Operation: $$ accumulation

ha, your "nit" FR game is only slightly tighter than many of my regular opponents' "standard" 6max game

running pretty bad this month
worse than i ever thought could be possible? nah, probably not. terrible though. Barely in the black after rakeback. Gross. Turn cards are terrifying me.
every time i'm holding aces in the big blind and it's folded around to win one small blind I have to remind myself again to breathe and smile - but i'm sick of it
in other news, cashed in the rest of my feeps and withdrew some more $$

Originally Posted by daven

running pretty bad this month

blah blah just remember you are supposed to lose 96-4s and 99.6-0.4s at least some of the time, and that shoving nut flushes on unpaired turns isn't always printing money in the short-term/moan
another five months of running like this and i'd need to consider getting a job to pay the bills when i get back from holidaying in thailand at the end of the year. Glad i already bought the tickets.

anyway, some family staying to visit at the moment. I live across from a golf course, but don't play golf. Heading across shortly to carry some clubs and whiskey for family who do.

life feels good
i've been reviewing my year in poker so far. It's a classic case of 'could do better' i guess, but at least i'm winning at the tables and making enough to save some money while living a life i enjoy

Cheers for posting stats.

note to self, don't forget that you are bad at poker

good read. cheers

this morning i walked down my driveway and slipped on ice, landed on my arse. Stood up a little sore but fine, and started laughing. Kinda sums up the month

a week ago i was just over 25buyins down at the tables for the month (after a 35buyin downswing, run worse than ever before blah blah whatever shit happens)

i've been low on energy yesterday and today - fighting a cold or something - so i haven't played at all, even though i am within only a few buyins of being in the black at the tables for June. Not playing these sessions when there is pretty much zero chance of a-game is a big thing for me, i'm more proud of that than i am of winning back my losses.
Anyway, i cashed in a bunch of fpps that i had been saving during this month, so still withdrew heaps enough $$. Roll on July.

counting down until a half-marathon in september, training is underway. My first half was the same one 12 months ago and super-slow 1hr 50, this time i'm aiming to go a little faster, 1hr 35 is what i'm trying for, might be optimistic but it's not unrealistic if i get the running in between now and then. It's still nothing special, but i don't think i'll have a 1hr30 in me (1hr 30 is some sort of benchmark time for recreational runners)

then after the half i'm off to thailand for some good food. Between now and then there is a whole lot of poker to be played, good food to be eaten, surfing and climbing to be done, live music to see, people to hang out with, life to be lived. Things are still remarkably good, although i'm broker than i've been in years. Less than six months worth of money sitting in reserve in my bank accounts. Time to remedy that. Game on.

yesterday i went fishing and didn't play poker
today i ate trout and played poker
good session, i'll take it

nice garp

Eat trout, play poker. Got it. Adding trout to shopping list.

Or does it need to be fresh?

Originally Posted by bjsaust

Eat trout, play poker. Got it. Adding trout to shopping list.

Or does it need to be fresh?

worth trying all options imo, except that in nz it is illegal to buy or sell trout, so i have to catch it myself. If i was over there i'd hit up some freshly caught sea trout caught off the reefs near townsville, and expect good things

but, yeah, eat fish in general seems a good thing, then again, on both of these days i've been out for hour long runs too - so maybe that's it?
oops, i did it again

Thats some nice BBs per 6k hands!

Originally Posted by IowaSkinsFan

FE and equity and metagame is essentially all poker is...
---
I'm not sure there is one decision of poker that can't be explained through those 3 points.

.

life is mostly coffee, climbing, and running at the moment. I was hoping to run 100km this week, but it ain't gonna happen cos i got a blister and i'm slower than i thought. I may end up running around 8hrs total (4.5hrs from 4 days so far), heaps of that is on sand at the beach and other off-road so it's probably going to be around 80-90ish km. Still a heavy wakeup call for my legs. Loving it.

plus some poker. i tried playing more tables for a couple of days cos i was in a mashing buttons frame of mindnext time i play 20+ tables i'm going to play tighter. And start less tables. 7 tables of 2-4 handed play in that mix is just asking for focus issues

blah. posting an ev graph cos it doesn't mean shit but sometimes i like to look at it

lolwat poker?! cashed the micro millions main event for about $10/hr after over five hours of play. Ridiculous.

running is feeling heaps fun. And climbing. General fitness mayhem the last few weeks. Tired body. Rest day today. Well, active recovery anyway.

ring games and i'm 25bi behind in flips or whatever it is that aiev measures this month - barely made enough profits to make my standard withdrawals
coolers etc too; if i see another rivered hole cards underpair -> boat with 1/2 pot behind vs my nut overpair then who really cares, i'll have shoved the river anyway and their turn call was still -ve EV

life's sexy

Originally Posted by daven

lolwat poker?! cashed the micro millions main event for about $10/hr after over five hours of play. Ridiculous.

lol donkaments

ahh, july, you were lovely. Except for flips. And i lost more 97-3 allin flops than i have in ages. But i made money. Enough i guess. And made a lot of progress in my garden. And did a lot of running -> feeling pretty fit right now. And healthy. Yeah, life is good.

As for Full Tilt Poker, well, i still haven't thrown out my black card, maybe it's gonna be of some use after all, $5k buys a bunch of coke

Originally Posted by donkbee

poker stars
Q: What happens to my Full Tilt loyalty rewards?
A: We are reviewing all previous Full Tilt reward programs and will provide more details on plans for these programs in the near future. We intend to have a fair resolution for players with accumulated points and other rewards under the program.

wonder if it's worth using a 'one-time' for about $5k value of ftp points?
I'm stoked for everyone with cash stuck on FTP

sounds promising

how many hours do you suppose you put in over the course of a month, on average?

Originally Posted by Vi-Zer0Skill

how many hours do you suppose you put in over the course of a month, on average?

poker I guess? I'm playing more this year than ever before
last month was huge - close to 120hrs
Feb-June - 100 hrs per month (+/- only a few)
Jan - 60hrs
August thus far - 7hrs. I've spent more hours running this month than gambling. Don't think I'll keep that up though.

thanks daven -- I am impressed you don't need to play more than that to earn enough $!

Originally Posted by Vi-Zer0Skill

thanks daven -- I am impressed you don't need to play more than that to earn enough $!

live cheap and learn to enjoy being hungry bro that's all it takes

running update (aka lol can't afford petrol cos busto poker player etc):
week ending 22nd July - 6hrs 20
week ending 29th July - 7hrs
week ending 5th August - 6hrs 50
the end of last week was interesting
i went for two very good runs on the weekend. At around drunk am, a girl i was out drinking with on friday night suggested a long sunday run. Saturday i ran 3km to pick up my bike, rode a quick 6km in 9 minutes to where i was running from, then ran a slow 1hr30 on hilly roads with a friend of mine.

Sunday i ran 2.5km to arranged meeting spot, then we headed out for what started as a nice run a few km uphill at a good tempo. Turns out i was about to get my arse kicked. We'd been going about 9km and the pace picked up, then about 3km later it picked up again. 1km out from the meeting point we agreed to go a bit faster. Only one of us was able to run 1km in under 3'30" at that point. And it wasn't me. I mean, i can't even do that fresh. The 2.5km back up some hills to get home after that was killer. Nice 20km on my feet though, and if you're going to get your butt kicked while out running then why not let a hot girl do the kicking.... my girlfriend is laughingly jealous, but not really jealous, things are solid.
today will be a light 10km
tomorrow morning she gets to destroy me over 20km again

garden update (aka lol can't afford to buy food so gotta grow it cos busto poker etc)
spring just around the corner. One garden bed is fully planted, another small garlic bed is in, the rest is work in progress to be ready by september. Hope to have it fully planted before i head to thailand in early october. Bought plum and pear trees to plant this week. And turned a big willow tree into firewood sized pieces of timber.

poker update (aka busto poker etc)
need to sacrifice a goat or something cos wtf

climbing update
feeling stronger than i have in a while. Probably cos of weight loss due to running and being unable to afford food. Or maybe training is working.

you seem to have a very healthy attitude towards the negative variance of poker, so props for that. good life balance as well. it'll turn around eventually!

this freedom thing is expensive

Originally Posted by Vi-Zer0Skill

you seem to have a very healthy attitude towards the negative variance of poker, so props for that. good life balance as well. it'll turn around eventually!

I'm struggling with the health of my attitude towards variance in poker right about now... to the point that i finally updated my cv to include poker - hard to leave that out given that it's been my only source of income for over three years now. But things aren't so bad that i'm doing anything with that cv just yet

Re life balance. I think that having poker play the dominant role in each of the work and social and recreational aspects of life would be a recipe for clinical depression or worse, like, anyone who has even some tendencies towards instability would have to be pretty fucking stupid to let poker play too big a role in their life, even if it was their job. Galfond talks about the value of life outside poker a lot in one of his blogs, and it's gold. It's my job, and i still enjoy it. But I mostly enjoy the lifestyle it enables. Not living the life of hedonistic luxury (can't afford that), but living the life of ample flexibility and free time, and enough money i guess.

Originally Posted by Vi-Zer0Skill

this freedom thing is priceless

fyp

flipping poorly over the last week:

garden sounds like a good idea and most def +ev, I might even build one myself for next year in back yard

Originally Posted by daven

Not living the life of hedonistic luxury (can't afford that), but living the life of ample flexibility and free time, and enough money i guess.

This is my life too right now. Not getting rich, but don't have to play that many hours and tons of freedom. My future self may regret it, but I'm pretty happy now!

I also totally agree that letting poker take over your life is a terrible idea. I don't see how anyone can be happy that way.

i decided to read through Theory of Poker again. A couple of years on and some of those simple ideas near the start got me thinking all over again.

running is going fun. Did a 14km hill circuit on friday, an 18km loop saturday, then a 19km heavy hill run on sunday. Plan for the half marathon is to run the first 10km in an easy 50mins with the guy i'm running it with, then the next 5km in 23mins, then we'll probably separate and i'll try to run the closing 6.1km in sub-24. Or things will go nothing like planned. See what happens. Forecast is rain and strong winds.

the half on Sunday was fun. Didn't manage to go as fast as i had hoped over the last 6km cos obviously, but was super-stoked with life within ten minutes of finishing regardless. Came home and a bunch of people turned up to drink beer in the sun and bask in endorphine glow. Rode into town for the prize-giving + recovery leg stretch, rode home later after more beer etc. Monday was recovery, so 10km on the bike, then a 12km run with a few friends, then a ride home (my poor car is being neglected!), then donned my wetsuit and walked down to the beach cos i saw a big front approaching - managed to be in the ocean chaos ducking between weird rips and whitewater as the front rolled on in. Headed home in a hailstorm to spend the afternoon finishing a re-read of the bone people - one of darkest, saddest, and most hauntingly beautiful books i've ever had the pleasure to share my time with. Then good food in front of a warm fire. Today it's a mixture of hail and snow, cheers spring! think it's going to be a poker-grind day. I'm glad i postponed planting out seedlings/seeds until the coming weekend, everything that's already growing should be tough enough to survive this storm. I hope.

Feeling pretty good about poker. Which is weird given results and runbad and playbad over the last couple of months. I've been playing badly and tilt has crept into my game. Decided yesterday to change that. A couple of sessions in and so far so good on the things within my control.

I'm still somehow not life-busto. And it's only a month until i head to thailand for a break from all things online. Hell, maybe ftp will be sorted by the time i get back and those points will have magically become $$ or something. Or not. Definitely not holding my breath.

a couple of garden context pics
1 = some patches of dirt with garlic growing in foreground
2 = gonna be a berry summer, looks like spring!

i've quit sessions by insta-closing the poker stars client three times this week
that's how poker is going
AA<KK when LAG flatted KK and AKK flop allin 240bb deep over 3 streets gg. AQ < QQ on A74, allin on turn Q gg. etc. etc. tilt rant done. Time to re-read my tilt post, and chill the fuck out.

About to meet a friend for a 15km hill run for sanity, then come home and bake a gluten-free, dairy-free, hippie chocolate cake for a friend's birthday, eat good food, then go eat cake and get loaded.

wrt poker, I think it's time to just start over again, it's a while since i did that and it would probably calm down some of these tilt issues. Start from $100 again or something? dunno. $200? $400? maybe $150 and 10nl moving up aggressively. Sounds about right. See if i can turn $150 into $1k in 9 days without cashing in any feeps.

Good luck daven.

Why do you think you're getting annoyed at the beats? Is it because the money means a lot to you in a "wow that pot was worth like 5 meals out" or is it just because you feel you've been running bad for a long time?

Originally Posted by Pascal

Good luck daven.

Why do you think you're getting annoyed at the beats? Is it because the money means a lot to you in a "wow that pot was worth like 5 meals out" or is it just because you feel you've been running bad for a long time?

This has always been what has got me.

daven, you have a great life from poker and you need to keep sticking to your guns. I think there are some great posts in this thread to help bring you back into the moment. I'm not sure if I am making sense, but in this day and age of poker being what it is, your still one of the ones taking money out of the system to have a pretty good living while not playing at some tough swongy high stakes. That's pretty special and I envy you.

10nl from a starting roll of $200 is the plan, see if i can grind a roll again! it feels good to have made that decision.

Originally Posted by Pascal

Good luck daven.

Why do you think you're getting annoyed at the beats? Is it because the money means a lot to you in a "wow that pot was worth like 5 meals out" or is it just because you feel you've been running bad for a long time?

cheers for the good luck wishes. It's a combination of what feels like extended runbad along with I think i'm more annoyed than normal because it's the first time since i started playing for a living that i haven't been both playing off a ridiculously fat roll and with a bunch of money in the bank. Guess that's what buying a house does. I also made a couple of decisions that in hindsight weren't financially optimal (warmth optimal though!). I got ceiling and underfloor insulation installed + fixed up a couple of other things BEFORE grinding the money out. So I've been watching my life bank accounts slowly drain along with my poker account balances as I've been making withdrawals exceeding profits. I've got an emergency bank account with a bunch of months worth of mortgage/life money in it, and for the first time i've had to start looking at it with an eye to touching those $$. That's something I really hope not to have to do, this isn't/shouldn't be an emergency. Yeah, so i've been trying to force things, playing off a roll that's probably too thin, that sort of thing.

The decision to start over has been refreshing, and i'm feeling good about poker all over again. I should have done that a couple of weeks ago, better late than never

Originally Posted by jyms

daven, you have a great life from poker and you need to keep sticking to your guns. I think there are some great posts in this thread to help bring you back into the moment. I'm not sure if I am making sense, but in this day and age of poker being what it is, your still one of the ones taking money out of the system to have a pretty good living while not playing at some tough swongy high stakes. That's pretty special and I envy you.

cheers for the post, makes a lot of sense. Life is cool, and that is unlikely to change regardless of whether i continue on the poker track - thanks for the reminder. And also thanks for pointing out that living off poker without too much stress is a pretty lucky place to find myself still hanging out.

Originally Posted by jyms

...I envy you.

me too

Good Luck, daven.

(Plizz try not to obliterate me as you go whooshing past, though)

Originally Posted by daven

10nl from a starting roll of $200 is the plan, see if i can grind a roll again! it feels good to have made that decision.

i'll post updates at 10k hand intervals for a while
looks like i'm playing too loose, but hopefully that's influenced at least a little by starting tables. Just checked, average number of players dealt in is 7.5. 12-20tabling. Hmm. Calling less is good, the regrind is fun - it's good to be enjoying poker! that winrate should be higher, but the right direction is ok for the first 10k.


and spring is happening in my garden. Some flowers, the white ones are eventually going to be edible (plums).

keep it up!

I love the pictures of springtime coming to the Southern hemisphere (I miss Australia desperately!!)

two more weeks of the gambool then to wellington for a few days and chilling with good people (plus a small race), then to thailand with my girlfriend for a few weeks to go and get some travel buzz.
I'm fitter than i've been in ages. Feeling pretty good. Ran a 14km circuit against the clock on thursday, friday was a short run with a friend of mine that turned into 18km and some big hills, saturday i spent the day climbing with a great crew and got shit done. Hell yeah.

this morning and the plan was 3hrs of grind until a friend turned up to run, then run,then etc. He bailed cos flu cos shares an office with normal people who get sick.

So, instead. Wow.

3hrs grind -> lounging in the sun -> fence construction shit-talking with my neighbour (one medical doctor, one poker player, one absence of fence construction talent) -> message from a friend 'run over, drink some afternoon sunshine' -> ran there via a 15km detour -> a few friends there sitting outside on couches in the sun -> afternoon sunshine -> walk to the beach -> ocean swim -> wander on home along the beach -> shower/beer -> post run beer/cigar indulgence in my garden (cheers villiger)
just another day in the life i guess.
Ladytron - International Dateline - YouTube
R.E.M. - Uberlin - YouTube

I really enjoyed playing poker today. It was nice.
FTR tourney was cool, although next time i end up with <7bb i'm going to start getting chips in before dropping to 2bb wtf. Pretty poor late-game by me. gg everyone.
life's good

for my birthday a while back my girlfriend got me an old-fashioned push lawnmower because she knows i think they're cool. I mowed the lawn a couple of days ago - for the first time since I bought the place

Orangeboom! Why do I know that beer? It brings back really happy memories of something I can't quite remember properly but leaves me with a smile nonetheless.

passing through chiang mai for the second time this trip. Successfully made it up to Huay Pakoot from here about ten days ago via a combination of local bus/sungtao/hitching. Spent some good time living in the village hanging with my friends and their two kids. Did cool things. Ate good food. Smiled loads. Had an adventure involving a big limestone cliff that had never been climbed on before. Stuff, basically.
back to bangkok for a few days tomorrow, then onwards to nz.
good trip.

Originally Posted by rong

Orangeboom! Why do I know that beer? It brings back really happy memories of something I can't quite remember properly but leaves me with a smile nonetheless.

hazy memories and smiles the best of times...

Originally Posted by rong

Orangeboom! Why do I know that beer? It brings back really happy memories of something I can't quite remember properly but leaves me with a smile nonetheless.

prolly that stupid advertising jingle...

thailand was heaps of fun
today was catching up with life here in nz, which included beer this arvo and meeting some friends to win a pub quiz later on
tomorrow a friend has the day off and apparently i'm playing golf then going for a run. Tips for golf? hit the ball into the hole i guess. And then we're going for a run, cos i will have shot 140 and he 75 or something, so my ego will need some recovery.
did a bunch of database review today and found some glaring leaks
finally heard from ftp, they still don't know how many ftp points i will have when they re-launch. Hopefully a million or so. Wait and see. Not sure how it can be complicated...

one of my goals for november and december is to spend at least 20% of my poker time studying - with full attention, using appropriate tools. Poker forum hand history stuff won't count as part of that. Nor will watching poker vids. So far since i got back i've spent about 40% of my poker time on study, mostly checking in on some ideas i had while i was in Thailand. I feel like i'm getting better at poker again. Which is necessary cos lfdo.

HELLO FULL TILT POKER!!! it took a bit of to-and-fro e-mail action to sort out access to my FTP account, but now it is up and running
just under a million ftp points, and what i thought was a zero dollar cash balance is in fact a little more than that - not sure how but that's fine.
game on

Whoa that's some serious pointage you got there!
I just managed to log in. 80000 ftp's 2 tournament tickets and thirty-five american dollars and fifty-two cents!
Tomorrow there will be grind!

Originally Posted by FTP

Alternatively, if you achieved Black Card membership at any time during 2011, you have automatically been awarded Diamond status, with a 50-day grace period beginning from Full Tilt Poker’s official relaunch dat!

thanks\\ i have 365 days remaining at diamond = i guess i played some hands at ftp over the years

here is my first hand back on the ftp cash tables... seems that everything is working. FTP grind coming soon.

Full Tilt No-Limit Hold'em, $0.10 BB (6 handed) - Full Tilt Poker Hand Converter from HandHistoryConverter.com

CO ($15)
Button ($15.39)
SB ($15.24)
Hero (BB) ($10)
UTG ($10)
MP ($6.26)

Preflop: Hero is BB with 4, J
UTG bets $0.57, MP calls $0.57, 4 folds

Flop: ($1.51) Q, 7, J (2 players)
UTG bets $1, 1 fold

Total pot: $1.51 | Rake: $0.10

I really think this is a fantastic time to play FT. There must be tons of fish like me who had money on there who since have stopped playing.
I cought myself contemplating cashing in my ftps and trying to grind out the $500 bonus, but then I asked myself: would a fish do that? I concluded that fish would do that, so I did not do that thing.


Read up on your blog. Of all the people I know in poker, you are the one I expect to always be there and be successful, simply because you absolutely rock regarding your attitude towards the game and life in general.
Who can run a 14k and play a million hands a month. If there was a combined discipline for that you would easily be the top contender.

Yo, your blogs have been quite inspirational to me. Just know that I'm lurkin and may pop in for a couple comments

what would newman do?
abc bro
i needed some runhot, poker was starting to be way too tilt yo-yo
another 25k hands like that would be nice

Originally Posted by oskar

I really think this is a fantastic time to play FT. There must be tons of fish like me who had money on there who since have stopped playing.
I cought myself contemplating cashing in my ftps and trying to grind out the $500 bonus, but then I asked myself: would a fish do that? I concluded that fish would do that, so I did not do that thing.

Read up on your blog. Of all the people I know in poker, you are the one I expect to always be there and be successful, simply because you absolutely rock regarding your attitude towards the game and life in general.
Who can run a 14k and play a million hands a month. If there was a combined discipline for that you would easily be the top contender.

Bold is interesting, i don't expect to be still playing poker as my primary income past about April next year. That will be the 4 year anniversary of fulltime poker (well, sole income source = poker anyway, it's hardly been 40hrs/week), and it's probably healthy to make a change. See what happens...

i still haven't clocked more than 10 hands on FTP since re-launch. I'm diamond edge for a year, so no great hurry just so long as i clear any bonuses before they expire. I doubt there would have been many bad fish initially, and i expect that the ones that appeared wouldn't have lasted long... Poker success at the moment is not as simple as it has been at times in the past, but life is still awesome. As for the running/poker hands combo - i'd prop bet on playing 150k hands and running 100km any month, but i doubt i'd find many takers.

Originally Posted by xptboy

Yo, your blogs have been quite inspirational to me. Just know that I'm lurkin and may pop in for a couple comments

i'm flattered. If you want to read a properly inspiring blog then you should check out micro2macro's set of op threads. Gold. He's made it to mid-high stakes, whereas i'm playing at lower stakes than i was 4 years ago.