Monk,

That second to last post could be the longest post I've ever seen on a poker forum. I tried to read it all I swear!! But then this naked woman was on my computer screen and bang...i lost my place.

Also, why is your journal the only one that is a sticky? You aren't that important.

Well, it's been a rough weekend. I've played tons, and lost money, which, given the hours i've put in plus the multitabling I do, is so frustrating. I've had my worst day, mentally, in as long as i remember this year today, had a bad session in the afternoon where about $400 went awry and another ugly session this evening where the river kept on crapping on me. I lost another $150 in the evening, including playing separate O8 sessions all over the place, and, well, losing.

I guess I could list all the shit that's happened to me but basically what'd be the point. Oh OK, here goes anyway .... Particular highlights have been two 200PLO hands at empire where I had top set vs and opponent with bottom set and a gutshot. On hand 1, we got all in and he caught, on hand 2 he picked up a flush draw on the turn, raised it all in, and caught on the river. Something like $700 down the shitter in those two beauties. Today I found sets with AA twice in PLO; once, the window didn't pop up and I autofolded, once I make a big RE-raise on the flop, some dick with a ten high flush draw and a gutshot for the wheel comes along, wheel hits on turn and no pair on river for me, about my only big hand of the afternoon apart from PLO hand ~2 on empire. Two big hands in a 4 hour session in between some garbage cards and small rebuys, costly stuff. This evening I had a lot of garbage happen at O8, though nothing much sticks in mind, I feel like a bit of an interloper at these tables these days and the hands kinda wash over me a bit. Maybe that's two much mutlitabling. Big hits of this evening came in PLO where, although I won overall, I found 22 in the BB, flopped A2J, bet pot, a couple of calls, and turned a 2. River brought a J and yes, some goon had sat on JJ not raising all the way, and after I turned my quads he rivered me right up the ass with his quad-over-quad. I even had a feeling he had it when I bet, but obviously I had to go to the felt. About an hour later JJ crapped on me again in a quadtastice river moment, as I had JJ on a AJT8 board (8 on turn)... The 8 on the river hit one of my opponents and I lost out again (thankfully he only had $60-odd) as he flipped up 88 for a runner runner quads to beat my 2nd best boat. Upshot of this all is that I've played about 7 hours of poker today, and somewhere in the 40-50 table hours figure, and lost somewhere approaching $600. Sickening.

I realise that PLO going bad today is simply due to other people playing garbage and hitting when they don't have odds to do so (or on a few occasions playing a hand horribly and "accidentally" making more money doing so). However, the worst thing is that I just CAN;T win at O8... for a start, in limit and pot limit, I simply never seem to make a hand... when I have an O8 session, big scooping hands seem to come like once every ten table hours or so, so I assume I have been running INCREDIBLY cold, but i'm down this year overall and took another utter mauling today, I played a 100PLO8 table at gaming club (badly), three different 3/6 tables at empire, a 3/6 at UB and a 2/4 at UB. Every single table I finished down, I was never up more than 50 on any of them. Always seems the way for me in O8 almost as long as i can recall - either lose a lot or win a little, and it's annoying. I guess I should just stick to PLO but it's so annoying and frustrating this year that i cant win at any other game; I know I haven't played enough hours, but it really sucks to be a losing player at NL (errr... I think, or maybe about break even, though to be honest I barely played), SnGs (luck), O8 limit (fuck knows whats wrong here, cards seem cold, maybe I suck, who knows ), PLO8 (barely played, had a couple of bad beats in recent sessions) and limit holdem (not played a lot of hands but beats again etc etc).

Other than that, I'm in a kinda good mood about stuff at the moment. Something fairly important in my personal life might work out next week, and I had a good run today, first time in ages I done anything physically demanding after a coupla weeks sat on my arse at work or playing poker.

Anyway, after today's utter bullshit I think I'm going to probably try to take a bit of a break. Was hoping to get 3-4k this month the other day, after a good run, but i'm playing lots all of a sudden, and i guess my figures still look ok. I'll still be just about on track for my yearly target, I think. I'm sure i'll find some time to play PLO this week, but we'll see. Maybe I need to give the PLO a rest for a bit and genuinely convince myself I can win at my other games, I dunno. Anyhow, I'm pretty pissed off with poker right now after wasting today and pissing away the equivalent of a week's wages, so I guess I might find some time to whine at tightwad and cast whimsical doubts over his sexuality before hitting the sack. Dunno if I'll be playing much in the next few days, we'll see how I feel I guess.

$2450-odd
53 hours-odd
$46/hr

Well fuck me if that's not something of a drop back to earth after my monthly $70+ per hour rate i've had for the last few weeks. Great.

Monk
xxxxx

Tough break Monk. I must admit that if I lose more than 3 buyins in a short period I almost always take a break from PLO since I have trouble handling the variance, even though my bankroll can handle it. I then play o8 and SnGs until I have my money back and am completely at ease with the thought of losing it again...
Is there a certain limit to the number of suckouts that you can handle before you call it a day? I'm not sure about the higher limit games, but it is just a fact of life for PLO players that you can play perfect all day long and be down two buyins or more, especially with maniacs or calling stations at your table.

Strangely enough, I am annoyed by a better player outplaying me than by a stupid player sucking out, since if I am being outplayed, at least I learn something...

Anyway, hope you are back on track soon, and don't fall for overplaying those low quads again ....

Pieter

YEHAAAA! Well after my recent mediocre run, things are right back on track again, and the catalyst (somewhat surprisingly, given my poor O8 form this year) seems to have been scoring some BIG wins at PLO8 after making a short return to the game.

Most excitingly, I've just this session topped FOUR THOUSAND DOLLARS for the month, which is my best month so far in 2005 and indeed my best since October last year (where I played a fair few more hours, I believe). Just for the satisfaction of returning a month over 4k I think I'm going to *perhaps* give the games a rest over the next few days, spend some time doing stuff this weekend and get out of the house a bit.

Also, I have a chapter finished for my first (hopefully) published article... not on poker would you believe, but on microarray methods (errrrr it's a science thing...) at work... I get paid some royalties on it (if it's accepted, which fingers crossed it should be) but mostly it's one of the things I wanted to do in life, and although a published poker article or something on another of my interests woulda been nicer (for a while I tinkered with the idea of writing children's stories a year or two back, which never really got off the ground due to my abject laziness, and I also intended to write a blues-related travel book after returning from a tour of america's central mississippi states, following the path of the river, in 2003, which also never happened) it's still pretty cool and I'm fairly proud to (hopefully) finally have my name in print on something.

Anyways, back to poker...

After my post yesterday, I had a very nice evening session where again the loose PLO8 tables at empire and Crypto proved my big winners. Although I made $140 profit early on by catching and holding up the top set in a big three-way pot for $280 or so in PLO (I was up against a big wrap straight draw, middle set, and a flush draw, so I was semi-fortunate to hold on, although I was +EV in a big way to get my chips in), my better hands seemed to come in the hi/lo game. I was rather cold at empire, but at crypto I found one real beauty when I called a preflop raise with the average hand of A[d] 2[d] 7[d] 3[c], and the flop came a gorgeous 6[d] 5[d] J[h]. The SB bet out the size of the pot, one caller, my hand was so good (nut low draw with protection would get there often enough to make calling a fine move against these guys, but my additional high draws made it a raise IMO, if I could keep both opponents in). A genuine "pulling" spot, I wanted both guys to put their stacks in and that's how it turned out, 8[c] on the turn giving me the low and the beautiful 6[d] on the river scooping the whole thing. It turned out I was fortunate to scoop, as the SB held JJ with three diamonds, making my flush a big dog for the hi end, but my low was the only one out there. The third player had fished in with some indescribable garbage hand and I was only too happy to take his money. Later on, I found a nice win or two with high only hands and finished the whole session $400 or so to the good.

This morning I fired up some PLO and PLO8 again, and although the tables were rather quiet, I found a hot run at 100PLO8 at empire again (first I doubled through as big money went in on the flop and my all-in on the turn with two pair and a nut low draw was folded, then I made another $100 pot as I called a small flop bet with A26K on a J64 flop, found the K on the turn for two pair and low draw, pushed in against a short stack and he called, the 6 on the river netted me the win, and THEN I found AK36 in the BB, flop came a tasty AA8, I called a pot bet trying to keep it small on the flop and lure in more bets if he had a weaker hand, also looking good for low as a backup, and found a 2 on the turn to give me a nice low, he bet pot and again I called. On the river, the board blanked, and he made what seemed a small blocking bet, I pumped him for the pot, he called and I scooped against his bare AJ with 47 for low). I also made one smart bluff play at 200PLO that was good for a $50 net profit after 40 mins at the table, and showed the benefit of having some low features in a scrappy hand at PLO8 at crypto - I fished in LP with KK24ss, flop brough AKJ with a flush draw (not for me). One bet, one call, I decided to take one off with backdoor low as a useful help. The 3 on the turn was a good card, but put out the flush. The bettor (obviously with a straight) checked, the next guy bet weakly at it (non-nut flush?) I called and the first guy dropped. The river was a 6 for the nut low to me, with my set. He checked, and I fired for the pot. He mucked which was nice, as I suspect he mighta had a straight or weak flush for hi and thus woulda had half of it. My low features made it very easy to steal the pot with "backup" for half of it if he was on a check-raise.

All in all, I am playing well, liking PLO8 again and, excpet for one setback in my "real" life today, fairly happy with things. It's sunny too, so I might go do some shopping and perhaps get myself a nice bottle of lager or something to celebrate my good month so far!

APRIL NUMBERS:

$4020
65 hours
$62/hour

Monk
xxxxx

In the first hand you described, you had 2 6d's out there and the second one would have made a boat for the SB. I assume that is was a 3d or something?

Anyway, good job on the 4k month. Keep up the good work.

WELL.... May HAS started with a bang!

For the first time in a while I feel I'm playing pretty well, I've had three big sessions in May so far, one on sunday and two today, and have recorded wins in all of them (including a nice $500 2-hour session first up, including a $500 pot that I described to norton and brian whilst we were playing the BTP PLO ring-game on Stars).

Part of my recent success is down to a great run on my return to PLO8. Not playing much PLO for a while has given me a bit of a new outlook on the game, and I'm playing much more rockily and, I feel, solidly, than when I had a bad run on the game at the end of last year. This, combined with the fact the Party/Empire games seem weaker than PLO and my success on the crypto tables, has meant that I've put up some great numbers at the end of April (finally putting O8 in the black for me this year) and the start of May. So far this month I'm hitting something in the region of 60BB/100, which obviously won't last but generally, other than ONE hand tonight where I missed a chance to steal on the turn after someone checked to me, and then he hit a 3/4ing car on the river for a decent sized pot, i'm playing OK.

Because I am multitabling more now (6 or 7 tables is generally the norm, whereas a few months ago 5 would've been more usual), playing omaha more or less on autopilot with some interesting plays throw in here and there, I'm able to throw away all but the very premium O8 hands, which I think was a previous problem for me, and when I only catch a part of the flop I'm not as tempted to make big drive bluffs which, at the lower levels, never clear the field anyway. As it is, the mix of 3 or 4 PLO games and 3 or 4 PLO8 games is suiting me well and I'll stick with it for a while, perhaps until the next omaha dry spell and then I'll look at adding to my 4k 3/6 limit hands.

As for websites, this month I'm concentrating on my usual suspects, 100PLO8 at empire is good so far so that's been hit solidly, and the PLO and PLO8 games at crypto, with the monthly bonuses, being my bread and butter. Stars has more or less been retired in the short term, I have about $400 left there after my last cashout (the cheque has annoyiongly gone missing, though, bloody fedex..), and Gaming Club hasn't really been that good of late so it only really exists (with about 1.5k in the BR) to pick up the odd 100 or 200 PLO game if I'm struggling to find enough at my other sites. The money I have in UB, stars and Gaming Club is nice to have around but if things continue well at empire and crypto I might clear out those sites, despite the fact i'm currently working on incremental bonuses at all of them.

I'm back to looking at houses again and have cashed about $6k or so out of my BR this month, which I'm currently waiitng for in various guises. Will come in handy because I need all I can to find myself a decent place in the good city of Leeds...

Right, busy week at work (alas) so I might not be on much for a while.... But May, so far, is looking very tasty indeed!

MAY NUMBERS:
$910
8 hours
$114/hour

Although it won't last, it's nice to have a monthly winrate so far that eclipses TUPs

Monk
xxxxx

Well, a rather frustrating little 2 1/2 hour session tonight sees me dropping back (albeit only a small amount), although it really FELT like it should've been a nice win. Those can be the most frustrating!

Basically, three decent hands kind of ruined things for me after I made a good start (150 or so up on Crypto at the 100PLO8, 2 tables, with 4 tables of 100 and 200 PLO running also, clearing bonuses).

First up, I get 88JT in PLO and the flop brings 893 rainbow. Excellent! Second set and a straight draw. A small stack moves all in for next to nothing, I make a raise of about 2/3 of the pot (I don't mind a caller or two here, especially if they have 2 pair etc), the guy next to me dumps in the rest of his short stack and the only tall stack on the table calls.... It comes back to me, I push my last $60 into the pot and the tall stack calls and turns over the most pathetically wimpily played top set I've ever seen. My straight doesn't materialise and I lose a stack.

Second hand, this one really hurt and had me steaming.... PLO8 I get AA73ss in LP. A couple of limpers to me and I raise the max. Four to the flop, which comes 25K with two diamonds (I have the A[d] but no draw). SB makes a weak lead, the other two call. I decide my AA might be good for high, and I have the nut low draw, and I know no-one has the top flush draw, so I decide I have enough to make a big raise to try to force out weedy draws from taking a shot at my pot. Alas, it doesn't work. The SB, who otherwise didn't play TOO terribly, calls off nearly all his stack with the ABYSMAL 4567, no suits.... He called that garbage preflop, and then calls a massive re-raise with a gutshot that'll not even give him the best low... I'm over 80% equity on the flop and the three remaining 3s are his only scooping cards, well you can guess what showed up on the turn. The pot was nearly $250 and was a nasty one to lose.

Third hand, I get AKQ8 and flop K83 on a very loose table. I decide to make a maximum bet on the flop, and get two callers. On the turn, a 4 shows up and no flush. Top two still looks good, one more maximum bet. Two more callers, and a K shows on the river. At this point I'm moaning to dodgyken on msn about the PLO8 hand, and for some reason the window doesn't pop up. Sodding crypto decides that instead of just auto-checking for me, i fold to no bet on the river. With the nuts. My KKK88 hits the muck as I time out, and a guy with queen high and the board wins the near $80 pot. Somewhat worse, crypto doesn't let you rebuy above $80, so after this hand I had about $81, doubled through about two hands later against a guy who had about $140, so if i'd just been able to play this hand i'd have won more off the other guy too. Grrrrr! The perils of multi-tabling.

Anyhow, I then picked up a couple of small pots, made $50 bonus at totalbet (90 to come very soon at interpoker) and finished the session in a haze of poor cards and one or two slightly sub-optimal plays. $120 down is no great blow but today I felt this could, and in many ways should, have been a winning session.

$790
11 Hours
$72/hr

Monk
xxxxx

OK, OK... So I haven't updated my journal eh, "much", this month... Sorry! I've been a bad boy.

In way of recompense, I'm going to insert a full and juicy monthly "round-up" in the next day or two, and then hopefully be a bit more fastidious about journal updatage in June. I promise. Scout's honour. Well, OK I never was a scout. I have a couple locked in my basement, however, guessing that possibly counts. Anyway...

I've been busy, so I have lots to update y'all on, and hopefully I'll find a bit more time for poker and stuff in June. We'll take stock of my 2005 halfway progress in a month, and I'll put some detailed figures in and plans for the next 6 months. Now, won't that be something, for, all my PLUCKIN' fans to look, forward to....

Monk
xxxxx