Well, it's October, three quarters of the way through the year, and I thought (after stopping my journal in the journal section a few months back, in part due to lack of things to write, in part lack of time and (mostly) because I went on an ugly run for a couple of weeks and got tired of documenting mostly losing sessions) that it might be a good time to take stock of things with an "omaha blog" type of thing for the remainder of the year.

What this is basically going to be for is randomly posting my thoughts on how things are going generally, my aims for next year, how i've got on with reaching 2005's targets and any random thoughts on omaha poker along the way. I'm hoping it's not going to end up being a forum for simply posting my results in a very dry kind of way, which is what seems to be the fate of many journals. I'm hoping it'll be a bit more interactive and (hopefully!) a little more lively and interesting. Hoping I'll be able to update every day or two, so give me a jolt if I forget...

TUESDAY OCTOBER 11th

Well, it's been a distinctly quiet last fortnight or so for me. The reason? My desktop PC died at the end of September- it'd been on its last legs for a while, didn't seem to boot up properly (had to reset the thing about 10 times before it finally "caught" and got to windows without freezing, and eventually the hard disk seemed so screwed, in conjunction with whatever was causing the mechanical boot problem, that it just stopped booting altogether). The treatment? Why, buy a new laptop of course, something i'd been thinking about for the last year but as good a way as any to replace my 3 year old machine with a slightly better PC and keep on the tables. So I splashed out £700 on a fairly decent Fujitsu siemens model, which should keep me occupied for a while yet. Hopefully, I'll take better care of it than the desktop.

Annoyingly, I hadn't yet got round to backing up all my results spreadsheets from 2004 and 2005 from the other PC, or, perhaps more seriously, my PTO. Thus, I don't (yet) have PTO on my new machine and have about 40k hands frozen on the hard drive of my previous computer, which i'm hoping can somehow be rescued but i guess I need to speak to someone who knows a little more about computers. It also means I'm having to resort to keeping my records on paper for a while, at least until I can get Excel sorted, although maybe it'll spur me on to get round to downloading to PTO a little more efficiently next year, I dunno.

Another issue with my new laptop is that, although it has a nice widescreen 15.4" display, I noted with dismay when I got it that I can't ramp up the resolution for multitabling. This means i'm going to have to play maybe a maximum of 6 (or, at a REAL push, 7) tables at once. Normally, I play 7 or 8, more usually 8 (which was really successful for me in September as I broke $4k for the month for only the second time this year in ring games). However, I think moving back to 6 might be beneficial for my game. It'll be good for me to play some more "thinking" stuff, rather than playing on rapid autopilot at all times, and maybe concentrate a little more on making some good reads and winning more small pots. This could be useful at Cryptologic, as I've noticed of late both the PLO and PLO8 tables seem to be tightening up ever so slightly, especially midweek. They're getting to the point of being only just a little more loose than Stars now, which is a site I've struggled at this year (i'm nicely positive, but a horrific run there in the last 3 months or so has taken my winrate right down to about half what I make at Crypto).

Of course, the other major enforced change that October is bringing is the change at Party. For those who've been on the moon for the last week, Party has now split off from the "Party Skins" servers (that used to carry all the party players, plus empire, intertops, eurobet etc etc), leaving the other party server sites high and dry with about 25% of the previous number of players on their tables. I can really understand why party did this, and I think it's great business on their part, though it may (for fairly obvious reasons) be bad for the majority of players. I'm not expecting this to impact on me TOO much, though - I do have a rake rebate at Empire (not at party) which means I won't be getting $100 or so rebate every month for my usual one or two tables of 100 and 200 PLO8, but hopefully it means that the Party tables will be freer of bonus whores, which (i'm hoping) will loosen the games right up to the days before they introduced the 100BB buyin. Admittedly, most serious break even rock-like BWs inhabit the ultra low level games, but (from what I've heard) the games that I play (which, at Party, is liable to be mostly PLO8 in the 100 and 200 buyins, for now) are certainly no more tight after the change; hopefully it stays this way. I haven't downloaded the new Party software on my laptop yet, so I'll check it out in the next day or so.

So, I played my first session last night (a pretty gentle one with only 5 tables mostly) since I was forced to finish my September run (I missed out on the $50 PokerPlex bonus because of the computer dying, grrrr). September was a spectacular return to form for me, I booked about 40-some hours and made over $4k, which is excellent after I had two dry months where I made only a little over $3k combined (albeit with a limited amount of play). So, I'm generally optimistic about the rest of the year but hoping to continue my winning form and maybe book out $30k for the year, which would be really nice. As I don't have my records to hand (due to computer issues!) I can't say how close I am, but I *think* I need to make about $6 or 7k in the last 3 months, very achievable if I can put in enough hours in between doing stuff to sort out my new apartment.

Anyhow, the session yesterday was a pretty dry one, the tables at Crypto (with the exception of one E200 PLO and, later, a slightly wild 100PLO8) were fairly rocky, I also fired up a $100PLO at Empire and a few various 100 and 200 PLO and PLO8s at Stars.

In monetary terms, the biggest hand of the night came at Crypto in the £200 PLO game. In dollar equivalent, this is basically a $400 PLO game and it's basically the highest I play. Anyhow, it was quite an interesting hand because I've still not made my mind up about it (I can't get the odds calculator on at work, so I can't figure out the exact, rather slim, EV calcs for the hand).

Anyhow, I had about £230 and was in LP with A876ds. This is a nice hand and one I usually try to raise in MP and LP, so I raised it up. I got 4 callers (or was it 3? working from memory here...) and the flop brought K94 with two diamonds (I had the A high flush draw).

Everybody checked to me, and with a (fairly) uncoordinated flop except to my draw and a decent little pot in there I decided to risk a semi-bluff, which seems a fairly reasonable thing to do here. An MP player who I hadn't played before and had no real read on check-raised himself all in. The bet was a little less than the size of the pot, about $90 into a total pot size of $290 if I called.

I had a bit of a think about this, and ultimately I decided to call (I was closing the action). I thought it was pretty close but the odds were probably in my favour to call rather than fold, and either way I couldn't possibly make a BIG error here by calling (calling down with 2nd set and having him show me top set would be a much bigger EV loss, even though my hand would be "better"). Plus, I am trying to loosen my game up a little bit.

Normally, a flush draw has between 25 and 30% equity against a set (other than in exceptional circumstances) as a rule. I estimated I needed about 30% equity to call, given his bet was a bit under the size of the pot. This is assuming he had a set of course.

Thinking about it rationally, I guessed (given no read) there was maybe (broadly estimated) something like a 65-odd% chance he has a set here, maybe a 25-30% or so chance he has top two or another two pair and is trying to snap off my (possible) AA hand, and maybe a 5-10% chance that he has a hand that is either not far ahead or that I have significant extra outs to beat (like a semi-bluff on AA, top pair with a wrap, or a bare wrap with a flush draw). Against the set I'm maybe 25% or so equity most of the time (perhaps a little more), against the two pair I'm up to above one third equity, and against the other random stuff I am potentially up to 40% and beyond. My 876 is not a great feature, but on this flop it carries a surprising amount of value - any 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, T or J gives me additional straight outs if I hit them on the turn. This could be worth 5-10% extra equity against my opponent, largely dependent on what he has.

Anyhow, as a total estimate, I guessed that (perhaps quite generously) my equity was in the 30-35% range and that, although a high variance play (which perhaps I should be shirking in my biggest game, although, what the heck, that's what bankrolls are for!), calling was perhaps marginally better than folding.

Anyhow, I called, he had KK (no flush draw). I don't have the odds calculator working (as I said before) but I'm guessing I am somewhere around 30% for the hand, so it was probably a tiny bit -EV given his hand but in real value terms my call wouldn't have cost me much more than 5 quid or so. I can live with such "mistakes". Anyway, I didn't hit and he won the £290 pot.

Having lost my largest pot of the evening, I ended up down overall. I lost a little more at the Cryptos (although I did make about $35 of the regular monthly bonus) and won a nice double through with top set in the $100PLO game at Stars, as well as a few smaller pots in the PLO8 games, to finish up a little over 100 there, making me overall about $120 or so down for the night.

The other interesting hand I played was in the $200PLO8 game.

I had something along the lines of AK24 with a suited ace in MP, raised it up and got one caller, who had position on me. The flop came K79 with two clubs (I had no clubs), and I decided to bet out. I bet, he called me. The turn paired the 7 on board. I bet out again, thinking it probably hadn't helped him, although my hand is now vulnerable to a lot of things. He called. The river paired the 9 on board, I checked, he bet about half pot. Now, the turn and river look like decent cards to me, at the time I had the feeling he either had quads or a busted draw/nothing. I reckon he'd have checked down a hand containing weak trips, given I bet all the way, although I guess a boat using the K was also possible. however, again I thought he might've been a bit more positive with this hand. I typed in the chat window he had "quads or nothing" and called, and won a nice pot (I believe he had some sort of busted draw). This was a good example of a river check to elicit a bluff; had I bet out I would've made busted draws fold and get called or raised by all the hands that beat me. The way I played it, I managed to lose the same amount if was I beat but potentially win more if he decided to bluff, so that river check netted me a nice $40 or so.

Anyhow, I'll keep my progress for the month updated here as I go (particularly given my lack of PTO and Excel at present!). So far, excitingly enough, it's:

Hours played in October: 2
Winnings: -$120
Hourly rate: -$60/hr

I hope to get in a few hours this week if possible; it's been a late start to the month and I have to get a few things sorted, poker-wise, starting with transferring my Empire BR over to Party (hopefully, they'll start giving me some bonuses now I'm actually going to be playing there! The bonuses now seem to be account-specific, and as I've only used Party to whore at once a month for the last 6 months or so I suspect I'm currently persona non gratis, but I'm guessing that'll change if I start to play regularly and keep an active account... Just hope they'll keep offering attractive bonuses to make up for my lost rake rebate, now they have a captive audience). I also need to rustle up all the Crypto bonuses (I now have 8 different sites running, so that's a reasonable amount of play) and I'd like to make some withdrawals from them too (I need another £1000 or so to finance all the work I'm having done on my new apartment). Stars seem to have a $150 bonus this month also, which is good news. I've also just remembered I can get about $80 or something by cashing in my Empire "VIP Club" points, which is well worth doing before I move my account - anyone else in the same position needs to check their empire point account, too - there's $1 for every 10 points or something, so it's well worth the few minutes it takes you.

Oh, and one last thing of note - you may or may not have gathered by now (depending on how good your comprehension is - pay attention!) that I've recently (well, about a month ago actually...) bought a new apartment, which has somewhat drained my finances, and the place seems hungry to absorb yet more of my money on electricians, kitchens, carpets and paint etc. Although I have just about enough money to do everything I want, I thought it'd be fun to track my poker winnings in the next few months with a few essentials and luxuries I need to buy for the place. It'll be quite cool to say after a week or two of play that I've made enough for a big screen TV or whatever, so it should give me a nice feeling of accomplishment and a bit of a reason to put the hours in, now i've actually got the place!

High on the list of "wants" is:

New fridge ~£300
Flatscreen 35-40 inch TV for the living room ~ £700
Repair/replace desktop PC? £?
Beer fridge for the living room ~£200
Shower installed in bathroom £??? maybe £500 ish?
Dishwasher for kitchen - £need to research...
Painting and retiling in kitchen and hallway - £800 ish?
Drinks bar - £?

So there's plenty there to look forward to getting . Obviously, main priorities (next couple of months) are the essential bits and pieces. I'd also like to pay for a holiday in the new year some time, and have enough money in about 6 months to get myself a new car, which I suspect may require something like £6-7k on top of the value of my current one, so this is more of a long-term desire.

Anyhow, this has been a bit of a marathon, phew... better sign off!

Monk
xxxxx

As for screen real estate... you may want to try to hook up your old monitor to your laptop... you can then use both screens.

Nice plan. Have to see if its possible, though. I'm not too great with wires and the like !:shock:

OCTOBER 11th

Well, a good day at work, I got quite a lot done and we had some nice results to show my boss, which is always good. At the moment I'm staying with my folks for the next month or so whilst my apartment is having new carpets fitted, being painted (mostly by my own fair hand) and sorted for electrics etc. So, I came home today to find them nattering with an old friend, and I took the opportunity to get in some post-prandial poker.

Managed 3.5 hours tonight, and had (by most estimates) a pretty good session, though it was, in many ways, a frustrating one. I've deposited for the Empire bonus, but the omaha action is VERY thin there at present, so I was only able to play a $100PLO table for about 2 hours and a variety of 25 PLO and PLO8 tables during the session.

I did make a big score in the $100 PLO as I won a $280 pot - I raised PF with AKQTss, and got called in about 5 spots. The flop brought KT4 with two spades (which I didn't have). I bet pot when checked to, and got called in two spots. The 3d was a nice turn to see, and so I potted again, and again both players called (this table was temporarily pretty loose-aggressive). The river brought an offsuit 7, meaning that only a set or 56 beat me. With only 5 or 10 bucks left, I elected to bet out the rest, assuming with the pot this big they'd pay with just about anything. Thankfully, no-one had a set or spawny 56 and I stacked the chips.

I had a frustrating time at 25 PLO - samples included losing one all-in with middle set to top set, and on another occasion having KK on an AAK flop, and running into AA which was costly. I did, however, do well at 25 PLO8, so I made nearly $200 at Empire on the way to freeing up less than a quarter of my required hands.

Elsewhere, the session was a very curious, "bitty" affair. I didn't lose a single full stack, but I didn't manage a single double-through either. I felt that, apart from being a bit flustered at first with 7 tables up (i'm a bit out of practice multiing I guess) I played well and made a few nice plays, including a couple of realy well-placed bluffs for medium sized pots. The frustration really came from the lack of big hands, and the fact a few annoying moments came along. Most notably, I'm on diallup internet at present until i get broadband in my new place, and the connection timed out just as I was about to call a river bet with a low boat in a E80-odd pot (about $100). I even clicked the damn call button. Ridiculously, Crypto has NO disconnect protect of any sort and takes ages to reconnect if your connection drops, and my hand was folded. I don't necessarily know that I won, but I feel like I probably did!

I am loosening up a little more in PLO lately, playing a lot of semi-connecting hands I'd previously fold. Wihout PTO (and the benefit of a lot of hands) it's hard to know how this will work out, but i'm hopeful. Today the tables were broadly quite tight but I still won pots doing quite creative things and, I think, made a couple of decent folds, so being a bit more loose PF doesn't seem to be hurting.

I am also trying to limp a few more hands i'd raise in PLO8 and raising some unusual things (for me) but i'll discuss that in a later post.

Hours in October: 5.5
Winnings: $280
Winrate: $51/hr

i was dashing out the door when i made my last post, so i definitely want to say that i am glad to see you journaling again. the first post was excellent, and the follow-up is nice, too.

as for the cables... usually you just need to hook up the same cable that you use to connect to the back of your desktop. you may have to connect a USB cable if you have a fancy monitor. that's it.

you do need to do some tweaking in the Display control panel, but it's really easy. i'll talk you through it if you can't figure it out (although i imagine you can and will).

OCTOBER 14th - EAT MY BLOG!

Well, another highly dissapointing day in Monkland!

Had a somewhat frustrating day at work, as I spent about an hour in the morning trying to get some analysis files off a computer onto another one only to find that every time I did it they seemed to be saved as "read only" and I couldn't even copy them across on the CD. By some ridiculous company screw up, a certain type of DNA analysis machine we have (the one I used) only runs on Windows NT, widely regarded as the biggest mistake in the corporate world since MGM decided to give Kevin Costner a few hundred million to make The Postman. This means it's not only extremely virus prone and goes down to some incredibly non-virulent trojan every 13 seconds, but that its not USB compatible and thus instead of easily transferring files by USB memory stick or something, we're reduced to copying onto hundreds of disparate CDs which end up lying round the office and leaving it looking like the aftermath of a tsunami-ravaged branch of Tower Records.

Anyway, in actual non-boring poker news, I fitted in a 3 hour session last night which was probably the most frustrating part of my day. I fired off to a great start, the E200 tables at Crypto were looking pretty loose so I had 3 of them running at once, plus some PLO8 and a couple of games at Empire (to clear the bonus mainly). Had a couple of nice wins at $200PLO8 at Crypto which put me up to about $350 in the first half hour, and then won a big pot in the E200 PLO game.

Dealt AAT3ss in the SB, it was min-raised by a slightly over-aggressive and fairly poor player in MP. I just called, as I couldn't make a sizeable re-raise and didn't think he was likely to bite and pop it again if I made a smaller one. Plus, it disguises my hand whilst I'm out of position.

Flop came a juicy AT5, with two clubs (I didn't have clubs).

The PFRer bet pot, after I checked, and picked up one call, who was pretty short stacked (only E80-odd after the call). Now, normally I'd check raise here, but on this occasion for some reason I didnt. At the time, my thinking was that at least one of these guys had a draw and they were both loose and would thus be certain to call. Now, if it hit the turn, I could see what the betting was like and maybe take one off if they gave me odds to chase my boat. If it didn't hit the turn, I was confident I could check the turn again and the aggressive PFRer would bet, allowing me to get all in with only one card to come, because my hand was still completely disguised. Normally, of course, I'd raise here, but I really felt I could get both of them in on the turn if they had any sort of hand and it fell blank, and I didn't think I could make them fold anything here. Plus, I had a feeling the PFRer had a made hand (like AT) rather than a draw (either that or nothing!) and that I could win the sidepot against him even if the shortstack caught something. Of course, low and high straights were possible and would throw a spanner in my plan (especially if I let someone catch a cheap gutshot or something) so there probably was merit to CRing too. I think my play is fine here though.

Anyhow, the turn brought a 4, which was only hurting me in the unlikely event either of them held 23. I checked, PFR bet as planned, I got all in as planned, the 4 paired on the river and I scooped a big pot, over E500 (pushing $650). PFR had AT BUT also had the flush draw, so in retrospect if I KNEW his hand I'd made the right play. Especially as the other guy had flopped a set of 5s and thus was drawing pretty dead to one out!

So at this point I'm something in the region of $450 up, in that zone of thinking "well, I'll have to go some to record a losing session here". Unfortunately, from that point on things went downhill with a combination of dry cards, a lot of annoying 2nd best hands, or hands that I could seemingly make a +EV move with but ran into the nuts, and one or two bits of harsh luck. I finished down about $300, which is a pretty big swing for me.

I'd lost a few smaller pots on the 200 tables when I got stacked with what (at the time) seemed a reasonable play, although now in retrospect it seems marginal at best.

Game #1050578183: Omaha PL (€1/€2) - 2005/10/13 - 22:18:57 (UK)
Table "Poppy" Seat 2 is the button.
Seat 2: Gregoshea (€1601.89 in chips)
Seat 3: Jbj007 (€423.50 in chips)
Seat 4: BigElmo sits out
Seat 5: JAMMYBSTD (€352 in chips)
Seat 6: HongKKid (€224.25 in chips)
Seat 7: Kalamees (€45.75 in chips)
Seat 8: Thetaker (€235.75 in chips)
Seat 9: CptKaos (€235 in chips)
Seat 10: ME (€194 in chips)
Jbj007: posts small blind €1
JAMMYBSTD: posts big blind €2
----- HOLE CARDS -----
dealt to ME [As Ah 5d 5c]
HongKKid: folds
Kalamees: folds
Thetaker: calls €2
CptKaos: folds
ME: raises to €9
Gregoshea: calls €9
Jbj007: folds
JAMMYBSTD: calls €7
Thetaker: calls €7
----- FLOP ----- [2s Kc 4c]
JAMMYBSTD: checks
Thetaker: checks
ME: bets €37
Gregoshea: folds
JAMMYBSTD: folds
Thetaker: calls €37
----- TURN ----- [2s Kc 4c][Ks]
Thetaker: checks
ME: bets €20
Thetaker: raises to €171
ME: is all-in €128
Returned uncalled bets €23 to Thetaker
----- RIVER ----- [2s Kc 4c Ks][Qc]
----- SHOW DOWN -----
Thetaker: shows [Kh 2h Ad 4s] (A Full House, Kings full of Fours)
ME: shows [As Ah 5d 5c] (Two Pairs, Aces and Kings, Queen high)
Thetaker collected €404 from Main pot


On the CO it seemed a good hand to raise preflop (especially if I could fold the button, who is a very good player). On the flop, two of the three callers checked on a flop that's mostly low-orientated, so I'm likely ahead unless someone has KK (I'll get check-raised, and then fold, end of story), and I bet, again to gain position, maybe steal the pot, and also because I don't mind building the pot if someone has a bare flush draw. I do have 4 practically nut outs (the non-flush ace and the non-flush 3s) as well.

Anyhow, I get one call so a flush draw seems the likeliest culprit. The turn hits the K again, he checks, I decide to bet weakly here because I'm still vulnerable to the flush draw but if he doesn't have a K he's less likely to call a draw on a paired board.

However, he check-raises all in. Normally I fold pretty quick here but a) I'd seen this guy make a BIG river bluff against the good button player about 15 minutes previously - the good guy made a fantastic call down with the A high flush on a paired board when Thetaker had only a busted draw or something but made a big river raise and b) it's hard to put him on a hand here, as he called a raise preflop - KK seems less likely now another K is out, and surely he won't risk me folding with such a huge hand. 44 and 22 are possible, but seem less likely again given the PFR, K4 and K2 likewise. I also think he'd be fairly likely to try to raise any of those hands on the flop, barring any other read, rather than give me a free card. However, I should be worried about AK which I guess he would play this way.

Anyway, I made the call because I thought my bet might've looked sufficiently weak that he took a stab at it. Plus, it's less than the pot to call (though in hindsight I thought i'd only been calling a E100 raise or so, so it was actually more than I thought). Still, big check-raises are usually pretty rare on bluffs so maybe it was a poor read. I just had a real feeling this time that I was ahead and my feelings often seem right so I usually trust them (especially where brave calls are concerned!). It backfired though and in retrospect I looked a little dumb.

Annoyingly, if he'd played the hand "correctly", my feeling is that he'd have folded that garbage preflop, either that or raised his likely winning (but very vulnerable) hand on the flop. Seriously, I don't understand his flop play at all. I could easily have a hand like AA with a flush draw which he's letting have free cards, or something like KQJT which could catch a big turn. Either way I'd have got out of the hand without losing much more than E50 on it. Bah.

I made two more plays I'd categorise as (at least) poor, something unusual for me in one session but I guess enough of these marginal hands (where it's possible to make a mistake and lose your stack) appeared where I held the worst of it that I just had a bit of an unfortunate run of cards.

Firstly, I held some hand involving J8. Flop came 228 and was checked around. Whatever. Turn J, gives me 2 pair but I'm still not betting as anyone with a QQ-AA beats me, and there might yet be a 2 or 88 lurking. River another 8, giving me a pretty strong boat. I decide to bet half pot to hope for a call if someone else had an 8. Some guy with a short(ish) stack raises the pot. He has about E60 left after the raise, I decide although I'm worried about JJ and 22 that I should put him all in (he is a decent, although slightly loose player; I've not seen him make a lot of aggressive bluffs or crazy plays but he can be a bit loose and poor). Probably a bad move, there's not much that I outright beat that he calls (another J8 is a big possibility, 2J perhaps though I reckon he'd have bet the flop, and, I guess, A8, but again he'd probably not raise, maybe). Although there's only precisely two possible sets of cards (the two remaining jacks and two remaining deuces) that beat me, there's not much else it seems he'd raise here. Right enough, he had quad twos and I lost perhaps E60 more than I should've on the hand. Annoying in a way that a) I managed to hit enough to pay off a flop hand that had the board crippled and b) he was a shortish stack - if he had enough to make a full re-raise on the river I wouldn't have raised, but I knew I could put him in and figured he might call a few things I could beat. Marginal, and not a terrible raise but I think I have to just call here, right?

Secondly, again I get sucked in to paying off the nuts because I have a bluffy sort of a read on my opponent. $100 PLO this time, a lot later, I get KKTx with the king suited in hearts, flop brings J94 with two hearts, loose guy bets out, I decide to call because my hand seems to have a decent amount going for it if he has a set or two pair even. Turn brings another heart, he bets pot again, there's still some depth to my stack so I try a small raise, to keep him in if he has a weaker flush and make him pay if he has a set, ready to fold a re-raise. He calls, river blanks, he bets out ($50 into a $70-ish pot). Normally I'd have given up on this somewhere, but I've played this guy before, and seen him do some dumb LAGGY things, including when I had middle set, he check-raised me on the flop (I often fold this to good players) and I put him all in only for him to show bottom two or some crap. Of course, here he wasn't bluffing and had the nut flush. Maybe not the worst play in the world, again, and pretty much "my style" against these sort of guys, but again I'm left feeling I didn't need to lose my stack there.

Had a few moments of annoyance at PLO8 as well - I'm clearly not quite up to playing 7 tables at once on my PC just yet (either that or I'm losing braincells due to inhalation of paint fumes at my house) because I managed to misread the board and waste about 25 bucks on a no-hoper hand. I raised AQT2ss preflop and got two callers with position, flop came something like J28 rainbow, I decide to bet out first to act because I think I've got two pairs, jacks and deuces (and because the 2 might've counterfeited someone's A2 and it's unlikely anyone has my hand beaten here), perhaps because I had AJ2x on another table. Of course, I got one caller, who was too short to try and bluff or bully and I had to check-fold the turn when I didn't catch a miracle straight or something.

I also (on a kind of positive note) ran into one of the worst players I've yet seen at 200PLO8 (this time at Crypto again), although proceeded to lose money to him in two hands he played badly beyond belief. He did have his "lucksack" hat on for a while though as I wasn't the only one he was bad-beating. Worst thing was he wasn't the textbook lucky LAG, who shoves on all sorts and catches, but a passive-loose type guy who was calling any bets with just about any cards. Absolute ATM at PLO8 but he picked up a few pots so he hung around for an hour or so before finally busting.

First hand I tussled with him, he's short (down to his last $90 or so I think). I get TTxx in the SB (can't remember the sidecards, probably some weak-ish low). Only two guys in the pot, so I come along. Flop comes KKT, out of position I decide to check-raise to try to remove the guy with a deep stack and see if I can get the dummy in against me. It works nicely, he calls a $20 check-raise. Turn is something, I bet out again, he calls. River is another K (ugh!); I'm guessing maybe he had a draw of some sort, although I did have him on a K when he called the CR, and I don't want to encourage a bluff, so I bet a small, milking/blocking amount ($10 I think). He thinks for an age, calls and flips up AQQx for a 3 outer, after calling a CR on a KKT flop. yep, he was that bad.

Shortly after, I have AA37 and raise it up. He calls, as does one other tall-ish stack. Both check to me on the QQ4 flop, I decide to bet out half pot or so, fairly cheap way to flush out a Q (I'd probably do the same with something like AQxx). Idiot calls me. Turn brings a lovely A, giving me the top boat and a scabby 37 for a low draw. I decide not to mess around here because he probably needs to be holding 4 cards here to consider calling. I bet pot, he calls, river brings a 6, I put him all in and he calls, flipping 3557 for the low. So he called a QQ4 flop with 3557, then called a full pot bet to chase half a pot on the turn when he didn't even have the first or 2nd nut low draw. Yep, as I told you, he was that bad. I doubt I'll see much more of this guy in these games as he will get his backside handed to him in the customary rapid way that dreadful PLO8 players do, but I hope to play with him again soon.

On another semi-positive, I stacked a short guy in my last PLO8 hand, I held A3TQ or something, A suited in diamonds, and called a small raise (the guy was steaming after being rivered by our friend, mr. fishy). Flop came all diamonds with two low cards, I CRed him all in, he had A2xx and I scooped.

Anyhow, a $300 loss was a bit of a shocker to be honest, but I'm confident I'm playing reasonably at the moment and although I haven't won or played much this month, hoping to get in plenty of hours either side of painting some of my house in the next week or so. I have a lot of bonuses left to collect, with Empire's $100 making slow progress (are those tables tight now or what?) and Stars hopefully going to get there for $150 before the end of the month (though I won't hold my breath!). I still have the majority of the Cryptos to clear, too, which usually net me about $500 or so in total after a lot of play. Additionally, I'm due a couple of months of Empire rakeback (after I played so little in August) so hopefully that'll be another 100, 150 or something, and I'm going to cash in my VIP points there which I think should net me another $80 before I transfer it to Party. On a related point, I've managed to lose/mislay/eat the letter which has my TotalBet account number on it, which I need to validate the account (which has the best part of $1k in it...) on my new computer, so that's a worry. I guess I better email them....

Might get in some hours tonight post-painting, I'm going to a friend's housewarming and clubbing tomorrow night so I might have to miss out on the Saturday night fish-fry this week. Oh well. Here's to better fortune!

I'm adding in the $80 I'll be making from Empire VIP points to make my early month figures look a little better ....

Winnings for October: $270
Hours played: 10
Hourly rate: $27/hr

More money, please, poker! I have hungry electricians to feed!

OCTOBER 14th (again..)

Checking back in again, a quick entry before bed.

Managed to get home quite early today and got in 4 hours or so in the evening. The usual Friday crowd was in evidence at Crypto, plenty of people buying in short, chasing poorly and getting in on wierd hands, usually equals nice profit for me! Today there didn't seem to be too many complete balloons, but I still booked a reasonable win.

A lot of the pots I won were small, but there seemed to be an awful lot of them. Nothing particularly exciting jumped out, my feeling about the session was that i played very well as a rule, although I did make a few loose plays in the PLO8 game. No big pots won, but I did narrowly miss out on a really big score in one of the 200PLO games:

Game #1059676073: Omaha PL ($1/$2) - 2005/10/14 - 23:54:59 (UK)
Table "Swaps" Seat 6 is the button.
Seat 2: Coolmouse ($96.50 in chips)
Seat 3: bootaroo ($242 in chips)
Seat 4: ME ($280.50 in chips)
Seat 5: Lastcall ($200 in chips)
Seat 6: WinCash2 ($164.25 in chips)
Seat 7: Howszat ($775.50 in chips)
Seat 8: NUT-DRAW ($91 in chips)
Seat 9: 2231 sits out
Seat 10: rooster18 ($160 in chips)
Howszat: posts small blind $1
NUT-DRAW: posts big blind $2
Lastcall: posts big blind $2
----- HOLE CARDS -----
dealt to ME [Kd 6d Kh 6c]
Coolmouse: folds
bootaroo: calls $2
ME: raises to $11
Lastcall: folds
WinCash2: raises to $40
Howszat: folds
NUT-DRAW: folds
bootaroo: calls $38
ME: calls $29
----- FLOP ----- [5h 6s 2s]
bootaroo: checks
ME: checks
WinCash2: bets $124.25 and is all-in
bootaroo: raises to $202 and is all-in
ME: calls $202
----- TURN ----- [5h 6s 2s][4h]
----- RIVER ----- [5h 6s 2s 4h][Qd]
----- SHOW DOWN -----
bootaroo: shows [4d 7h 3c 5s] (A Straight, Seven high)
ME: shows [Kd 6d Kh 6c] (Three of a kind, Sixes, Queen high)
WinCash2: shows [Ad 5c Jd Ah] (A Pair of Aces, Queen high)
bootaroo collected $155.50 from Side pot #1
bootaroo collected $494.75 from Main pot

$650 pot but alas I missed out. I usualy raise the double pair hands when I get chance (today I feel one bad aspect of my play was my regression to a very passive preflop style, I really need to start raising more). The re-raiser obviously had AA and was a bit on tilt, so I thought I'd check-raise the flop with my very well disguised top set. Unfortunately of course, the other guy happened to have the straight. There's no way I can fold to his all-in obviously, he could easily have a worse hand (he is loose and not that good) and I'm calling 200 into a 650 pot with a hand that's liable to be winning at least a third of the time. Annoyingly, two of my outs (the 5s) were dead in my oppponents hands, and I missed out on my 30% outshot (close to the worst case scenario really). No biggie, I played it fine.

For the second day in a row I found a complete muppet in the PLO8 game at crypto who was raising all sorts of utter garbage preflop (9865 and the like), but again I failed to take advantage with any big wins. For most of the session I was a little up over two tables, but then it slipped away a bit at the end (I made one misclick which thankfully didn't cost me any money) and almost my last hand I made a really loose play against this guy which, though it wasn't dreadful, was far from very good either. That said, I called his flop bet when I was about 50:50 on the hand, and his turn all-in for less than the pot when I had an uncounterfeitable low draw and very dubious high pair of 6s, which is the point I probably should've folded. Both calls were poor and overall I dropped about 80 bucks on the hand, trying to play a bit looser at PLO8 but in some ways I still think I make some really poor plays in this game, in a few different ways. Frustrating.

Empire is a total rock garden, I'm utterly wasting my time and money messing about there to free a measley 100 bucks, and although i'm up in the time i've been working on it (I think), it was another drab set of tables today, with only the 50 PLO game livening up some ludicrously tight 25 PLO8. I think everyone is just there freeing the bonus. I'm gone as soon as I get it, I think - I have 550 hands now of the 1000 so it'd be silly to quit now when I can get there in a couple of decent sessions 2-tabling the small omaha games, but I'm not expecting to make any money! Today I lost a couple of hands throughout, mostly not played very well, although I did lose a 40-some pot to a horrible river suckout from the one real fish I saw all day, which was about the amount I finished down I think.

Still a load of crypto bonuses to free, although they're getting there, and then I will spend a bit more time at stars and, once empire is cleared, move my empire cash over to party where (apparently) the games are looser than they used to be, although a quick scan now didnt reveal anything unusual.

Feel like the month is going well, even though the winrate is merely average, there's been two or three real big $600+ pots i've had good equity in and lost so far, and sooner or later one or two of those will hit. Generally, I'm playing well despite a few aberrations in the last two sessions, which have been unfortunately costly, I feel i'm making a lot of strong, creative plays too, just need to cut out the mistakes (which is somehow harder to do when you're playing a slightly more open, creative game - although broadly i'm still playing tightly, and I think I can sort it). Probably no poker tomorrow as i'm painting in the house then heading out for evening drinks.

October winnings: $730
Hours: 14
Winrate: $52/hr

discusses set up of dual monitors using a laptop and a proper monitor. a bit short, but it's all that's necessary, imho.

OCTOBER 19th - current mood: pensive.

Played like a drain tonight for a couple of hours (maybe 3), although I was somewhat fortunate in some respects it only cost me $50 (partly because I freed up $90 of crrypto bonuses). Probably made some decent plays but lots of stuff didnt work out and I felt like I was either playing a tiny bit too cautiously (on my E200 and $400 tables) or a tad recklessly whilst trying to make too many plays on straightforward fishy opponents.

Did spend some time with briachek at empire (I am still freeing the bonus, though probably one more good session will do it, then i can hit party again). It was fun though as usual I wasn't taking it seriously enough and splashing silly money around. I got up to about $65 then managed to lose $40 on two silly plays after deciding to have "one last round" before bed lol, that round and the last one on the $50 table I played being the difference between break even and losing LOL. Other than that I lost no big hands (I didn't rebuy once, just had a lot of small rebuys, which on a $400 table can be a full buyin for a 100 or 200, which happened a couple of times) but I didn't win too many monsters either. My one chance of a biggish score came in a three way all in with AQ on a KJTx board on the turn in the $400 game for a ~$1000 pot. I was freerolling the lot of them with a nut flush draw but my 9 outs didn't come on the river. Was quite relieved though, because the board paired and I guessed at least one would have a set but no, it was a total freeroll!

Perhaps a few days off has dented my concentration a bit. I am a little disappointed to not have played very well tonight to be honest. I suppose it happens; times like this make you realise you've always got a lot still to learn about playing top class poker! I will try to concentrate a bit more tomorrow; watching the TV and messing about a bit too much on the 25 table probably didn't help matters today and I really need to take stock and get back to a bit more of a professional attitude about this. I feel like I've been "dabbling" a bit too much this month.

Probably won't be on tomorrow because I'm heading back to the house to do some more painting. Living room is now nearly covered in a pretty cool aqua blue, which will look rather splendid with my new leather sofa. What-ho, buttwipes!

October winnings: $680
Hours played: 17
Winrate: $40/hr

Crap considering all the bonuses i've been getting. However, I'll be putting in some more heavy hours before the end of the month. Feels like i've barely played in october!

Monk
xxxxx

Okayyyy.... Well, it's been a few days. Sorry about that. Time for a full update, I know! Lots has been going on and i'll try and update my general progress more fully tomorrow (might have to post from work , or at least write some of it there!).

Suffice to say i've played 3 exceptionally swingy sessions, the last one culminating in one of my biggest swing-fests ever, starting in the afternoon and going about 200 up, before dropping almost 1k, and then swinging back up to a 200 win thanks to a $800 bad beat bonus at crypto when my quad aces went down to a straight flush (see anything goes section for more details!).

On the whole, progress is slow and steady, with bonuses making up most of my winnings once more. I've had a couple of hands where bad luck has intervened today, and at least one (if not a couple) of hands lately where i've made a horrible cock up of things and lost money as a result. today, though, I feel i've played really well (albeit a bit less aggressively than usual, a 1k downswing will do that!) and i'll try to go through some hands tomorrow.

My three unblogged days have all been winners once the dust settled, $150, $160 and $200. I've given up on stars for the moment (as i'll discuss later) and have bonuses still to free at Interpoker and my new site, Stans poker, as well as a possible new deposit bonus at Party (which probably won't get done this month).

Summary:

Hours: 28 (This is REALLY vague, I hate not having my excel spreadsheet or PTO to log my sessions - could be as much as 31 or 32, this could be a slight underestimate but I think it's near enough). A pathetic number of hours but I SHOULD manage 40 for the month (I hope!) and that's my absolute bare minimum. I didn't play for 10 days due to computer issues.

Winnings in October: $1190

Winrate: $42.5 per hour

Interestingly, I've made somewhere around $1300 from bonuses this month thanks to the bad beat bonus. So I'm down at the tables over about 30 hours of session time, a REALLY terrible run for me, which can also be said for August and July. Probably due a hell of a lot of big hands sometime soon, I hope.

Ok, as promised, a quick update of my recent progress.

Managed to play precious little over the weekend for a couple of reasons; firstly, Friday night I was tired (and a little drunk!) so I only managed to catch a couple of hours on Crypto and Empire (finishing the bonus and withdrawing my BR of about $1.4k to start up at the new and (hopefully) improved Party). On saturday, I went a-painting once more, my house is looking really good now and I'm well on the way to finishing the decorating. I have to do all of the hall, stairs and landing (which promises to be a very big job!) but the living room is already a pretty snazzy shade of blue with freshly painted ceilings and radiators, and all the bedrooms are more or less done now as well. Carpets and new doors should be sorted in the next two weeks, hopefully along with my shoddy 1960s electrics, and then I can start shifting in (and buying new) furniture. Anyways, I digress - I didn't find the time to play on saturday because of the house stuff, and then because I was tired and nodded off in the evening watching to football. Sunday came around, I was back doing some more painting and then had my usual afternoon of sport (following my usual 6 days of sitting on my arse, eating, swilling beer and working), involving 5-a-side football (other team didn't turn up) and 3 hours of volleyball. During the latter, I managed to land awkwardly on my heel and, although I didn't think it was much at the time, I've been struggling to walk since and although there's no permanent damage or breaks, it kept me off work on Monday as I went to get an x-ray and rest it, and kept me from playing on sunday night as I opted for an early-ish night instead.

So, really, my only un-blogged days are the last three I've played, so i'll do my best to re-create the unbridled excitement of playing mid-level pot limit omaha games with you in the next few paragraphs....

I put in two sessions on Wednesday (had planned to do some painting but I couldn't be bothered after work and wanted to make up for what felt like a pretty limp session the day before). I fired up Empire and Crypto when I got home (empire because I still had a couple of hundred hands pending for the bonus) and sat down. I noticed that the tables were pretty crap, average pots a little low although the 100PLO I found at Empire (the only PLO game above $25 running!) was rocking along nicely. The only really loose game was a £200PLO (~$400 PLO) at crypto which (if I remember) broke before I really got the chance to play any hands. Anyways, I fired up a couple of 25PLOs at empire to clear the bonus a bit quicker and stuck on an average E200 ($300)PLO and a couple of 100 PLOs and PLO8s at crytpo and got to work.

I felt a little bit like it was one of those sessions when I wasn't going to make much of a hand - I gradually slipped a little money and didn't really seem to be getting anywhere. I seemed to manage to lose in the bigger games whilst winning in the smaller ones, always an annoyance, and I got stacked early on twice in the 100PLO games.

Hand 1 at Empire I held AJ98 (or something to that effect) with a suited ace and called an EP preflop raise from LP. 4 to a flop, PFR bet weakly into a flop showing J83. I can't remember off the top of my head if it was suited or not, I think there might have been a flush draw out because there was one call in the middle before it got to me. At this point I could make a big raise with top two and I was pretty certain I was ahead against so much passive play (if I get called here I'm probably gambling against a lot of drawing cards, but the raise is the only option since I might clean up my hand a little by knocking out some of the draws, or even take it down with one play).

Unfortunately, the one guy who had position on me re-raised all in, one caller, and I was really forced to call as it was only another $15 or something to me in a $250+ pot. The re-raiser had 2nd set, and I missed my two outs (the other jacks) as he stacked me. Can't complain too much here since I don't see what else I could do, other than fold a likely winning hand in position against two weak bets, which is clearly not the way to go about things.

At Crypto, meanwhile, I spilt a stack when my strong draw didn't get there against someone with two pair in the PLO100 game, but managed a couple of solid pots in the fishy 100PLO8 to double myself through. With a few small rebuys here and there I ended up a slight loser.

However, I was most upset with my stupidity over at the increasingly rarely-profitable waters of Pokerstars. I sat in some PLO8 and NLO8 games, not really getting anywhere (up or down) significant when the following hand came up at 200 NLO8.

I am in MP with QQ53ss. Not a great hand by any stretch of the imagination, for some reason I decide to call. God knows why as I'd usually fold this on all but the fishiest tables, and this one wasn't half bad. I guess I have a little bit for both low and high on the right board so it's maybe not the worst call in the world.

Anyhow, the flop brings a rainbow J24. Not a bad flop at all for my hand, it's four handed (I think) and checks to me. I decide to bet pot to try a semibluff steal with decent position, fancying the most likely callers here have two pair or a low draw, both of which i'm not in bad shape against (obviously i'll fold to a check-raise). I buy the button with two callers.

Turn brings a 6, giving me the nut straight and third nut low, but putting out 4 to a flush in clubs. Both check to me, I decide to bet my hand strongly, betting just over full pot into the $35 or so on the felt. The EP player check-raises me all in, other guy folds. It's about $135 or so to me to call, final pot will be about $400 or so if I do.

So I called; horrible play and I couldn't exactly complain when my 1/4 pot fell down to a painful zero as the club flush hit on the river, my opponent having painted his A35 suited in clubs for the nut straight, nut low turning into nut flush. I felt at the time that it was quite likely he either had the low with a nut flush draw or maybe A35. However, he'd been fairly passive and his raise is just screaming strength. I've got to assume I am, at best, getting half pot (netting me a $60-odd profit) with him drawing very strongly to scoop (either a set or a flush draw with his A3), either that or i'm up against A35 and i'm looking, at best, at quarter of a pot which will net me, at best, a $35-odd loss. So I'm risking nearly $140 to win, at best, probably $65-odd, with the very real probability that I'm getting quartered regardless of the river (which was pretty much the case here; I had 3 outs for a half). Definitely -EV given the situation and I was mortified to have basically stacked myself on fricking QQ53. Ugh. Butchered from start to finish basically.

After that loss I was getting frustrated (mostly at myself, some of it at the dead cards I'd had for about an hour beforehand) and quit. Thankfully, I picked it up again an hour or two later and turned my losing session around with some aplomb. Although I lost a few more bucks at Stars, I managed to treble through at Empire on a $50PLO table whilst finishing off the bonus (part of my reason for playing again was that I'd got within 90 hands of it), and won a few medium-sized pots with some strong play at Crypto in the 100PLO to make about $360 there, finishing the day up about $160.

Next day I added another $150-odd to the monthly winnings after clearing out my empire account and starting a new one at Stan James (Stan's) Poker, a UK-based bookmaker site which uses the Prima engine and was offering a highly generous $100 deposit bonus for just 500 hands. When I checked out the lobby, prima seem to have a few more omaha games than the last time I played there (initially they had 2 full-handed PLO8 games at 100 and 200, as well as one full handed PLO and a few $200 6-handed games, a lot more than I remember last time, and all with decent average pots; however, since then i've played a couple of times and it's not been quite as good as I remember).

Anyhow, I was basically break even everywhere for the session and UP FOR ONCE!!! at stars. I played 200PLO8, scene of my previous cock-up, found two decent games and made a $200-odd profit over the two in the course of an hour or so. I don't recall any particularly large hands though I made one lovely river bluff which took down a decent pot when a pre-flop raiser showed weakness (probably an A2/AA hand) with lots of broadway cards showing and I was banking on the fact he didn't have a straight when I raised his weak river bet about $30 into a $100 pot. Picking up pots like that seems to be the only way I win at Stars, no-one seems to pay off when I get a decent hand, and when they do, they usually seem to hit some unlikely draw these days. This seems to make me more eager to bet hard on hands and generate pots, and perhaps I overplay things a bit too much over there (not adjusting from typical winning Empire/Crypto play, where calling down and being aggressive is a good plan when half the time people show junk).

And that brings us up to date except for yesterday's two sessions. After returning from the x-ray department and getting the green light on my heel injury (which actually got a fair bit better through the day, to the point where I could walk/limp fairly well and drive) I decided to put in a couple of hours before calling some joiners and decorators to do some work on my house.

Anyway, the session was an unmitigated disaster of variance. It started well enough, I noted that tables during the UK afternoon were hard to come by, so I decided to experiment with playing fewer tables but only playing $200+ buyins, meaning I had $800-$1k on the go at one time but across only 3 or 4 games. Seemingly a fine idea, in principle, and it was looking pretty smart too. I picked up a $300 pot in the 200PLO at stars and made some small inroads at Inter and Stans also, putting me up somewhere in the $200 region. As the tables cooled down yet further, I had thoughts of quitting, but I decided to play another hour. Big mistake, it turned out.

Anyhow, I felt that for once in a big losing session I actually played OK. Usually, when I drop a lot of change, it's a combination of (mostly) bad luck with perhaps a poor play thrown in here or there. Well, yesterday afternoon I felt I played fine. perhaps one or two minor errors but nothing that warranted dropping the best part of $1k in an hour (most of which seemed to disappear without losing too many big pots, strange!). The rot started, as always, at Stars, as I found myself making frequent small rebuys ($50 here, $60 there) in the $200 tables and was soon back to level. Similar occurrance at Inter. The cards had gone ice cold, and I kept getting trapped preflop playing decent hands between a few raisers, getting in a big chunk preflop or on the flop then having to fold when the board totally missed.

Typical example: 100PLO at Inter, I have 8765 (might have been double suited actually) in MP, a pretty strong hand. Sometimes I would raise for deception, in this case I didn't The button made it another $10 to go when it hit him, I called that. A few limpers dropped out, some other fella made a re-raise up to $30-some, button pushed most of his stack in. It came round to me, with a strong hand vs two opponents likely holding lots of broadway cards, it seemed a good investment three ways with implied odds or chance to drop on a bad flop (if it didn't get all in before we saw a flop) so I made a marginal but (I think) good call. Anyhow, it ended up all in, the re-raising idiot had some garbagey KK hand and the other guy had AAJJ. Flop came all high (!) despite their hands and I lost. Checking afterwards both me and the AA guy had somewhere in the 35% region, other guy had about 25% or so, so everybody ended up gambling really.

Then I started attracting a few rough-ish losses, notably I got stacked twice when I held AAxxss, flopped an uncoordinated low board both times, made a maximum pot bet after raising preflop, and ran into a set both times. Frustratingly, my hand was close to 40% on both occasions (meaning that to get stacked I basically had to run into an opponent with a set or (perhaps) two pair, and still miss all my outs) and both times lost. Certainly not bad beats of course, and nothing much to complain about, but it gradually sapped my dollars away along with the cold deck.

The camel back-breaking straw that made me quit because I was too pissed off came at Stars. I held a hand involving a 6 and an A on the button (don't remember the rest). I limped. Flop came 668. Everybody checked to me and I bet about 3/4 pot or so. Called in two spots. I remember thinking VERY clearly at the time, with that eerie feeling of certainty you sometimes get playing poker (which I reckon is no more than luck now and again, if you consider the times you call or fold when you're "certain" you're ahead or behind and someone turns up something unexpected), that an ace was going to hit the turn to give me a strong boat and someone was going to have 88. Sure enough, the A hit. I bet semi-weakly again, not wanting to lose any weak 6's. River blanked off, all of a sudden SB comes alive and bets his last $40 into the $50-some pot. I call and of course he has 88. My last $20 disappear the next hand as I raise preflop, get called, all in on a 9-high garbage flop and lose to someone with 9923.

I started again in the evening session, things didn't get any better. My downswing continued beyond $1k as I found top two plus a straight draw in 100PLO at Inter, got all in by the turn and promptly lost to the preflop raiser, a player I'd pegged as "reasonable" who happened to river his 7-high flush, chased all the way after I re-raised the flop. Great.

However, as always, Interpoker came up trumps for me. It's amazing how people have "lucky" sites and "unlucky" ones. For me, it's always been a struggle winning at Party, but previous to the recent split, I've always done pretty solidly at Empire (when I steer clear of 100PLO, or the "suckout zone" as I call it, and limit holdem). At the cryptos, there's some sites I always seem to do well at (UKBetting, Pokerplex mostly) and some where I'm rarely better than break even and often seem to be scraping the barrel bankroll-wise even though they all use the same tables (Caribbean Sun and Ritz Club London I always seem to be making redeposits at). However, Interpoker tops the lot and seems to be the site where I consistently kick the most ass and win the biggest pots.

Anyhow, last night I had a pretty brilliant turnaround from approaching $1k down for the day (and, indeed, about break-even for the month) thanks to the worst beat I took all day. At interpoker in the 200PLO game I found AA83, raised preflop (perhaps a bit rashly from UTG, although I've been experimenting playing AA a bit more aggressively at the Cryptos especially, even re-raising sometimes against a poor player when i've got position), flopped nothing, turned an ace, and river an ace. I managed not to get stacked by the royal flush that someone else had (see ANYTHING GOES section in the forums for full hand history!), although I should've fired one more raise on the river and actually probably played the hand rather badly, I just *felt* he had the royal and only called his weak river raise. He flipped it up and picked up $125 for the royal flush, whilst I won the rolling bad beat bonus at Inter, nowhere near as lucrative as Party's but still pretty fantastic - I picked up my share of about $1.4k (which was $820 for MEEE!) as my quad aces went down in flames. In actual fact, I think that might even be my biggest ever NET win in a single pot - I've won pots in the $1k region before (in fact, I once won an $800 pot at a $100 table!) but usually after putting in about $400 or 500 of my own. On this occasion, losing to the royal only cost me about $40 in the hand (should've been more if I made the smart raise on the river), and so I picked up a little under $800 in net winnings.

Anyhow, that seemed to kick off a decent run as I played some really strong poker for the last hour of my session, winning some small pots here and there (including one rather fishy effort at E50 PLO8 (there weren't any bigger PLO8 games going at Crypto) when I chased a nut low draw and not much else, some crappy pair, against a preflop raiser and runner-runnered a flush against him; my flop call was a bit loose but from there I played it well). I'm still almost exactly break even at Stans poker since my return to prima but feel i haven't necessarily been on the tables at the best times yet (the 100 plo and plo8s I played yesterday were pretty tight-passive) and have generally done OK.

Anyhow, I finished the session up $200. Hence my October stats which you'll see in the above post, and which I'll recap at the end.

Now, onto other matters. It seems, much to my disgust and annoyance, that Stars has replaced Party/Empire as my ultimate nemesis. I went on a horrific run there starting a couple of months back when I dropped (I think, in July or August) about $1k on a site which has always done well for me. Well, since then it's got no better. I really feel when I sit there that I'm just not going to win big. It's been SO long since I remember a really big winning session there (or even a really big pot that I've won, say $500+); seems I either win small, in the 50-200 region, or break even, or I lose big. And the losing sessions seem to be greatly outnumbering the winning ones.

Now, a lot of it seems to stem from bad luck. I haven't been outdrawn much but seem to consistently find 2nd best vs best type of hands (see the 668 flop hand mentioned previously), and when I do find a strong hand I struggle to get callers. I refuse to believe I can't win at Stars or anything of that sort, I had a good record there last year and played it as my main site in January when I won over $2k, but lately having such a long losing run is getting to me, so even though i'm about 1/3 of the way to the latest $150 bonus I decided to kick it on the head for a while and withdraw my money. Hard to explain the problems i'm having because the tables don't seem significantly more tight than at Party or Crypto (average pots are generally in the 25-30 BB region, which is certainly winnable, and you can add 10% onto any stars AP because the tables are 9 handed, not 10). Perhaps it's a combination of things:

1) Failure to adjust to the more passive/tighter style that most people seem to use (there's the odd complete balloon but in general the play does seem a notch higher than most sites it has to be said), leading to me sometimes getting my money in with the worst of it, a rarity at Crypto or Empire.

2) Medium term variance. I've probably had my fair share of luck at other places (interpoker as described before!) and it's amazing how just a few hands going the other way can make such a difference. In my horror run there I probably dropped over $1k, maybe even more, of pots against opponents with 6 outs or less, and remember at least three pots where I got all in and lost to guys with three outers or worse. Recently I've been losing (not sure how much but I think about 550 or so since depositing for the 150 bonus), and I think I could easily come up with a couple of pots that, had they gone the other way, would've easily covered the losses. I remember pushing preflop in a 200PLO8 game with AA2, some goon calling with 456J or something, and getting half. That's 200 right there that could've been mine. I've been in numerous times on draws in 100PLO games that missed, or been in with a good shout but run into better hands, etc etc etc. Just add two hits on those all in draws or sets that didn't get drawn out on as low as 100PLO, and pretend I stacked the moron in the 200PLO8 game and that's $600+ right there. It's just that the 550-odd loss followed right on the heels of two poor months where I lost money at this site and I guess I'm on something like a $1.5-2k downswing all told from sometime in the first 4 or 5 months of the year, so perhaps leaving the site for now is in order.

3) Not getting paid off often enough. People get to know other players at Stars, I'm not helped by being active on internet forums, having a recognisable name and my ugly mug plastered all over my Stars icon. A change of identity would be VERY good for me I think.

I hate leaving sites like that, even for a short period, because it undermines my confidence. I'm well aware that most of my winnings in the last 2 years have come from playing at crypto (albeit where i spend most of my time), and so feeling I can't win after a bad run at Stars, or (as in the last year or so) Party/Empire is not good. However, the more I think about it the more I'm OK with it; I'm still very optimistic for the future and realise I probably don't play enough for my stats from a month, or even a year, to be completely variance-free. I know i'm largely playing good poker, so the best thing for me to do is simply to keep doing that and move to pastures new when I feel like it.

At the moment, I'm more confident and hopeful about the future of my career, having been given a new, more responsible post in the lab which also gives me a bit more money. The idea of looking at playing more and working less is (for now at least) on the back burner, and I'm less conscious of a need to pick up x amount of money each month on poker, knowing i'm due a big payday soon when I drain out some of the excess in my crypto accounts and get my stars BR back, and knowing that my big expense for the year (my new apartment!) is more or less paid for, except for a few grand for furniture, electricians etc which i've put aside anyhow. Given i'm making more at work, and will soon be looking for some tenants to pick up the two spare rooms and (hopefully!) pay enough rent to cover my mortgage, the pressure will kind of be off in 2006 to make lots of money, unless I decide otherwise. Currently, my feeling is that if I can put in 40 hours a month, which (at current rates) should average me about $2k a month (a shade less than I've made this year), that I can probably put away pretty much all of that for savings, rainy days etc and not worry too much about my finances. I need to do a lot more with my life (especially if i'm still going to be working full time) so the need to spend more time doing recreational things is out-weighing the need to get in poker hours (although i still like playing and yearn to play sometimes, even though I often go two or three days without now, which hasn't always been the case). There's still a seed of ambition to find a way to push my winrate up towards $100/hour, which would be a potential "get rich quick" scheme if I could put in significantly more hours each month, and an interest in, perhaps, making it up to play the big games sometime, but I recognise that at the moment it's tough to find a decent stepping stone between $400 and $2k buyins and thus that I'll probably be happy treading water for a while.

For now, I'd still like to make $30k for the year and would consider that a great personal achievement, given i'm just playing as a semi-pro in my spare time. I'm more or less on target for my main yearly goals (averaging in the mid-$40s hourly rate, and need a couple of good months, I believe, to hit 30k for the year) so I think I ought to be pretty happy with things.

Anyway, if you stuck with it this long, you're a braver man than I. Now go do something constructive, the lot of you!!!

Hours: 28 (ish)

Winnings in October: $1190

Winrate: $42.5 per hour

Hey, well you don't have to read it

Seriously, though, if this is too long-winded and it's putting people off, let me know.

Anyhow, I enjoyed a very solid session tonight, my first decent win in a while (oddly, corresponding to a Pokerstars-free night ). Took me four hours or so to rack up just over $600 profit, and I also finally got my empire rebate from last month, just shy of $100.

Played at Interpoker and my new home at Stans tonight, and won on both sites. Tables were hard to come by for a short while, so I did play a couple of 50 buyins, 50PLO8 at Stans and one 50PLO (briefly) at Inter, as well as the usual diet of 100 and 200 PLO.

At Inter, I don't remember winning any huge pots, but played some very solid, strong poker throughout and managed to avoid any ugly moments of beatage. I was about break even on the 200 and E200 tables, but I made about $400 overall because I won a couple of nice pots at 100PLO (firstly when my top two held up against a draw, then when a loose-aggressive/tilty idiot got all in with me preflop for a $200 pot - I had AAxxds and he had a rather limp KJT7 or something, with no live flush draws) and also did well in the 100PLO8, doubling through on one occasion as my nut flush and nut low draw scooped a preflop raiser for a $200-odd pot. I also freed the $90 bonus, meaning I only have the $100 Stans bonus and the new party deposit bonus i'm hopefully going to pick up with my new account.

Over at Stans I had a great time in the 50PLO8 game, running into one particularly fun fella who seemed to make it his vocation to transfer his entire bankroll to mine. My first big hand came when I scooped a 3-way pot with A26Q when the flop came Q64 and I was able to get it all in with my top two/nut low draw combo. A Q on the turn gave me the win, although I was ahead of both opponents anyway. Later, the goon managed to give me stack number one when he decided that A344 was a really good hand to get 75% of his stack in preflop, then moaned when my AA2J caught a rivered flush to break his lucky flopped set of 4s. Of course, I had a go at him in return. He managed to "apologise" for his rather stupid outburst by first stacking himself with a stupid bluff against someone holding a boat, paid me off in another pot, then, to demonstrate that some people really DON'T learn, re-raise me with A229 or some rubbish preflop when I had AKK2 and I put him all in. Normaly I'd tread carefully against a re-raiser without AA but against this fella I felt I had it well covered, and indeed I did as my dominating hand won and he left the table. I finished with about 6.5 buyins.

My PLO100 form at Stans wasn't so good, as a number of decent draws missed and I failed to find any big hands, although I only dropped about 70 bucks or so. Total profit = 185 or so. I'm a hundred or so hands from freeing the deposit bonus too; would've done already but didn't realise hands below $100 buyins didn't count.

Right, better get to bed - i have tomorrow off work so i can do some apartment-related stuff, meeting joiners etc, but i screwed up by forgetting about it and setting up a test at work that i'm going to have to go in and finish tomorrow morning. Bah!

October -
Hours: 32
Winnings: $1900
Winrate: $59/hour