Happy weekend all! Haven't posted in here for 3 weeks... Road trip to see Misfits was super fun and got a couple new chips for my collection. Been grinding solid volume lately getting in 8 hrs a day. I have hella more pics to post from the trip, I'll update when I get a chance. Crush em today!

Go pure_aggression!

Great pics man.

FWIW I haven't followed this thread closely or read all of it over the years. Just popped in from time to time mostly to check out the art and see how things are going overall.

You're obv a very talented person in several fields and I think having balance in live is super important overall but I think having periods of your life where you buckle down and focus anywhere from like 80-95% of your waking efforts on 1 specific area is very beneficial in the long run.


This is gonna be a bit of a tough love post bc it seems like you may need it, I know I needed a lot of pushes from friends along the way myself for awhile. Granted I don't know you so some of this may be off base, feel free to ignore anything that is.

It seems to me you moved out to Vegas around 5 years ago with the intention of playing 160hr/month of 1/2 and building up a BR and 5 years later you're still playing 1/2 and 1/3. You're only about 45% of the way to your hours goal for the year yet the year is almost 75% over. Maybe you don't enjoy poker anywhere near as much as you enjoy making music and art and that's perfectly fine if that's the case. Perhaps you should pursue those full time over poker if that's the case.

If not though and you intend to go forward as a poker pro who makes art and music on the side...I'd light a fire under my own ass quick and turn **** up pretty quickly. You haven't moved up in stakes in 5 years and poker is getting harder and harder everyday. You need to be frontloading your hours that you play early to build a BR and when you're settled in somewhere that you feel your hourly is maxed out, now you can play less hours bc you've maximized your potential and become the most productive you can be with your time.

Take this from someone that has had many sub 1000 hour years and moved to LA to play 5/10+ after Black Friday. I was lazy, didn't handle adversity well for awhile and bounced between 20/40nl and 5/5nl with most of my hours at 5/10. I couldn't ever seem to make things stick at 10/20 and when I would hit a bad stretch I would play less hours and distract myself with other things. In actuality if you're planning to play professionally this is where you have to turn it up prove to yourself what you're actually made of if you want to move up in stakes. The reason you can't make 2/5 stick is most likely bc you're giving up too quickly. 600 hours on the year for someone that plays 1/2 and 1/3 as their main game is pretty pitiful tbh if you think of yourself as a pro. You only build confidence and improve in life by living up to your potential in the areas you're focusing your time and energy. And all areas of your life affect one another so by living up to your potential in poker, you increase your confidence and that will expand out to your ability to make music and art as well as your social life....tho it's true that those areas will have to fall behind for awhile for that to happen. Ultimately though, true happiness comes from your ability to live up to your potential as a man and accomplish what you set out to accomplish in life. And in your pursuit of doing that with all the trials and tribulations along the way, your sense of happiness comes from realizing you're on your way to doing that no matter what results have shown up in the past. I think it's really hard as a man to be happy in life if you aren't as successful as you know you're capable of being in your career.

I don't mean any of that to be harsh necessarily but more of a wake up call. Poker doesn't get easier any day and not getting hours in now means you will have to play more in tougher games later on. I've watched so many pros get downsized from 10/20nl to 5/5 and 5/10. It's not as easy to earn promotions in poker as it was years ago, don't waste it, frontload hours and get to the highest stakes your capable of beating for the highest hourly. For a lot of guys that won't be higher than 5/10 and that's OK, what's not OK is if you're capable of that and just keep playing 1/2 and from seeing you're art and hearing your music I'm sure you're more than capable of beating 2/5 and game selecting 5/10.

Good luck

^brb, taking a good look at myself in the mirror.

yeah tough love, but good post

I've often thought the same with regards to Carl's hours, but it seems one thing people like about being a pro is the flexibility. If he doesn't need the money maybe he doesn't feel the need to grind more hours.
Not that it is a bad thing to build up a cushion for bad times or invest for the long term.

Sure, flexibility is great and a huge perk or being a pro. You know how you get even more flexibility in poker tho....MAXIMIZE YOUR POTENTIAL! It actually isn't that much about how many resources you have but rather your resourcefulness. How can anyone be confident in their resourcefulness when they haven't had a promotion in 5 years and they are playing what equates to under 20 hours/wk of poker?

As I said, I understand if he doesn't care much about poker and would rather make music or art. However he's been keeping a blog tracking his progress on a poker site for 5+ years so I'm just going to assume he still does care about it a great deal. It's really hard to get great at something when you split your effort between 3 things at once, and so long as poker is still the most important of those 3 things, he will be required to treat it as such with the amount of time and effort he pours into it if he wants to move up and increase his hourly.

I'm sure Carl will give a considered response to the above, as is his habit. Personally, I don't mind the way he goes about his poker life; occasionally he might express the desire to play a higher stake, but, as far as I can recall, it's never been a primary goal. It would seem that many (myself included at times) just assume that poker players always want to move up---that the cash world is organised in terms of "low", "mid" and "high" stakes is testament to this fact. In the end, this is a default assumption, one that makes sense for many, but, logically, is not the only way of thinking about the matter. If one looks at the reasons for playing poker in more depth, then, I believe, it really is about value systems: does one just want to make more money, does one want external recognition as a top-flight player, does one want freedom of lifestyle? Often it feels like poker players don't directly address these questions, and, as a result, automatically become hitched to the high-stakes dream, a scenario which can led to a host of life problems. I would say Carl is an exception in this regard, and, relatively speaking, has a clear understanding of why he plays the game, fifteen-hundred hours a year. Just because he's not talking about "moving-up" doesn't necessarily mean he's unmotivated.

I think I'll break up this little roadtrip TR into a few posts since I have so many pics.

PART 1

The first day of the trip I drove from Vegas to Western Colorado and caught some surreal scenery on the way. I had a really great time on this excursion, hope you enjoy the pics and the vlog I threw together!

Arches NP, Utah











Silverthorne, CO



follow my snapchat story live: zxxcarlxxz

Here is my latest vlog-



Here is a cover of "We're only gunna die" by Bad Religion-



Here is one of my paintings-





Hey thanks for the post, you are absolutely right. I have been lazy this year pokerwise and my progress towards the volume goal I set for myself is unacceptable. Getting the hrs in at the tables in one of my biggest leaks and it's kept me from playing higher and a lot of EV. It is a shame to be 5 years in and playing mostly 1/2 and 1/3, I need to work harder. I really appreciate the sentiment and I've had most of the same thoughts in my head and it sucks to let myself down and hold myself back by not giving poker my best effort. I will learn from my mistakes and get on track to progressing toward my potential.

I have more in depth thoughts in reply that I'll get into later. Thanks again and if anyone else sees me slipping you are all more welcome to give me a little kick in the nuts to keep me accountable.

PART 2 coming soon...

Nice pics!
Yup on the 5 yr on 1/2. I'm in the same boat. I've started the transition to 2/5 as well as reigniting tournament play. What I noticed is - on line and now live cash, winning and bankroll building tends to create a I'm satisfied, why move up attitude. We all saw what happened to on line poker. Now a huge missed opportunity.
Sometimes we need to move out of our comfort zone....

Where was the Misfits venue?

PART 2

Continuing on east I-70 to Central City and Black Hawk, CO for some poker. It's a cool little old mining district and now gambling area since legalized in the 90s. It is a 30 min drive from the Denver metro. I stopped here once a couple years ago on the way to Chicago.

Ameristar has the vast majority of the poker action with 1/2/100, 2/5/100 (100 max bet or raise) They aslo have big limit games 30/60 and 50/100 running. Very nice room. Golden Gates across the street has a 1/2/100, The Lodge just recently closed their poker room.

Central City







Black Hawk









Next in PART 3, off to the show!

600 hours in any profession is big time slacking this late In the year! Step yo game up mang....and Gl!

Enjoy Colorado . It's where I live ha. I'm about 40 minutes from those casinos.

PART 3

I went to the last day of Riot Fest a 3 day music festival at the national western complex. The show was awesome. It was my first time seeing Hatebreed, they sound a lot like one of my favorite East Coast HxC bands Sworn Enemy. I've seen Bad Religion once or twice before with Offspring and they played all their signature songs. The Misfits played a great set of their classics, sounded great.

Hatebreed





Bad Religion





The Misfits





Next in PART 4 we head south to CO Springs and Cripple Creek.

Looks like a fun trip.
I was surprised to see Bad Religion was still performing and went to their Wiki page, only to see they were formed in 1979.
Interesting too that the lead man has a PhD.

seems on Bravo the Gates should be where people play, excellent $5 per hour promotion, which would guarantee $200 per week for those with 40 or more hours. while in co springs, tell me if theres still more than 1 room in the towns west of there, or if theres any way to get rooms cheap on weekends without leaving cripple creek. (non-casino regular motel?)

theres no need to ever play higher than $1-2/$1-3. u can still earn close to $4000 per month, and with no stress or variance $2-5 and up has. much easier to win in $1-2 too

PART 4

Cripple Creek is a few hours south of Denver. It's a tiny town with some tiny casinos and 1 poker room with about 8 tables at The Midnight Rose. They games played are 1/2/20 spread limit and 1/2/100 spread limit. I played 4 hours and they hooked it up with a free hotel room and some free food vouchers that covered a nice steak dinner and also breakfast the next morning.

I went to a museum to learn a bit more about the mining boom era, interesting stuff. I went on the half scale railroad which was pretty cool. (some footage in the last vlog)

Air Force Academy



Cripple Creek







The Continental Divide



Pikes Peak



Next up in PART 5, off to NM.

Mad respect to the bands touring and putting out records for 30+ years!

Yep Greg Graffin is cool and the lyrics are much more intellectual than a lot of other bands.

Not sure about the room rates on weekends.

It's all about risk and reward, higher potential earnings with higher risk and bigger swings at higher stakes. If you are adequately bankrolled and skilled enough play higher that is probably the better choice. But if you don't really have anything to fall back on mitigating risk may be a high priority.

It all comes down to individual situation.

That's all I need - clean air, a Safeway, and a poker game not too far away.

Love the trip reports PA. I lived in CO for many years and enjoy seeing familiar, beautiful places. The action at Ameristar (Blackhawk) is decent but the $100 max bet always tilted me. Looking forward to the next installment...

Def enjoying the travel and poker stuff you've shared. I'm down to join for a Phoenix or SoCal trip one of these months if you wanna plan ahead for such a thing!

Love the pics!
The locals in Deadwood this summer kept talking about Blackhawk. Some of em went down there. I've left Deadwood for the year, until next summer, but if you ever plan to play in deadwood, or just visit, let me know! Most players are easy to beat. Every year I make a bank deposit on my way out of town, lol.
I watch some of heartland poker tour tournaments on tv, they play so poorly. Have you ever played in HPT events?

PART 5

Sandia in Albuquerque has a decent poker room, they are on bravo 1/2 and 2/5 NL running. Played a short session then on to Flagstaff, stopped at Twin Arrows, they closed their poker room withn the last year, I did bink $25 from free slot play for signing up. Continued on to Laughlin, free room at Harrahs. The 2/5 never ran only had 5 on the interest list. 4/8 limit was running with "overs" btns on 4 stacks. Basically if the only players remaining in the hand have these btns the betting becomes NL. Played for a couple hrs then went to the mall and got a couple new pairs of shoes, another pair of chucks and some nike running shoes. Went on a run from Harrahs down the hill to Riverside and back. Then the drive back to LV to complete the trip. It was a fun week, great to break up the routine and experience some new places and cruise the highways a bit.

New Mexico



Into the Abyss



Sandia



Twin Arrows



Laughlin







Back in LV



Next post I'll review my goals.

Sounds like a good advertising campaign for Safeway haha

Colorado is no doubt a beautiful, stunning example of nature. Ameristar is a very nice casino, 100 spread is kind of annoying but it didn't bother me knowing ill be back in LV with an abundance of structures. Living back in Oakland and grinding at Oaks they only had 100 max and 200 max SL, but they finally converted to NL like the rest of the Bay Area rooms.

Thanks! Sure I'm down for a SoCal trip, still some San Diego poker rooms I need to check off the list.

Cool, I'm sure I'll make it there some day. I only play cash, I think I might have been at Thunder Valley in Sacramento when they had an event going on.

If you end up hitting San Diego message me.


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First time posting on 2+2. Been reading your thread for a few weeks now from the beginning to now. First off let me say thanks, for the good reading material and for your honesty. You have had quite a journey the last few years and it was fun to read all about it.

Your like a brother from another mother. I obviously play and love poker, but I also play guitar and bass, listen to most of the same music, used to be artist. We share many similar interests. I like your covers and originals.

Only criticism I could give you(you take criticism well and seem to enjoy the different views) is that personally I liked the begging of your thread where you tracked your stats and posted. I do understand why you don't post them as often anymore but it did make it very fun to follow the swings.

I'm more of a tournament player but watching you play the cash games has got me thinking about playing more and reading 5 years of HH has helped me see where you came from and how you got to where you are at.

Anyhow thanks for all the posts, pictures, reviews, thoughts, art and life experiences. You live they way most people want to but never have the balls to do. You do what you want, when you want and how you want. You have created your own path and wish you nothing but success in your future endeavors. If I ever see you on the felt I am saying hi, and if I can getting you high.