Journal of a Poker Pro
boom, $3k day (well, $2971, but yeah)
+1.5k bonus cleared today, so lets call it a cool $4500 :)
I'm a bad blogger, I know.
But I have lots going on at the moment, so this has kind of fallen off my priority list.
I'm grinding every day, trying to reach 500,000 vpps, which gets me a $5,000 bonus. I'll make it, I'm like 7200points away.
I'm also moving to the phillipines in a week or so. Kind of random, I know. Should be a fun change up though.
This month sucks, and I may end up being down in cash games at the end. Thankfully bonuses will put be somewhere between $5-7000.
I'll do the numbers next week, and reflect on the year in a later post.
I guess there wass only one way to follow up my biggest hand ever, and it was with my biggest session ever.
Without including bonuses and/or rakeback, I'm 99% sure this was my best session ever:
5.5hrs, 5387hands, $2,381.
This helps my pathetic month tremendously. :)
This month has been a pain. I've been running pretty bad and breaking even for the month not including bonuses. Sucks.
Thus, no recent updates. I'm just waiting for the month/year to end and I'll re-evaluate from there. Grinding has been really annoying, especially while not making any money.
SOoOo, I took a shot at some 600NL and 1000NL and things went... well, check out the hand:
Poker Stars, $5/$10 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
MP: $342.25
Hero (CO): $1,010
BTN: $1,105.50
SB: $990
BB: $460
UTG: $1,000
Pre-Flop: Q
Q
dealt to Hero (CO)
UTG raises to $35, MP folds, Hero calls $35, BTN calls $35, 2 folds
Flop: ($120) 4 Q
A (3 Players)
UTG bets $75, Hero calls $75, BTN folds
Turn: ($270) J (2 Players)
UTG bets $200, Hero raises to $640, UTG raises to $890 and is All-In, Hero calls $250
River: ($2,050) 8 (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
Results: $2,050 Pot ($3 Rake)
Hero showed Q Q (three of a kind, Queens) and WON $2,047 (+$1,047 NET)
UTG showed A J
(two pair, Aces and Jacks) and LOST (-$1,000 NET)
Ship my biggest pot ever. It was my 3rd hand at the table I think and I obv hit and ran. :)
Today was the weirdest poker session I've ever been a part of.
First, I played 7,000 hands. Which is probably the 2nd most I've ever played in a day.
But every big hand I got all in with,went terribly, and I ran ~$1200 below expectation. Yes, 6 buyins below expectation.
But whatever, I played really aggressively and took down a lot of mid-sized pots without going to showdown. And I mean, A LOT. It was fun.
So somehow, I managed to eek out a profit for the day:
lol. Yeah, I managed to win ~$1600 which is probably in my top 3 best days of the year.
If I ran at expectation today I would've made like $3k, which would've crushed my best day ever in cash games.
Oh well, can't complain. I was even for the month before this, so it feels great.
David “Chip” Reese, the three-time World Series of Poker bracelet winner, longtime cash-game star, and member of the Poker Hall of Fame, has died. He was 56.
Too bad, he was a great player and seemed like a nice, genuine dude.So I played a bit on sunday and got killed. I was up early and played/busted out of the sunday million after 3hrs. I just didn't feel like grinding and was down about $700 so I quit early. Probably not a good idea b/c I have to play sooo many hands this month.
Almost every big downswing is from $400NL. Omahahaha:
some flips for $80
Tournaments:
12 played for a net loss of ($308) --I didn't cash ONCE.
Pokerstar Bonii:
$4000 Milestone bonus
$1500 VIP bonus
November Net profit: $9,569.70
----------------------------------------------
Year to date: $65,119.58
$10k month? nope.
gay gay gay.
The month started out so promising, with visions of going on a tear. But I've been ice cold for the 2nd half of the month.
I was actually at like $12,000 for the month 3days ago, but have managed to lose an average of $1k/day since. Most of this was playing $400NL, where I've had some bad luck.
I ran really well at $200NL and piss poor at $400NL this month, which is a bad combination IMO.
These results are sort of preliminary. My new laptop should be here any minute, so incase I have anouther database disaster I have my results here at least. I might take tommorow off anyways so whatver.
December should be a grind. I have to play about 40% more hands. Yuck.
But with my new laptop, I should be able to multi table better, and be able to use my buddylist as well. +EV.
Hopefully I can finally crack that $10k mark in december or I should probably quit. lol. Still my best month of the year, but that isn't really saying much. I'm pretty disapointed with my results thus far :(.
One of my buddies here is a pro boxer. Anyways, he's preparing for his next fight and he films all his sparring sessions. So the other day he's sparring and this happens:
He's the one in the white headgear
So yeah, end of the month is upon me, and I'll be back in a few days with my numbers. Barring any unforseen downers, it should be my best month of the year... possibly ever.
There arn't too many places in Korea where you can find good collections of English books.
However, inside the CoEx mall (which is about an hour away from me) is the biggest book store in Korea.
So when we make the trip, me and my friends stock up on a bunch of good books, and then trade them around. I bought a bunch myself, and wanted to discuss one in particular.
I skimmed through the new release section, and picked up "Unlimited Power", by Anthony Robbins. I had always heard good things about him, and I have an interest in psychology, neuro-linguistic programming and hypnosis. So I figured I'd check out his newest book.
Turns out it's not new at all. I think it was published in 1986 actually. But regardless, it has been a great read.
I would urge poker players to check it out. It basically teaches you how to run your own brain. How to 'lie' to yourself, and choose the state you wish to be in. It's a great way to eliminate tilt.
Outside of poker, one thing it helped me with immediately were my sleeping habits. I've often had trouble falling asleep, because I can't seem to 'turn my mind off'. I've always been pretty analytical, and sometimes I drive myself nuts. I remember once when I was a kid just lying in my bed, literally thinking about what to to think about. Anyways, nothing has changed.
I'll constantly be thinking about what I did that day, what I have to do tomorrow, poker, relationships, whatever. Sometimes it's really annoying because I need to sleep. Well, this book has taught me how to turn that voice off. Within minutes I'm asleep.
The applications are endless really, and its a good read for anyone interested in improving yourself, your poker game, or simply your life in general.
Last couple of days have been meh. Break even over last 6k hands. Whatever. I'm still at ~$10k for the month. I made a sexy graph a few days ago before this, and that's what I'm posting :)
(click for a better look)
My buddy Brian just bought a new dog. It peed on me.
All is well on the pokerfront.
The month is only 13 days old and I'm already having my best one of the year.
I'm not even running that well to be honest, but at least I'm not running bad.
Not much else is new around here. My girlfriend randomly decided to buy me a new phone which was sweet. The phone I was using was a peice of trash (bought it used when I first got here), so it's a nice step up. It's nothing super balla, but all I use it for is txting anways so whatever. I tried to find a pic oline but failed.
Oh and I think I'll get a new computer next week too. Probably head over to the electronics market and browse some stuff this weekend.
Time to throw out a few 'thank you's to some random people who've helped my out with shit this week.
Bryan - Thanks for making the new header and fucking around with it until we got it right.
Dan - Thanks for your help with the computer stuff. I've been tweeking my system and the links you hooked up were a great help. It seems like I need more RAM though -- I'll check it out this weekend. If not, I'll probably bug you again soon if I end up getting a new comp. :)
Chris - For hookin me up with the XP disk and listening to me bitch most of the weekend
Hyejin - For helping me out with the chair and shieet, sometimes I don't know how I'd get anything done here without you.
I've been pretty much breakeven since I reinstalled everything. But my $4k bonus clears soon, and then a $1500 right after that. So that will make for a sweet month regardless. I'm gonna grind hard all month and hope for the best.
Alright, so I'm back online after a weird weekend.
My girlfriend came by late Friday night, and we just decided to have a quiet night in. She was gonna stay over, and then spend Saturday with me. This obviously means no poker.
So I figure this is a great chance to format my hard drive in the hopes of speeding this beast up.
I backed everything important up to my external hard drive, and begin the process.
Long story short, 5 hours later I realize I'm an idiot and who formatted his external hard drive instead. So yeah, everything was gone. All my pictures, all my albums, all my poker stuff... everything... gone. Some of the stuff was irreplaceable like my old sets from when I DJ'd back home.
So I quietly freak out, as to not wake up my girl, frantically trying to think of any way I can recover my data. I must've told myself I was a morAn a million times. I felt so stupid... like I can't even explain. And I'm not clueless with computers -- I've formatted ~5 different comps, so it made me feel even worse.
I couldn't think at that point so I just went to bed.
This story has 80% of a happy ending though. I managed to find a few programs, and was able to salvage ~80% of the data. Most of what was I lost was albums, which unfortunatley included some of my irreplaceable music. My poker database was also corrupted (I think I may have just backed it up improperly), but I requested all my hands from Stars and should get it in a day or two.
I'm still a retard though. This pretty much led to a lot of extra work, and put me in a grumpy mood for the weekend.
Comp is running smoothly though now, and I'm thinking it should be able to handle the extra load (though I havn't tried yet).
If it still doesn't work out I'll use Dan's suggestion and just pick up some more RAM. I just wonder if it'll be difficult to find RAM for an HP laptop in korea? meh
Anyways, so yeah... I'm a retard, but I have a nice chair. Or at least I will soon. I just ordered the DuoBack Chairman DR-130:
It's supposed to be pretty awesome, and I've read a million good reviews about it. Seeing as I'm gonna be plopped in front of my computer all next year, I figure its a good investment in my health.
Finally, Nate asked a question in the comments about my setup. I'll probably take some pics when the new chair gets here. But yeah, I have an additional monitor where I keep the lobby and any other programs running. I play all the tables on my 17" laptop with tonnes of overlap. It's kind of like 4 stacks of tables, but slightly off centered which saves me from a lot of misclicks. No neck problems really, I usually wont even have to move my neck... just dart my eyes around.
I generally just drink water and listen to music. Once you start putting in long sessions, it just sort of gets easier. I've heard from lots of people that 5minute breaks every hour help out. I usually only stop to use the washroom, but then again, I'm a retard.
Well, I was all geared up to give 18tabling a shot today, but it didn't quite work out how I planned.
While I think I can easily handle the speed, it seems that my computer can not. I was getting crazy amoutns of lag with 18tables, so I cut it down to 15 which was OK. But I had to close down all other programs other than my HUD and winamp, which I simply can't do without.
I managed to play 6hrs w/o a break and got in 5,298hands (booked a nice $800profit too).
So I dunno what to do from here. I think I'm gonna format my computer and see how it reacts. If it's still slow, I mgiht just buy a new desktop.
This last week has been good to me, averaging ~$700/day. Ah, if only I could keep this pace up :)
As some of you may know, I play 12tables at a time.
Why 12tables? Well, because it's the maximum allowed at pokerstars.
The cap is in place so people don't slow down the games too much.
Well, as of this morning, the cap has been extended to TWENTY FOUR tables.
wowwaweewa
24 tables is just insane... I don't think I could play well on that many tables. 16-18, I can see myself doing though.
So this development has me questioning what my plans are for next year. I could stay at 1-2NL and grind out 150,000hands a month (If I can comfortably play 18 tables, this is only 30hrs/week) and essentially guarantee myself $100,000 net profit for '08. If I run good it could even be closer to $200,000.
OR do I cut down on tables so I can concentrate, move up, improve, and try to make it to high stakes NL games where I could conceivably be having $50k+ months.
Basically, do I play it safe, or do I shoot for stars?
Cash Games:
Hold 'em:
54,998 hands for $3,141.75 [$40.30/hr]
Omahahaha:
22 hands for $403 [$1,209.00/hr] :)
Tournaments:
7 played for a net loss of ($389.50)
Pokerstar Bonii:
$1500 VIP bonus
October Net profit: $4655.25
----------------------------------------------
Year to date: $55,549.88
I guess October was a pretty good month overall. I took ~2weeks off, and still managed to book a decent profit. I ran well below expectation, and was on the wrong end of a sick amount of set vs. oversets and other various coolers. But I'm not going to dwell on that. Let's hope those are out of the way and the tables are turned in November.
I'm actually looking forward to the next 2 months, and hoping they're huge for me.
First off, I'll be getting the $4000 and $5000 bonuses from pokerstars. Secondly, I'm mixing in some higher limit games into the mix.
My hope is to put together back to back $10,000 months which should be pretty doable if I put in the hours. Shouldn't be tough as I'll have lots of time to grind. My g/f is busy with work/school and the weather is starting to get cold so I have less desire to get out and party. That doesn't leave much else to do but hibernate and play a tonne of poker. :)
My guess is I'll end the year ~$80,000 profit, which is a little dissapointing in all honesty. But I'll take it. If I can play and run well at $400NL, and other games... I suppose $100k is possible.
My goal growing up in highschool and univeristy was to ONE DAY make $100,000/yr. A nice number that would allow me to live very comfortably. Plus it's just cool to say you make SIX FIGURES! Haha, anways it would be awesome if I could accomplish it my first year out of school.
Here's hoping....
edit:
Oh and happy b-day to my dad, on this happy halloween... have a good one!
Well, I've been back from laos and it was good a time.
Generally the people are super friendly, but there isn't a hell of a lot to do. There are only a few clubs that go past 12pm. We basically ended up relaxing all day and getting cheap massages, and drinking all night.
As far as relaxation goes, it was pretty good.
Pretty sceneic palce as well. Here's an idea of what you could expect:
Also cruised down the nam song river in intertube for a few hours which was really beautiful to see. I don't have my own video, but this will give you some idea.
Alright - I'll be back at the end of the month wiht my pathetic numbers.
peace
I came across this new website that was just released called askwiki.com
Basically, it lets you ask questions of Wikipedia and does some natural language processing to find the answer.
It gets most basic questions about poker and some that aren't so basic
"What is poker?"
"When was David Sklansky born?"
"Where was Daniel Negreanu born?"
"When was the World Poker Tour founded?"
"What school did David Sklansky go to?"
It even gets "How big is my dick?"
I went to everland with my girl the other day. It's a great amusement park/zoo in korea.
Fun rides, good times, blah blah blah, masturbating monkeys:
Sorry my video skillz are lacking, but the vid is awesome nonetheless.
Also, I decided to go to Laos on wednesday for no reason other than that I can.
Well, the end of the calender year is drawing closer, and it's time to make a push.
I'm certainly way off the ambitious goal I set for myself at the beginning of the year, which was $200k. lol.
I suppose if I played as much as I had planned (I should end up at ~50%) this might have been possible, but as it stands I should come up pretty short (barring any surprise tournament win or something).
I will probably also come short of the ultimate goal I set at the beginning of my blog, which is to earn $100,000 in one year.
But I'm thinking positively about the next coming months. I have a game plan, and am hoping to pull in about 30-40% of my annual income in the next 82days.
This will be largely in part to the $4,000 and $5,000 bonuses I will be reaching(stars supernova milestones), and the other 5 $1500 bonuses I will get while reaching those. So that's $16,500 right there, plus whatever I make at the tables. I'm hoping to at least match that and grab a cool $33,000 before the year end.
Actually I guess there is nothing cool about the number 33,000, but it's fun to say regardless.
So, this means playing 3000hands/day for the rest of the year -- 246,000hands. Shouldn't be a problem at all.
There's an interesting poker movie out called "the big blind".
The acting, directing, soundtrack and cinematography are all pretty incredible.
I didn't think anything would be able to top rounders, but this movie definitely has the potential.
Check out this scene and I'm sure you'll agree
Anyways, I'm off to go watch it again.
First things first, I have to give it up to Pokerstars for a sick-good event.
Incredibly well run, and they took really good care of thier players. Being at the event has made me really want to play some more.
That said, I didn't cash in the main event. I've never played any tournament with such a slow structure, and maybe I didn't adjust as well as I could've. But then, maybe I'm just being results oriented.
I lasted about 8hours into day 1.
I got involved in about 4 memorable pots, and didn't take down a single one. I think I played them all out of position too, but I couldn't really help that.
The table was full of unknowns.
The first hand I got involved in was with JJ in the SB. I still had my starting stack, which was 10k. BLinds were 25/50 and the Hijack raised to 150. No real reads yet, but I bumped it up to 550 which he called. The flop came AQx, I fired a continuation bet of $1k which he called. I shut down and check/folded the turn.
Next hand, blinds still 25/50 I think. Same guy as last hand raises to 150 from late position. The small blind calls him, and I squeeze to 650 with AQ. Open raiser folds, and small blind calls. The player was really weak from what I had seen, but was a nice guy Canadian who had qualified for $1. I figured I'd be able to take it away on most flops without resistance.
Flop came 9 high, and I bet 1200. He doesn't think long and calls. The turn pairs the 9, and he donk bets into me for $2k. I pretend to think a bit and fold.
I have about 6500 now, and pick up AK in MP. Blinds are 50/100 now. I raise to 300 and get called by the button.
Flop was Q high, 2 spades. I fire 500 into the flop and get snapped called, which makes me think he has spades. The turn is another spade so I bet again because I'm smart. I bet 1k and he thinks and raises me to 4k. I pretend to think again and FOLD and am now on tilt because I get no respect.
So I have ~half my stack now, but still lots of room to work with. And now I have a laggy/weak image as I had been opening more pots than anyone else at the table.
So naturally, this is the perfect time for the tourney director to come and move me to a new table. sonofahyatctchcuihcicici.
He brings me to my new table, and things perk up as he sits me a few seats away from Joe Hachem. I'm not really concerned or anything, actually I'm pretty excited about the whole thing.
I hung out with Joe a bit the night before at the pokerstars party, and he seemed like a nice enough guy. So obviously I say hi to him as I sit, but he ignores me which puts me on even more tilt. Now not only do I have a shortstack, but I get to find out nobody likes me.
Joe played pretty well, except that he limped a lot of pots. I guess it was because he could get away with it as the table was pretty weak tight. He limped when I was in the big blind a few times, which allowed me to lead at a few pots and slowly build up my stack. I managed to climb back as high as 8k, but no further.
Eventually I dwindled back down to about 4k when blinds were 150/300. Some older asian dude who had been active raised to 900 from MP. I pushed on the button with 66. He thought for like 5 minutes which made me happy and then calls with AKs. WTF DUDE SLOWROLLZZ YOU HAVE 20K IN CHIPS.
Flop KKx, turn A, gg me.
All in all it was fun. Met some cool people and learned a thing or two.
What was more fun was the cash games afterwards. I destroyed 2/5 and 1/2 for the next 3 days for $3,000 and like 1,000,000 gin and tonics.
Anyways, since I've been back at my apartment things have been shitty. A bunch of my friends are in trouble, and some left the country. Plus my Internet has been out for 3days (just came back today) and my fridge is broken.
FRIDGE RANT:
Ok so I come back on monday and open my fridge, which is warm and very smelly. I leave it because I'm lazy and deal with it on Tuesday.
So I call the technician and he comes and says the compressor is shot. $180 to fix. Whatever, it's 5yrs old and these things happen. Plus it's not mine so I get my g/f to get hold of the landlord so she can fix/replace it.
Keep in mind that in 14months, I've never seen/spoken to/asked for anything from my landlord. Also that I had $100+ worth of groceries in there, which I've had to toss out.
SO yeh, the real estate liaison says that the owner will be VERY angry to hear about this problem, and that is my fault for damaging the fridge. Also, in the 5yrs of this building, there has never been a problem with any fridge. OH REALLY? As an employee of an electronics chain for 3years, I can sort of smell the bullshit here.
Anyways. She gets hold of the landlord, and now she wants to come and look at it. Why in the world does she need to see the fridge? Is she a fridge expert? The technician said what the problem was, told her it was not my fault-- so just deal with it please.
It's just really annoying that she doesn't believe me and that everyone assumes its my fault. Isn't it totally standard to have to make repairs to your place? And shes going to come in, and say things I wont understand, and she wont understand me, so it's just going to be a mess.
whatever this post is way too long, eff it im going to sleep.
Cash Games:
52,940 hands for $1,624.70 [$20.18/hr]
Live Games:
~25hrs for $2,941.24
Tournaments:
17 played for a net of ($2921.74) includes APPT buyin+$500 event
Pokerstar Bonii:
$125 Reload bonus
$3000 APPT package
July Net profit: $4769.20
----------------------------------------------
Year to date: $50,894.63
Thank god I crushed live cash games so hard or the month would've sucked.
There's a slim chance I cash $5500 in bonuses next month. Fingers crossed.
Well, this will be the last post I make as a grinder.
Next time you hear from me, I will have won the APPT Seoul event and be ballin with an extra $200,000 or so. :D
I'm leaving tomorrow morning to make the casino my home for the next 4days. If there was ever a time I needed to run good in my life, it's this weekend. ONE TIME PLEASE.
I haven't played much at all this week in preparation. It's 추석 (Chuseok) (the equivalent to thanksgiving) here in Korea, so all my teacher friends have had the week off. Obviously this just spells trouble, but we've had some fun times.
The tourney starts on friday at 2pm local time (1am EST). I hope I can get some live games in before that. Maybe tommorow I hope. Though I wont have a tonne of time, because Pokerstars is throwing a party for thier sponsored players on Thursday night. Should be fun. Joe Hachem and Isabelle Mercier are going to be there (they're playing in the event), so I should get a chance to meet them. I'm going to try to befriend Hachem so that maybe he'll give me some money. That would be awesome. Anyways, I'll get some pics.
You can follow my progress at : www.appt.com
GO ME
THis month sucks. People stressing me out, and not making much money.
WHATEVER.
APPT tournament is in a week. I'm excited.
There are 2 other sub events, $500entry each. I'll play both if I get knocked out of the main event. Hopefully I can play a lot of cash games as well.
Hopefully I can make some money this weekend.
As far as those championships I mentioned, well I just won the 4th event, which was heads up NLHE. It was the first NLHE event, which I dominate of course. :)
I'm like 8/28 overall at the moment, with 4 events to go. Hopefully I can win that and keep the $500+ in my account fromt he entry fees.
PEEACE.
I was doing some thinking about 'fake-misclicks'.
This is basically when you have a very strong hand, and make an abnormally sized bet. This is done with the hopes your opponent will sense some kind of weakness and try to push you off your hand, or call you down with a less marginal holding than they usually would.
Anyways, I was thinking of some ways you could exploit people in this way and came up with something pretty sneaky.
Now, I'm sharing because it wont really work well at my limits -- it's much better at 25NL or 50NL. This is just an idea, I don't nessecarily advocate using this! It's an angle shoot, and probably not very moral.
Also forgive me if this is painfully standard, as I havn't played these limits for some time.
Now, in order for this to work, you need to have at least 101bb's at the table. It's also ideal when you have a few limpers in front of you.
So let's say you're playing 25NL and pick up AA on the button. Two limpers toss in thier .25$ and its to you. Instead of making a standard raise, you now raise to $25.25.
When it gets back to the limpers (or even the BB), they will see the option to call "$25", instead of "$.25".
Also, when you raise, you're only putting 2 chips in (the $25 and the $.25 chip), just like if you were minraising (2 $.25 chips). This is the key, and why it wont work as well at my limits.
It's very easy for your opponents to mistake this raise for a simple min-raise, and call off their stack with trash. Hell, you might even get two callers with your aces!
I havn't tested this, but I think it could interesting. Let me know what you think.
On a similar note, I cam across an interesting story someone posted on facebook. Another interesting angle shoot that I found funny:
"So, I was playing at the MGM Grand's finest $1-$2 no-limit Texas Hold'em table, and, after about 2 hours, was sitting about even, when I get dealt Ace-King of spades on the button. Two guys limp, I raise to $12, and one guy--from now on, Crazy Asian Guy--calls. The flop comes down Ah9s2c, a good flop for me. Crazy Asian checks, I bet $15, he calls. Turn card is the 6 of spades, which gives me a potential nut flush draw. Crazy Asian checks again, I bet $20, and fully expect him to fold. However, he surprises me by just flat-calling again. Turn card comes and it's the Jack of spades, which gives me the nuts with an ace-high flush. Crazy Asian guy--after two straight check-calls--surprises the hell out of me by betting $20 (in 20 $1 dollar chips... remember this, it's important)! At this point, there are only two possible hands he can have: Either AJ (so the jack gave him two pair) or pocket jacks (so the jack gave him trips). Since I have the nuts, I don't really care either way; I'm just thrilled he's betting.
At this point, my only question is how can I get as much money as possible out of him. I doubt he'll call a huge re-raise with the 3-flush on the table, even if he has trips. On the other hand, I'm almost sure he'll call if I just reraise it to $40...but I'm pretty sure I can get a little more out of him. I'm close to just putting $50 in the middle, when I decide to get tricky and do the greatest move in the history of poker.
I let out a big sigh, and start acting like I might fold my hand. I go back-and-forth, and start calling out his possible hands ("You called all the way down with Ace-Jack?" etc). Finally, I say "OK, I'll pay you off" and count off 20 chips... 20 of my 5 dollar chips, so I'm actually re-raising him to $100. I count them out, throw them in the middle, and say "I just have the ace; you have two-pair, right?" and show him my ace of spades (but not the king, of course!). Crazy Asian Guy doesn't show, of course; instead, he looks at the dealer and says "He just raised it, right?". Dealer says yes, and at this point I get pissed.
"What are you talking about? I just called his $20." Dealer points out that I put out 20 $5 chips, and I start complaining again: "But I never said 'raise'! If I don't verbalize a raise, it's just a call!" Dealer informs me that that's not the policy, and I say "This is bullshit. Where's the pit boss?" He calls the pit boss over, I plead my case, the Pit Boss confirms the dealer's decision, and I sit back in my chair with a pissed off look on my face, mutter "such bullshit" under my breath.
Crazy Asian Guy thinks about it for like half a second and calls. I turn over the nuts, and he throws his cards off the table (ace-jack, as I thought) and calls me an asshole and says he hopes I burn in hell. I grab the now almost $300 pot and give him my biggest shit-eating grin.
Poker is so much fun."
Someone told me that this move isn't original, and that Phil laak apparently pulled it off in a really deep game for A LOT more money. Not sure though, and this is the first time I've heard of this, so there it is.
I've had a couple rough days at the table. But the bright side is I've found a new release for all that stress.
Guns:
I had no idea there was a shooting range in korea. I headed out with a couple friends to lotte world (biggest indoor amusement park in asia... maybe the world? not sure). They've got a skating rink, roller coasters, a huge department store, movie theater, shooting range, bowling alley, folk museum, water park, tonnes of restaurants and stores... it's HUGE.
Anyhow, at the range they had tonnes of handguns to shoot and we rocked them hard.
I shot a glock 9mm or something... I don't know anything about guns except that they're fun. My accuracy was 40%, which the guy said was terrible.
Then we hit up some bowling, where I bowled an aggressive 157, which is unimpressively my best score ever.
So after knocking a bunch of things over, putting holes in things, and lots of loud noises, I'm officially cured of my tilt. :)
Event #2 of the championship is tomorrow -- I hope I can final table it again, and hopefully take the win.
I don't think anyone wants to mess with me anyways --
Thought I would post this for some of my korean friends to find out WTF is going on in this video:
LOL
Also, we had the first event of the full ring championships this morning. I did OK -- made the final table but ended up busting out 7th... which puts me in 7/28 place overall after one event.
It was a limit hold 'em event which I hate, so hopefully I can do better in the next ones.
Event #2 is pot limit omaha, aka, crack. The game is lots of fun because it has lots of gambool to it -- I'm sure it will be one of the quickest tournaments in the series.
Finally, I've been doing some experimenting with shortstacking. This basically means buying into a table with 20% of full stack. The idea is that you can exploit loose raisers/callers pre-flop, and not have to make many decisions after that.
I've been doing this at 3/6--10/20 and have had decent results over a small sample. (+$500 or so). I don't think it's something I would want to do full time, but it has opened my mind a little more to how short stacks play. I'm gonna keep at it for a while, and try to learn and improve.
It will also give me insight into how some of the higher level players are playing, so I can handle them better when I eventually run into them.
Not much going on these days. Just playing a lot (~30k hands this month so far) and trying to get prepared for the big APPT event.
Also, I organized a championship/challenege for a bunch of people on my forum.
It consists of 8 events, and the person who does the best overall wins all the entry fees (should be about $5-600, depending on how many people show up).
Should be interesting because I've never played any of the different types of poker seriously.
#1 Limit Holdem - $5 (tuesday sept 11, 20:00 EST)
#2 PL Omahaha - $5 (thursday sept 13, 20:00 EST)
#3 Stud 7 - $5 (tueday sept. 18, 20:00 EST)
#4 NLHE Head Up - $5 (Thursday sept 20 20:00 EST)
#5 PL Omahaha H/l -$5 (Tuesday sept. 25 20:00EST)
#6 Razz - $5 (Thursday sept 27 20:00 EST)
#7 HORSE - $5 (Tuesday, OCtober 2 20:00 EST)
#8 NLHE - $5(thursday, October 4 20:00 EST)
All events are on pokerstars if anyone wants to sweat (private tab of the tournament section -- listed as FRC Event #x.
I'll post updates as I go.
I have about zero things of interest to post.
I"m running good this month, +2k or something. Other than that, enjoy this video and the series. I've seen t before, but dude is funny.
Better late than never right?
Well, I got back a week ago, and it was a great trip. I've never really been on a vacation this long with my girlfriend before, so I was a little worried, but it worked out beautifully. We got along really well and she is a great traveller. I've heard horror stories about koreans abroad, and she definitely didn't fall into line with those stereotypes.
We showed up Friday night in Bali at about 11pm. We didn't get to the hard rock hotel until about 1am. Densapar airport was a mess, and it took sooo long to get through all the loopholes.
But whatever, someone from the hotel picked us up at the airport, we got there, checked in, and headed up to our room. We selected this 'honeymoon' package because it was good value, and it was a good decision. They kept doing little romantic things for us all week.
Such as, the bed:
(those are rose pedals btw)
(me rockin' the jetski)
(nice lobster I choose, was awesome)
(hindu temple)
(hindus cleansing body and mind)
(me chillin' with my boys)
What a month, what a month...
Lots of positives, lots of negatives. I'll just start with the numbers:
Cash Games:
49,947 hands for $826.49 [$10.40/hr]
Tournaments:
19 played for a net of ($562.94)
Pokerstars Bonii:
$3000 milestone bonus
August Net profit: $3263.55
----------------------------------------------
Year to date: $46,125.43
So what can I say about this month?
Well, first -- it's my 2nd worst month money-wise (april was $2002). I could've tacked on another $1500, but I'm saving up my points for the APPT in September. Even still, that wouldn't have made it that great.
But I don't really feel bad about the whole thing. I played well, and just ran terribly. My all-in income ended $1688.84 below expectation, ran my KK into AA waaay too much, and I only had ONE set over set all month. lol
I also went really deep in a few big tournaments, but couldn't win my flips when it counted. A few things go differently, and I could be talking about my best month ever right now. :)
But anyways, despite everything I still managed to come out on top, which is a good feeling.
Plus, I've been on 2 vacations this month and am feeling really good with life.
Anyways, time to look ahead.
September.
BIG month ahead of me. I'll be playing in my first televised tournament, so I'll have to get some practice in. I'm going to play more tournaments online and try to get some live games in as well. I'm expecting first place to pay about $200,000. I could put that to good use.
Goals:
200km on my bike.
75k hands online
Win tournament :)
funny video for no reason:
sorry no update or trip report - I've come down with nasty cough/cold. My g/f is sick too, so it must be something we picked up in Indonesia. I hope it passes soon so I can start hittin the tables hard.
August is going to be an ugly month, I know it. I've been getting shit luck (running abbot $2000 below expectation in all-ins) and getting coolered every which way. I'm down $2k or something for month. Bad timing consdiering how expensive my vacations were. Whatevvver. I'm not even phased. It'll turn, I'm sure of it.
Trip report to come, i swear. Until then, I posted my pics on facebook -- if we're friends there you can check them out.
Just got in from Indonesia a few hours ago. Trip was pretty sweet overall.
I'll have a bit of a trip report with pics tommorow if I get the time.
Well, it came down to the last day, but I managed to accomplish both goals I set out for myself a month ago. Most of the details of my challenge are HERE, but I suck and changed a lot of things along the way. So sue me :)
The first goal wasn't tough, but just required me to get into a routine. It also helped that I was losing money, because that always motivates me to put in more hours. 71,593 hands total, and I made a whopping $554.55. I've been on a sick downswing, so that's hurt my numbers. Whatever, it's about more than double that if you count bonuses.
The next goal was a lot tougher. I'll tell you, it's alot easier to play poker hungover than it is to ride an exercise bike. I put in 35km today alone just to reach the goal. I just got out of the shower actually. But it's done, and I can enjoy my vacation looking a little better.
I'm down to 86.8kg and 28.4% bodyfat. That means I've dropped 1.8kg and 1.6% fat. Not bad, but hopefully I can keep up my regimin.
So yeah, I'm off to BALI BABY!! Can't wait, I'm so pumped. I'll be back in a week with some pics. But I'll leave you with these:
The bike:
The sickest sunrise I've ever seen:
Playing quite a bit these days, and running pretty BAD. I'm down almost $3,000 for the month which is pretty awesome.
I'll keep you all in suspense abotu whether I'm going make my goals. FWIW, it's been a lot tougher than I thought it would have been.
In between playing, I've become a huge fan of that new show on HBo called 'flight of the conchords'. It's quickly becoming my fave. show on TV right now. It's a comedy about a band from New Zealand trying to make it in the US. They just randomly break out into songs all the time. Check a clip:
I'll check in befor emy trip. GL me.
I have nobody, to stack alone.
(click pic to see chat)
/brag
Haha, I've been playing some of the HU cash tables stars recently introduced and I've had some pretty good success so far. Not bad for a full ring nit.
10 days left.
Right now I'm at :
114/250KM
30/70k hands
So far I'm up $2,250, down 1.5KG and 1.8% body fat.
So ahead of me, I have:
13.6KM/day
4k/day hands
note: I made a small edit to last month's tourny results. I missed a $10 tourny I finsihed 164/1529 for $55.11. Edited numbers now reflect this.
I think every time I've traveled a fars way, it's been by plane or car. So this made my last trip to japan a little more interesting.
I set out with my buddy Chris, and we took a bus out to the KTX station. It is a super high speed bullet train, that can pretty much cross Korea in 3hrs. At one point we were traveling about 310km/hr. It was a really comfortable and smooth ride, with lots of nice scenery along the way.
The train took us too Busan, which is the biggest port city in korea. It's really nice there, and the weather was a lot nicer considering it's so much further south. More on Busan later.
From Busan, we took a hydrofoil boat known as a beetle to Fukuoka, Japan. The thing was really cool to look at, I'd never seen anything like it. On top of that, the thing really flew and had beer at duty free prices. :)
Total travel time was about 8hrs I think, and costed $250 for the roundtrip.
I've only been to Japan one other time, and that was in Osaka. I guess I was a little surprised at how nice the weather was. Palm trees everywhere, and apparently a pretty sweet beach that we didn't get a chance to check out. The city was really similar to Osaka, but just a little more chill. We walked around for a while, trying to find a hotel a buddy recommended with no luck. One thing about Japan compared to Korea is the amount of English spoken. In Korea, soooo many people speak English, but Japan is truly a different story. Most people we met had like ZERO english. I guess it didn't help that we had been drinking for the past 8hrs. :)
So whatever, we found a hotel for the night, dropped our bags and hit up a popular bar called sam 'n daves or something.
While trying to find our hotel, we bumped into this plump white girl who was also from Korea on a visa run. She tagged along to the bar, which ended up being PACKED:
So yeah, we just had a drink, ordered up some awesome chicken wings, paid, and then ditched the white girl because we're jerks like that. lol 
So we hit the streets trying to find something to do. Nothing really seemed to be happening, and if it was, we couldn't find it. My friend was exhausted and went home, but I stayed out until about 4m just wandering around and meeting random people. I ended up getting completely lost. But I met this really nice girl who spoke no English, and she walked me the 30mins it took to get back. :)
The next morning we got up at about 11am with a plan in mind. My buddy wanted to get some more ink done, and I was considering getting another tattoo too. I wasn't sure, but figured if I got inspired I would do it up. So after a few hours of searching and grabbing brunch, we find a place that was recommended to us and head in.We end up staying there until about 6pm when Chris' tat is done. During that time I had looked through about 40 tattoo magazines and came up with a theme and some ideas. I left the artist with the idea, and said we would come back tomorrow to see what he came up with.
We then hit up a bar where we knew the owner through a friend in Korea. It was like a punk rock club, and was very cool. Drinks weren't a bad price, and we got treated really well. We drank alot, yadda yadda yadda, and made our way back to our hotel.
The next day was exactly the same as the last, except with me getting tatted instead of Chris.
Took about 5hrs, but it turned out pretty sick.We ended up at the same club that ngiht because it was close to our hotel, and they had a 2for1 drink special. More yadda, yadda, yadda-ing, and we call it a night really late. oh and I bumped into this guy on the way home:
Our boat back to busan left in the morning at 7:30am, and we woke up at 10am. So much for a wake up call.
