Well I decided to start a thread, because it's what all the cool kids are doing these days. I'm leaving for Rosarito, MX in ten days to grind on Pokerstars, and I want to keep track of the journey through this thread. I'll be making the agonizing 30+ hour drive from Knoxville, TN over the course of four days with frequent stops for booze, sleep, and gambol with some possible sight seeing thrown in. I don't really know any Spanish, and I've never even been outside of the country. I'm not entirely sure if those facts will create hurdles for me in Rosa, but I've heard it's pretty touristy so I should be okay. I may try to fit in a few hours of Spanish study a day along with grinding, but until I learn anything useful I guess I'll just work on my charades skills.

Here are pics of the condo I'm leasing:







It seems like it's in a pretty safe area and it has security and what not. Guess I'll just have to see.

Some background

I'm a 22 year old college dropout who has been playing poker for about four years now. I've played quite seriously the past two years, and my passion hasn't really subsided at all. I still want to take all the maneys! I had a big breakthrough last year when I got staked by a friend of mine who plays higher than me, and he taught me a LOT. I honestly can say I wouldn't be able to make this journey without what he did for me, and he continues to be a very supportive influence on me. So yea, if there's anything I can share now with people that helps the most, it's that. Get a coach or staker who you respect and absorb as much info as you can. Anyways, we ended our staking deal in August, and I've been grinding on my own since. I had a big BE/downswing stretch over the last two months mainly because of bonus grinding on True Poker. Gotta get those yearly rewards... It's pretty silly of me because I've known for a longggg time that I don't function well trying to grind volume. Oh well. Back to grinding 6-8 tables and focusing.

Last years graph



I'm basically disappointed in a lot of things in this graph, but it's also my best year in my short career so there's that I guess. I'm just going to work hard as **** in 2013 to become better.

Year to date so far



I've been lazy so far this year, but the grinding will pick up hot and heavy once I'm on stars.

So yea no real big goals or anything. I'm just trying to do better than last year and enjoy the hell out of Mexico. Leggo.

def subbed good luck!! also first??

tyty!

woke up with strong motivation to grind today. time to put in some big sessions!

gl , what stakes and site do you play?

ty. i play 200nl and 400nl 6max on True Poker.


Played the biggest pot I may have ever played at 2/4 this morning. I went back and looked at if I was actually getting the right price in this one, and it was very close. Pretty obvious I was behind on the turn. The two players that reached SD with me are very big fish btw.

Winning Poker Network - $4 NL (6 max) - Holdem - 6 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

SB: $400.00
BB: $643.82
Hero (UTG): $1,124.69
MP: $400.00
CO: $433.09
BTN: $765.95

SB posts SB $2.00, BB posts BB $4.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $6.00) Hero has 9 9

Hero raises to $12.00, fold, CO calls $12.00, BTN calls $12.00, fold, BB calls $8.00

Flop: ($50.00, 4 players) 9 K 7
BB checks, Hero bets $31.33, CO calls $31.33, BTN calls $31.33, BB calls $31.33

Turn: ($175.32, 4 players) 8
BB checks, Hero bets $124.00, CO calls $124.00, BTN raises to $722.62 and is all-in, BB calls $600.49 and is all-in, Hero raises to $1,081.36 and is all-in, fold

River: ($2345.05, 3 players) Q

BB shows 6 T (Straight, Ten High) (Pre 13%, Flop 21%, Turn 18%)
Hero shows 9 9 (Three of a Kind, Nines) (Pre 52%, Flop 61%, Turn 24%)
BTN shows J T (Straight, King High) (Pre 35%, Flop 18%, Turn 58%)
BTN wins $2,341.55

weeeee...

Welllll so much for good volume yesterday. I got dragged out by my friends who used the whole "you're leaving in nine days man!" thing to their advantage. I'm glad they did though. I had a great time and saw a lot of people that I may honestly never see again. Needless to say I'm pretty hungover today and will just be grinding some tournies while watching the NFL Championship games.

GLA!

good luck!! seems to be great thread!
Are you going to live alone? cause you didn't mention about any friends over there, in Rosarito. I'm just asking because i've been always wondering if i could just move to another country and live there for a while without any known faces for me.

Thanks! Yep I will be riding completely solo on this one. It makes me a little nervous, but I've always been very resourceful and outgoing in new environments and never really had a problem with homesickness. I know that there is a pretty big poker community down there some of whom even have P&G threads(notably jdawg and ruse), so hopefully I can kick it with some of those guys. In any event, my lease is only for three months right now, so I'm not committed to anything big.

Glgl, probs will cya around at some point although you missed my partying days where I'd be down to lead missions to TJ any and every day; now I'm just a withered grinder who doesn't leave the house much .

Which building are you staying in? Don't recognize the kitchen, def doesnt look like La Jolla del Mar or Calafia

thanks jdawg. im sure you still have a few more TJ runs left in those old bones ! but yea im not gonna be partying that much myself. ive gotten plenttyyy of that over my last four years in knoxville. the building is called mision viejo. its about 15 min south of rosa, i think.

8th in true poker 150k gtd for 3200...28k up top. mehhhh feels kinda gross, but i guess pretty good for just sitting on my ass and drinking a bit while watching football. gg.

Yo message me if you have facebook, I am a live player who splits time between san diego and tijuana( tijuana 20 minutes from rosarito) and I'm always down to party, I know tons of chix down here and am fluent in Spanish. Also have cousins that live in germantown tn

gl noob! congrats on ft.

Ill hit you up this week bro.


haha thanks tom! woulda been nice to bink...oh well.


On a bit of a downswing since my final table run good. I haven't really been adhering to all of the things that I know will help me play better, so the results really aren't all that surprising. For example, waking up and just immediately starting to play or playing after having a few drinks, etc. I'm really just excited to leave the ****hole that is Knoxville and get down to Mexico, so I can fully focus on making money.



Some run good

Winning Poker Network - $4 NL (6 max) - Holdem - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

Hero (BB): $750.33
SB: $2,093.53

SB posts SB $2.00, Hero posts BB $4.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $6.00) Hero has K K

SB raises to $8.00, Hero raises to $32.00, SB raises to $88.00, Hero raises to $168.00, SB raises to $2,093.53 and is all-in, Hero calls $582.33 and is all-in

Flop: ($1500.66, 2 players) 3 9 2

Turn: ($1500.66, 2 players) 7

River: ($1500.66, 2 players) Q

Hero shows K K (One Pair, Kings) (Pre 66%, Flop 86%, Turn 93%)
SB shows A K (High Card, Ace) (Pre 34%, Flop 14%, Turn 7%)
Hero wins $1,499.66

Winning Poker Network - $4 NL (6 max) - Holdem - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

BB: $530.00
Hero (SB): $827.60

Hero posts SB $2.00, BB posts BB $4.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $6.00) Hero has J Q

Hero raises to $8.00, BB raises to $28.00, Hero calls $20.00

Flop: ($56.00, 2 players) 6 6 5
BB bets $36.00, Hero calls $36.00

Turn: ($128.00, 2 players) J
BB checks, Hero bets $88.00, BB calls $88.00

River: ($304.00, 2 players) T
BB checks, Hero bets $400.00, BB calls $378.00 and is all-in

BB shows 9 J (Two Pair, Jacks and Sixes) (Pre 27%, Flop 15%, Turn 15%)
Hero shows J Q (Two Pair, Jacks and Sixes) (Pre 73%, Flop 85%, Turn 85%)
Hero wins $1,059.00


Some spew

Winning Poker Network - $4 NL (6 max) - Holdem - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

Hero (SB): $679.36
BB: $1,165.76

Hero posts SB $2.00, BB posts BB $4.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $6.00) Hero has J 9

Hero raises to $12.00, BB raises to $40.00, Hero calls $28.00

Flop: ($80.00, 2 players) Q T A
BB bets $48.00, Hero raises to $104.00, BB raises to $180.00, Hero calls $76.00

Turn: ($440.00, 2 players) 6
BB checks, Hero bets $459.36 and is all-in, BB calls $459.36

River: ($1358.72, 2 players) 6

Hero shows J 9 (One Pair, Sixes) (Pre 36%, Flop 29%, Turn 18%)
BB shows Q T (Two Pair, Queens and Tens) (Pre 64%, Flop 71%, Turn 82%)
BB wins $1,357.72

All of those hands are from a match I played against a regular who is pretty decent. I find that when I play a very aggressive match like this that I play far too spewy in 6max for a day or two. I just generally need to do a better job at coming to the tables with a fresh mindset and ready to tackle whatever sort of game gets set in front of me.

So the day is finally here. Today i begin a four day road trip across america from knoxville, tn to san diego and then down to mexico. My feelings are somewhat mixed between fear and excitement, but much more the latter than the former. This day is the culmination of two years of work and struggle not only within the game of poker itself, but also in my family and social life. So to all of my doubters and detractors i want to say thank you. You were the catalyst behind my persistence. Its finally time for me to realize my "dream equity", and noone can stop me now! No time for rest though. On to bigger and better things. My first stop is in tunica tonight where i'll be visiting with my dad and some old friends. After today i'll be completely solo. Let's go.


Gla

Wooooooo. I'm sitting here at a Days Inn in Plano, TX, and I figured I would make an update before I head to Las Cruces, NM today. It's a 12 hour drive, so that's going to be zero fun :/. Anyways, my stay in Tunica was much like all of the other times I've been there. My Dad came down from Memphis, and we had dinner at Jack Binion's Steakhouse which was surprisingly disappointing. As we walked in to the place, I asked the hostess if they had a dress code, because I was wearing a hat. She replied somewhat snoodily that no they didn't have a dress code but that Binion's was a five star restaurant so that I should act accordingly...loooool. Well whoever rated that place five stars is ****ing delusional. Ruth's Chris is easily better than Binion's, and it's a chain.

After dinner we hit the three card poker and blackjack tables for a little bit of gamble. My dad doesn't really play that much, and whenever we do play he just gets destroyed all the time, so I feel somewhat bad always dragging him down there when he never wins anything. Alas, it was great to catch up with him, and he fully supports my endeavors which is all I can hope for! Since he works a normal 9-5 he had to leave pretty early, but having had a few drinks I decided to play some live poker with my buddy JN over at Harrahs where they were hosting a WSOP event. As I walked in the cardroom, I see a familiar face sitting at a 2/5 game and ask JN if that's who I think it is. He confirms that yep it's Chris Moneymaker. Because he's from Memphis, I guess he likes to frequent the events in Tunica. It was pretty cool to see the guy who really started everything and gave most of us the opportunities(although inadvertently) that we have today.

I hop in a 1/3 game with JN, and immediately I like the energy of this game. These days I honestly have abandoned the idea of playing live to try to make any money. I play mostly to drink and have a good time, and within five minutes of sitting down I'm doing shots of Jack with five other people at the table. My kind of table! I can see that Steve, an older gentleman to my left, has a bit of gamble in him, and I ask him if he wants to play red and black flops for $5 a hand with a $10 bonus for all of one color flops. He snap calls my offer, and we do several more shots while sweating flops more than we were actually playing the game.

I woke up the next morning having only snuck in 5 hours of sleep. Needless to say, I was not looking forward to the 7 and a half hour drive while slightly hungover and tired. Luckily I bought an audiobook on CD and some new music to enjoy so that mostly got me through it without falling asleep at the wheel. Once I hit Texarkana though, a big T-storm popped up and the driving got extremely intense. I had to say focused for about two hours, and it was pretty exhausting. Finally though I punched through it, and I was in Texas. This is when I did something pretty stupid. I had the Pontiac cruising at 82mph in a 75mph zone with basically no cars on the road. This seems more than standard, and I don't expect to ever get pulled over only going 7mph over. Well I came up behind a state trooper who was doing what I assume to be exactly 75 mph and being lazy I decide to just keep it in cruise control. Bad idea. He sees me pass him and just snap pulls me over. Now I honestly thought cowboys were extinct, but this trooper was the closest thing to one that I had ever seen. He was quite nice and asked me about what I did for a living and where I was going and what not. After explaining everything to him, he just wrote me a warning and sent me on my way. Bink! It's always nice to run good early on a trip.

Well today is going to be very long, but if i can just get through today, I'll practically be home free.

Here I come Meeehhhhhiiiicccooooo!

Don't follow a ton of threads but I think this one has potential (Macklemore and solid savers, how could it not?)

best of luck

Hey thanks tender! Yea macklemore is one of my new favs. The views he expresses in his music regarding socioeconomic issues are heavily aligned with my own. Plus his music is just dope.


Tomorrow is the big day. I'll be driving into mexico for the first time. My primary emotion right now is pure elation. I just cant wait. I'm on my phone so i'll give a bigger update at some point when i get setup. I also have quite an amusing vegas story from last year that includes pretty awesome pics that i've decided to put in this thread also. I doubt anyone will be anticipating it but i'm sure once i post it, people will enjoy it . Next time i post will be in rosa!!!

Gla

HOLAAAAAA!! Yep, I finally made it to Mexico. Here's an update.

I woke up yesterday in Wellton, AZ at the Microtel Inn and Suites there which is a ****hole. If you can avoid this place, please stay elsewhere. My mind was racing with thoughts of what could go wrong, but also with the notion that I was finally headed to where I wanted and needed to be. The drive from Wellton to San Diego is absolutely fantastic, as you must go through several mountain ranges on your way. There were certain moments where I had the music very loud and just became filled with mania and elation and let out loud yells of excitement. They went something like "WOOOOOOO, **** YEA, LET'S GOOOOOO BABY!!!". I was pretty pumped hehe . After going through several border patrol checkpoints, I made it into San Diego and headed down I-5 towards the border. Btw, if you are rolling through this area and smoking herb I would be very careful, because at one of the checkpoints they had a dog go around my car. Once I reached the border, I had some confusion as to which lane to go through. After asking a dude at one of the non-declaration lanes, I was instructed to park and go declare so I could receive my visa. This is when it first hit me how little Spanish I actually knew. Most of the agents spoke Spanish and a little English so there was plenty of confusion on my part. After about fifteen minutes though, I was driving into Mexico for the first time.


I followed the instructions my realtor, Mario, had given me to get to his office. I drove quite tentatively on these unknown foreign roads and spent a ton of time just looking around at all of the sites. I have a feeling people watching in Mexico will be about ten times as good as the States. Eventually I made it down to Baja Open House's office and met Mario. He was exactly how his picture on their website looked, a very cordial and helpful guy. His office is right next to a taco shop/bar with a back patio that looks directly over the Pacific, so he told me to go have a look around while he prepared some papers for me. I had my first really good look at the Pacific and breathed in the smell of salt water just letting it sink in that I was finally here. As I walked back into the office, I met Jim and Yhazmin, a couple who live in the area. They were incredibly nice and told me a bunch about the area. Upon realizing that I had come completely alone and knew zero Spanish, they invited me to hang out some time and I may kick it with them for the Super Bowl. They came along with Mario and I to check out my place as they are considering getting a unit in the same building. I was a bit nervous driving over just thinking about what a huge letdown this could really be. Fortunately for me it turned out spectacular. The place was amazing. Here's a small tour for you guys.




After settling in for a bit, I went down to a restaurant in the area called Splash which was recommended to me by Jim and Yhaz. Once again, not knowing any Spanish wasn't really a huge problem, but it made me quite uncomfortable. My waitress was a cutie with big tits, and I couldn't even hit on her :/. After a few beers and some of the best fish and shrimp tacos I've ever eaten, I went home and hit the sack.

Today I went into town and got some groceries from the Walmart in Rosa which is quite different than any I have ever been to. I still managed to get most of what I needed though without too much trouble. Tonight, I'm going out for dinner/drinks with Jdawg and the rest of the Rosa crew so hopefully they can give me some more insight into how things work around here. I will also be adding a few Vegas stories right after I post this so enjoy!

Says the video is private, was looking fwd to watching it!

See ya in a few hours man, hopefully susannahs impresses (sun)

Sick story so far, I live in california and wouldn't set foot in mexico. Met a lady last nigh who was obviously mexican. I told her tourist tows are ok right. She said no, but she is a drunk, who cares what you think. Good luck on everything. I wish I had the balls to move out of the country.

This particular story happened last year during March Madness in Vegas.

Having spent the entire spring grinding in Cherokee, NC at Harrahs, I ended up meeting some pretty cool guys who also grinded the room for a living. This is a terrible idea btw as Harrahs Cherokee absolutely blows, but what other options did we really have? If we could have gone somewhere else we would have. A buddy of mine who I'll refer to as BBR and another friend who I'll call MilfSlayer decided we needed to get out town so we went to Vegas for a week. BBR is also a Seven Star in the Harrah's VIP system so by rolling with him for the trip we would get some pretty nice perks. Always nice to have a huge degen as a friend .


So on one particular night after having been in Vegas for a few days already, we decide to go to MGM for some sports betting. After we lose most of our college bball bets on the day, MS and BBR decide that its time to do some blackjack degening. I opt out for 1/2 in the poker room, while double fisting drinks. I would make an order with the waitress and then run over to Centrifuge, a bar in the middle of MGM, get a drink there and drink both at the same time. I happened to be at the most boring, dead table of all time so I wanted to liven things up a bit. I manage to do just that and have half the table loving me and half hating me as is usually what happens when I drink at the table. After booking a small win, I decide to go find MS and BBR. As I walk up to the table I notice they are talking with a solid looking girl who is dressed extremely provocatively, and I immediately think she is working. When MS sees me he gets excited and says to the girl, "Stacks, show my buddy ICU what you showed us!" She doesn't hesitate and obliges by pulling apart her dress and showing me her DDs in the middle of MGM, which btw is extremely busy on a Friday night. My jaw drops and I ask MS where the hell he found this girl. He just grins and tells me that she came up to the table and played with them for a bit, losing $400 of her own money. This amazes me, and I figured the idea of her being a working girl was probably out the window. MS announces that we are headed back to the room to drink more, and Stacks doesn't hesitate to come with us.

Once we arrive at the room, the real fun begins. Stacks just lets her tits out permanently while sitting legs open in a chair in front of all of us. We take turns doing some body shots off of her tits and for some reason we all decided it would be a good idea to sign her ass and titties. During all of this I realize we need to document it somehow and I ask Stacks if I can take pictures. She doesn't care at all. At one point we even coerce her into trying to stick a Jack Daniels bottle into her snatch, which she doesn't hesitate to do. It's safe to say that she had some attention/ self-esteem issues. We end up finding out that she's actually a madame from Canada who is just in Vegas to party and **** anything she can lay her hands on. She informs us that we can run train on her or **** her all at the same time if we like. Much discussion follows as to what the best option is. We decide that taking turns would probably be the best bet, as none of us really wants to take our friendship to that level. MS goes first and brings Stacks back to his room. Unfortunately it is quite late, and he never returns having apparently passed out after ****ing her. Bastard. Honestly she wasn't the cleanest broad I had ever encountered, so it's probably a good thing that I didn't get to hit it.

Some pics for the evening:




There is another decent story from this trip that I will tell another time perhaps, but this post took forever to do so I'm done for now. Hope you guys like. Cheers.

I think I fixed it. Let me know if it's working now. I'm sure susannahs will impress if you are going there sir!

Thanks for the love man. Haha yea I guess it is somewhat sketchy, but what can you do? Gotta get that paper and this is the best spot to do it right now. **** the US legislative system is all I have to say!

Had dinner last night with the rosa crew at probably the best place in town. The initial after dinner plans involved staying around the area and going to HK2 which had just opened, but Jdawg wanted to give me the authentic experience so we went to the original in TJ. JLlama and his gf came along also, and it was quite the experience. Jdawg is something of a god around there, so we were treated quite well. Also had probably the best taco of my entire life at a little street cart outside the club. Let's just say I'm enjoying Mexico more and more by the day.

Probably not doing much for the Super Bowl today. Just grinddddd. Already put in a small session, and I'll put up and end of day giraffe when I'm done. GLA

This thread is relevant to my interests. How much is rent at that sweet spot?