Played less than an hour at PS today. Missed the 10 billionth hand by 6K or so. Bonus is cleared, but epass is out of sorts, so can't cash out just yet. finished up down $3 on the tables, which is pretty dissapointing. Given how badly I ran though, I guess I should be relieved. At any rate, I knocked out a $55 bonus in under 7 hours, which is decent.

It's the end of the week, but I'm not sure where the bankroll is at since I'm in the process of moving money around. I'll edit the post tomorrow when I'm not too tired to do the addition stuff. I think I probably recovered all losses for the week and am up $50 or so from the bonus.

It's fairly late in the month, so looks like one of my goals for the year is pretty well shot. I wanted to log 25K hands at 100NL with a win rate of 5ptbb/100, but that seems unattainable right now. This leaves me with the other two goals of developing my omaha game or my shorthanded hold'em game. I've decided on the latter, which I will begin probably over at Cake, so that I have some bonus to cushion the learning curve. I'm kind of looking at Cake as a new beginning to my poker career, or at least, the beginning of a new stage in my poker career. I need a fresh start after this little run of doom.

In other news: my wife and I celebrated our 7th anniversary tonight.

Current Bankroll: $3895.96
May: $173.33

Last night Bodog was down when I tried to log in; so I just played some HORSE at UB and picked up a slight amount. 5 outer on the river killed what would have been a decent session. Played two NL sessions today, both for wins.
241 hands: $26
202 hands: $28
My discipline is still quite good. I folded a set and a str8 today. I seriously love, no no no, I hate folding those hands. What am I gonna do, board gets atrocious, action gets nuts. I pushed in with one set and was up against a bigger set, whee. That was early in session number one, but recovered and had a decent session. Number two going really well until I took AK up against KQ on a KQT flop. I think I lost $16 or so on that one; so pot control kind of kept the loss mild.

If things go as planned, I should be able to deposit at Cake tomorrow and get some playin in. I'm planning to play some limit to start off, and just try to work off some of the bonus for a bit. BW shows the limit tables as really sucking right now, so I may not do that. At any rate, I'm excited to start the learning process with shorthanded play.

Other news: substantive revisions of the diss. are done, finito. Well, until I get comments from my advisor and one or two committee folks, but I don't anticipate anything dramatic there. I'm moving on to three papers, now, which I will be polishing up to send off to some journals where they will be rejected.

Started at Cake yesterday. An observation, Cake=rigged. Started off with some limit poker and flopped four sets. I won one of those hands. I also made a set of queens on the river, but the other guy made a royal flush! Sometimes, I have to seriously cackle about how good I run. Around 120 hands; I lost $2.50.

Then I started the SHNL, 10c/20c. Cake has a huge buy in limit for the games, but no one really plays deep stacked (EDIT: IGNORE THIS STATEMENT; ITS THE USUAL 100BB BUY-IN). I bought in for a little less than I normally do, as I kind of want to limit the damage I do to myself as I get going. I had two tables up initially, but wasn't comfortable with that, and my position at both of them sucked, so I walked and sat at a new table. I played pretty tight and just focused on getting atuned to the flow of the game. Even with the tightness, my raises got plenty of action, so I should be doing quite well once I get my feet under me. Mostly a bunch of small pots until near the end, when I flopped top and bottom pair. Didn't see the guy's cards but I think he turned a worse two pair and then rivered a full house. 101 hands, -$11.35.

A bit later I played some FR 100NL at Bodog. I'm not sure I want to be playing against the drunks at SH until I'm more acclimated. This session started off poorly and I was down $65 due to me raising some donk bets into me on the flop, which got 3-bet. Maintained the discipline, however, and fought back with series of small and medium pots to a $74.50 win.

Plan to play some SH today and probably more FR tonight.

Man, I think I like this SH stuff. Swingy as hell, but me likey the action. I was up roughly $5 in first session of the day and I then flopped a str8 against top pair. A runner runner later and I lost all but 80c of my stack. I seriously run so freakin hot. I forgot to get hand stats from that session, but I'm estimating somewhere around 60. Cake doesn't make it easy to track your results. I played 3 other sessions on the day. Yep, kind of like it. Winner in each of those sessions, so totals were: 284 hands, $4.55. I live large, baby.

I'm kind of kicking myself for not switching over to SH about a year ago. I get to play a bit more in my natural style, which is more aggressive than what I can play in FR. I do have some complaints about Cake, however. I can't find a damn add chips button, so I don't know how the hell to top off at teh table. The tables are also big and I think 4 will be the maximum I can ever multitable with my tiny CRT monitor. There's no PT support, so I"m just kind of playing in the dark. I don't think that's all that wise, given that I'm learning a new game. UB has PT and they have smaller games I could play. But....I've only got so much time to clear the deposit bonus at Cake, and it appears that I will need to put in quite a few hours to clear it. I could always just play some limit for a couple hours a week, though. We'll see where I'm at bonus wise at the end of June.

Current plan: I'll keep working on getting comfortable with the play next week. If things go well, I'll consider adding a second table mid-week. I think I'll just sit tight with two tables for quite some time, though. If June goes well, then I think I'll try adding a third, and probably similar approach for the fourth table. I think I'll also try and get a couple sessions in at UB next week just to get a feel for what kind of game I'm playing.

Current Bankroll: $3863
May: $140.37

Last night I had a nice long, beautiful post going and the battery on my laptop went out. Truly, some of the finest prose the English language has ever seen. Alas, there is no auto-recovery on web browsers. I was too pissed to rewrite it all last night, so I just went to bed.

Thanks T, I had to use the add chips feature yesterday . I should have figured that out, since I play at PS here and there, but I'm used to Bodog and UB where I just click the ole add chips button. Per your warning, play chips came up, but about 3 seconds later it auto-switched to real money.

I played several short-handed sessions yesterday, and won about four cents. Growing pains. Here is an interesting hand: I have about a $17 stack and am in the BB w/ . A LAG is in the CO (covers table). LAG has been raising the last three hands then potting the flop and everyone has folded. UTG limps, LAG raises to 55c (10c/20c blinds), BTN calls, I call, and UTG calls.
Flop: ($2.30)
Checks to LAG who pots it, BTN calls, I call, and UTG folds.
Turn: ($9.20)
I open push, LAG thinks for a long time and finally calls w/ , BTN auto-mucks and I don't river an out.

I open pushed here for a few reasons. I don't want LAG betting so much that LAG gets pot committed and has to call me. I don't want LAG checking and BTN trying to take the pot away, again killing my fold equity. I have LAG on two overcards, and BTN on maybe one pair or just A high (BTN was capable of good calls like that). I figure my push is big enough to get a good deal of fold equity and if I get called, I have a ton of outs. In retrospect, I think I need to lead on the flop, and if LAG raises me, then I need to push in right there. I'm not sure LAG folds A high even then, but probably a better chance than when he picks up the flush draw.

I also played an hour or so of 3/6. I was quickly stuck $50 (standard) but came back to win $11.50. I cleared $10 of bonus in the process, so I think I may throw in an hour of limit here and there to keep the bonus clearance on track.

Also played some 10NL SH at UB and picked up some stats. I still need several hundred more hands before I get a reliable picture of my play, but I do appear to be completing the SB too much. I was sort of aware that I was completing with more marginal hands than normal, but didn't think I was doing it that much. I'll work on that today.

I also did some multi-tabling yesterday at both Cake and UB, and I handled that pretty well, so I think all is well on that front. I'm thinking I will just fire up one table and try to develop some solid reads in about 30 hands or so, and then add a second table rather than my usual firing up of three tables all at once. This seems preferable, not just for SH play, but more generally, so I probably should have been doing it even while playing FR.

Journal Changes:
I'm making a few changes to the way I post in the journal. First, I'm going back to the old weekly division (Mon.-Sun.) rather than the current (Sun.-Sat.) one. I made that change initially because I was just playing NL all week then limit on Friday and Saturday. I'm not doing that now, and Sunday still feels like the end of the week rather than the beginning, so back to the old.

I'm not going to be posting daily stats anymore. They are boring and almost completely insignificant. Particularly, as I learn a new game, I want to be focused on longer-term results rather than daily. I will probably still mention how the day went, but I just want to remove my focus from specific results. I will report weekly totals on Sunday along with current bankroll and Monthly total.

Stats will be replaced by hand histories or by some concept I want to think about. I should be able to come up with one interesting hand each day, especially since I'm playing a new game. If I can't come up with an interesting one, perhaps a terrible one in which someone donks off a stack, whether that be me or someone else donking to me.

Bankroll/Moving Up Changes:
Making a change here as well. Old system, which I have posted on several times previously, is three up/three down. I don't want to do that unless and until I'm comfortable with this shorthanded stuff. I really only followed that method in NL, since I just played whatever decent limit game I could find from 50c/1 up to 5/10. So now, I'm just going to focus on being a winning player at each level. I want 10K hands at 10c/20c. If I'm in the black, at the end of that stretch, then I'll move up. I'm not really concerned with winrate, since I think whatever winrate one has after 10K hands is so liable to be highly inaccurate. If I'm only a 1bb/100 winner, then that might be a reason to just give up on short-handed play. While I'm content right now to just break-even or lose a bit, I won't be in a few more thousand hands. At that point, I will want to be profiting from the knowledge I've gained in all my previous mistakes. At the next level, I'll again log 10K hands and move up if I'm a winner; rinse and repeat.

I don't plan to change this approach until I'm up to 200NL. Assuming I win at previous levels, I'll be really well-bankrolled for 200NL, but maybe not so much for 400NL. It looks like it will take between four and five weeks for me to put together 10K hands, so I'm covered for the remainder of the summer on this bankroll approach, and I have plenty of time to think about the next strategy. BK6 is working on something, so I may adopt what he comes up with.

Well, an up and down and up sort of day. I can feel just an ever so slight settling in just ever so slightly starting. Feels good. Ran two tables most of the day and that was A-OK, so no worries there at all. I spent all day at UB just building the hand sample. Not sure what the weekly games look like, so don't know if I'll be there or back at Cake tomorrow. If I'm at UB, I think I'll give three tables a go. PT makes it pretty easy to multi-table, and I'm thinking four tables won't be all that difficult, but probably wise to hold off on that for at least a few days. At Cake, I'm probably just sticking to two tables.

600 hand sampling says I'm playing TAG poker. 18.91% VPIP, 8.62% PFR, AGG Total: 2.18
I'm still putting in too much money from SB (39%), so I'll try and work on that more. I'd like to steal more blinds and such, but at this level, very few players actually fold, so I don't think that's such a great play. If I find a tight player then I steal, but I don't see PFR going up much. VPIP will fall when I cut out the SB limps. I think it's going to look fairly nittish in another 500 hands or so.

Couple HH, both dealing with fuckers betting into me on the flop. Here's the first one: (tried FTR converter but that thing is fucked up so, by mother fucking hand)
blinds are 5c/10c, (please contain your excitement) fish limps in, I raise to 50c w/ QQ and get called by the BB (loose player) and fish.
Flop: ($1.55)
BB bets 90c, fish folds, I call
Turn: ($3.35)
BB bets $1.15, I call (cuz I suck)
River:
BB checks, I check

Thoughts: I'm not feeling too great in this situation, but sort of feels like he's drawing when we get to the turn, but I don't really want to raise if I'm up against Kx, so just call again. He checks the river and I think I have the best hand, but pretty unsure so I wuss out and just check. Retrospective thoughts: Hate it. I don't hate the flat call on this flop, but I hate not raising turn. His bet is weak and I need to pounce on that weakness and charge the damn draw. He had TT.

Second hand. This guy is posting right in front of the BB first hand, so this tells me he is ready to mix it up.
I raise to 45c w/ OTB, new poster is only caller, both full stacks.
Flop: ($1.05)
He pots it to me, I call.
Turn: ($3.15)
He pots it, I call.
River: ($9.45)
He pushes in 5.35, I call.

Thoughts: He pots it into me, and I make a very marginal call on the flop. When he pots again on the turn, I think I'm good and I don't want to raise because he seems pretty fucking aggressive here. He had , so nice pot for me, but I think this hand is just slightly +EV, so I'm not thrilled about it. I think my flat call on the flop is not good.

Play today was okay. I'm not happy with a couple plays I made, but also doing well here and there. Sometimes I think I make the correct read and make the right play, but haven't got a good enough sense of the player and discover that the guy can't fold top pair even with a 5 kicker. I have to remember to dumb down my play when I'm at these limits and just value bet the goods. One of these hands happended at Cake and then the following hand happened, so lost a good chunk over there on the day:
I've got about $29 and villian has me covered. No read on villain as yet, he's somehow picked up a big stack (I must have been paying attention to the other table). Anyway, table limps in and I limp BTN w/ . Villian min raises in BB and everyone calls. Flop comes:
Villian bets minimum, I raise pot, SB calls, Villian min 3-bets it and I raise again. SB folds and BB just calls. I'm guessing BB has AK here, so I'm prepared to check it down.
Turn:
BB checks, I check
River:
BB pushes in, I call.

I can't really put him on an 8 at this point, so my only worry is AA. Still I figure to be chopping. No way he has less than K here. I'm calling to win maybe $3 or so, which are just horrendous odds. HIs min raise 3-bet should clue me in, and I should fold. He had AA. Fuck I play bad sometimes. I have a worse hand from the day, but I'm not gonna post it, despite my masochistic tendencies.

I tilted off a couple bucks after this, but fought that shit off and recovered $10 or so of the losses before calling it quits. I think the tilt happened because I knew I should have played that hand better. I have to just put that shit behind me immediately and focus on the next hand. Always easier said than done, particulary when one is at the table.

if this is 6max, raise the KJs yo.