Silly

Date: Mon, Nov 5, 2007

I can't stop talking like Kenny Tran. I'm taking mundane situations at work and home and pretending it's the WSOP.

"I fix that bug like no other. I so sick with that bug fix."

"Nobody cook steak like that. Genius! I genius at cooking steak."

This is perhaps funny only to me.

I fine with that.

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Silly

Date: Mon, Nov 5, 2007

I can't stop talking like Kenny Tran. I'm taking mundane situations at work and home and pretending it's the WSOP.

"I fix that bug like no other. I so sick with that bug fix."

"Nobody cook steak like that. Genius! I genius at cooking steak."

This is perhaps funny only to me.

I fine with that.

Read Full Poker Blog Post

Tales of the Great Reconstruction

Date: Fri, Nov 2, 2007

"I just booked my trip to Vegas," I said to my co-worker Random101.

A singular eyebrow was raised in Spock-like fashion as he replied, "Don't you need a bankroll for a trip like that?"

Ouch.

"Good point," is all I could muster.

****

My live game bankroll took a nosedive in the months of August, September and October. And by nosedive, I mean wings-off-the-plane, engine-failing, pilot-already-dead nosedive. Proper bankroll management dictates that twenty buy-ins is sufficient padding to theoretically survive the variance encountered by those who espouse the never-ending "all one session" philosophy.

However, for me, in the live games here in G-Vegas, there are a couple of problems with that.

Problem 1: When your bankroll drops, you're supposed to drop down in limits in order to recover. Well, for me, there are no lower limit games to play in. It's not as simple as dropping from $200NL to $100NL with the click of a mouse. G-Vegas homegames are most likely going to always remain $1/$2 blinds.

Problem 2: During my time online, I've seen swings of +/-10-15 buy-ins happen quite frequently. If you read the forums at 2+2, there are many successful long-term players who suffer downswings of that variety. It's not really too uncommon. However, for me in the live games, the 15 buy-in downswing with nowhere to go to regroup was just a jackhammer to my poker psyche, wearing it away chip by chip until there wasn't much left. Of course, my play suffered which compounded the issue.

****

What was the solution? It hurt, but I had to make a decision. I hamstrung myself by putting away nearly all of last year's winnings, leaving myself no cushion for any downswing of this size. If I was going to continue to play, I'd have to reload the live game cash roll by making a withdrawal. I hated doing it. It still rubs me the wrong way just thinking about it. But if I wanted to continue playing in the few home games that I do, and if I wanted to go to Vegas in December with enough cash to play in the variety of games that I enjoy; then I had to do it.

The check game on Tuesday.

****

If I don't learn from this, then I'm not the player I think I am and I'll never become the player I want to be. Fifteen buy-in downswings can happen. While some of it is due to bad luck and bad play, the bottom line is that I need to take measures to ensure that if and when it happens again, I'll have the cushion I need to keep playing the game the way I need to play it in order to make that rebound happen without making another withdrawal.

My ability to play well depends on a clear mind. It depends on not having thoughts that I could go broke if things continue. It depends on a big enough buffer of cash such that downswings don't impact my decision-making process.

I'll hopefully get back on the winning track. And when I do, I'll keep a 50 buy-in roll before I sock any of it away again. Because if I end up losing 50 buy-ins, then the decision to continue or not will be oh so painfully easy.

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Tales of the Great Reconstruction

Date: Fri, Nov 2, 2007

"I just booked my trip to Vegas," I said to my co-worker Random101.

A singular eyebrow was raised in Spock-like fashion as he replied, "Don't you need a bankroll for a trip like that?"

Ouch.

"Good point," is all I could muster.

****

My live game bankroll took a nosedive in the months of August, September and October. And by nosedive, I mean wings-off-the-plane, engine-failing, pilot-already-dead nosedive. Proper bankroll management dictates that twenty buy-ins is sufficient padding to theoretically survive the variance encountered by those who espouse the never-ending "all one session" philosophy.

However, for me, in the live games here in G-Vegas, there are a couple of problems with that.

Problem 1: When your bankroll drops, you're supposed to drop down in limits in order to recover. Well, for me, there are no lower limit games to play in. It's not as simple as dropping from $200NL to $100NL with the click of a mouse. G-Vegas homegames are most likely going to always remain $1/$2 blinds.

Problem 2: During my time online, I've seen swings of +/-10-15 buy-ins happen quite frequently. If you read the forums at 2+2, there are many successful long-term players who suffer downswings of that variety. It's not really too uncommon. However, for me in the live games, the 15 buy-in downswing with nowhere to go to regroup was just a jackhammer to my poker psyche, wearing it away chip by chip until there wasn't much left. Of course, my play suffered which compounded the issue.

****

What was the solution? It hurt, but I had to make a decision. I hamstrung myself by putting away nearly all of last year's winnings, leaving myself no cushion for any downswing of this size. If I was going to continue to play, I'd have to reload the live game cash roll by making a withdrawal. I hated doing it. It still rubs me the wrong way just thinking about it. But if I wanted to continue playing in the few home games that I do, and if I wanted to go to Vegas in December with enough cash to play in the variety of games that I enjoy; then I had to do it.

The check game on Tuesday.

****

If I don't learn from this, then I'm not the player I think I am and I'll never become the player I want to be. Fifteen buy-in downswings can happen. While some of it is due to bad luck and bad play, the bottom line is that I need to take measures to ensure that if and when it happens again, I'll have the cushion I need to keep playing the game the way I need to play it in order to make that rebound happen without making another withdrawal.

My ability to play well depends on a clear mind. It depends on not having thoughts that I could go broke if things continue. It depends on a big enough buffer of cash such that downswings don't impact my decision-making process.

I'll hopefully get back on the winning track. And when I do, I'll keep a 50 buy-in roll before I sock any of it away again. Because if I end up losing 50 buy-ins, then the decision to continue or not will be oh so painfully easy.

Read Full Poker Blog Post

Rebuy!

Date: Wed, Oct 24, 2007

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Rebuy!

Date: Wed, Oct 24, 2007

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Ending of the Vending

Date: Tue, Oct 23, 2007

If you somehow happen to read about a Greenville county male who killed a random person without provocation, please direct all donations for bail money to Mrs_Blood.

I just wanted a Diet Coke.

I work on the 3rd floor in a 3-story building. On my floor, there are two soda vending machines: Coke products and Pepsi products. Given the choice, I prefer Diet Coke over Diet Pepsi. Sue me. Occasionally, I like to have a bag of fucking pretzels with my soda during lunch. It's not too much to ask, I don't think. However, the snack vending machines are on the 2nd floor.

And that's really not a problem because also in that second floor vending area are two soda vending machines: Coke products and Pepsi products. I like to kill two birds with one stone. In an ideal world, there would be snack vending machines on the 3rd floor too. But we don't live in an ideal world. I'm OK with that. I've come to terms with it.

I generally suck it up and walk down to the second floor and satisfy both of my vending urges at the same time. The snack vending machine is great because it's see-through. Snack empty? Don't put any fucking money in. But not so with soda. It's opaque. And because I'm not Superman, I can't see through the goddman plastic. When do you know your selection is empty? Well, of course, right after you put your money in and select "Diet Coke."

In our building, the cost of a 20 oz. bottle of soda was $1. A simple American dollar. Four quarters even. But then something happened. Six months ago, it was $1.05. Who the fuck carries around an extra nickel? Nobody, that's who. So us corporate monkeys trained ourselves to treasure those nickels. Seriously, who wanted to put two dollar bills in and get back 95-cents? Like I said, nobody.

When the vending machine fuckfaces couldn't phase us with the nickel, they figured they could double their extra profits and hose us even more by charging $1.10. And like lemmings we mindlessly began carrying around extra dimes.

But that's OK. I just want a Diet Coke and pretzels with lunch.

For the past week, the second floor vending machine was out of Diet Coke. The first time, there's really no way to tell. I put in a dollar bill....AND MY DIME....and pressed the button. This machine has three, count 'em three, Diet Coke slots. All three greeted me with the red light of stupidity, taunting me, blinking in code that said, "Ha ha moron! No Coke for you!" I pressed the change return button and was greeted with eleven dimes. Who the hell wants eleven dimes?

So I'd adjust. I'd get my soda on the 3rd floor, walk down to the 2nd and get my pretzels, then walk back up to the 3rd floor and eat. I waited a week. A week's a pretty good amount of time to wait for the vending machine to fill back up, don't you think? We have perhaps 1000 employees in the building, you'd think the vending machine company would take advantage of that fact.

Nah.

I tried the 2nd floor machine again. Three buttons, three red lights. But because the vending machine had been near empty for so long, I didn't get back eleven dimes this time.

Yeah, that's right. Twenty-two fucking goddamn nickels! Fuck off Diet Coke, fuck off and die.

So I resigned myself to the fact that I'd from now on get my soda on one floor and my snack on another.

Until today.

Third floor soda vending machine, why have you forsaken me? I put in a dollar....AND TWO NICKELS....and pressed vend. Bang, a soda comes down. But it's not Diet Coke. It's regular Coke. If I wanted regular Coke, I'd have pressed the regular coke button. Luckily for me, the machine has two Diet Coke buttons, not three like its second floor counterpart, but still better than one.

In goes another dollar....AND TWO NICKELS...and bam! out comes another soda. REGULAR FUCKING COKE. I'm ready to kill.

I leave the regular Coke's on a counter top, some lucky sugar-based, calorie junkie just hit the jackpot. I hope he takes my free Coke's and goes into an insulin fit.

I hang my head, resolved to the fact that I have to now go down to the first floor vending machine area. The last resort among snackers on the 3rd floor. I grab another dollar out of my wallet and head towards the Diet Coke machine. I stick the edge of the bill into the receptacle and....

...it won't take.

I give up.

****

Someday, they'll find the body. What will puzzle the investigators the most will be how someone could kill someone else with an empty Diet Pepsi bottle.

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Ending of the Vending

Date: Tue, Oct 23, 2007

If you somehow happen to read about a Greenville county male who killed a random person without provocation, please direct all donations for bail money to Mrs_Blood.

I just wanted a Diet Coke.

I work on the 3rd floor in a 3-story building. On my floor, there are two soda vending machines: Coke products and Pepsi products. Given the choice, I prefer Diet Coke over Diet Pepsi. Sue me. Occasionally, I like to have a bag of fucking pretzels with my soda during lunch. It's not too much to ask, I don't think. However, the snack vending machines are on the 2nd floor.

And that's really not a problem because also in that second floor vending area are two soda vending machines: Coke products and Pepsi products. I like to kill two birds with one stone. In an ideal world, there would be snack vending machines on the 3rd floor too. But we don't live in an ideal world. I'm OK with that. I've come to terms with it.

I generally suck it up and walk down to the second floor and satisfy both of my vending urges at the same time. The snack vending machine is great because it's see-through. Snack empty? Don't put any fucking money in. But not so with soda. It's opaque. And because I'm not Superman, I can't see through the goddman plastic. When do you know your selection is empty? Well, of course, right after you put your money in and select "Diet Coke."

In our building, the cost of a 20 oz. bottle of soda was $1. A simple American dollar. Four quarters even. But then something happened. Six months ago, it was $1.05. Who the fuck carries around an extra nickel? Nobody, that's who. So us corporate monkeys trained ourselves to treasure those nickels. Seriously, who wanted to put two dollar bills in and get back 95-cents? Like I said, nobody.

When the vending machine fuckfaces couldn't phase us with the nickel, they figured they could double their extra profits and hose us even more by charging $1.10. And like lemmings we mindlessly began carrying around extra dimes.

But that's OK. I just want a Diet Coke and pretzels with lunch.

For the past week, the second floor vending machine was out of Diet Coke. The first time, there's really no way to tell. I put in a dollar bill....AND MY DIME....and pressed the button. This machine has three, count 'em three, Diet Coke slots. All three greeted me with the red light of stupidity, taunting me, blinking in code that said, "Ha ha moron! No Coke for you!" I pressed the change return button and was greeted with eleven dimes. Who the hell wants eleven dimes?

So I'd adjust. I'd get my soda on the 3rd floor, walk down to the 2nd and get my pretzels, then walk back up to the 3rd floor and eat. I waited a week. A week's a pretty good amount of time to wait for the vending machine to fill back up, don't you think? We have perhaps 1000 employees in the building, you'd think the vending machine company would take advantage of that fact.

Nah.

I tried the 2nd floor machine again. Three buttons, three red lights. But because the vending machine had been near empty for so long, I didn't get back eleven dimes this time.

Yeah, that's right. Twenty-two fucking goddamn nickels! Fuck off Diet Coke, fuck off and die.

So I resigned myself to the fact that I'd from now on get my soda on one floor and my snack on another.

Until today.

Third floor soda vending machine, why have you forsaken me? I put in a dollar....AND TWO NICKELS....and pressed vend. Bang, a soda comes down. But it's not Diet Coke. It's regular Coke. If I wanted regular Coke, I'd have pressed the regular coke button. Luckily for me, the machine has two Diet Coke buttons, not three like its second floor counterpart, but still better than one.

In goes another dollar....AND TWO NICKELS...and bam! out comes another soda. REGULAR FUCKING COKE. I'm ready to kill.

I leave the regular Coke's on a counter top, some lucky sugar-based, calorie junkie just hit the jackpot. I hope he takes my free Coke's and goes into an insulin fit.

I hang my head, resolved to the fact that I have to now go down to the first floor vending machine area. The last resort among snackers on the 3rd floor. I grab another dollar out of my wallet and head towards the Diet Coke machine. I stick the edge of the bill into the receptacle and....

...it won't take.

I give up.

****

Someday, they'll find the body. What will puzzle the investigators the most will be how someone could kill someone else with an empty Diet Pepsi bottle.

Read Full Poker Blog Post

iWin

Date: Mon, Oct 22, 2007

Last Friday, our group at work had a little team-building competition. It consisted of two parts; both of which, luckily for me, involved Unlimited Texas Hold Them.

Our current boss is a recreational player and thought it would be neat to have the company sponsor two types of tournaments: a live one and a computer simulated one. During a weekend business trip, he wrote a poker tournament simulator (in Excel of course, because if you're not sure what your development environment should be, the default is Excel) and gave us access to player functions in which we'd write our "Poker AI" if you will.

We were given a couple of weeks to code our bots using the vbScript within Excel. Whoever's bot won the 12-player Sit 'n Go simulation would take home an 8 gig iPod Nano.

After the simulation was over, we'd convene at a co-workers house for a live tournament where 1st would pay out an 8 gig iPod touch, and 2nd place would earn a 4 gig Nano.

Pretty cool for free shit, huh?

After ironing out a few minor bugs in the wrapper code, my "bot" lucksacked its way to victory. I had won a 2nd iPod for the week. I wasn't sure what I'd do with it since I had that 160 gig one coming soon from PokerStars. Still, a win is a win, and I felt it more than appropriate to be as unbearable as possible to my co-workers.

Enter the live tournament. Few of the players had any real poker experience; only Random101 had played nearly as much as I did so we were the favorites going in. A few hours later, and it was heads up between he and I. I had a chip lead and won the final hand with a race, my 88 beating his A9s.

I had just won my 3rd iPod of the week. In fact, I'd won each of the different kinds offered by Apple: the Classic, the nano and a Touch. Crazy.

After dishing out the appropriate level of trash talk, I gave away my nano so that the 3rd place finisher in the live tournament wouldn't go away empty handed. After all, how many iPods can one person use? I still have my 30gig video iPod, so having four of them was a little much.

****

After a weekend of using the Touch, all I can say is that it's an amazing little toy. The most usage it got was browsing the web via the Safari application and built-in wireless connection. It's pretty sick.

Also, I ripped some DVD movies to it and in widescreen format, the quality is pretty amazing. Apparently, Apple is opening up the API so my guess is a ton of 3rd party apps are on the way.

Not a bad six days, $900 in Apple merchandise won through poker.

Now if I could only win some cash.

Read Full Poker Blog Post

iWin

Date: Mon, Oct 22, 2007

Last Friday, our group at work had a little team-building competition. It consisted of two parts; both of which, luckily for me, involved Unlimited Texas Hold Them.

Our current boss is a recreational player and thought it would be neat to have the company sponsor two types of tournaments: a live one and a computer simulated one. During a weekend business trip, he wrote a poker tournament simulator (in Excel of course, because if you're not sure what your development environment should be, the default is Excel) and gave us access to player functions in which we'd write our "Poker AI" if you will.

We were given a couple of weeks to code our bots using the vbScript within Excel. Whoever's bot won the 12-player Sit 'n Go simulation would take home an 8 gig iPod Nano.

After the simulation was over, we'd convene at a co-workers house for a live tournament where 1st would pay out an 8 gig iPod touch, and 2nd place would earn a 4 gig Nano.

Pretty cool for free shit, huh?

After ironing out a few minor bugs in the wrapper code, my "bot" lucksacked its way to victory. I had won a 2nd iPod for the week. I wasn't sure what I'd do with it since I had that 160 gig one coming soon from PokerStars. Still, a win is a win, and I felt it more than appropriate to be as unbearable as possible to my co-workers.

Enter the live tournament. Few of the players had any real poker experience; only Random101 had played nearly as much as I did so we were the favorites going in. A few hours later, and it was heads up between he and I. I had a chip lead and won the final hand with a race, my 88 beating his A9s.

I had just won my 3rd iPod of the week. In fact, I'd won each of the different kinds offered by Apple: the Classic, the nano and a Touch. Crazy.

After dishing out the appropriate level of trash talk, I gave away my nano so that the 3rd place finisher in the live tournament wouldn't go away empty handed. After all, how many iPods can one person use? I still have my 30gig video iPod, so having four of them was a little much.

****

After a weekend of using the Touch, all I can say is that it's an amazing little toy. The most usage it got was browsing the web via the Safari application and built-in wireless connection. It's pretty sick.

Also, I ripped some DVD movies to it and in widescreen format, the quality is pretty amazing. Apparently, Apple is opening up the API so my guess is a ton of 3rd party apps are on the way.

Not a bad six days, $900 in Apple merchandise won through poker.

Now if I could only win some cash.

Read Full Poker Blog Post

Karma and iPods

Date: Mon, Oct 15, 2007

Our lovely town hosts a festival of sorts each autumn. Fall for Greenville they call it. I wasn't going to head downtown last Friday, but I got a phone call from G-Rob saying he could hook me up with some free beer and wine at some VIP tent he had access to. All I heard was "free."

With half of the down town streets roped off, parking was at a premium. So much so, that I had to find a spot in a garage and actually pay to park. I hardly ever pay to park, but this time I had no choice. Being woefully underprepared for this out of the ordinary circumstance, I only had $3 cash on me. Parking was $5. I had a small problem.

I asked the kind lady parking attendant if she would trust me to park and then come back and pay her the remainder. Apparently, I wasn't the first stiff that tried this line on her. I looked her in the eye and said, "I'll make up for it, honest." She reluctantly agreed after telling me that she had to make up any shortages at the end of the night. "I won't let you down."

I parked my 2006 Car of the Year on Level 3 and walked towards Main street and the nearest ATM. I was determined not to let this parking attendant's faith in humanity die. As I approached back towards her, another car pulled up to her and the lone semi-hot woman inside said, "Do you take debit cards?"

I laughed inside. Another poor soul not used to having to pay to park. I interrupted their conversation and handed the attendant a $20. "Just give me $10 back and pay for her parking as well." Confused, it finally dawned on "Little Miss Just as Clueless as I" that I was paying her tab. "Thank you very much," she replied.

"No problem. Merry Christmas." And away I went towards the free alcohol.

****

I wasn't sure how karma would pay me back. Not until last night.

WBCOOP at Pokerstars.

24th place and 1 160GB iPod. Remind me to pay for someone's cab ride in Vegas next time I see you, would ya?

****

I almost promised to lead this post off with, "There's some blogger up in Canada..." BamBam up there sweated me nearly the entire tourney, obviously allowing me to luckbox my way into the money. Thanks again man, that was awesome.

Thanks also to the sweaters that I can remember, hopefully I don't forget too many.

Dr. Pauly
Derek
Change100
AlCantHang
Surflexus
OOssuuu754
EasyCure
23skidoo
IronGirl
DoubleAs
Heather
TheMark
CJ
BloodyP
Drizz
....and of course, the host himself, Blogger Brad. :)

Read Full Poker Blog Post

Karma and iPods

Date: Mon, Oct 15, 2007

Our lovely town hosts a festival of sorts each autumn. Fall for Greenville they call it. I wasn't going to head downtown last Friday, but I got a phone call from G-Rob saying he could hook me up with some free beer and wine at some VIP tent he had access to. All I heard was "free."

With half of the down town streets roped off, parking was at a premium. So much so, that I had to find a spot in a garage and actually pay to park. I hardly ever pay to park, but this time I had no choice. Being woefully underprepared for this out of the ordinary circumstance, I only had $3 cash on me. Parking was $5. I had a small problem.

I asked the kind lady parking attendant if she would trust me to park and then come back and pay her the remainder. Apparently, I wasn't the first stiff that tried this line on her. I looked her in the eye and said, "I'll make up for it, honest." She reluctantly agreed after telling me that she had to make up any shortages at the end of the night. "I won't let you down."

I parked my 2006 Car of the Year on Level 3 and walked towards Main street and the nearest ATM. I was determined not to let this parking attendant's faith in humanity die. As I approached back towards her, another car pulled up to her and the lone semi-hot woman inside said, "Do you take debit cards?"

I laughed inside. Another poor soul not used to having to pay to park. I interrupted their conversation and handed the attendant a $20. "Just give me $10 back and pay for her parking as well." Confused, it finally dawned on "Little Miss Just as Clueless as I" that I was paying her tab. "Thank you very much," she replied.

"No problem. Merry Christmas." And away I went towards the free alcohol.

****

I wasn't sure how karma would pay me back. Not until last night.

WBCOOP at Pokerstars.

24th place and 1 160GB iPod. Remind me to pay for someone's cab ride in Vegas next time I see you, would ya?

****

I almost promised to lead this post off with, "There's some blogger up in Canada..." BamBam up there sweated me nearly the entire tourney, obviously allowing me to luckbox my way into the money. Thanks again man, that was awesome.

Thanks also to the sweaters that I can remember, hopefully I don't forget too many.

Dr. Pauly
Derek
Change100
AlCantHang
Surflexus
OOssuuu754
EasyCure
23skidoo
IronGirl
DoubleAs
Heather
TheMark
CJ
BloodyP
Drizz
....and of course, the host himself, Blogger Brad. :)

Read Full Poker Blog Post

SNG Challenge

Date: Wed, Oct 3, 2007

Ok, I just now completed a month of Turbo SNG's on Full Tilt. I don't multi-table very well, so each tournament was played one at a time. My self-imposed challenge was play 100 of them and then post the results. If I did well enough, I'd move up a level.

Here are the stats for the $11+1 level:

Number Played: 100
10th - 4th place: 50
3rd's: 13
2nd's: 14
1st's: 23

ITM: 50.0%
ROI: 51.0%

Total Profit: $611.70

If you wish, take the challenge yourself and post the results.

I understand that 100 is actually a small-ish sample size for these things. 1000 would be better. But I'm simply not that masochistic.

Read Full Poker Blog Post

SNG Challenge

Date: Wed, Oct 3, 2007

Ok, I just now completed a month of Turbo SNG's on Full Tilt. I don't multi-table very well, so each tournament was played one at a time. My self-imposed challenge was play 100 of them and then post the results. If I did well enough, I'd move up a level.

Here are the stats for the $11+1 level:

Number Played: 100
10th - 4th place: 50
3rd's: 13
2nd's: 14
1st's: 23

ITM: 50.0%
ROI: 51.0%

Total Profit: $611.70

If you wish, take the challenge yourself and post the results.

I understand that 100 is actually a small-ish sample size for these things. 1000 would be better. But I'm simply not that masochistic.

Read Full Poker Blog Post