting for me like a demon waiting to pounce and to rob me blind:

I chose the Paddy Power client over the PKR one because the former allows a minimum bet of just 10 cents whereas the minimum bet with the latter is 50 cents. Furthermore, Paddy Power allows you to bet in 1 cent denominations whereas PKR only allow 10 cent denominations. This just means that Paddy Power gives you more blackjack for your money.

With the exception of poker, we all know that any casino game is -ev and blackjack is no exception. I've busted entire $500+ bankrolls in the past playing this bleedin' game! But in saying that I've also turned $50 into $200 as well (by withdrawing in chunks of $50.) If you've never played, you need a blackjack strategy card like this one which basically tells you what action to take based on your hand and the dealer's upcard:

 
If you just have this up next to the blackjack table while you play (or a similar one that you can get from the internet in accordance with the subtle rules each site uses for their blackjack game) then you're on your way. But please note: with or without a guide you're going to lose at blackjack in the long run anyway (unless you know the strategy inside out and are able to get away with counting cards in a live casino). Still, the guide can still tip the edge a little bit your way as long as you apply it religiously and do not deviate from it.

If you bet the same amount each time and never withdraw or bank what you might win then you're eventually just going to lose - it'll take a long time but you WILL lose. What I do is just vary my bets a little bit by placing higher bets after I've lost quite a few hands in a row. It's still lame (I know) but if you can get on a good run and then actually withdraw some winnings, you CAN give yourself a fighting chance and beat the game in the short-term. 

The problem (apart from becoming addicted and suffering from the delusion that you can actually beat the online blackjack game in the long run) is that you will eventually go on a losing run of over ten, twelve or fourteen or so hands which will inevitably wipe out your entire bankroll. In an attempt to counteract this it is important to bank some of the winnings (get the winnings out of the site and into your bank account) so those winnings do not become vulnerable. Once you've got the winnings out you may want to keep a little bit on the site so that you can attempt to rinse and repeat the process again. And that's it; Wobble's Wobbly And Wacky Blackjack Wackattack!

So why am I advocating blackjack and continuing to play it after stating that I've lost $500+ in the past and that it's clearly -ev!? Well, poker is all about patience along with not allowing yourself to get frustrated even when the patience and sound play doesn't get rewarded. Sometimes, a player just needs a release away from all that stress but the gambling itch still lingers and needs to be scratched. Blackjack offers that escape and as long as the money gambled remains sensible and is not seen as a quick-fix way of winning back lost poker money, then it's not a bad stress-busting solution.

I'll let you know how I get on with my $52.03.

Live Session #39 (Steaming At The Empire)

Tonight was just one of those nights I'm afraid. It's nice that I haven't written about a big loss in a long time but tonight was one of those maddening nights where you're reminded of just how damn painful this game can be.

It started off at The Fox with the £33 freezeout which ended up being a non-descript and non-eventful affair. I got no premiums and no opportunities and busted out midway through. This was followed by an hour session at the £1/£1 cash game table where, with much the same junky hands coming my way, I finished with a £16 loss.

With the time at around 11PM and £50 down on the night thus far, I thought I'd try to make amends with a visit to The Empire. Things got off to a bad start here as well. Bringing £350 to the table I soon end up paying off a tilted short-stack who throws in his last £28 on the small blind after everyone else has limped. I call him with A 10 and he flips over A J to take down the pot. Soon after, I look down at QQ which is something I haven't seen in yonks. I re-raise a mid-stacked early position raiser from her £12 up to £28 and she puts all the rest of her £65 in. I really can't get away from it and I make the call only for her to flip over KK and to take the pot.

With my stack down to about £200 I manage to fight back and build it up to £280 but then I donk off about £60 with an ill-timed bluff. (Funny how 6 2s can look so nice sometimes.) Then comes the hand that sends me home. It's limped round to me on the button and I look down at 5 5. I tank for a bit, really wanting to thin the field but I eventually elect to just limp myself. The flop comes 5 7 7 for a flopped full-house. I raise it to £12 and get the one caller from under-the-gun. The turn comes a jack and after the UTG player checks I bet £40 which he calls. I'm pretty sure he has the 7 at this point and I line up for a huge river bet which I just know he will call BUT plans get completely scuppered when the jack hits the river!! With the board reading 5 7 7 J J the UTG player checks again (bad play on his part) and I slam my pocket fives face up in disgust cos I just know what's coming next: yep, he shows the 7 x for the rivered higher full-house and takes down the pot!

At this point I just can't take it any more and I scoop up the remaining £165 in chips and storm out. This is just one of those hands that you just can't get out of your head as you travel home but the only consolation is that I managed to read my villain correctly and got away from the hand on the river. After getting dealt junk and folding hand after hand for hours on end it's frustrating when you finally get a hand like QQ only for it to run into KK. Also it's just plain ugly when a flopped full-house gets beaten by a higher one on the river! Down £235 on the night but still happy with my play, it's all a little disappointing and I'm thinking of taking a break from poker until the end of the month.


Jesus!!

We're Off Again Tonight

I tell you, I just love the summer months. With just 4 weeks to go now until my 6 week summer break and with the sun shining bright in the summer sky, I'm feeling really happy with life at the moment. Also with 7 hours of live poker under my belt this week - and only £15 down after a terrible run of cards over that period - I'm feeling good about taking myself to the felt this weekend.

As I've said before, despite being down over a few sessions, as long as I feel like I'm playing my A-game and that I have an edge at the table then everything is hunky-dory. Tonight, I plan to take myself off to town yet again. It could be an MTT at The Fox or I may stick with my Empire £1/£2 cash game campaign. If it's the former then I feel the drinks will be flowing for sure but if it's the latter, we're talking sober sober sober.  Whatever it'll be: bring it on boys!!

Live Session #38 (Stuck At The Empire)

It's Thursday evening and I've just got back from a very short session at The Empire making it my second midweek trip of the week. I got to The Empire at 6PM  with the intention of playing no longer than 4 hours cos the midweek late nights just kill me for the next day at work. I plonked myself down on a very quiet and serious table with a full £400 buy-in. I recognised one good regular player two seats to my right and there were just two or three other semi-competent players.

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It's early doors, I look down at A7 in late position and just limp along with a few others. The flop comes A 8 6 and someone bungs in £8. There is a call and so I just smooth call to see what happens. The turn is a 6 and it checks all round. I elect to check as well which may sound weak but I was still very new to the table and just feeling things out. The river comes another 6 and the early position flop raiser plops in £13, mid-position folds and I snap call. I show my A 7 and take down about a £30 profit as the villain mucks his hand... And that's it! Apart from one or two limps, I fold the rest of my hands for the entire session. 

I get dealt no pairs, no suited connectors, no AK, AQ or AJ. Just junk for the next hour and a quarter! In fact, the best hand I got dealt was A 10 (UTG) and this just hit the muck. The three or so LAGs at the table made it difficult for me to get any sort of grip and I never really got the opportunity to mix it with the soft spots either. So there you have it. £25 down after a 5 hour session on Tuesday and £10 up tonight after about 2 hours of folding one hand after the other. Who said cash game poker was exciting!?

Live Session #37 (A Midweek Crack At The Empire)

So yesterday evening I took the plunge and tried a Tuesday evening session at The Empire. For a start, although the standard of play was generally better than weekend evenings, there were still plenty of soft spots - and I'm not really as put off about midweek evening sessions as I was.

I arrive at about 7PM and take out £250 in chips. I'm seated at a tough table and immediately ask for a table transfer. Early doors I look down at KK, in late position, and raise it up to about £10 but get two callers from the button and big blind. The flop comes 6 7 8 with two spades and I don't like it. As I recall, I weakly check the flop but call the button's raise after the big blind folds. I check call the turn for £36 which is a 9 and which might well be my biggest mistake. I check the river which is a 10 and the villain throws in a large £140 bet. It's early doors; I'm looking at KK with 6 7 8 9 10 on the board and an aggresive villain who's representing a highly improbable JJ but who could have been semi-bluffing the flop with 10 J (of spades?) or the turn with JQ. Hell, he may have even made a set but just wants to push me off the pot to take it all for himself. The villain is obviously a good aggressive player who knows how to play the button. I just don't think it worth making the call and so let the hand go and my stack already has a £60 dent. Perhaps it serves me right for playing the KK so weakly but I was new to the table, was out of position, was looking at a fairly scarey board and had no real reads.  

I get the table transfer soon after that and begin to feel a lot happier about the table I'm on but then get involved in another chip-dwindling hand. I look down at JJ in early position and zonk £12 into the pot. I get four (count 'em, FOUR) callers. The flop comes 7 8 2 with two diamonds and I bung in another £30 into the pot. Mr Clueless calls on the button and Mr Competent chucks in another £80! Ok, so I read him for the set and fold my hand; two more diamonds appear on the turn and river, and lo and behold Mr Competent flips over two 8s for the flush. Yep, he did make the set on the flop so I was right to fold but I can't recall whether one of my jacks was a diamond but it doesn't matter; I played the hand fine and made the right decisions.

I may have played the hand fine but, after topping up for another £50 for an effective starting stack of £300, I proceed to go card dead. My stack gradually goes down to £200 and then, after about 3 or 4 hours of play, I'm down £150 and by around 11PM have just £150 in front of me. The competent players continue to take chunks out of a big fish at the table who gets felted often and then buys back in for £100 each time - but there is just no action for the most important person at the table.

Hand #1
Luckily, my patience is rewarded with two hands that help me to finish with a respectable stack for the evening. The first of these is where I'm holding A K and see a wonderful A A x flop. Yep, there are two clubs on the board but no matter. The villain in this hand has about £70, holds an ace himself but with a rag that doesn't connect with the board. He pays me off with his stack and I'm back in the game.

Hand #2

The time ticks on to about midnight and I start to feel tired. With about £220 in chips and in early position I look down at AA. I zonk it up to £14 and get two callers from the cut-off and the button. The flop comes K K 8 and two diamonds. I check with the intention of check/raising and I tell myself that no one has got the king or the flush draw. Cut-off man checks, button boy throws in about £25 so I zonk in £75. Cut-off insta-folds and button boy goes into the tank. The more he talks the hand over in his head, the happier I'm feeling about the hand and he eventually mucks. He tells me that he held 9 9 so I congratulate him on making a good fold.Yep, my check on the flop WAS risky but the game's all about risk innit?

--------------

All told, I cashed out £275 which means I was down £25 for the session. As I was very tired by about 11PM, card dead and down to £150, I have to be happy with the way things turned out. Unfortunately, getting back home at around one thirty in the morning does NOT make it easy to get up for work the next day!

Midweek Live Session?

Live poker, just like online poker, generally changes its dynamic according to the time of day and, indeed, the time of week. It may be hard to demonstrate or prove but casual players generally tend to take to the felt in the evenings and at weekends. Put all this together and the most lucrative time to go out for a nice catch would be Friday and Saturday evening with Sunday thrown in as well.

This view is also borne out from personal experience where my past midweek visits to the poker room tend to be very sober affairs which are tinged with a seriousness that you rarely get on a Friday or Saturday night. Recently though, with the longer and brighter days and with the summer sun hanging in the air, I've often travelled back from work considering how nice it would be to go on a midweek evening trip to The Empire or The Vic.

In the past I vowed never to try my hand at midweek live poker preferring instead to keep it to the Friday, Saturday or Sunday night but I'm really tempted to give it a go either today or tomorrow - and to even make it a regular thing for a while if it proves a success. Now this may sound a bit weird but the vibe I get from the missus before I go out is often important to me when I leave for a live session. If she clearly disapproves of me going out for a session then I really think this can sometimes interfere with my balance. If she is positive and genuinely wishes me luck, then I feel a lot better and I reckon I do better.

I've mentioned the midweek thing to her and she initially questioned this, precisely, by saying that I had already resolved not to do midweek sessions due to players being better and blah blah blah... However, on putting it to her again, she suggested that maybe just ONE midweek session might not be so bad after all. Therefore, I think either tonight or tomorrow I'll be putting in that one midweek session and seeing how I get on.

The only downside, of course, is that I'll need to soldier into work the next day and if I'm still in the poker room at 11PM or even as late as midnight (with a horrible 50 minute - 1 hour journey home to contend with), this could really put me out of whack the following day.

Anyway, I'll keep you posted...

Gold Members+ Freeroll Freezeout

Every month PKR hold freerolls for members of their VIP loyalty program. For any gold member and beyond, we get a $5K freeroll - and yesterday I finished high enough to be awarded $31.50!! Now, as I had already cashed out my entire June balance, $31.50 was my total balance.

Tempting though it was to try to spin this up at the blackjack tables, I decided against this and plumped for some $0.10/$0.25 poker instead. After shifting this up to close on $40, I made a terrible call against someone who completed their runner runner flush and plummeted back down to around $12. A bit more duckin' and divin' and wheelin' and dealin' later, I pushed this back to $20.

So as I write now, on Monday afternoon, my PKR balance currently stands at a whopping $20.

P.S. Mini PrimeTime Monday for $5.50 Let's do this.

P.P.S. WIPE-OUT!!

June Experiment Complete

With the self-fulfilling prophecy of doom that I've brought about for myself after all my previous brag posts, I've naturally succumbed to a not-so-good session this afternoon and, as such, I'm knocking my June experiment on the head. I've cashed out exactly the £440 profit that I've made this month and this puts me on exactly break-even point at online poker this year. That's ok, I can live with that.

The final hand that did it for me is the one you're about to see as a hand-history below. It would look much better as a sixth street screenshot (try saying that quickly) but I forgot to hit the "Prt Scr" button at the time so you'll have to make do with the hand-history:

(P.S. I accidentally cut off the last bit but you get the idea.)

Of course you could question my passive flop play but I make no apologies - checking a set is standard on a rainbow flop and I was drawing to a full-house as well. With Aman going all-in on the turn the money is going all-in anyway. Still, it signals the end of my online stint for June, but I'm not really complaining; I've managed to achieve my goal.

As I sit here with my cream cheese bagel and Dorito and dips for Sunday afternoon poker then, it looks like it'll be the freeroll freezeout for Gold+ members on the ol' PKR site. I've got around 30K in PKR points as well so that'll put me up for a few Masters Stage 2 satellites so at least I can keep my hand in for a little while longer.

As it happens, everything is still tickity-boo; my live balance and online balance are on nice round figures (albeit a fat round 0 for the online game) and I reckon I need a break from poker for a little bit anyway. It just means that I'll be spending more time levelling up my mage and playing time-wasting computer games instead than actually working on the "proper" game of poker but hey-ho, we all need a break once in a while innit?

Live Session #36 (Freezeout Bad / Cash Game Good)

Yesterday afternoon I took myself off to The Fox Poker Club for their £38 freezeout. Arriving at 5PM I registered for their tourney and then (armed with the latest copy of Stacked sent to me by the good people at PKR) took myself off for a mini pub crawl of the pubs in the surrounding area. I knocked back 3 pints; making a big saving on the prices they charge at The Fox and loosening me up a little bit. I then headed on over to The Fox for their 7PM start. With solid play and sound ABC poker I worked my way up to the final 3 tables and was doing ok but crashed out, when down to about 8BB, after going all-in with A 10 in the cut off and getting the call from the button who held 9 9. With no help from the board, that was that.

It was a good, pleasant evening although a little hampered by some seriously slow play at the tables with some folk taking a bleedin' age to make a decision. I still find it bizarre that so many players take it SO seriously but there ya go. Needless to say, I fought off the boredom by purchasing some aneasthetic in the form of bottles of Peronis. This got me into the "sweet spot" of allowing me to loosen up my table talk a little bit but did not hinder my game.

One plus for The Fox occured, though, after a player spilt my entire bottle of Peroni all over the floor. With just a "sorry" and nothing else, I felt a little aggreived that he didn't offer to buy me another. Feeling slightly tilted by this, I asked the waitress if she could replace it with a complimentary bottle and she said no, so I asked if she could ask her supervisor. The supervisor actually DID show up, told me that they didn't normally replace spilt drinks, but did get the waitress to bring me a complimentary bottle! That's a PLUS ONE for The Fox!!       

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Anyway, after a quick reconnoitre of the £1/£1 cash tables, I decided a trip to The Empire was more in order and once again, this lovely place did very well for me! I plonked myself down with £280 in chips and hammed-up the drunk guy image a little bit. (Actually, I had consumed about 5 pints so was in a slightly daft mood anyway.) With some incredibly loose play and a few players just finding it hard to fold any sort of hand preflop I managed to get paid off a little bit for my good hands and left the table with £350 and a £70 profit (£30 profit on the night). Not a huge result but not bad.

Three observations:

1) In one hand against a fairly loose player (who was a young lady of South-East Asian origin), I held a good two pair and threw a £20 bet in on the river  knowing that I had her beat. All I told myself was to act a bit funny but NOT to make eye-contact. I had played against her in the past and knew that if I made eye-contact she would likely fold. I then STUPIDLY glanced at her while she was making the decision and made direct eye-contact for a split second. The moment was enough and she insta-folded. This type of interaction is what puts the live game well ahead of the online game and is just what I love about it - but why the hell did I go and have to glance at her right at that moment!? Grr.

2) A comment about miserable dealers: if you are a dealer and you smile occasionally, look like you actually enjoy your job and generally respond to players in a positive way then I will tip you all day long. If you are a miserable git, grumpy or clearly have favouritism for some players over others then I wonder if I should really tip you at all.    

3) For those of you wondering where my poker winnings go then I'll tell you: the winnings, what little there is, go to my non-working 18 and 19 year-old daughters who need to dye their hair, put credit on their phones and drink while socialising with their friends. Sometimes I wonder who the mug really is in all of this.

A Mid-June Update (Green Green Green)

I know I've been blowing my trumpet a lot this month but, then again, if my return to online poker has been all about winning sessions then waddya gonna do? Still, I'm a bit annoyed with how things went in yesterday evening's session which, after a really good start, had me messing around with some questionable plays and saw me ultimately end up $30 down :-(

Yesterday, I allowed myself the luxury of withdrawing my initial £600 from my PKR account  - which leaves me the $800 profit to play around with. Now the danger, of course, is to consider this net profit as "freerolling" money - but we all know that this is the wrong way to view it. My intention is to carry on playing for a bit (at any level up to $1/$2 that tickles my fancy) and then to withdraw and bank the entire lot (for June) as soon as I feel I'm starting to play badly. Yes, this may look like a "stop-loss" mentality, which I spoke out against in an earlier post, but the point is that we all need a psychological pick-me-up once in a while - and to register a good online month, this month, is what I need to get my head and mental strength back into the right gear and into a positive frame of mind for the future.

As I sit up here in bed on a Saturday morning and review my month so far, the big psychological line for me at the moment is the break-even point at the online game which is currently hovering £40 below me. Of course I don't want to fall below this but at the same time (as I wrote about in a previous post) I don't want it to become the all-powerful safety net that permeates my decision-making process either. So I think the best thing to do is to take a short break from the online game and to devote myself to some live poker over the weekend.

Ok, so as I've hit the £2.5K mark for the year, I'm going to throw up my stats for the month and for the year so far. Hitting a milestone is always a nice feeling and good for morale but also, in the cut and thrust world of poker, could also be a short-lived affair - so I may as well just revel in the glory of it while I have the chance:    

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ONLINE: JUNE(So Far) +£480 /  YEAR: +£40

LIVE: JUNE(So Far) +£560  /  YEAR: +£2470

TOTAL: JUNE (So Far) +£1040    /  YEAR: +£2510

Live Poker Tonight

Everything is going hunky-dory for me at the moment. It's Friday afternoon here at work which means I'm out the door for the weekend in about 2 hours time. Online poker is going really well for me as is the live game and overall I'm up to well over £1K in profit for the month. Not only that but it's payday today! Oh yeah!!

So with everything going smoothly, a trip into town tonight for some live poker action is in order. This brings me to the "type" of game I should be going for. Well, I've been doing pretty damn well in the MTTs at The Fox recently so their £33 freezeout is a definite possibility. I've got a pretty strange image there as the wild, drunk nutter - who tips generously - so I could play around with this for a bit of fun.

Then there are the crazy £1/£2 games at The Empire. This will involve staying off the booze for a more sober approach but with a £300-£400 buy-in the variance will be wilder. Finally there is the middle ground and the £1/£1 cash games at either The Golden Nugget or The Vic (or maybe The Fox - depending on the vibe). This game has been quite comfortable so far this year and is a fairly "safe" option so I'll just see where the mood takes me.

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P.S. The time is 4:10PM and I've just arrived home. I'm feeling pretty knackered and the weather is damn awful so I'm going for one of my afternoon siestas. I'll see how I feel about my above plan after I've woken from my nap.

P.P.S. Ok, I've woken from my nap with the time at 6:10PM so that rules out the 7PM freezeout at The Fox. The weather still looks pretty gloomy so I may even knock the Friday evening live poker idea on the head completely but I'll see how I feel over the next hour or so.

Happy Chappy

It must be so boring sometimes for the pros to hear low-limit players going on about their little $40 victories one day and then their little $20 losses the next. When you deal in 1000s of $$s and 1000s of ££s each day or week and have a mind on the long-term goal with 5-figure sums in mind, it must sound pretty pathetic hearing Little Johnny $5 Sit 'n' Go man going on about his "bad run of seven (count 'em SEVEN) non-cashes" or his "brilliance" at managing a run of 5 cashes, in a row, in an afternoon session.

But this is the thrill that us amateur players seek. This is what we love about poker and what keeps us coming back to this mind-fuck of a game. This evening, for about four hours, I was breaking-even at the $0.50/$1 game with ABC poker. I was actually thinking of just cashing out my winnings, chalking up a winning month online, and knocking online poker on the head for the month. Nothing special was happening as I was just chugging along as usual, but then I hit a lovely run which has put me up $250 on the night - and I just wanted to share the joy that us struggling players can experience. This hand occurred after I was already up $100 in an earlier session:

 

Ok, so the preflop raiser was getting frisky so I thought I'd throw a curve-ball in and play it cute with a call on the button with KK. However, the other villain's crazy/small raise on the flop practically telegraphs to me that he has the trips - but I still can't really fold anyway for $16.50. (Yes, of course, these are poor odds to hit my two-outer but I have great implied odds if I do hit my king and - hell - he might not have the 2 after all.) So when that king hits on the turn it's happy days baby!

P.S. You have to be questioning his play anyway here. He calls in the small blind with 82o(!) and he's not really going to get me to fold on the flop with that raise. An all-in move on the flop would certainly have had me thinking.

And The Dip Goes On

Getting the money in good against mediocre short-stacking players is a large part of what profitable cash game play is all about. But when those mediocre players keep hitting their cards, after you've manipulated it so that they put all their money in on chasing those unlikely draws, it can get a little disheartening.

After my stratospheric start to the online game this month, it was only going to be a matter of time before variance was going to turn round and strike me down. Over the last couple of days, I've endured a few bad beats at the hands of average players who are hitting their draws and, sure enough, my bankroll has taken a bit of a hit. A bit of a bummer really. The main thing, though, is that I'm still playing fine and with the odds generally stacked in my favour.

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As we've been trundling through the week, I've really been considering taking myself off for a few mid-week evening live poker sessions at The Empire. With the tourist season in full swing, work getting a bit boring and with the sunny weather upon us I've been thinking that this really isn't such a bad idea. Unfortunately, I've just been so tired at the end of the day that a late-afternoon siesta has been in order when I've arrived home; meaning that by the time 7PM arrives, it's just too late.

Yeh, I could bus it and tube it out to Leicester Square to start an 8:30PM session - but that means an arduous late-night journey home and makes the next morning's "get-up" extremely difficult. (And facing students on the next day, after a big losing session, is just pants!) Furthermore, with these thoughts hanging over me while I'm actually playing, I just think it'll be difficult to sustain my A-game standard of play throughout.

Nope, unless I just jump on the train and head on down to Charing Cross straight after work, it looks like it's just weekend poker for me - for the time being at least.  

The Stop-Loss Mentality

Playing poker with a stop-loss approach is where you tell yourself that you'll stop playing as soon as you hit X amount of cash or chips. It takes many forms but essentially it's a strategy to limit or minimalise any losses that may be incurred. A stop-loss limit may be brought in after a big winning session or sessions (to "bank" those hard-earned chips) or it can be put in place to stop losses spiralling out of control or getting any worse than they are already.

I have to say that I've certainly been a proponent of this mentality in the past and have often written about my self-imposed stop-loss amounts. However, I'm now starting to understand that controlling things in this way is really just a short-term plan that has no real positive impact on the long-term scheme of things. In fact, if anything, I think that imposing these types of limits is restrictive and stunts that part of us that should just loosen up and play free A-game poker.

I remember sitting in The Empire one day and looking down at £825 in chips after having spun that up from a starting stack of £400. Nothing had significantly changed at the table but I remember looking down and telling myself that I was not going to let this stack go below £800. (Doubling-up your starting stack just sounds so nice doesn't it?) The consequence? I just threw away decent hands, in position, that I really should have played - and for the stupid reason that I'd fall below £800 if I called big raises or raised myself!! Needless to say, I just limped and called small raises for a few hands before leaving when I hit exactly 800. Stupid.

In future, as soon as I find myself even slightly thinking along those lines, I'll either get up and go for a walk - or I'll be scooping up my chips and just getting right outta there. (In the above case it woulda saved me £25!)

Conversely, imposing a stop-loss limit to curtail loses is just as daft when you come to think about it. Why? Because it just encourages negative thinking. Rather than just playing A-game poker and trying to win money (as you should do), metaphorically speaking you just end up looking over your shoulder (or downward) at the trap door or safety net. You play, almost expecting to fall because you've put the safety net there for your protection and "it's not going to hurt" very much. A totally rubbish way of thinking.

So this post is really about convincing myself to take the shackles off and to look up towards the light rather than down at the dark. I mention this because I could have stopped playing the online game as soon as I hit £440 this month and banked a nice profit for June and been happy at breaking-even for the year. Then again, do I really want to enforce a self-imposed ban on myself of a game I'm currently enjoying? Ah, no, not really.

So, yeh, having dipped yesterday, I'm up only £380 for this month and now looking at a £60 deficit for the year. Should I let this bother me and put up some kind of stop-loss limit to smooth things over? No!

Let's play poker!!

Another Hole, Another Climb

We all knew, did we not, that as soon as I rejoiced at breaking-even at the online game I'd be knocked back down the hole - and of course, that has been the case after my first hand of the day. It occurred after this brilliantly played hand by the bumble (Or maybe it was me who played it badly?):

Classic.

Mission Accomplished

I know, I know, poker is all about the long haul, I know this. But today is a momentous occasion for me. At about 9PM today, I managed to finally pull myself up and over and out of the hole at last. Yes folks, I have broken-even at the online game for the year and I'm actually UP to the tune of £10!! I know this all may sound a bit petty an' all but it just feels nice to acknowledge that I can still weave enough of the wobbly magic to survive the online game after all. Here is the hand that tipped me out of the mire and into the sunlight to glory:

 

Let's do this...

 

Ok, so for deception I just cold called the flop bet. It was probably the right move cos my villain is sitting with two pair and may have raised my re-raise to make it difficult for me to chase the straight. The turn brings me the second nuts and it's just a case of extracting. I guess, with the villain insta-calling my river-bet, I could possibly have gone for a pot-sized raise for a bit more coinage but I suppose I should be happy with the outcome.

What really annoyed me though was that soon afterwards this sorry sight happened: 

 

You see that? Don'tcha just hate it when this happens? That's a folded flush hitting the muck preflop with a player going all-in on the flop. (He raised it $10 pre.) In the words of Jim Bowen, "Just take a look at what ya woulda won!" Grr.

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Tomorrow, Monday morning, it's back to work - I've had a great weekend of poker so I'm gonna call it a day there and just bask a little in my break-even accomplishment. I just hope this post won't trigger any sort of doomswitch but you know what it's like.

Chug Chug Chuggin' Along

With a $1K deposit made last week and with a view to playing just the $0.25/$50 cash games at PKR throughout the month of June, things have developed very much in my favour thus far. The plan was to attempt to clear away some of the £440 online poker deficit this year and, with a few unplanned forays up to the $0.50/$1 and $1/$2 limits, I have achieved much of this goal by making a cool £400 through the week. It means that after playing just around 1.5K hands this month I am now just £40 down for the year.

Coupling this with my live game action for June, and winnings of £560, I am having a great month. (I just hope I haven't jinxed it with this post.) Interestingly, it's the low limit games, where I'm playing 50NL games or less, that are hurting me the most. Here is my PokerOfficer graph for the cash games I've played on the laptop that are between 4NL and 50NL:

So that's a $114 loss. On the other hand, here is the PokerOfficer graph for my 100nl-200nl games that show a $745 profit:

Both graphs show that I've played around 600 hands in each and although it's a very small sample size, it doesn't take an Einstein to work out where I really should be playing. Actually, this analysis chimes in with stats from earlier sessions in the year (and last year as well) which simply shows that I just shouldn't be playing games below 100nl.  

Anyway, I'm still feeling a bit groggy from the Friday session so they'll be no more live game action this weekend. I think it'll probably be a case of a few small buy-in online MTTs for a change today.

Live Session #35 (Too Much Beer and Tipping)

It's all very well turning up at The Fox and getting hammered but it's starting to cost me a lot in both beer AND tips. When I've had a few I become far too generous. I must have bought at least 12 bottles of Peroni last night but the thing is, I order them in twos along with a pint glass (cos I prefer to drink out of a glass) and let the waitress keep the change. They are £3.70 each which means each purchase costs £7.40 altogether but, with the tip, that means I'm throwing away an extra £2.60 a time - that's £10 a shot and that mounts up! I also tipped £5 at the cash table after I won my only pot of £10 (I only played a few hands between breaks in the freezeout) and I tipped £3 to one of the nice dealers who gave me a straight on the river in the tourney. Why the hell am I giving away so much of my money!?

Anyway, the tourney itself was another success with a seat on the final table and 5th or 6th place ( I can't remember) for a £210 payout and a £180 profit! I'm actually a bit annoyed at myself - not for being totally pissed (I kind of played on auto-pilot), but for crippling myself for going all-in with A3 on the button against someone who insta-called with AQ. That's the second time in a row that I've stupidly gone all-in with Ace/rag on the final table and got caught out. It's got to stop. Also, in retrospect, I was actually chugging along very nicely and really felt that the game was there for the taking - so, yeh, maybe the beer did get me into trouble but there again maybe it actually helped me get to the final table in the first place! Who knows?

On a sour note (and I make no apologies for mentioning this on my blog) I was a little bit taken aback right at the very end of the evening when I cashed out my chips. As I say, I played very few cash game hands during the night but broke-even and had £200 in chips to cash-out. When I handed it over I was short-changed £10!! When I started to frown and look closer at the cash the staff member noticed his "mistake" and said, "Oh, sorry, just testing you." Well, I don't know about you but I don't think you should ever "test" your customers when it comes to money. Anyway, I just went "hmmm" and took my money - and I'm not convinced it was good-natured on his part.  He could see I was heavily under the influence and I wonder if he was trying to take advantage of the state I was in.

It's strange, cos a few weeks ago I was overpaid £5 by the cashier (different person). That time, I pointed out the mistake with the throwaway comment, "honesty is always the best policy." Now maybe I'm just being paranoid but it does make me wonder what sort of little game they're playing to be so inaccurate with counting out cash. Anyway, I don't remember much at all about the journey home last night but slept like a log, as they say in The Beatles' song, and I woke up this afternoon with only £100 more than I left with which means I must have spent a bloody fortune on beer and bloody tips last night! Now let that be a lesson to you and let that be a lesson to me as well.

My June Experiment: Story So Far

Well, after playing just over 1000 hands this month, my "June Experiment" has turned out not to be so "experimental" after all. Rather than sticking to the plan of playing just $0.25/$0.50, I've ended up getting just a little bit bored of playing at those stakes and have moved up to playing a lot of my usual $0.50/$1 or $1/$2. On my PC I've played about 200 hands of break-even poker (I can't be bothered to get up and check the exact figures) while on the laptop I've played this:

7 hands @ 4NL
23 hands @ 10NL
2 hands @ 25NL
449 hands @ 50NL
389 hands @ 100NL
82 hands @ 200NL

And here's my PokerOfficer graph from the laptop:

Of course my jackpot hand from yesterday gave me that nice boost and, with £300 to the good thus far, we seem to be on the right road.

Ofsted Done; Now Onto Parents' Evening

It's 3:30PM and the school day is all done along with the Ofsted inspection. No inspectors came to see my superb lessons but there ya go, that's how it is sometimes. In half an hour I'll be up for the last parents' evening of the academic year and by the end of the day I'll be shattered but will definitely still need that pint for sure. I've done a pretty good job so far of avoiding the ball-busting parents but I think they'll be the odd one or two out tonight on the warpath.

Of course, the main annoyance with all this is that they'll be less time for me to play online poker tonight so it'll probably be some B game play at nl25 or nl50 at around 10PM or something. After yet another stressful week at work I'll need to unwind come tomorrow so it's looking very likely I'll be up for some small buy-in MTT action at The Fox on Friday night. Jeez, maybe I'll go right on ahead and make it another one of my tipsy "sod-it" sessions.

Another Parp On The Trumpet

The last time I did a brag post about hitting the £2K mark it was way back in mid-March. Unfortunately, my fortunes changed after that where, by the end of April, my balance had plummeted to a not-so-good £1.2K. Fortunately, with the help of solid live game play and a jackpot hand today online, my poker balance, this year, has risen back up and surpassed the £2K mark once again. (That's 3 months of break-even poker baby!) The milestone was revisited today after a 3-way all-in at a $1/$2 online cash game which brought me in a net profit of $336 (~£200) which is my biggest online pot of the year so far and which ended like this:

A great one for the album, for sure, but I thought I may have been done for when that spade hit the river. For anyone interested this is how the hand played out:

No worries, the rainbow flop means I can slowplay this no problem but I need to be careful if the board pairs:

My raise on the turn to inflate the pot was necessary to put my opponents to a decision. It's nice because it serves two deceptive functions: (1) It looks like a squeeze play and (2) It looks like I'm making a move with fold equity while holding a flush draw; that's maybe why we had an all-in from r0b. The all-in on the turn by Spnage with bottom two pair has to be questionable play, with such aggression before him, but does vindicate my decision to slowplay the flop. Nevertheless, I was very happy to see the chips come my way by the end of the hand. In fact, I managed to end this particular session with a very respectable $575 or so.

So there it is. I guess I just can't resist a little $1/$2 when I get a little stuck at the low stakes games but at least online poker is doing well for me for a change. Now, as I said before, last time I did a self-congratulatory post like this my balance took a nose-dive. Come to think of it, I bemoaned the fact that I had a parents' evening the next day as well and waddya know? I got a parents' evening tomorrow. Well, at least it's the last one of the year - maybe this time I should just go right on out and just try to enjoy it.

Inspection Time: No Pressure

After surviving a redundancy process last month and learning that my job is still safe come September, it's a case of out of the frying pan and into the fire on the first week back after half-term with an Ofsted inspection.

This is where a load of inspectors descend onto the school and snoop around inspecting things. They can visit your classroom at any moment so you have to be prepared and be on your toes. Today I planned for and delivered three fantastic and awe-inspiring lessons only to be visited by ZERO inspectors.

Bloody typical. There is a possibility of being visited for one of my lessons tomorrow - that'll probably end up being the dud and when I get the bleedin' visit but there ya go.

Lessons are a bit like poker hands when it comes to long-term evaluation. You have good ones and excellent ones, bad ones and average ones along with those that go horribly wrong. But essentially if you're good at what you do, you get the job done well enough and head in the right direction.

So judging whether you're a good or bad teacher on one lesson is a bit like judging whether you're a good or bad poker player based one hand - a bit silly really.

Love and Hate For Bacchus

Bacchus has visited me and has taken hold of me once again. Our school was told there's going to be an Ofsted inspection on Wednesday and there's a parents' evening on Thursday and it's 1:30AM on Tuesday morning and I should have hit the sack by now. Bacchus is reminding me of the PKR Social and this beautiful song that came over the speakers while we were playing:

"Sweet Child Of Mine" by Taken By Trees.  Lovely.

Here's another one I often play when Bacchus pays me one of his many visits ( a bit more testosterone fuelled)...

"All These Things That I Have Done" by The Killers.

Bacchus (the one that sent those women into a frenzy in the woods and made them rip that fella apart limb from limb): I love him, I hate him. Gotta love Apollo for the music as well though but none of them beat The Producer.

Vegas - My New Itinerary

Ok, it's all mapped out. In August I hit Vegas for an 11 night trip and plan to visit all 25 casinos between Mandalay Bay and Wynn. Five of them don't have poker rooms but I still plan to pick up $1 chips from each of the 25 places for my collection. Now after a few enquiries, the good people on the 2+2 forums have eased my concerns about playing $1/$3 and sitting down at the $500 maximum buy-in games. As such my "Vegas 14" idea has been scrapped and now it's just about visiting all the rooms in the first 4 days, playing just a little bit, and thereafter deciding to play wherever the mood takes me.

As always the following list is colour coded with casinos in the south of the strip being in green, casinos in the central being in orange and those in the north of the central area being in blue:

Night 1 (Wednesday 18th - Thursday 19th)
After touching down in Vegas at about 2PM, it'll seem like 11PM to me so after checking in at Harrah's I'll need a sleep. I plan to sleep as much as I can until the evening when I can start my first exploration. At first I'll hang around Harrah's to get my bearings and then it'll be off for a walk to the south end of the strip to scope out these places:

1. Mandalay Bay

2. Luxor

3. Excalibur

4. New York-New York

5. Tropicana

6. MGM

I enjoy walking (especially exploring new places) and as this will be my first night, it'll be more about sight-seeing and recovering from jet-lag rather than playing poker. It seems like those in the south end of the strip are not that great for poker anyway, hence my decision to head off to this area first. MGM appears to be the best place for poker out of all these so if I'm not too knackered, or have a burning desire to play, I'll take me a seat at MGM for a few orbits.

Night 2 (Thursday 19th - Friday 20th)
On the second night it'll be time for me to play some proper poker sessions. It won't be time to jump into the big fancy rooms just yet so I plan to visit the cheaper rooms on the eastern side of the road first:

1. Harrah's

2. Imperial Palace

3. Flamingo 

4. O'Shea's

5. Bill's 

6. Bally's

7. Casino Royale

These are all fairly close to each other, generally allow lower buy-ins and may possibly be softer than the bigger games in the plusher establishments. This area sounds good as a relatively gentle introduction to the Vegas poker scene.

Night 3 (Friday 20th - Saturday 21st)
By now, I'll be into the swing of things and it'll be time to visit the more sophisticated poker rooms. It'll be the weekend, and no doubt busier, but despite what the 2+2 people say, I still think I need to be on my guard about jumping into a pool of sharks at these places:

1. Wynn

2. Venetian

3. Treasure Island

4. Mirage

5. Palazzo

6. Caesars Palace

If I've still got cold feet about playing at these so-called "tougher" places I can still return to some of the poker rooms I visited on the second night or even wander back over to the MGM.

Night 4 (Saturday 21st - Sunday 22nd)
This will be time to visit the final batch of poker rooms and if I haven't got my feet wet by playing proper sessions in any of the big rooms so far, then I'll definitely be diving in today. The last on the list are:

1. The Bellagio

2. Aria

3. Cosmopolitan

4. Monte Carlo

5. Paris

6. Planet Hollywood

Cosmopolitan and Paris don't do poker which means, out of this batch, Planet Hollywood is the only place on the east side of the road that does. I'll visit Planet Hollywood first, pop into Paris followed by Cosmopolitan for my souvenir $1 chip and then it'll be onto the final three poker rooms. It means that I'll probably save The Bellagio and Aria (arguably two of the best) till last.

---------------

After I've got a general feel for all the places, it will then be a case of playing where the mood takes me during the rest of the week. As I say, I'd love to do trip reports while I'm there but I still need to find out about internet access and where the best places will be to blog.

Breaking Even In Bad Beat City

It's Sunday afternoon and I've had a few online sessions of about 300 hands in total. It's been a case of playing a little $0.25/$0.50 but getting bored with that and moving up to $0.50/$1 pretty sharpish. It started off good at the end of Saturday evening when my graph looked like this:

However, Sunday morning was pretty bumpy and now my graph looks like this:

I'll show you the two hands that caused the drop. The first one is just a bog-standard cooler where the villain hits his three-outer on the turn:

HAND 1

Looking good baby...

Oh. Not really much I can do about that one.

HAND 2

Still, we play one hand and then I get dealt the ideal hand where everyone on the table will have me pegged as possibly steaming:

 

An all-in on the turn may have got a call from my villain anyway but my turn bet was pretty poor on my part and was always gonna get a call by someone on a flush draw. Also, a final check on the river was more in order. His check/raise all-in on the river should have sent alarm bells ringing and I should have thought more and read him for the flush based on the post-flop action and saved myself $20 but there ya go. I played this hand pretty much as badly as AA could have been played in this situation. 

So hand number 1 is a bad beat to a three-outer and hand 2 is a loss to a runner runner flush after flopping a set of aces (albeit played like a true donk)!

Nope, this game doesn't drive you mad at all.