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So, is there anyone still coming on this site?

I planned to post a lot more these days, but this month has been far from my best by a long shot. I've been sick most of the time, so I guess I deserved the right to whine a bit. In the last 35 days, I've had two flus, two fevers, one indigestion, one strained tendon, and an otitis media combined with an otitis externa.

At the moment of this writing there is blood dripping from my left ear, so I can safely affirm that my level of comfort is quite low. However, thanks to the wonderful progresses of science, I have drugs strong enough to not feel most of the dire pain I'd otherwise succumb to. They do affect my mind in a way that leaves me quite dumbed down, almost too stupid to feel anything but happiness. One could get used to this state of mind, as it is quite a relief from the my usual habit of overthinking everything and always being in doubt.

Anyway, because of this, I can't play poker and I can't drink or drive, so choking is not even in the realm of possibilities. I'm pretty much stuck here for another day, unable to use my brain most of the time. I'm using one of my few moments of lucidiy to write a few words here and try to get some most-desired attention and pity from the reader.

Go back to your usual business now, and come back in a few days. The odds are quite good that, by then, there will be more insightful rows of random letters to lay your eyes upon.

Back in the ring

After a lenghty break away from the tables, I've jumped back into the fray. The swings have been huge, but I'm coming out ahead. Something feels different though.

Back in Niagara, I lost 300$ in a few hands, and I really didn't care. Today I quickly lost 200E, but it didn't affect me at all. I could keep playing, and came back ahead with a well-played monster hand (albeit it wasn't really that hard to play well).

I guess I finally grew accustomed to the idea that swings are huge in shorthanded NL. These days, I just rake in the hours, do what must be done, and don't really care where I stand. In the end, it all seems to even out anyway.

I'd like to think it's some Zen-like state of mind, but that'd be preposterous. The only thing I've done to understand these principles is reading a 10$ book about it, and that hardly classifies me as a master of the Art.

But I can't deny the obvious, and I like to take some comfort in the fact that I'm still improving. The moment I start stagnating in a certain field, I quickly lose interest, and I'm growing tired of it. I guess a little stability, even as little as poker can offer, is something I want, or even need.

I know I'll crave for change soon enough, but meanwhile, standing back and relaxing seems like a plan a man could enjoy.

On winning rates and limits

Here are a few tips I wrote over the PSO forums about winning rates and going up in stakes.

There's not much difference between NL50 (No-Limit $50 buy-in) and NL100. The biggest difference is between the lowest level and the 2nd lowest level. On Party, the lowest is NL25, so you can keep pretty high numbers at that limit.

From my own logs, and from what I heard from others, keeping 15BB/100 is pretty good if you play anything above the very lowest levels. Moreover, if you have a good style (that is, not a tight by-the-book hoping-to-catch-fishes style), moving up in limit isn't that hard.

The toughest part about moving up in limit is not playing scared. Another thing that takes a few hours to get used to is adjusting pot odds and everything on the fly with your new numbers being 2x or 1.5x what they used to be. The few split seconds you lose thinking about that stuff when you just move up usually results in lost profits, as it makes staying focused a lot harder.

But anyway, if you want to go up, you need to learn to play the players. Playing your cards work at NL$25 or in SnGs, but it's not gonna cut it when you go up. Find players that scare you, examine their style, and play that way.

I'm on it

I've been playing a lot lately, and I'm focusing on improving my game. I learned some new theory that I want to mix up in my play, and hopefully work my way up from there.

I was starting to focus too much on specific moves, and when to make them, instead of focusing on the bigger picture. I should not be looking around, asking myself: "Alright, I gotta make a move soon. Maybe this one would work." When you do that, you close yourself to other possibilities, and the results will suffer. If you dedicate all your attention to only one target, you'll shut yourself from picking up tells from the others.

What I have to do is simply try to have fun, and adopt a mindset that will allow me to react to the situations that arise. I need to be ready to make a move, but not be looking specifically at making one. Play my game, see how it goes, but react fast and precisely to unexpected turns of events. If you look too hard at making a specific move, you will not react fast enough to situations that require a totally different one. You just gotta trust your guts, and hope for the best.

Another leak I've spotted in my game is that I focus too much on a specific situation where I could have played it better, I start to overanalyze it and then choke lots of other perfectly good occasions. I know that I have what it takes, and that I should win pretty often, but I seem to forget that, in order to win, sometimes you gotta lose. You need to let go of those losses, and just keep on going. Living in the past is only going to make you miss the present, and the present can be pretty fricking great.

Once I've included these improvements in my regular style, I'll be able to switch back to simply enjoying it. There is always an occasion to learn, but sometimes, it's fun to just relax and enjoy the reward.

Niagara Part Chokage

My head.. it's shaking. Left to right... in disbelief.

You guys know I've choked before. And I've choked hard. But this?? This is the mother of all chokages. I still don't understand how I could not get any.

One day she's telling me to make sure I have the hotel room all by myself the next day, while she's reaching in my pants, and now she's just sleeping and doesn't really care that we're never gonna see each others ever.

I knew the rule #1. I know most rules by heart, and I know they're true, but I never realized how true this one is.

Rule #1: The guy never knows what the fuck is going on.

I'm pretty sure that she meant everything she said the night before. She showed me that she meant it. I had her tits in my mouth in a public place. If it wasn't for that whole confusion thing, it was on the first night.

But something just changed in a few hours. The worst part is: I'll never know what exactly went wrong. I'll have no feedback at all. I've just choked and I never saw it coming.

Of course she's sorry. But I've got news for you, bitch:
Sorry is not gonna suck my cock.

Disclaimer: This post was uncensored and barely edited, written right after the events happened, after the consumption of some alcohol. I'd usually come back and edit that post, but I was told it was just perfect the way it was. This was mostly an exercise in entertainment, using a style I'm not accustomed to. Plus it reflects what I was thinking, there's no use in denying it.

Niagara Part 2

I'm coming back from the Fallsview Casino, after a pretty disappointing poker session ending in a 300$ loss. I played basically three importants hands. The first hand I played, I had 99, I raised 5x to 25$ after two limpers, and I hit a 9 on the flop. I hit another 9 on the turn to make quads, but I got no action so I only made 50$.

The second important hand I played, I had kings in the small blind. The button raised to 15$, I re-raised to 45$. Flop came AQx. We checked both the flop and the turn, then I made a small defensive bet on the river, and he raised all-in, so I had to fold. He showed me AQo.

The last hand I played, d-onion raised to 15$ in middle position, and I made it 45$ to go with Aces, which was almost one third of my stack. The big blind called, and the flop was Ah5s2s. We went all-in, and he flipped over AsQs, for top pair and a flush draw, which was a 3:1 underdog to my set of aces. Unfortunately, the turn was a spade, and I didn't hit my fullhouse, so I was out.

It kinda sucked, but at least I know I played well.

Niagara Part 1

I've been in Niagara for less than 24 hours, and a lot has already happened. Due to a weird twist of events, it involves chokage and not poker, even though the sole reason we're here in the first place is to hit the Casinos.

After an eight hours drive, we finally got here, and went out to buy some beer. We (d-onion, Brian, Riverrun, Kugr, Red_diamond and I) played a small tournament, and I split for first with Riverrun. We all had a few drinks in us, some more than the others, so the evening looked quite promising.

We took the elevator down, and Riverrun proceeded to hit on the chick in the lobby right away. He asked her for the best club around, and he was working pretty smoothly. It didn't quite work out because she had to work the following morning, but you could see he had done this an awful lot of times.

We went to the club she mentionned, the Rumors, and in less than 30 seconds, Riverrun had already engaged conversation with two nice chicks. A few minutes later, he started talking to another one, and paid drinks to all of us, and a few more to her. He told her we were all professional poker players, and made about 100k$ last year (but he said I only made 60k. Damn you.). I'm still not quite sure if he's a machine or an asshole, but whatever it is, it works.

Some time later the girl came back with her friends, one of which was a cute 21yo blond german. And, unfortunately for all of you chokage-savvy readers, there's no such thing right now. I talked to her a bit, paid her a drink, and I was working smoothly. I told her in French that she was cute, then I translated for her, and proceeded to kiss her. Sometimes you just gotta love speaking French when you're in an english country. Even my name is apparently cool out here!

We left the club to head out for some poker at the casino, but one of the girls was apparently too drunk and we couldn't get in. We went to the Hard Rock cafe instead to finish the evening. We then brought the girls back to our hotel room to proceed from that point on. One guy left with the drunkest chick, then the two other girls started speaking german, and unfortunately I could barely understand a word. After some frustration due to the impossibility of playing poker, and some more confusion, I ended up with the cute blond in her hotel room, but her friend brought back one of the guys, which made for a pretty awkward situation. Obviously things didn't work out too well right there, and even though we tried hard, it ended in a forced chokage due to external conditions.

I'll see her again tonight though, so stay tuned for Niagara Part 2 with more poker, more drinks, and less chokage!