Well so far, the job is fine. Living situation is decent. But poker has been rough. I've been running soooo bad the entire time I've been here.

Last night, for example, I'd taken a beating all night and was sitting on about 40 bbs. Finally picked up AA in the bb. A guy in middle position who had just sat down and this was the first hand he was dealt opened preflop for 4xbb. folds to me, and I put in a 3x raise. He insta-calls. Flop is 3-5-8, all spades. I put my remaining 28 bbs in, and he snap calls again. I had the Ace of spades, so I figured at worst, I was drawing live. Turn...River...no more spades. Villain turns over KJ of spades - flopped the flush. I called it a night after that.

That's how it has been the whole time I've been here. I've only had 2 sessions where I felt like I caught somewhat of a heater. The rest have been a combination of card dead and run bad. Hopefully my luck to turns around while all these poker players are still in town (for WSOP), but I'm probably going to take a break from poker for a week or so.

I have no confidence at the table right now after the beats I've been taking, so I know if I play right now, every playable hand I'm dealt, I'm going to be wondering what will go wrong/how I'll lose it - before the flop is even dealt. Obviously, that kind of negative mindset is dangerous, so I've got to let it cool before I play again.

Also, I just realized that today marks a month since I moved here. I've played 77 1/2 hours of poker in that time over 12 sessions. I've only cashed out 4 of them...

Side note: this is my 100th post. Only took me 9 years.

Friday night I was at the juiciest table I've been on since I got here. Things were going slow, and I was ready to leave, when this happened. Around 4:30am, a really drunk guy sat down, told a story about how he and his friend hit it big at 3 card poker earlier in the night at Binion's, and then he proceeded to spew money. He continued drinking, and got another guy at the table - who was sitting on 500 BBs - to start doing shots with him. It wasn't long before that guy starting spewing chips too. Unfortunately, I was completely card dead for most of it (and was already 3 buy-ins deep), but luckily just toward the end, I caught a couple hands, hit flops, and got paid. I got back to even and cashed out a small profit.

I played close to 30 hours across 3 sessions over the course of the weekend. I spent at least half of that completely card dead. It was a real grind. I finished in the green, but just barely. At one point, I was up over $500 for the weekend, but lost most of it in a hand where I was open-ended and got into a 3-way all-in on the flop. I flopped an open-ender and shipped it against 2 overpairs. I was getting terrific pot odds, but blanked the turn and river. Overall results since May are still not good at all. I just can't seem to catch a good, long heater where I run good for a whole session. You know that feeling when you play a session and it seems like you're completely invincible the whole time... I need one of those!

Just a quick update. I haven't played poker in 2 weeks (since the weekend I highlighted in the post above). I thought maybe a taking a brief step back might not be the worst idea, and then I got really busy at work and have been working extra hours since then. I know I'm going to be busy this week and won't have time for poker, but I'll probably get back to the tables in a week.

I know strategy is frowned upon when it's unsolicited, but I honestly feel like it's -EV to rely on a heater rather than studying, playing, and getting rid of that desire to GII at every opportunity.

tl;dr I would suggest plugging your leaks before trying to #cru****