Pro On a Downswing - Confirmed

The life of a Certified Internet Pro (tm) can be rough. I am officially on a disastrous downswing in September, my results are now at -226 EUR over a massive sample size of 2300 hands. EV wise I am only down 42 dollars, so I am running a gigantic almost-four buy-ins below EV. The last hand I played this session, I got it in with aces against kings pre and lost when he turned a straight. How horrible isn´t that bad beat? When the money goes in I am an almost 70% favorite, that he hits is just absurd. Am considering diving deep into the "Online Poker is Rigged" thread - after all, are there any reasons to believe that PokerStars is not rigging the game against me?

Anyway, on a more serious note, I don´t think that my play has been that good lately. Pokertracker thinks that I call river far too little, I on the other hand think that I call too much. I am quite sure that a large part of my losses comes from calling river check-raises with non-nutted hands. Probably some confirmation bias here, since bluffcatching can be very profitable, however lately I have been running into a lot of spots where I make the second best hand on the river and don´t find the fold. A few of those calls were just atrocious, some where quite standard in HU play (I mean, I can´t fold J6xx on 6xx6J when I get check-raised on the river, at least I don´t think I can even though river check-raises tend to be quite nutted, and yeah, he had JJ for the rivered top boat), but I think that for the past 500 or so hands, had I folded to every river c/r my results would be better buy a couple of buy-ins.

Haven´t played any live poker lately, I really want to, but there´s just no time and possibility to do so. This week I have been alone with both kids, since wifey went on a short city-break to Budapest. She suggested that I try to go somewhere solo as well for tourism (all my solo trips in the past years have been to Sweden to meet friends, or for work) and Budapest seems really nice, and as far as I could tell from Google, they also have a poker club, so maybe I should go there for a weekend or something - exploring the city by day, being a gambling degen by night. As for live poker back home, well, when you have two kids to take care of by yourself, you can´t really sneak out to the casino. Or, well, since they are 6 and 10 I guess you could in theory, but man, leaving your kids on your own at night just to go gamble... I think that would be a good sign that you need to quit gambling forever.

Tomorrow I am meeting a Swedish friend that lives here as well. He asked if he can join me and my friend back in Sweden for tomorrow´s big Pick 7 Jackpot in Sweden, so I´ll head over to his place at around 5 PM and watch the races with him. The prize pool will be over 10M EUR for 7 correct, meaning that the payback should land somewhere along the lines of 90-100+%. Superb value to be had, and we did hit the Pick 7 a few weeks ago for 6k EUR, so let´s get lucky one time, right? 3-4M EUR would mean that I could easily afford to do a city break in Vegas, after all. And basically retire whenever I feel like it.

After the races we are going out, probably going to hook up with another friend of mine. This friend sent me a message at 5AM a few weeks ago, with a picture of something that looked like a storage or something with lots of alcohol bottles and a poker table. The accompanying text was "Found a poker game for us, 50 EUR buy-in, lot´s of blow". That was it, that was the text. But I really liked how degenerate the place looked, and I appreciate the degeneracy in sending such a picture and such a text at 5AM. I really do, makes me feel warm inside. Later he wrote that there was like 4k on the table at 6AM - he didn´t play himself, just went there to hang out and drink and do drugs (or so I assume). Anyway, when I messaged him that I´m planning to go out on Saturday, he instantly replied that he´ll check if the game is going on Saturday. Not sure if we´ll end up there, we´ll meet up in some bar after the races and then take it from there. I don´t drink (with extremely rare exceptions), but I also don´t say no to drugs. And gambling. Or just gambling. Or just hanging out. Got to feed the inner degen somehow, right?

Talking about drugs, the last time I did any drugs was my trip to Sweden. The same night we went to the casino. It was actually kind of cool, before the game we were hanging out in a spot on a hill in the area we grew up in, a place where we used to drink beer when we were underage. This particular place is quite isolated, you need to go on a small path to get there. So, we were just chilling out there when a random guy in his 20´s shows up. He asks us if we´re supporting Hammarby, we say of course, then we chat some football and tell him that we used to hang out here as teens, and we ask him why he came here. He says, to smoke a joint, as he liked this place for chilling out and smoking weed. So, yeah, he passed it around and it was good weed. Cool guy, didn´t think that stuff like that would happen in Sweden, but the kids nowadays do smoke a lot more weed than we did when we were young.

But I´m no big drug user and I´m way too lazy to score drugs myself. If a possibility to shows up to get high, I rarely say no, but these opportunities arise just a couple of times a year. I don´t go out that often and when I do, it´s mostly just hanging in bars with friends. There are some drugs I´d say no too regardless, like opioids, benzo and the like, and psychedelics as well (I´ve done my fair share of them when I was younger, but I really don´t think that going on a mushroom or acid trip would be benefical for me these days). But if someone would offer me to take a sniff of speed or share a joint, who am I to say no?

The negative thing is that my son has a football tournament that I need to take him to at 8:30 AM on Sunday. So I can´t allow myself to get too ****ed up, don´t think my wife will appreciate it if I arrive home at 7AM and tell her that I´m in no condition to drive since I´m still high as a kite. I mean, it´s not like she´d divorce me or anything, but she´d be (understandably) pissed off. Most likely it won´t come do that and we´ll just end up hanging out at the bars... but you never know!

Anyway, over and out from me, the Certified Internet Pro (tm) on a massive downswing.

A Night of Degeneracy

I wake up at 8AM on Sunday morning after two hours of sleep. Since my son has a cold, he won´t be going to the football tournament, but I can´t fall asleep. ****. Annoying. I take a bath, make my kids breakfast, and then go to the store to buy some groceries. On my way back I run into a friend of my mother, we chat for a minute or so. Outwards I am calm, inwards I am a bit paranoid, asking myself all kinds of weird questions. Do I look normal? Can she somehow tell I am a bit out of whack? Did I act weirdly?

I´m not young anymore, so I put my mind at ease quite quickly. There is no way someone on the street can see that I smoked weed, snorted coke* and played cards until 5AM in the morning. There is no way that I don´t look and act normal, even though I don´t feel that way. That is what being almost 40 brings - the ability to rationally evalaute your situation when your mind is racing with paranoidal thoughts. When I was younger it wasn´t like this - I still remember a lovely Saturday when I was 19 or 20, went home midday after no sleep after a night of partying and some meth, I was sitting in the subway more or less convinced that the next stop, the cops will rush in and arrest me. I even tried fake-sleeping between the stops, but as soon as the train started to slow, I opened my eyes, looking out for the police. Of course, no police stopped the train to arrest me, but when I neared my home I saw a police car turning on to my street. Makes senese - why should they take me in the subway when they can just arrest me at home? For a while I thought about just hanging out in the park for a while, but then I resigned myself to my fate - if the cops want to take me at my home, they will just be waiting for me and I can´t live in a park forever. Went home... and there were no officers waiting for me. What a surprise that the whole police force of the city wasn´t out looking for a young kid who was on his way home after a night of partying!

***

It´s Saturday evening, I am sitting in a bar with a couple of friends. We all want to score some drugs, so we head out to another bar where a friend of a friend is supposed to bring some drugs, and meet up with another group of people. We chat around a bit, I end up talking to a guy who lived in South Africa for a long period of time. An interesting conversation. An hour passes, two hours... and then my friend, the same one who sent me the text I referenced in my last post, says that we should head over to the poker game. I´m not one who needs any convincing whatsoever, especially since my friend says that we'll be able to score some drugs there for sure. I have felt the need for some degeneracy for quite a while, so I am down. My friend calls the guy running the game and asks if it is OK to drop by, it is.

We take a taxi, head to a bar, go past the toilets, then through a door leading to a staircase. One floor up there is a large room with a couple of tables and a small bar. I ask what's playing, he says that both tables play Dealer's Choice and the blinds are 1/1. Seems just lovely. I buy in for 200 and promptly lose, then I buy in for 300 more. This buy-in I lose an hour later when my wrap fails to improve against bottom set in PLO.

The game is quite deep, agressive (play-wise) and friendly (people-wise), almost all hands are straddled and it's fun. I'd say it's more of a home game than a poker club, the players deal themselves and there's no dealer. And no rake. When you buy chips the first time you pay 15 EUR and that's it. Oh, and every orbit there is a 3 EUR double-board PLO5 bomb pot.

Anyway, I guess that this also makes the game fall within some sort of legal gray area - since there are no dealers and the house doesn't take any money from the pots, I guess one could argue that they just provide a place to hang out and charge an entry fee. And if the persons decide to use the chips they bought for gambling, that's not the responsibility of the house, right? I have no idea, but I really do enjoy the home game vibe.

The game itself is good. One player who is pretty decent, but a tad overly aggressive. One tight and decent player. Two bad players. But yeah, I manage to be down 500 in a 1-1 game. Probably also partially due to the fact that there is a guy smoking joints at the table, and happily sharing the stuff to anyone who wants to have a puff or ten. So I indulge. Anyway, I head of to the ATM. When I am almost back, my friends call me and say they are waiting outside. They want me to stop playing, since they think I've lost enough already. They´re probably right, but I am in a good game and don´t want to leave. In the end I give half my money to my friend and promise that I´ll go home if I lose, and then I also buy him in for 50 EUR so I have some company at the table.

He doubles up more or less instantly, he hasn´t played a lot of poker and nothing out except for Texas, but he cleans out in the PLO bomb pots and soon has a stack of around 300. By this time some cocaine had also showed up, so we went to a back room and did some lines. This actually did wonders for my brain and removed all the cloudy fuziness and sleepyness, however, my play only improved marginally. I did do one call that I am so ashamed of, basically I had AJxx in PLO, flop was J6x, checks to be and I bet, one caller. Turn is a J, he checks, I check back. On the river he pots it for something like 100 EUR, there aren´t really any missed draws he could represent, so my brain tells me to fold, but my highness (which was nothing of the calm, royal kind) tells me to call. I give in to my degenerate highness and call, only to be shown J6 for a boat. We play on for a while more, my friend yet again doubles in a bomb pot and now wants to leave. We agree that we´ll play for one more hour, until 5AM, and we do.

5AM approaches and my friend announces, OK, this is the last hand. It turns out to be a bomb pot. Someone (maybe me?) raises pre, everyone sees a flop, and I flop good. Very good. On the first board I have the nut straight, on the second board I have top two, a gutshot and a flushdraw. Bad player pots, the next player takes calling chips and is about to put them in, but I say "Pot" a few seconds too soon. He now reconsiders, tanks for a while, and folds. I re-pot and we get it in against the bad player. He has the same straight as me on the top board with a flushdraw to go with it, and only one pair on the second board with no other redraws. I am in a great position to quarter him or at the very least split the pot, and if I quarter him I will be break even for the night.

Well, it wasn't to be. We split the top board, but on the bottom board he turns a higher two pair, and since the river doesn't hit any of my draws I am the one getting quartered. I want to keep playing, but I had promised my friend that I'd leave with him, and I stick to my word. Cash out for a loss of around 500 EUR. However, my friend tries to give me half his winnings, I say no, I can't take your money, you won it fair and square, but he doesn't budge and gives me back my money he held for me together with quite a few more bills. In the end my loss ends up just a couple of hundred.

***

It's Monday afternoon and I am sitting in my office. Feeling demotivated to work, but working anyway. Even though I was quite out of it on Saturday, I had the presence of mind to get my number added to the list for the game described in this post, so I´ll be notified when it´s running. When I was there they said that they play 2-3 times per week usually, sometimes also tournaments. Since the game is about 15 minutes on foot from where I live, and since it is way cheaper than the casino game (and also I think they run as many tables as there are players for, unlike the casino that has only one poker table open), I should be able to squeeze in more play time. As it is so close, I can just walk over there on weekends after the kids are asleep and play for a couple of hours.

I´ve had my share of degeneracy for the time being, so I´ll avoid the drugs as well. So on this bleak Monday, I take solace in the fact that I have found a poker game that is close to me, has a reasonable buy-in and isn´t full of competent players, and also has a nice vibe in general. Hopefully I´ll be able to book a nice win the next time I visit. Until then - over and out for now!

* By the way, everything in this text is of course a work of pure fiction and I do not condone or partake in any illicit activities whatsoever.

Interesting work

Just Some Random Thoughts

Online has been treating me roughly lately, so I reduced my deposit limit to 100 USD/week. If I lose I don´t really feel like playing, One hand was a legit full buy-in punt, there were some more glaring mistakes in the past 500 or so hands, but yeah, if I will continue to get crushed, I probably will lower the deposit limit further to just one buy-in per week. No use in donating money to good players who put in the work, right? Besides, it´s not really that much more fun and exciting compared to other **** I can do at the computer to kill time, like playing Football Manager. Right now I am down 350 USD in September, and although I am running four buy-ins below EV, that still puts me at a loss.

I also need to get in better shape. During the summer I was active, ate healthier, biked a lot and lost something like 5-6 kg. Was feeling good about myself, energetic, and so on. Now in autumn my kids have swimming practice three times a week, and on Mondays and Wednesdays I need to be there as well since my son is too young (6 years) to go there by himself. Earlier in September I used this time to swim myself, and was feeling good - progressively faster, better technique, more endurance etc. I mean, the first month is really easy, since you progress so fast, but the feeling is great. Well, I went to Sweden, then my son got a cold, and as a result I haven´t been excercising at all for something like 2,5 weeks or so.

And I can instantly feel it. I am sure I´ve put on a kg or two of weight, I am more and more lazy and apathetic. Yesterday I told my kids we´re going to be biking to school and kindergarten more often, even if it´s getting colder. Luckily for me, they are both active and were happy about this, so this morning we got up a little bit earlier and biked. It´s a short distance, but I feel much more energetic even though I only biked something like 6-7 km at a moderate pace (a bit faster on my way home). And it will be another 8-9 km in the afternoon, when I pick my son up and take him to swimming practice, and swim myself while he´s with the trainer. I hope that I´ll have time to join my daughter when she has practice tomorrow as well, with my daughter I can also swim for a bit longer - she´s swimming in the big pool (she´s a good swimmer) and after practice she usually joins me for some more swimming, so then I get something like an hour of excercise instead of just 40 minutes.

I also have to make good of my promise to myself to sign up for the gym again. I don´t like going there, and it´s kind of hard to find the time, but 2-3 days of swimming per week is not enough to get in shape. I mean, if I set a gym goal of at least three times per week, I´ll probably make it at least once but hopefully twice, and then I will have 4-5 days of excercise per week. Should be enough.

Things are also getting hotter here in Europe with the sabotage of the gas pipelines yesterday - I think it´s Russia sending a signal to NATO, saying that they can sabotage critical infrastructure at will. So, I am basically thinking of stocking up a bit on food that doesn´t go bad (like rice and beans) and getting some more firewood, so we can move to our summerhouse if **** hits the fan. Wouldn´t be too nice to be stuck in winter with power and heating outages and people in panic rushing to pick up food etc. I´m no prepper and I don´t foresee the end of the world or anything, but being a bit more prepared can´t hurt. Maybe I should pick up a chainsaw as well, so I can cut down trees at our summerhouse if **** really hits the fan in a big way. But it does feel great to at least have a second option - at our summerhouse we´ll never run out of water, since there´s a stream next to the place, and if it freezes and there´s no electricity, we can always use the ancient wood-fired stove to melt snow/ice and cook. Of course, I hope it won´t come to this, since I enjoy all the comforts of modern civilization, but having a next-door neighbour who thinks that my country´s independence was the greatest geopolitical disaster of the 20th century does make you reconsider things at times. Especially since our neighbour is actively pursuing an aggressive war and shows no signs of letting up.

With regards to poker, I really hope that the game I visited last weekend (in my work of fiction) will run on Saturday, since I have the evening more or less free. Wifey will be home at 6-7 PM so nothing is stopping me from playing some poker. This time sober and looking to win some money.

Short Homegame Recap

So, yesterday I played in a wild and splashy homegame. Load of bluffs. It was great fun. Bought in for 350 EUR (blinds 1/1, most hands straddled, later in the night we were also playing 1/1/2/4/8/16 a couple of times), lost some early on so I added for 150 more, then I started running good. Was up to around 900 at the highest point. Unfortunately, in the end I ran quite bad in some huge bomb pots (got quartered twice) and was down to something like 200 (and tilted - it was late and I basically just wanted to either get even or go brok), in the end I cashed out for 400. Would have been in the green if I hadn´t made an audacious and stupid pot-size bluff on the river in a double board bomb pot against three other players, when I turned my flush on one board+FH blockers and pair on the other board into a bluff. The player I was the most afraid of folded, but the other two shorter stacks called. The shortest stack won both boards, I split for peanuts for the side pot since my one pair on the top board was good (he had 22 for bottom full on the bottom board).

Lot´s of fun hands and a fun game, got home at 5AM so a bit tired today. My daughter has her best friend over, wife is away, going to go for a bike ride with my son, so no time for a lengthy writeup. Might donk off a couple of buy-ins playing HU PLO online next week, not sure if I´ll play any live or not though.

Definitive Proof - PokerStars is Rigged

Today I managed to deposit a large bankroll for my game (I play heads up PLO50), two full buy-ins, and they lasted only 60 hands. I know that this is a controversial topic, however, I now have definitive proof that PokerStars is rigged. The very first hand I flopped the low wrap in a three-bet pot, I check-raised and got a third of my stack in. Turn was a shitty card, but he three-bet me pre and there was not that much money left, so in desperation I bet, he raised me and I called it off hoping he has a set, two pair + FD (FD came on turn) or something like that, but no, he had top pair+OESD on the flop and turned the nut straight, leaving me a buy-in down.

I fought valiantly, battling on, but all big pots I played during the session I lost. Against a shorter stack I got it in preflop with AKJ7ds, he had aces. Of course, a king flopped, a seven came on the turn, but then PokerStars rigged an ace for him on the river. There was another one I don't remember, and my final money I lost in a four-bet pot where I flopped top pair and a gutshot, I donked pot, the other player shoved, and he had an over (ace), a flushdraw and a higher gutshot. He hit it right on the turn to piss on my glorious top pair. But how does it prove that Pokerstars is rigged?

Well, when the money went in, my equity in these four hands was approximately as follows: 0%, 35%, 60%, 45%. The total equity is 140%. But I got back 0%. Zero ****ing percent, although my equity was 140%! How is that possible if the site isn't rigged?

Yeah, so I basically played the first hand like a total donk (should have just check-folded the turn when the straight completes, since there is a good chance I am drawing dead, and if not, any hands that would call or push against me will still have me beat, basically I could end up losing to Q high or something if he has a high draw that missed OTT - I mean, I still hade like 6 ****ing high), then I had three standard PLO pots go against me. So no more online poker this week.

When I wrote my sarcastic write-up above I also remembered how rigged live poker is, since the absolute best starting hand I split the pot with (we ran it twice) - found AA97ds on the BB, there was a bunch of limpers, so I potted it, the straddle re-raised to something like 50, the player to my right called, I potted again, straddle folded and the other player got it in with Kxxx with a blocked flush draw. Flopped two pair on the first board and held. I mean, these spots in Omaha ar so standard, win some, lose some, lately I feel I've been on the losing end a bit more than a couple of months ago, although that could also be confirmation bias. In the live game I got dealt J4o only once, raised it pre and took it down with a cbet. Unfortunately I did not have the chance to soul read and call someone with jack high.

Will see if I have the time and energy to find some live game to play in the weekend. There should be a game running on Wednesday, but I'm not too thrilled with playing on weeknights since I have a busy period of work and I am old enough to want to sleep at least seven hours on weekdays. I mean, the casino has their one table of nitty 1/3 (weekdays) and 2/5 or 5/5 (weekends) going, but the private games I've played in the last two weekends are so much better and so much more fun. And also a bit cheaper - losing 1k at 2/5 is basically super easy (games are uncapped, so they play deep) while losing 1k at 1/1 (uncapped and deep also, and mostly 1/1/2, often 1/1/2/4 or more) is a bit more of a challenge. I am pretty sure I am up to it, I mean, I was in for 500 after an hour of play last Saturday and the guy on my right lost something like 1k in four-five hours, but at least the milage you get is a lot better. And I doubt I'd bring more than 1k to a 1/1 game anyway, if I play so bad/run so bad that I lose it, it's time to call it a night.

Nice thread man have enjoyed the read!
Shame there isn't more replies,

Glgl!

Thanks, glad to hear!

Bankroll Management - Non-Existant

So, today I took some cash from my poker money, deposited it in the ATM and booked two nights at a hotel in Estonia in the end on November. It´s a hotel with a waterpark in Pärnu, a really nice play where we´ve been a couple of times. The kids have been wanting to go back there for quite a while, so we booked a weekend there. 450 EUR down the drain. But it´s like a 2-3 hour drive and the city is nice and it is so dark and depressing in November, especially as the weather often is total crap with temperatures around zero degrees centigrade and seemingly neverending days of sleet and rain. Sure, sometimes there´s nice winter temperatures and snow, which is basically the only redeeming thing that winters here have, but more often than not it´s just total depressing crap. And then you need to get away.

As a side note, today I am thinking a lot about contrasts - a lot of people here in Latvia are afraid of the winter. The rising heating and electricity costs will hit a lot of households hard, and since this still is a low-income country (especially compared to Western Europe), people are understandably worried. Especially in the countryside. A lot of people who have been living from salary to salary will have a tough time dealing with the higher costs, and although the government has put some measures in place to counter this, the bills will still be a lot higher than last winter. Families who used to be able to make ends meet no longer will be able to. Personally I am not a fan of this type of government intervention, since it gives benefits to households that don´t need it (like mine) - targetted measures would be much more effective and I feel that high-income households that can cover the costs out of pocket should do so, while low-income households should get much larger financial support.

The reason I started musing about contrasts is that today I came face to face with the harsh reality - we won´t be able to afford a family vacation to some exotic destination this spring break. We were thinking about Mali, the Seychelles or the Maldives, but looking at income vs expenditure both in my business and in private, I highly doubt that we will have the 8-12k free to pay for this in March. And that... that just ****ing sucks. Last year we went to Zimbabwe during spring break, it was fabulous, and when we got back we decided to put some money aside each month in a travel fund, but unfortunately we are hopeless spenders. We did that for like one month, and then we started travelling, a lot. So basically we have no separate savings for a longer trip and to put aside 10k in 3-4 months just isn´t realistic, especially coupled with the raging 20%+ inflation that our country is hit with.

There will, however, be direct regular flights between Riga and Gran Canaria from spring, and if I book the tickets now, we will get away with something like 1,2k for our entire family for flight tickets. So on Friday or Monday, when I´ll get payment for a couple of invoices, I´m probably buying the tickets. We haven´t been to Gran Canaria and it seems lovely, the weather is nice enough and although it´s not as exotic as something like Bali, I am sure it will be a great vacation.

Yeah, the contrasts are great. While some people are lamenting not being to able to pay their bills, I am lamenting that our vacation will be less exotic than we had hoped for. And I am very far from rich - I mean, I make good money, especially compared to the average salary, and my wife also has a quite good salary, but we mostly spend most of what we make and we don´t put aside nearly as much money as we should. Sure, we have back-up for unexpected expenses etc., but there´s no million in savings. Actually, if there was, I´d probably retire and just live off of the dividends and do whatever the **** I wanted to each and every day.

The same logic as in life applies to my non-existant bankroll management. I´ve tried a couple of times to separate gambling money from "real" money, but that always fails spectacularly. As I wrote in the first paragraph, I have no qualms whatsoever to just grab 500 EUR from my poker fund to finance life expenses. When I had my big score in Stockholm, I really had an idea that I´ll separete these funds, this time for real.

The very fact that I changed 2k of that win to live it up in Prague with my wife basically should have given me an idea that this notion of mine was doomed from the start. Of course, the rest of the money was only partially spent on poker. From one point of view, not separating these funds is kind of stupid, and also limits my possibilites of playing when I have the chance to. But from another point of view, it´s actually quite good. By using poker money to finance stuff like vacations I kind of make sure that this money doesn´t go to waste and I think this is also one of the reasons why my wife has no problems whatsoever with me playing poker with amounts that are quite absurd when you think about them in real money.

I mean, losing 500 EUR is a very big deal for most people, and if you think about it in life money terms, those people are very right. The average salary in this country is like 1000 EUR/month after taxes which incidentally also is the amount I usually take with me when I go to a poker game. For my wife, who has never gambled and hasn´t ever really been interested in gambling (although I did teach her poker like 10 years ago), it is kind of hard to understand that I can lose (or win) this kind of money and be completely emotionless about it. The fact that I use at least parts of the winnings to do fun stuff helps, and when we needed money in the summer (I don't even recall for what - some unexpected renovation works at the summerhouse or something maybe?) I took them out of my poker bankroll. So basically I treat any money won at the tables as backup cash for emergencies or fun, and if I run out and don't have the cash to replenish my roll available, I just skip playing.

Sometimes I think about what would happen if I would go on a heater, or go, for example, to play in some big tournament in Tallinn or something and ship it, but I am quite sure that nothing would change. I'd maybe play some bigger games occasionally, until I use the money for something else (like going to the Seychelles) and then just go back to playing whatever I can afford at the moment.

On the other hand, I'm not a pro and don't aspire to be one, so I guess it doesn't really matter.

Misreading the Board

So, I took a peak in the ongoing megathread on the J4 call vs Garret. Can´t actually believe that it´s still going that strong, I saw the hand, saw the initial discussion and read some posts/tweets about it now and then, but haven´t spent much time analysing or thinking about it. Maybe she cheated, maybe she didn´t, doesn´t really matter to me (although HCL is the only stream I watch the highlights from on Youtube). But all this discussion if she could mis-read the board or not I find kind of absurd - I feel it´s pretty much obvious that she could. There´s been a lot of examples of players, even seasoned pros, making mistakes in this regard. And I do myself, too.

Board misreading skills are underrated. In the home game I played last Friday, I managed to pull off a great play in PLO. The flop came T98 with two spades and a club, I had the nuts with no blockers or redraws, but the nuts are still the nuts so I bet the pot, a tad under 50 EUR since it was straddled and raised pre. I got called by the player at the table who was the most solid, so I knew he had some type of hand. The turn was a low club. I bet the pot again, this time for a sizeable chunk of my stack, and I had my opponent covered, he had maybe around 250-300 left. He tanked for a while, and then folded QJ face up.

I was perplexed, I showed my QJ and said, "I wasn´t freerolling you, man!"
Now he looks a bit perplexed.
The player to my left says, "man, you both played that hand very good!"
Now I look even more perplexed.

The cards have been gathered, the next deal is about to start, now my opponent says, "well, it´s kind of hard to play for stacks with a straight when the flush comes".
Since this was a friendly homegame, I didn´t keep my mouth shut and admitted to having misread the board. The card I thought was a low club was actually a low spade, completing the frontdoor flush draw. Everyone has a good laugh.

So yeah, my board misreading skills allowed me to push my opponent off of a chop. Good times.

Instant Karma

So, here is some top-quality entitled whining. Today when I booked the plane tickets for our family in Gran Canaria during spring break in March, the price had gone up with around 500 EUR compared to a couple of days ago. Instant karma, just ****ing instant karma. Serves me right for complaining about not being able to afford a more exotic vacation. And I am totally going to whine about it like an entitled bitch.

But yeah, I basically just splashed out almost 2000 EUR to book tickets for a family vacation in March. As I wrote two posts above, I don´t have a separate poker bankroll at the moment, so this basically means that I can´t really afford to run bad for a couple of games, at least not if I want to keep playing in October. I receive almost all of my disposible income in two parts - at the end of the month and in the beginning of the month. Right now things aren´t that bad (yet), but if I was to drop a thousand in a poker game this weekend, I probably will be out of serious gambling money for October.

And I am also so entitled that I don´t want to play if I only have one bullet or if I am forced to shortstack. Playing something like 100BB deep isn´t fun in games where most of the stacks are like 300+BB deep, and if I don´t have money in my pocket (at least early on in the game) it is hard for me to play my a-game. Or even b-game. I just get way too passive, so in spots where I normally would, for example, check-raise a strong draw all-in, I would check-call instead. And if the draw doesn´t hit on the turn, I´d be forced to check-fold. Or if it is checked to me - check back instead of bluff. And then lose to some random trash hand.

Not sure if there will be any games running outside of the casino tonight, and I haven´t really asked around yet, but if there will be I most likely will play. I am relieved of my caring family father duties for the evening, so I will be meeting up a couple of Swedish friends living here for dinner and then we´ll see what happens. Going to stay sober (I still have to get up at 8 AM tomorrow and do kid **** all day with my lovely offspring, since my wife is working) but I wouldn´t mind some after-dinner degenerate gambling. Hell, if there´s no private or semi-private game I can find, I might even hit the casino if the waiting list isn´t too horrible. Maybe I can run good at 5/5 NLT or something.

And yeah, the 5/5 game is probably the only one where I feel somewhat comfortable short-buying for 100BB. Partly since I can´t really afford to take a 3-5k+ loss, but partly due to the fact that the game will be bad with lots of players who are more solid than me, so I don´t really gain an advantage by sitting deep with other, better players. Sure, if I´ll run my stack up I doubt that I will cash out, then I´ll be up for the challenge, but I won´t sit with like 2-400 BB off the bat. However, I would much prefer to play in a loose and splashy 1/1 DC game with tonnes of straddles - it´s just so much more fun.

The Darker Sides of Degeneracy

"Run it twice?", he asks me. Although I usually agree, this time I really don´t want to.
"Sorry, just once", I reply and table my hand - K9o on a 972 rainbow board.
"Come on, please, let´s run it twice", he continues.
"No, sorry, not this time", I politely reply.
"Please, you are ahead, why not?"
"Look, I am stuck, the pot is small, I need to go home soon. Once it is", is my final answer.

After a short while of a little bit more bickering and begging, finally the cards are dealt and my top pair holds up against his A5o.

The hand in question was really quite standard, at least for a very deep and extremely splashy 1/1 game at 4:30 AM. It was folded to Villain with 12 EUR left in chips, he pushed and got called in six spots, by me included. On the flop I lead quite big, for something like 50, and everyone else folded.

The player in question hadn´t lost a lot with how I value cash, around 300 EUR, but it was obviously a lot of money for him. Half an hour earlier, when he lost his previous buy-in, he tried to get the player on the left to loan him 50 or 100 EUR, first promising to repay it in January or February, then in December. The guy - one of the few at the table who I think was completely sober - said no, told him to just leave the game and not to chase his losses. He didn´t listen and made a bank transfer to the game host for what I can only presume to be some of his last money (50 EUR) for another buy-in.

I did feel a bit sorry for the guy, since he obviously had lost more than he could afford, but he failed to realise that he had no chance whatsoever to make it in this game. He always just called pre-flop and folded most flops, with no regards to stack size etc. Playing a 50 EUR stack in this game would be hugely profitable if done right (and if you were competent playing deeper), since you could basically limp-jam all holdings you would want to play, and your jam would probably get called in at least two spots or more for 50ish EUR.

The reasons I stated for not running it twice were honest - the pot was small (72 EUR) and I was stuck and needed to leave quite soon, and I had no interest in splitting a small pot. The game was also nine-handed with several players being extremely drunk and not quite up to date with the rules of games like PLO, so play of pace was frustratingly slow. And the guy himself was annoying - he took forever on each decision, and most of the times he folded pre he ended up cursing his "bad luck" for not calling, since he would have hit like a pair or something. I mean, he wasn´t nasty or aggressive or anything, didn´t seem to be a bad person or so, but I wanted him out of the game if possible.

***

"Down 170. The best game I have played in a long while, but couldn´t make a ****ing hand in the final four hours", I text my wife at 5:10 AM, when I am sitting in a taxi home. Although it´s only a fifteen minute walk home, I just want to get home quickly, and it only costs like 4 EUR, so whatever. Leaving the table was extremely hard, since there were two players who were basically clueless in PLO/Super Texas and one of them also in regular Texas both sitting on large (600-1000 EUR) stacks. There were a couple of other guys who had drank too much and the game was extremely wild - although the blinds were nominally 1/1, it was unusual to have a pot without at least 50 EUR in it after the preflop betting. A lot of hands, especially in PLO and Super Teaxs, ended up going something like 4-6 ways to the flop for 30-50 EUR each.

It was just the type of game I love. The perfect game. However, I knew that I had family obligations the next day, and with my wife leaving home at 7AM for work I knew I needed to get my ass back. Not push the limits. The most clueless drunk guy was lamenting how his wife was texting him and mad at him for not being home, he had promised to be home at around midnight, but at 4AM he was playing cards, drunk out of his mind. I wouldn´t want my wife texting me at 6:30, asking me where the **** I am and why the **** I am not at home sleeping, since she needs to go to work soon. That would also be very -EV when it comes to future poker play - right now my wife doesn´t really mind as long as I don´t play too often and lose too much, but I am quite sure she would object the next time I´d go playing cards if she woke up to get ready for work, only to find out that her husband who is supposed to look after the kids is still stuck in a degenerate´s dream.

***

A minute or two has passed since I snorted my first line of coke*. I am feeling a pleasant tingling in my entire body. I´m not a big cocaine user and never have been (although this is the second time in three weeks that I don´t pass up the opportunity to get high), but that first line, it´s just so ****ing brilliant. It makes everything so much, I don´t know, better. Warmer. Sharper. Tinglier. Euphoric. The second one is good two, the third okay, but after the fourth or fifth the effects are too small to be worth it, at least for me personally. Maybe one could up the dosage to try to get that first line feeling again, but I´ve not really been one to go overboard when it comes to stimulants. Better safe than sorry.

I am running hot, the cards are going my way, my bluffs go through and my value bets get called. My 300 EUR buy-in has grown to a sizeable stack of over 800 and I feel it, I so totally feel it. I am convinced that this will be my night, my ****ing night, where I keep raking in the pots and go home with my wallet stuffed to the brim with bills. I smile happily, tell my friend (who is doing Sober October and therefore turned down the opportunity to chip in for the coke) sitting to the right of me that I am feeling so ****ing good right now.

***

The board comes KK8 with two clubs. There are five players in the hand and the pot is already a tad over 100 EUR. I have flopped top trips with the second best kicker and I have two quite clueless players in the hand. Having bled down from around 800 to 300, then added on for 300 more, I have a feeling that this might be the hand where I win it big. After all, two of the players in the hand will happily call big bets, or rip it in, with an overpair or a flushdraw even on a paired board in PLO. I am first to act, so I lead for 100. Fold... and then a re-raise to 400. From Mr. K, who is a solid and competent player I´ve played with a couple of times. Who is sober and not on tilt or anything like that. Who owned me in last week´s homegame in a couple of spots. And now he has made it 400 to go. Some short stack throws in his last 22 EUR in the pot and now I have a decision to make.

I look back at my cards to confirm that I haven´t misread my hand - and, indeed, I haven´t. I still hold KQ77. At this moment, I more or less decide to fold, however I do think it over for a while and engage in some table talk. I count my stack, after my bet I have a tad under 500 left. After a minute of tanking I trust my initial read and make the trivial fold - I dump my KQ face up, thinking that his range here is AK and boats, and I am drawing to five outs. Without a pair in my hand it might be a bit closer, especially if all cards were overs to the eight, but still a fold. One of the players - a quite good and solid guy - comments that it´s a disciplined fold and seems a bit surprised, although by his own admission he hasn´t played a lot of PLO. Of course, the villain has 88 for a flopped boat and has the shortstack drawing dead on the flop.

Just another pot that doesn´t go my way.

***

The game has slowed to a crawl due to some drunk players and due to being nine-handed. There is a small raise and a bunch of callers, I three-bet a quite trashy A-high hand, something like A864, hoping to thin the field a little and get some of the more solid players out, one drunk and aggressive player four-bets to something like 100, gets a call from the totally clueless player, and with one more player calling and me closing the action I can´t fold.

The flop is actually pretty decent, A97, so I flop top pair-no kicker and an open ender. The preflop raiser pushes his last 100 into the pot, the clueless guy calls (he had previously announced that he had four spades in his hand), third player folds and it is up to me. It might sound absurd, but I decide to go all-in for value here - I announce a raise and push my stack of 393 EUR into the middle. The clueless guy tanks for a while, but then unfortunately folds for 292 more, so no side pot to be had. The main pot is 700 EUR, my opponent turns over AQJT, so I am in decent shape, although I don´t like that be both blocks my straight draw and that my higher straight draw will be prone to getting outdrawn if I hit on the turn. I ask if he wants to run it twice, he says once, so off we go. Turn is a two, river is a seven and the pot is lost. If I win this one, I am up 500 for the night.

My opponent, who had borrowed money from Mr K who he seems to know for a couple of buy-ins, probably is in the green or at least break even for the night after this one. No idea how his financial situation is and if he can afford to drop 600+ EUR in a night of drunken gambling, but hey, that´s none of my business and when you sit in good games, the degeneracy is almost always at a high level in certain spots. And who am I to judge someone? After all, I´m spending my Friday night high on blow and playing for large amounts of money. For now I am in a situation where I can afford it, but I don´t think that makes me that much less of a degen.

And I have to say that in this hand my opponent did actually play good and got it in with the best hand, and although I feel that I haven´t made a hand since the Battle of the Bulge, the objective reality is that I ran good for the first three our four hours of the game, but when the game got awesome I started running bad, missing flops, missing draws, and due to the nature of the game there was zero use in trying to stab and bluff in pots, so basically I did a lot of check-folding and occasional flop calling/betting only to be forced to give up on the next card.

***

Half an hour later I call it a night. As I wrote, I really did not want to leave this table, I had more money in my pocket to rebuy for, and had my wife not had to work on Saturday I would have played on. At around 3AM I told the table I am leaving at 4AM, in the end I cashed out shortly after 5AM. The loss itself is miniscule, I mean, I dropped 170 EUR and that´s basically nothing, I had fun and overall I played pretty good (except for a little bit of frustration and tiltyness at the end), but it´s the second week in a row where I post a loss in a good and fun game where I was up a bunch early on. And that is kind of frustrating.

In the end, it didn't turn out be my ****ing night after all.

***

Next week there´s a 100 EUR PKO tournament played at an underground venue here, my Swedish friend (who left the game on Saturday at 1AM or so) wants to play the tournament and although I don´t like tournaments (tournament poker is fun, making a deep run, playing for eight hours and then getting 150 EUR back from a 100 EUR buy-in is less fun), I´ll probably join in. I can always just punt off my stack when the cashgames start if I´m bored, right?

* As always, any mentions of illegal activities are completely fictitious and only there to spice up the story - I do not condonde or partake in any llegal activities whatsoever.

The Monday Miracle

So, I took a short 15 minute break from the wall of emails that are in my inbox this Monday, and of course I fired up Pokerstars to play some HU PLO. Since there was no players in the PLO50 pool, I sat with half a buy-in in the PLO100 game. I lost a total of 6 USD in the three hands I played before someone sat in the PLO50 pool.

Going in with a positive mindset ("I´m probably going broke within the next 20 hands") I started grinding it out, and what would you know? A miracle happened this Monday and I just ended the session with a cool 34 USD profit total, meaning I won roughly 40 USD in PLO50 over 53 hands.

I´ve seen all the other popular pro grinders post hands after their sessions, and since I am a Certified Internet Poker Pro (tm) I will do so as well:

PokerStars - $0.50 PL Hi FAST (2 max) - Omaha Hi - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

SB: 126.16 BB
Hero (BB): 100 BB

SB posts SB 0.5 BB, Hero posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has 6 A 8 7

SB raises to 3 BB, Hero raises to 9 BB, SB calls 6 BB

Flop: (18 BB, 2 players) 4 7 7
Hero bets 4 BB, SB calls 4 BB

Turn: (26 BB, 2 players) 6
Hero checks, SB bets 12.34 BB, Hero raises to 41 BB, SB calls 28.66 BB

I think that my turn c/r sizing is a bit too large given the stack sizes, making it something like 30 BB would be better probably...

River: (108 BB, 2 players) 3
Hero bets 46 BB and is all-in, SB calls 46 BB

Hero shows 6 A 8 7 (Full House, Sevens full of Sixes)
(Pre 47%, Flop 95%, Turn 98%)
SB shows 9 3 5 T (Flush, Ten High)
(Pre 53%, Flop 5%, Turn 3%)
Hero wins 198.5 BB

...although I guess it doesn´t really matter if I get called down anyway. Maybe a smaller sizing would be worse, since it would increase the chances of him finding a fold OTR, although I doubt it when he hits the backdoor flush. Probably thought I was getting out of line with an overpair or something, IDK.

PokerStars - $0.50 PL Hi FAST (2 max) - Omaha Hi - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

SB: 53.52 BB
Hero (BB): 195.5 BB

SB posts SB 0.5 BB, Hero posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has T K 6 8

SB raises to 3 BB, Hero calls 2 BB

Flop: (6 BB, 2 players) T Q 8
Hero checks, SB bets 2.84 BB, Hero calls 2.84 BB

Turn: (11.68 BB, 2 players) 7
Hero checks, SB bets 5.54 BB, Hero calls 5.54 BB

River: (22.76 BB, 2 players) 5
Hero bets 7 BB, fold

Hero wins 21.62 BB

In this hand, I´m actually unsure if I did anything right and I am not really sure what to make of my bet OTR, but my reasoning was that I don´t want to c/f (too weak), although this board is really crapy to bluff-catch on with two pair (basically I beat only missed spades or complete air), so I chose to put out a blocker bet, just straight up representin´ that straight, yo! Don´ t really think I´ll get called by worse here to be fair, but you never know, my line looks so full of **** so maybe I get looked up my AQ/KK or something once in a blue moon (at PLO50 most players don´t bluff-raise in these spots).

PokerStars - $0.50 PL Hi FAST (2 max) - Omaha Hi - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

SB: 33.44 BB
Hero (BB): 213.56 BB

SB posts SB 0.5 BB, Hero posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has 9 K J 8

SB raises to 3 BB, Hero calls 2 BB

Flop: (6 BB, 2 players) 9 T Q
Hero checks, SB checks

Turn: (6 BB, 2 players) 7
Hero checks, SB bets 2.84 BB, Hero raises to 14.22 BB, SB calls 11.38 BB

River: (34.44 BB, 2 players) 5
Hero bets 18 BB, SB calls 16.22 BB and is all-in

Hero shows 9 K J 8 (Straight, King High)
(Pre 57%, Flop 91%, Turn 96%)
SB shows 4 4 T K (One Pair, Tens)
(Pre 43%, Flop 9%, Turn 4%)
Hero wins 65.38 BB

Same villain as in the previous two hands, this is just a straight up brag, yo! Here I basically went for the trap line, checking it twice, and again I maybe overdo it with my sizing OTT but doesn´t seem that it matters anyway. I was actually quite shocked to see what he called me down with, he has one nut straight blocker, second pair and a gutshot OTT, and just straight up calls me OTR with middle pair. Oh, well, I´m not one to complain.

PokerStars - $0.50 PL Hi FAST (2 max) - Omaha Hi - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

SB: 60.34 BB
Hero (BB): 208.3 BB

SB posts SB 0.5 BB, Hero posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has 3 9 J 8

SB raises to 2 BB, Hero calls 1 BB

Flop: (4 BB, 2 players) 5 K 7
Hero checks, SB bets 1.9 BB, Hero calls 1.9 BB

New villain, pretty standard call OTF here.

Turn: (7.8 BB, 2 players) T
Hero checks, SB bets 3.7 BB, Hero raises to 18.5 BB, SB calls 14.8 BB

As the turn improves my hand significantly, I opt to go for the c/r here, and choose to size it so that V will have roughly a PSB left on the river.

River: (44.8 BB, 2 players) K
Hero bets 43.3 BB, fold

My draw misses, but I feel that the king is good since I can credibly represent boats/Kx here and he´ll have a tough time to call me down light. Also all of the draws that were there OTT missed, and losing to something like a busted heart draw or some random A-high straight draw or whatever would be disastrous here, so I pot it and it works out.

Okay, back to the office grind!

Busto Again and Some Ramblings on Finances

That Monday Miracle didn´t last too long. Some 300 hands more, to be precise. -195 for October, running three buy-ins below EV in a laughable sample size of 401 hands. Not really interested in changing anything though, don´t feel like upping my deposit limit to something like 1000 USD to deposit a real bankroll would be a good play. At least not until I show more consistently positive results, and even then I think it would be a bad idea, since I would risk way more money in case I get tilted/bored/no PLO50 games running etc. I can perfectly well imagine myself taking a shot at PLO500 just to win some "real" money, you know.

One thing that comes with age is at least a semblence of financial responsibility. No, don´t get me wrong, I´m still way too irresponsible with finances and if I have the option to put 1k in my savings account or go for a weekend trip to some nice place, I´ll always choose the second option. That´s also why guys like me don´t get rich I guess. When me and my wife met, neither of us had any real money, we had shitty jobs and for holidays we did stuff like bike trips in the countryside or other cheap options. Travelled abroad maybe once a year at most. Almost never ate at a restaurant.

And you know what? It was perfectly fine. As our financial situation gradually improved, the main change was that we just started living larger. Instead of a used car bought for 3k we leased a new car. Instead of going on a local holiday we went abroad. And as our finances have become better, our spending patterns have become much worse. Too lazy too cook? Order food from some restaurant. Bored? Weekend getaway to some nice place. A year without at least 3-4 non-work trips abroad? Unthinkable. Good thing that we have very low living expenses (owned apartment, no loans).

I have no problems whatsoever living like this, however, I do know it will be mentally hard to downgrade our lifestyle if it will come to that some time in the future, and I just hope I have the mental strength to look at the positives if we will be forced to do that, instead of lamenting the life we used to have. Personally I will find it extremely hard to adjust to having to work as an employee for someone else if it would come to that, but hey, it´s not the end of the world, right?

But I do have at least a semblence of financial responsibility. When it comes to gambling, I am quite aware of my limitations. I know that it doesn´t matter how much money I have in an online account, as long as it´s not banked and I don´t have a deposit limit in place, that money is in danger. I know that my live game is prone to big swings and therefore I´d rather not play than go play when short on money. I know that by going to Gran Canaria in March our finances for this month will be pretty **** (and we also gave 1k to close relatives who are struggling financially and have some urgent and costly stuff to take care of with their house). At least I am aware of things like this with regards to money, something I couldn´t say about myself 10 years ago. Of course, awareness is one thing and awareness doesn´t guarantee that I always stay within limits, but mostly I do. I am also able to walk away from things, or not do them, if I feel that I don´t have the means to do so. I guess that´s progress and wisdom. Or something.

Sometimes I do wonder how much of my disregard for money comes from the years in my youth which I spent as a total degenerate, drinking, gambling and partying. If I would have stayed away from gambling back then, would I have a different outlook on life now? I am sure that being in my early twenties and walking to work straight from the poker club with a month´s salary in my jacket pocket after a good session didn´t help in forming a responsible outlook on money, especially since it always was all gone after a weekend of drunken degening. Or did it start earlier? I remember that when I was like six or seven, my parents allowed me to play some slot machine in some pub in London. And I won. They probably didn´t think more of it than a kid just pushing some buttons, but maybe this is where it started? Or maybe it is just genes - I mean, I know a lot of kids who have pushed the slot buttons when they were small that didn´t go on to become degenerate gamblers, who have a completely healthy view of money and who don´t think that losing 170 EUR at a poker game is "absolutely nothing" or that just spending money on a whim is perfectly fine. Maybe I am wired this way? My parents have never been gamblers outside of occasionally playing the national lottery, although my father has had alcohol problems at times, especially in his latter life (maybe youth as well, but no idea about that).

I have no idea and right now I don´t really feel that it´s important either - for now I am earning good money and not gambling excessively, I´ve quit alcohol four-five years ago and outside of a couple of times per year I don´t touch that **** any more (and when I do I don´t get horrendously wasted), I don´t do much drugs, and as long as I feel happy and can afford to live my life as I please, why should it bother me?

Since I am spending several paragraphs writing about it, I guess it does bother me to some extent. I am trying to put my finger on why, but no thoughts come to my mind. Because of my past? Because of the risks involved? Because the degen is deeply rooted within me? To be fair, I have no idea, so for now I´ll just let it be.

Since this is supposed to be a poker blog, I have to write something more about cards as well. On Friday I will play a 100 EUR Progressive KO live tournament. I can´t remember when I last played a live NLT tournament - it´s probably written somewhere in the first pages of this blog, probably something like four years ago. I guess it will be fun, I do enjoy certain aspects of tournament poker, and I don´t really mind if it goes poorly since then I´ll just play cash instead. At least in a PKO tournament you can hope to bag some money before you bust out on some random coinflip or crappy four-bet bluff with A3s... So I will probably be back with an update (that almost noone will read) after the weekend.

No Hablo Espanol

So, today is time to donk off some money in a poker tournament. Actually feeling unreasonably excited to play a tournament, probably since it's been so long. Will see how that goes, have been spending time memorising push-fold charts for different stack sizes and reading up on ICM... ehh, no, **** that ****. Charts are for pussies. I mean, if I will jam Q9s and it turns out that the chart says that Q9s is a fold but QTs is a push, who cares? It's going to be fun nonetheless. Or at least so I hope. My main goal is to keep alive until the cash tables open, since it would kind of suck to bust out in Level 2 and then wait for cash tables to open. Starting stack is something like 200 bigs, so I do have hopes of at least making it to Level 3. Not sure what the bookies are offering for odds on that though...

Hopefully my wife can pick up our son from kindergarten, then I might be able to go for a swim before the tournament. I am getting better, swimming a little bit faster, swimming longer and having more fun while doing it (although I still am slow and I am sure that my technique would make the eyes of any swimming coach bleed, at least that's the feeling I have). Main thing is that I feel so much better after I have excercised, and I really like that feeling. Will meet a friend, who also will play the poker tournament, for dinner as well, so it's going to be a fun evening/night.

At the end of November, I'll be going solo to Barcelona for four days. Wifey has two weeks of vacation at the start of November and will go to Venice solo (unfortunately we have no possibility to dump the kids and go together) and after she has been so positive about solo tourism, I chose to try it myself as well and tickets to Barcelona were cheap (200 EUR return airfare, fortunately Ryanair was only 30 EUR cheaper so I could go with a normal airline instead of the cattle transport that is Ryanair) so why the hell not? Getting away from the cold and darkness will do wonders for me. Or at least so I hope. Normally I go to Sweden for my solo trips, to hook up with old friends and so on, but this time I chose to try solo tourism instead. Going to be interesting, I think it will be a first for me.

Of course, I would be a liar if I said that I didn't check out the poker opportunities in the destinations I chose between. Being solo and not having a lot to do in the evenings (I am almost 40, so going clubbing is out of the question) means that I want to have the chance to degen away some hard-earned cash in the poker room, and Barcelona seems to have a really nice casino. Have to check out the area where it's located - judging by the map it's right by the beach, so hopefully it's a good and safe neighbourhood and I'll be able to find a nice hotel within walking distance so I can scratch my gambling itch whenever I feel like it. Checked the casino homepage yesterday evening and there were quite a lot of games running, from like 1/3 up to 10/20 and I think I saw a 5/5 PLO game as well which would probably be nice to try.

This night I dreamt that I went to Barcelona, won 7k in the 5/5 game and came back to play 10/10/20 the next evening and cashed out for another 10k in profits. First hand I played at the 10/10/20 table was AAxx all-in preflop against two other players for a 7k pot. Then I was sitting in my hotel room trying to decide how to spread the cash in my bags/pockets before going home, and when I went home I put 10k on the table and told my wife that we can do some serious shopping...

Sometimes dreams come true, right? In a month and a half we'll find out if this is one of those times!

You Load Sixteen Tons, and What Do You Get?


I know I should fold to the four-bet. I have a trashy hand against a player who knows how to play, and the call would be for almost half my stack. But I am stuck and I want to go home, or at least get something going, so I say "**** it, I´ll call, time to go home anyway". The flop comes A98 rainbow, not at all good for me, since all I have is a gutshot straight draw to the nuts and some backdoor equity with straights and flushes. He, of course, pots it. I think for a little while. He says "I don´t have Aces, I promise" and I believe him. I answer "I only have four outs, and some backdoors" to which he says "well, backdoors count too, don´t they?"

It´s a little past 3AM when I say call. He has AKQQx (don´t remember the fifth card) and I don´t improve, so I get up, wish the remaining players good luck and grab a taxi home, having lost 400 EUR in one and a half hours of cashgame poker.

***

I am having dinner with my friend P at the best steakhouse in Riga, at least in my opinion. It´s not cheap for Riga, the striploin I had cost 26 EUR, and with sauce and a side it´s 35 EUR for a meal, but damn, it´s good. And yeah, those prices seem a laugh if you are from a western European country (or USA, I guess) - I mean, I´ve paid 35 EUR for quite shitty meals in Stockholm and other places in Europe, but here you really get your money´s worth. Despite the inflation adding around 30-50% for a restaurant bill (eating out has gotten A LOT more expensive in the past year), Riga still offers great value for money when it comes to food.

"So", I ask, "you´re joining me in the tournament tonight, right?"
"I don´t think so", he replies. "I haven´t really played tournaments, I have no idea what to do."
"Don´t worry, it´s not really that hard."

We finish our dinner, pay our bill and leave the restaurant. "Are you really sure you don´t want to play?" I ask him again.
"I´m not sure, I mean, I think it will go bad."
"**** it man, don´t worry. I can stake you if you want to, you know how I am with money and 100 EUR isn´t a big deal. It´s a tournament, all you need to do is play tight and get lucky!"

I head to the ATM to withdraw some cash as he rethinks his options.

"I´ll join in, it´s not like I have anything better to do this evening", he says and instead of bidding farewell, we walk together to the tournament.

***

26 entries (including re-entries, including one re-entry by me) and six hours later I am sitting at the final table. Right before the final table, I lost a big flip - with blinds at 2k/4k/4k BB ante there was a raise in front of me, so I pushed for 150k or so with tens. The player to my left pushed as well, the preflop raiser ponders for a while and then throws KTo face up in the muck, and we show our cards. I am up against AK, he has 80 EUR bounty so winning this would be great (I had only knocked out one player so far), but there´s an ace in the window and I am left drawing to one out.

Instead of going to the final table as the biggest stack (at least on my table), I was down to 48k and now the shortest stack at the table. "One double and you´ll be fine", I tell myself, and I haven´t been playing good tournament poker and folding for long stretches of card-deadness just to blow it up after another lost flip (the third one this tournament - and that´s also the reason I haven´t knocked out more than one player). I fold for a couple of hands and now the blinds are approaching. I peel Q2o UTG+1 and fold. Next hand I peel 94o UTG and fold. Next hand is the last before the break - I post the BB and ante and am left with 40k, so if I fold pre this hand, I´ll have a 4k SB next hand and basically only one orbit to double.

It folds around to the SB. He checks his cards, I tell him I have 40k behind, he looks as though he is about to fold, but then just limps. I peel my cards. One time... and look down at six-deuce of diamonds. I decide to check my option. The flop is lovely - J 6 3 with two diamonds. So I basically flop the nuts with middle pair and a flush draw. He checks, I bet and decide to size it to 10k, leaving me with preciselý a pot sized bet left. To my surprise, he calls pretty quickly. The turn is a black ten - a card I find really shitty. He checks, I consider pushing but then decide to take the free card - if I push here, I doubt I will get called by worse and I am blocking the main draw, however, if I check he might try to bluff on the river. The river is a magical diamond and almost as soon as the card hits he announces all-in and I insta-call. He flips JJ for top set, I double up to keep my hopes alive.

***

We are at the break after level nine, there are still three tables in play and I am feeling good. The re-entry period was a real roller-coaster but I came out of it with a very healthy stack and things are looking good. I am amazed at how fun I find tournament poker to be - maybe it´s because I haven´t played live tournies for so long, but I am focused and feeling good. I see an aquaintance, and a good friend of P, sitting in a sofa talking with P and another guy at my table, so I join them. The acquaintance is rolling a joint and asks me if I want to smoke.

I politely decline his offer. Before going here I decided I´d run it sober, and smoking weed isn´t really something that sharpens my poker skills. Besides, I haven´t gotten enough sleep during the week, so passing up on the opportunity to smoke seems to be a wise choice. I hang around and talk with this group until the break ends.

***

I make the final table with an OK stack, something like 110k or so. The blinds are really catching up now, we are playing 4k/8k/8k, so I don´t have an unlimited time window to do something, but I am far from dire straits yet. A big pot happens and a player busts, and in the next hand the person who was chip leader as the final table started (same guy who doubled me up with top set vs flush) busts out. Seven remaining, four places paid.

My friend P, who joined from the other table, opens to 16k from middle position. I am to his immediate left and look down at 99. I push, hoping to take it down right there (win or lose, I´d much rather P folds, however I totally don´t mind busting against him if he has a good hand). However, the player to my left - the same guy that crushed my TT with his AK, now also pushes all-in. P folds and I get the bad news - this time it isn´t AK, this time it is QQ. The board runs out clean and after the hand it turns out I was basically drawing dead - P had folded 99 as well. Out in seventh after something like six hours of play.

***

A new cash table starts and I of course join in. I buy in for 400, one other player does so as well, but the three remaining players have stacks of 100-200. And... I can´t connect on a single flop. I mean, I miss so hard there´s not really any opportunities to bluff, and once I do hit a draw it misses. I only played one big pot, and I am still on the fence on whether I played it poorly or not. Considering position issues, I probably did play it bad. It's a double board bomb pot, the first board is Q high with two diamonds, the second board is QJ9r. On the first board I have a pretty concealed double gutter, on the second I have the nut straight without redraws. UTG pots it for 15 (with less than 100 behind after his bet) and gets two callers, and it's back to me.

Considering I have the button, I am pretty sure that a call is best here, but I don't really have a good multi-way hand here, so in-game I decide to pot it, hoping to isolate against the shortstack. I pot, he calls, the next players tanks for quite a while before folding (which I guess is good, since if he pushes I have to call of my final 200 EUR as well, and I am probably in bad shape), as does the next player, so we get it heads up. Unfortunately, he has a monster - AKQTx with diamonds, so he has the same straight as me and has me drawing to six outs to avoid getting quartered. On the turn I hit my straight on the top board, on the bottom board the king of clubs appears giving him a better straight, but adding a live flush draw for me. Not bad at all - we are currently splitting and his equity is only a tad higher than mine, since the Qc would give him a full house.

The river bricks on the top board, leaving me with the nuts there, and he hits the nut full on the bottom board, so we chop it up.

Afterwards I bleed down to a bit over 200, missing every flop I see, before the hand that I opened this post with happened.

***

I really need to get better identifying when to play and when to stop. Last weekend I should not have stopped, although life outside poker gave me no choice but to stop, however this Friday after I had really given it my all in the tournament and played for six hours, I was not really in a good state of mind to play cash, especially in a shorthanded, shortstacked game. The big action game on the first cash table (which was full) - maybe, but still probably not. I should have just sweated P on the final table (unfortunately, he bubbled, got quite short on chips, got it in good, but busted - at least he managed to knock out three players on his way, so he picked up 60 EUR of bounties) and then went home, but I sat tired and despodent, and as soon as I started to miss every flop I saw I quickly got frustrated, played more hands preflop which in turn led me to missing even more flops and getting even more frustrated, and in the end I just wanted to go home. So instead of just racking up with a 200 EUR loss on the cash game, I gave another 200 EUR away in a spot where I had no business three-betting preflop, even less business calling a four-bet and where I really should just fold the flop even though I get decent odds.

You load sixteen tons, and what do you get?
Another day older and deeper in debt.

That is basically how I feel that poker is going for me lately. Okay, I'm not in debt because of my play, but you get the idea...

Oh, and I forgot the most interesting hand of the night. Happened in one of the earlier levels, we both started the hand with around 50k. There was a raise pre, I look down at JJ in LP and make it something like 2k to go. Get called by two players.

Flop:
972, rainbow.

I bet small (like 2,5k) and get called by both players.

Turn:
972 T
I check, next player now bets 6k, third player calls as well and although I am not loving this spot, I still call with my overpair+gutshot since I get a very good price.

River:
972 T K
Check, the aggressor now leads for around pot, 32k. The second player thinks for ages before he mucks. Now it is my turn to go into the tank. His betting pattern is very polarising, and although I find 86 to be an outside possibility, he is basically repping J8 or QJ with which he floated the flop with. But would he play 86/J8 against a 3! pre? This early in the tournament I cannot really rule that out, at least if they are suited. I've played with this player in all the past games I´ve been in, he´s actually quite good, and he can absolutely have bluffs here. Having played with him before, I feel that this bet is extremely polarising and I don´t see him trying to turn a rivered two pair with KT or something into a huge value bet hoping to get hero called. I chat with him a bit, tell him I have one of the best hands to call him down with, try go get a live read, he projects strength, looks straight at me etc. I don´t really think that matters, since he basically acts like this in almost all big pots - for example, last weekend when I led on a KK8 board in PLO and he re-potted it, he acted the same (I folded KQ77, he had 88 for the flopped boat), so I don´t really think that this is a big deal.

So, we basically have a very polarising bet, which means that I basically have the best hand possible to call with, since I have two blockers to both the hands he is representing. Except for the very top of my range, JJ is basically the only hand I would consider calling with here I think, since having the two blockers removes such a huge part of his value range in this spot.

I tank for several minutes and make the call.

"It´s yours", he says as he flips 88.
"My blockers are better than yours", I say as I flip JJ and rake in the pot.

Let´s see if I can get some online rungood going! Second hand of the session:

PokerStars - $0.50 PL Hi FAST (2 max) - Omaha Hi - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

Hero (SB): 100 BB
BB: 102.7 BB

Hero posts SB 0.5 BB, BB posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has K 9 K A

Hero raises to 3 BB, BB raises to 9 BB, Hero raises to 27 BB, BB calls 18 BB

Flop: (54 BB, 2 players) J 4 Q
BB checks, Hero bets 52.5 BB, BB raises to 75.7 BB and is all-in, Hero calls 20.5 BB and is all-in

Turn: (200 BB, 2 players) 4

River: (200 BB, 2 players) 7

BB cashed out 117.68 BB for a fee of 1.18 BB

BB shows 3 A J Q (Two Pair, Queens and Jacks)
(Pre 34%, Flop 60%, Turn 15%)
Hero shows K 9 K A (Two Pair, Kings and Fours)
(Pre 66%, Flop 40%, Turn 85%)
Hero wins 198.5 BB

Hand played itself, ds kings HU w/ A blocker is a slam dunk four-bet and the flop is decent enough as well. But nice to win a 40/60 for a change. Also got a pretty nice chest - 15 USD cash and 500 Stars coins, so 20 USD total. Last chests were around 10 USD total at the same level.

Okay, forget about the rungood. HU in a 4-bet pot I flop middle set and an OESD on a T98 board... and I have ****ing 27% equity.

PokerStars - $0.50 PL Hi FAST (2 max) - Omaha Hi - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

SB: 180.64 BB
Hero (BB): 116.02 BB

SB posts SB 0.5 BB, Hero posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has J 9 9 T

SB raises to 3 BB, Hero raises to 8 BB, SB raises to 24 BB, Hero calls 16 BB

Flop: (48 BB, 2 players) T 8 9
Hero bets 46.5 BB, SB raises to 151.12 BB, Hero calls 45.52 BB and is all-in

Turn: (232.04 BB, 2 players) J

River: (232.04 BB, 2 players) 2

SB cashed out 166.44 BB for a fee of 1.68 BB

Hero shows J 9 9 T (Three of a Kind, Nines)
(Pre 30%, Flop 27%, Turn 10%)
SB shows Q T T Q (Straight, Queen High)
(Pre 70%, Flop 73%, Turn 90%)

So, basically all I had to do was whine. I had decided on playing a 200 hand session, shortly before the session end I was down something like 20 USD. Well, the last 20 hands changed everything and I ended the session up almost three buy-ins, all the money basically came from one player. I won't bore you with long hand histories (and I guess the few people that read this blog mostly read it for the long write-ups like my last post about the weekend), but basically first I hit wrap + mid pair OTF in a 4! pot, chk-chk, low board card pairs on the turn and he bets small, I call, river brings in my straight and I push, he calls with trips, next hand I hit a nine-card draw on AK6r in a 3! pot, call a bet OTF and re-raise his pot bet OTT when my straight hit (he folded), then I flopped the second nuts on 876 w/ two hearts, check-check flop, turn Q bringing in the second flush draw, I c/r his bet and pot a blank river, he calls me with top two, and the last hand I 3! 9987, flop T52 with two spades goes check-check, turn 9, I pot and he calls, river Kc bringing in the backdoor flush, I check, he pots, I call, he has Q873r for absolutely nothing whatsoever.

When you run good in HU PLO, it´s the easiest and most fun game to play in the world, at least online.

All this traveling and no pictures!

Got to get better in this aspect, I agree! However, to my defense I have to say that I didn't really take any pictures when I was in Stockholm last time. Maybe some random stuff I sent my wife over Whatsapp, but was to busy degening to do photos.

I'll try to add some pics when I'm in Barcelona in the end of November. Hopefully some nice chip porn as well, just got to hit that rungood!

Barcelona Planning and Cursing Qatar

Started to plan my trip to Barcelona. First thing that I needed to take care of was the hotel. A nice place to sleep in a nice location. Preferrably within walking distance of some sights, and preferrably not in some main party area. So, what did I do?

Of course, I opened Google Maps and did a search for "Casino Barcelona" and looked at the nearby hotels. There were some hostels quite close, those were instantly disregarded, but when it came to hotels there was not too much of a choice. One seemed at a decent price (130 EUR/night), but was like 1,5 km from the casino and in a residential area, so basically I had two to choose from if I wanted to live next to the casino. The first was super luxurious, judging by the map right next door to the casino, but at something like 350 EUR per night that was way too steep. The second one was a Sofitel a block away, 500 metres by foot door-to-door, listed as five stars, so I figured that will be out of my price range as well, but - surprise, surprise - it was actually quite decently priced at 210 EUR/night if you become a member in their rewards club, excluding breakfast.

So, do I want the ability to walk down to a temple of degeneracy at any given minute, or do I want to live somewhere cheaper, maybe closer to the sights, but be forced to transport my lazy ass on public transportation or taxi each time I need to scratch my gambling itch? I think it´s pretty clear to anyone who has read a couple of posts in this blog that I splashed out on a five-star hotel (which I guess won´t be top of the line five-star judging by the price, so basically expecting a very nice place, but nothing out of the ordinary) just to be near the casino. It´s next to the beach as well, but it will be way too cold to swim - but there were a few restaurants by the beach, and walking along the sea is always nice even if you can´t swim.

I did check out the area a little before, and although it´s not really central it works fine for me - the Gothic Quarter, which seems absolutely lovely judging by the pictures, is like a kilometre away and the other central parts something like 2-3 km, and I like to explore cities on foot. But since there seem to be waiting lists for most games (at least the times I´ve checked), it´s nice to be able to chill in your room instead of in the casino while waiting for a seat - and much cheaper as well, since sitting in a casino is ****ing boring if you don´t have company and/or don´t gamble.

I have checked out the games running, 1/3 NLT and 2/2 PLO seem to be the most popular options. Both of them are capped buy-in at 200BB, seems quite suitable for me, however I might jump in to play some 5/5 PLO as well if it´s running. Yesterday evening there was a 5/10 PLO game running, but that´s way too high for my budget - I assume it plays big, so shortstacking with a 1k buy-in wouldn´t be any fun. But maybe if I hit some mad rungood I can take a shot at it before I go home and drop all of my winnings in a couple of hands to ensure that I don´t go home a winner. On Tuesdays they also have a 100+15 NLT tournament, so maybe I´ll play that one on my first evening there if I´m not out doing touristy stuff.

Another thing that I don´t know is how the games are. They can´t be worse than at the casino here, at least I have a hard time imagining that. But yeah, basically my plan is to do touristy stuff during the day, explore the city, eat nice food and relax, and go play poker at least some of the evenings. If you have any tips with regards on what to see or what to do in Barcelona, please let me know!

As football is my favourite sport, I of course checked out the schedule of FC Barcelona, since going to a game at Camp Nou would be something I definately would love to do. I was a bit surprised to see no games scheduled in November/December, I was like wtf, La Liga doesn´t have a winter break like in Germany... and then it struck me. The ****ing World Cup in ****ing Qatar. So no FC Barcelona for me. My dislike for Qatar instantly hit the roof as I came to this realisation.

I mean, not only is hosting the world cup there messing up the scheduling of all top flight competitions in Europe, it´s also a massive symbol of the blatant corruption within FIFA. It´s basically a symbol of everything that is bad with football at the current moment. But now it´s also gotten personal, since it will rob me of a chance to see some European top level football live. **** Qatar.

When it comes to poker back home, I doubt I will play any more this month. I am running low on free money, especially money I can afford to just drop on a whim, due to my massive inability to plan my finances. And yeah, spending 800+ EUR on a hotel room for four nights doesn´t help when it comes to having free cash for gambling...

Meh. Haven't played live, been getting crushed online. Can't say it's just down to running bad, there for sure is bad play involved, but lately I've been getting on the wrong end of bad situations a lot (and fail to suck out) in big pots. This hand is quite symptomatic:

PokerStars - $0.50 PL Hi FAST (2 max) - Omaha Hi - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

SB: 108.86 BB
Hero (BB): 174.96 BB

SB posts SB 0.5 BB, Hero posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has 8 5 5 7

SB raises to 3 BB, Hero raises to 9 BB, SB calls 6 BB

Flop: (18 BB, 2 players) A 5 3
Hero bets 17.1 BB, SB calls 17.1 BB

With me having the flush draw as well, I normally would choose a smaller sizing, but I had a feeling that this player might call off with inferior hands, so wanted max value and to get stacks in as soon as possible.

Turn: (52.2 BB, 2 players) 2
Hero bets 50.7 BB, SB raises to 82.76 BB and is all-in, Hero calls 32.06 BB

River: (217.72 BB, 2 players) J

Hero shows 8 5 5 7 (Three of a Kind, Fives)
(Pre 58%, Flop 83%, Turn 40%)
SB shows 6 4 Q 3 (Straight, Six High)
(Pre 42%, Flop 17%, Turn 60%)
SB wins 216.22 BB

So, yeah. When I flop a set and a flushdraw and get action, he hits his straight on the turn. I still have 40% equity, since almost half the deck gives me a win, but can't hit.

Then I lost with second nut straight against the nut straight in a spot where I can't reasonably find a fold, I called an open with J875, flop was 762 with two clubs (I have the Jc), i check, he pots and I choose to call since raising seems a bit too ambitious. Turn is the 9s, I check, he bets around 3/4 pot, I c/r pot, he goes all-in for another 30xBB or so on top and I call it off, and he has T8 so I am drawing dead.

Down 630 USD in October, running 6 buy-ins below EV. I mean, I am no Paisting when it comes to the level of delusion, and after roughly 7k hands of HU PLO50 I am down a total of 750 USD so I am probably unable to beat the games (at least until I stop calling large river bets/raises with bluffcatchers), but being down 350 for the month would be a lot more okay than being down almost 650.

Maybe I'll have the chance to play live in the weekend, not sure if there will be any game running and not sure if I will be up to heading to the casino to play 2/5 or 5/5 NLT if no games are running, have to make sure I don't become strapped for cash when I hit Barcelona and dropping like 2k at uncapped 5/5 is quite easy (especially if you are a fish like me). Probably won't play if I can't find a smaller home game, since I need to be in a financial situation where I can drop something like 3k without it hurting too much in case I run bad (or play bad).

Been starting to check out what to do in Barcelona as well. If the weather isn't lousy, I'll spend a day hiking - Montserrat seems to be nice (and also quite easy), one hour by train from Barcelona. Want to do something a little more active than just regular tourism as well.

Oh, I haven´t gotten anything like this in a while!



Kind of sweet. The hand that triggered his rage was this one:

PokerStars - $0.50 PL Hi FAST (2 max) - Omaha Hi - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

Hero (SB): 141.28 BB
BB: 113.34 BB

Hero posts SB 0.5 BB, BB posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has 9 8 8 Q

Hero raises to 3 BB, BB calls 2 BB

Flop: (6 BB, 2 players) 7 T 8
BB bets 5.7 BB, Hero calls 5.7 BB

Turn: (17.4 BB, 2 players) J
BB bets 16.52 BB, Hero calls 16.52 BB

River: (50.44 BB, 2 players) 7
BB bets 1 BB, Hero raises to 22 BB, BB calls 21 BB

Hero shows 9 8 8 Q (Full House, Eights full of Sevens)
(Pre 45%, Flop 66%, Turn 23%)
BB mucks Q K J A (Flush, Ace High)
(Pre 55%, Flop 34%, Turn 78%)
Hero wins 92.94 BB

So, after the hand he says that I should have folded (not sure about that with set+straight even if the flush comes in, at least not OTT), that I am a "****ing fish from East" (I am kind of fishy, never have denied it) and some other nice things like that. That I lose "each day because u call". I actually checked my database and over 100 hands, I am up 15 USD against this particular villain. I of course goad him with replies of "hahahaha" (I actually found his massive blowup kind of funny), and later tell him that I love him too, when he re-joins the pool 20 minutes later and tells me to "die" and that he "hopes I get cancer" to which he reacts by telling me that he will come and kill me and that I should give him my address.

God, some people are just so ****ing ******ed.