Happy the freeroll is effective then!!! I did also struggle a little with weight, especially in my drinking days where I would be nonchalant about everything, but have been (just) under 200lbs for half a decade now and it definitely helps with self-esteem, women, health and whatnot GL bro, I hope I lose

Another month is over with no poker! I'm a chump haha. Even though I haven't played I have been somewhat productive in non-poker areas. Here were my goals for the month...


So as mentioned things were trending bad in the weight department to start the month until I saw Dub's freeroll offer, which he graciously extended 10 days for lost time (meaning May 10/July 10 for the 225 lbs/200 lbs markers). After I got the freeroll I got things back on track and have since eaten pretty healthy and been working out regularly, so thank you Dub! I had a photo on the scale at 264lbs on March 9th, although it was probably a bloated 260/high 250 lbs. Somehow managed to hit my pre-freeroll goal by weighing in today at 246 lbs!!! Pretty great feeling haha although I’m not getting my hopes up about winning the freeroll since that may require starving myself or just working my body to dust but I’m still going to try taking it as seriously as possible and give it the best go I can. I was using the treadmill at my parents for about a week but I still feel kind of bad about how much noise it causes with my bro at home studying and all. For cardio I’ve tried walking to the library/for groceries pretty regularly instead. Once the snow rethaws hopefully I can do a little running outside although that may still be another week or two, who knows. Weigh so much that if I just eat like a normal person I’ll lose weight so things are moving in a positive direction regardless!

I did not nail my eating out goal because of those first nine days hahahaha. Still of the opinion that even if I don’t win the freeroll money, just by making the effort I’ll save $500+ by not spending it eating out/buying garbage every day. Began tracking most of my food once I started the freeroll. Apparently to lose 2 lbs a week I can eat 1800 calories a day which I've been going under most days. Obviously no poker so that was a bust.

As mentioned I kept busy this month even if I played no poker. There was a solid week where I was getting dental work done, a couple of days at the optometrist getting new glasses and trying to adjust to new prescription, and another couple of days spent preparing for an unexpected radio job interview I applied for in November 2019. Haven’t heard back on the interview yet but I thought it went well, I happen to know the guy running the hiring through The Feedback Society so if I get the gig that’s a big reason why. Not getting my hopes too high though haha. The prescription is still messing with my eyes so I've been hesitant to play poker although I'll recommit this weekend. Definitely could have played on a few weekends but didn’t although I did spend a decent amount of time with fam too. Did a day trip with the fam to Swift and walked by my old place Feb 2018-July 2018. Damn good memories, had some serious nostalgia for the good old days haha

We had a bad storm come through on Monday, lost power for a couple hours and a bunch of ice/snow after weeks of thawing. Thought for sure I’d get a shift or two but no luck! I’m anticipating some shifts hopefully next week because of Good Friday/Easter causing a backlog of mail (hopefully). They keep saying COVID is getting worse so I’m glad I’m not out and about working with the public every day. Bigger risk as a young person being overweight and I think I still might qualify as obese, hopefully for not much longer. Regina's already shut down with the new variants just down the highway so I'm anticipating **** hitting the fan in Saskatoon somewhat soon


Here are my goals for April:

GOALS FOR APRIL

• Play 400+ MTTs
• Sub-$50 spent eating out
• Weigh sub-236 lbs
• Track food eaten on fitness app

All of these goals should be pretty self-explanatory. Set my weight loss goal at 236 since that might be the most reasonably healthy expectation for extreme weightloss in a month. Still gonna try going hard for the freeroll goal of 225 by May 10th, just want to set some goals I think are more attainable for now haha. Would love to play a lot more than 400 tournaments, I know SCOOP is starting this weekend and I really do need to try making a little money if I want to survive to next October with my bank account intact. I think my biggest priority right now is losing weight so that will be where my mind is most occupied for the foreseeable future (hopefully).


That’s all of the goal stuff! Feel free to skip the movie/TV talk now:


5/5: Hausu, Pale Flower, Paterson, The Babadook, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, and Airplane!

4.5/5: Sound of Metal, Face/Off, Late Spring, Tokyo Story, Senna, and Battle Royale

4/5: Il Mare, Collective, Paper Moon, Infernal Affairs, RoboCop, The Voices, The Man Who Wasn’t There, S#!%house, Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace, They Came Together, Metropolitan, The World of Us, and The Naked Gun 2 ½: The Smell of Fear


Feel kinda bad that a lot of my 5/5 and 4.5/5 are rewatches so might try to limit how often I write them up. Paterson is one of my absolute favourites though and a big reason for my minor crush on Golshifteh Farahani haha. Sound of Metal was the only first time watch in the top two categories. Haven’t been paying much attention to awards season for movies but I know it’s up for a few awards so it’d be nice if it won a couple, especially Riz Ahmed. I’m sure as **** not paying premium prices to rent a movie at home considering all the background noise I have to contend with so won’t see most of the Oscar movies until I can probably get the discs through the library. Went to the theatre once to watch Minari which, for being critically acclaimed, focused on a South Korean family, and an A24 film, I did not like nearly as much as I was hoping

Also watched a few Ozu’s again. I did not like Tokyo Story when I saw it almost two years ago. I thought there was a pretty good chance I’d like it better and wasn’t disappointed. Sometimes it helps to know what kind of story/mood you’re getting into for maximum enjoyment. Still a distant second favourite to Late Spring though which is mint

Been watching a lot of spoofy stuff the last few weeks. A ton of ZAZ with Airplane!, The Naked Gun 1 and 2, and the Hot Shots! series. Also saw Police Squad! through the library which was great, the TV show that The Naked Gun is based on. Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace basically fits the category as well. Lots of British humour I did not understand at all, the whole series is up on Youtube and pretty short haha. The other spoofy thing I saw was They Came Together which is same director as Wet Hot American Summer. It’s basically a parody of bland, vanilla romcoms and is somehow bland and vanilla itself in an incredibly stupid/enjoyable way? Apparently it bombed at the box office which is no surprise but I liked it haha

I should say that I didn’t actually watch the entirety of Face/Off (which I love). I only saw the last 25 minutes or so during a dental appointment and it was borderline torture trying not to smile/laugh with a bunch of sharp objects in my mouth. I have an appreciation for why they just have the home network channel on the dental TVs now…

Lastly, I spent a solid block of 4-5 days rewatching Avatar: The Last Airbender which I’m actually convinced might be the greatest TV show I’ve ever seen. Tried segueing into The Legend of Korra after but wasn’t a huge fan of the 1920s aesthetic, doubtful I’ll ever finish it


Been trying to come to grips with the fact that no matter how hard I try I’ll never be able to see all of the movies that I want to see, there just isn’t enough time in the world. Current relationship with movies is definitely unhealthy, so would be nice to cut down on the movie intake considerably. Sucks with COVID taking away most hobbies I might indulge myself with instead haha. And here’s a pic of the movies I’ve snagged recently! Bought Spirited Away and Pale Flower at retail prices but snagged the other two on Kijiji for a few bucks, trying to keep the movie expenses as low as possible haha. I swear to GOD I’ll play poker this month

When will the lies end!?!? Still no poker! I have been somewhat busy on weekends but once again I only have my own neglect to blame. Went to visit my grandparent’s farm in Manitoba on the last weekend of the month seeing as how they both got vaccinated and haven’t seen anyone for months. Guess I’d rather be a good grandchild than try to win a SCOOP Event, what are you gonna do. With most of the events being 2-day affairs and not being able to commit to two days for fear of turning down a mail shift and getting fired, motivation was not high. Excuses excuses...

Anyways, here were my goals for April...

I did not play poker and although I was close on all of the last three it all kind of blew up in my face in the last week. I had a not so good week earlier in the month but got things on track again. Going out to the grandparent's was absolute torture though because they were just stuffing me with pizza and pie and chips and gravy... Grandparents are bad for weight loss

I'm not gonna weigh myself considering I'm bloated rn but I would probably say I've finished at roughly 246 again. I'm allowed to have bad days/weeks as long as they don't become bad months. Back on the weightloss grind although any hope of winning the weightloss freeroll is gone haha

To recap notable things that happened this month it basically boils down to golf season being in full swing again! After months of agonizing internal debate I settled for a passport this year at Dakota Dunes instead of a membership. There was a sweet deal for a walking membership in December but then they unexpectedly jacked up the price $400. I'm crossing my fingers I'll get some mail shifts in the summer so I just settled for this. Half hour drive to the course so gotta factor in gas money too. Membership would have been $1400 for me, so with the passport at an average of roughly $55 per round I can play 25 rounds, or once a week, until I start going overboard. If I was super serious about budgeting I would not play golf at all but I gotta do something to keep from going insane this summer The guys I play with are older and therefore have their first vaccination shot except for the ringleader who is an anti-vaxxer. Oh well! Can’t win em all haha

Working out regularly was my biggest preparation for the year. Have a little swing trainer tool and a putting mat as well so came out buzzing. So far I’ve shot rounds of 80 (-$5), 78 (+$9), 84 (+$1), 87 (+$1), and 82 (+$7). Trending in the wrong direction! Getting some solid scores but still leaving shots out there mostly in the way of a couple doubles a round. As a reminder, games we usually play are greenies ($2 every par 3) and snake (whoever three-putts last pays $5 to everyone). My second round I racked up four greenies and was in line to win $29 on the last green. Ended up three-putting from 15-feet and owing everyone five bucks instead of winning five (swing of $20). Brutal haha. Dakota Dunes is so hilly it’s honestly a great workout. My calves needed an adjustment period of a couple rounds just to get used to the physical effort of walking eighteen again

Also, for my third round there was a mix-up at the pro shop and in the confusion I played a round of golf without paying for it. I didn’t realize until the next day and was just gonna let it slide seeing as how I totally got away with it. But when I came in for this week’s round I said I would buy two cuz I hadn't paid the previous week. I got a discount on the round but sometimes I wish I’d just shut tf up. I feel like every time I go out of my way to do something decent it always ends up being to my own detriment (see $16.50 PKO last May )


2021 Golf Winnings: +$13


Now for my May goals!!!

GOALS FOR MAY

• Play 200+ MTTs
• Sub-$50 spent eating out
• Weigh sub 235 lbs
• Track food on fitness app

Same deal as last month. I really do intend on playing poker to make money which is why I haven't abandoned the thread. As poker becomes more of a casual thing I’m thinking I should start a different one but that might be a few months down the road once I have a steady gig. Only lousy thing about the thread has been my reticence to play which will end as soon as I stop being a ***** about everything haha. Keep telling myself that if I make it to October I’ll be golden work-wise so just gotta hang in there. Cross my fingers and maybe if I’m crushing it I’ll be getting close to my 180-ish weight goal around that time too. Still a long way from there but so far this weightloss attempt has been promising. Losing 20-40 pounds is easy, it’s the grind to lose 50+ which is months of effort that is so hard. Praying to God I never let things get this bad again hahahahahaha. If I cracked the mental health case which seemed impossible hopefully I can crack the fitness thing too. I don’t need to be ripped forever, it’d just be nice to be in shape haha


That's it for everything golf/life/poker related, now it's time for my movie/tv/book deluge. Believe it or not movie viewership was way down this month! Part of it is golf but the biggest reason is that I've been replaying Mass Effect, just finished the second one. My grand plan was to write a Feedback Society article about ME before the remaster comes out but I've gone a week without playing ME3 so I'd be cutting it a little close to the release date for that. On that note, did not get the radio job that I mentioned previously. No experience! Shocker

Now for the goods...


5/5: Only Yesterday, Asako I & II, and Eat Drink Man Woman

4.5/5: To Live and Die in L.A., (500) Days of Summer, Tokyo Twilight, Total Recall, Pride and Prejudice and Stranger Than Paradise

4/5: Sense and Sensibility, The French Connection, Paranoia Agent, Comet, Paycheck, Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult, The Wedding Banquet, Tag, Retribution, Once a Thief, Han Gong-ju, Maquia: When the Promised Flower Blooms, Windtalkers, Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story, DodgeBall: A True Underdog Story, and Lust, Caution


Promoted my three five star movies and was heartbroken to demote (500) Days of Summer. Used to be my favourite movie during late high school/most of university but I guess it doesn’t have the same impact anymore. Oh well! Comet was similar vibes to 500 directed by Sam Esmail (Mr. Robot), weird movie but pretty okay

I read two books since last post. The second during my trip to the grandparents was Heart of Darkness. Currently waiting on the theatrical version of Apocalypse Now from the library (only seen redux thus far), although I can recommend Aguirre, the Wrath of God which is somewhat similar. First book was Sense and Sensibility, hence the movie as well. Jane Austen is pretty awesome, not gonna lie. I read Pride and Prejudice sometime in university and the version I saw this month was the 1995 miniseries which was way better than the 2005 movie

Watched multiple Ang Lee and John Woo movies as I've been trying to work through their filmographies. John Woo’s American films get way too much flak when the ones I’ve seen have been pretty amazing. Watched a couple Friedkin’s too. I’d heard good things about The French Connection regarding the car chase scene and the fact that it won Best Picture. Solid movie but To Live and Die in L.A. is just so ****ing awesome and the car chase is twice as hype haha. Retribution was directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Verhoeven Total Recall, and Tag was the Sion Sono flick which means it was super OOL and weird

Still haven’t seen most of this year’s Oscar movies but best picture Nomadland was just okay. Only movie of Chloe Zhao’s I saw previously was The Rider which I thought was wayyyyyyyyyyy better, especially considering the weird docu-fic mix both had going on. Absolutely hilarious that she’s directing a Marvel movie now, gotta make that bank hahahaha


Well, here's hoping I play poker this month. I am beyond promising anything will happen but I have a good feeling regarding the likelihood of my return to the virtual felt. Good luck out there everyone

(EDIT!!!: Worked up the courage to weigh myself and I actually was 246lbs. A bloated 246 I bet, so maybe low 240s. So I did hopefully lose like a pound this month haha)

still following.... & still not playing any MTT's myself Soon though (is the plan).

gl on your month's goals!

Yo! I failed the “play poker once” challenge again. Also failed in every other goal I set in convincing fashion. I’m not gonna weigh myself but just know that I had a really, really bad month food-wise. Need to get back on the horse I guess!

Despite not playing poker I was somewhat busy. I spent the first week+ of May finishing Mass Effect 3. I wrote my Mass Effect thinkpiece a few days before the remaster came out. I went with renegade playthrough because I had never done it before and I definitely did not enjoy it as much, not one for being a total dickhead I guess haha. Link below if you care to read (long live janky Mako)

https://www.thefeedbacksociety.com/g...ffect-trilogy/

After that I was enlisted by my parents to help paint their fence. I completely underestimated what they were asking for (I thought it would take a day) and ended up in their backyard for the better part of a week. They did agree to pay me though so it wasn’t a complete waste of time. The week after that the basement I live in started to flood from our next door neighbour. I caught it right before it got really bad but I ended up displaced at my parents for a few days while getting work done on my vehicle. Finally, during this last week after the long weekend I got three shifts on the mail gig! I’ve been told that I’ll get more work with people going on summer vacations and for once I might just believe them. Even if I only make a couple hundred bucks a month I will hopefully be able to survive until next Christmas rush with my bank account somewhat intact. Somewhere in the midst of all of this I did get my first shot of the vaccine. Seemed like it would never happen for a while but then distribution really ramped up in Canada. Decent chance I dodged the covid bullet, cross my fingers it doesn’t mutate and make me eat my words anytime soon

These were my failed goals this month...

These are my successful goals for next month

GOALS FOR JUNE

• Play 200+ MTTs
• EAT HEALTHY!!!
• Track food on fitness app

No weight goal cuz I am not stepping on the scale haha. The dream in my head is that I'll have a killer June and when I step on the scale thirty days from now I’ll be the same weight I was at the end of April. One can dream anyways. Keep telling myself that as long as I'm mentally solid then I'll be fine. The weight thing is part fat kid, part a lot of issues from the past few years manifesting themselves. Better that I stuff my face than being an alcoholic, gambling addict, or suicidal though so whatever haha I really REALLY think I’ll play poker this month and I’m not stopping the thread until I pack it in so we’ll see how things go!


For entertainment, hockey playoffs have started again and my Edmonton Oilers choked hard. I thought they’d roll to the second round no problem but I didn’t watch any games this season or I would have been more aware of the depth problems (McDavid>>>>> Draisaitl >>>>>>>>>>>>Nuge >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Everyone else). Anyways, four and out, thank you very much. Currently cheering for my 1B team the New York Islanders and they might do some damage because all they have is depth. They are weirdly the only team I've gone to a playoff game for back when they were at the hideous Barclays Center in 2016 lol. The American games are much better to watch because they have fans at the game! Makes all the difference, I absolutely cannot stand artificial crowd noise. Cizikas had a great OT winner today so I'm feeling good

Golfed a couple times although my game still ain’t great. Played maybe five or six times, once with family and the rest with the regulars. I’ve misplaced a few scorecards so I sadly don’t have all of my stats with me. All I know is I shot a 78 at Moon Lake and hit a sexy looking tee shot that looked deceptively close to being a hole-in-one (landed the ball like three feet behind the pin though ). Won some decent money that day but my last two rounds I got dinged for $17 and $25 (!!!) respectively. Big yikes. Overall, I might be down $25 on the year (more or less). The getting out of shape thing is definitely not helping me on the course haha

Movies and ****! You know the drill. I guess I watched way more than the average person but by my standards it was a relatively lower end total this month...


5/5: Kuroneko, Late Spring, Early Summer, Scarface, The Spongebob Squarepants Movie, and Spellbound

4.5/5: Late Autumn, Poetry, The Untouchables, and Kedi

4/5: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Blackhat, What Happened Was…, Body Double, Point Break, Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner, Legally Blonde, “I Was Born, But…”, Japanese Girls at the Harbor, On the Rocks, Children of Hiroshima, The Best Years of Our Lives, The Fugitive, Life of Pi, “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”, Idiocracy, The Father, and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly


The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was Fincher’s version. I’d already seen the original and while neither version really blew me away Fincher’s was decidedly better (I thought). Mixed in a few silent films that were surprisingly good in the middle of May, classic Japanese cinema strikes again

Westerns are my least favourite genre but as far as I’m concerned The Good, the Bad and the Ugly is just one long music video and the score is fricken amazing. Ennio Morricone did The Untouchables too so I’ve been jamming on tracks from both for the last couple weeks

Only book I read last month was In Search of April Raintree, pretty dark book about a couple aboriginal girls in Winnipeg that I read the YA version of in high school. Between Windtalkers, Atanarjuat, a movie called Smoke Signals, and April Raintree I’ve lowkey been getting in touch with my native side lately. Definitely makes me want to get my treaty card to save money on gas

What Happened Was… is a movie my screenwriting prof recommended me back in uni. I cannot for the life of me remember the exact reason why she chose that movie but I was writing some pretty bleak romance stuff. The other films she specifically recommended were City Lights, Annie Hall, and In the Company of Men which probably give good insight into my state of mind at the time

Spellbound is the quintessential spelling bee documentary and was a pivotal movie for middle school Blake. I walked around school with my dictionary in as nerdy a manner as some of those kids although I did not have the smarts, luck, or the study habits to spell my way to Scripps (and I'm still bitter about it lol)

Refrained from adding a few movies I’ve already listed 5/5 before but I decided to include Kuroneko because it’s borderline my favourite movie at this point. I think The Babadook still gets the sentimental edge but Kuroneko is a very close number two. So silly that my two favourites are horror movies considering how opposed I used to be to the whole genre but whatever haha


Like last time I ain’t making promises. Despite eating bad I’m still doing fine mentally so I can deal with my other shortcomings. Hopefully things go well this month and I’m able to exercise (some dietary restraint lol). Gl gl



Hope you had a good month, June will be GTO for sure

Anddddd I failed the play poker once challenge again. I was gonna play this last Sunday but ended up getting my second COVID shot instead. Six and a half hour wait which absolutely sucked but I was able to read the last 120 pages of my book so not all bad

I guess the really great thing about June is that I've been working full-time for the last three weeks straight! People are all going on summer holidays and I've slotted right in to pick up the slack. I've been in a walking-heavy route depot so I've had a few 20km days, a few of which have been absolutely brutal. Saskatchewan is seeing record breaking heat at the moment though so I've been rocking a vehicle route with air conditioning and plenty of water handy for the last week or so. The fear of not having enough money coming in to offset potential poker losses has historically been a major mental obstacle for me so now that I'm feeling confident my liferoll won't go bust hopefully I will play a session or two NEXT month

How'd I do on my June goals???



First of all I started the month right where I left off. I didn't start getting steady work until a week and a half into June and the diet was completely unhinged as a result. I was weighing in at that time around 260 but weighed in today at a trim 243 lbs! I weighed less than end of April!!! Losing weight on diet alone is pretty much impossible for me I think. I hope I keep getting steady mail shifts and I've still got a very realistic shot at hitting 200 lbs by the end of 2021

I did start tracking my food once I got back on the health grind and, as mentioned, still no poker. I was genuinely tied up several weekend days and the urge to rip in a marathon MTT session isn't as high after a full week of mail either. Would be nice to dabble in cash games a bit maybe. COVID restrictions are being lifted in Saskatchewan on July 11 so I would love to rip in a live session at Dakota Dunes after a round of golf. I only played once or twice this month though, good thing I didn't buy a membership this year

Here are my goals for this month!

GOALS FOR JULY

• PLAY ONE ****ING POKER SESSION
• Eat healthy!!!
• Weigh sub 235 lbs
• Don't die of heat stroke

I have been feeling more of an itch to play poker again and it's nice to feel more confident in the long term viability of my liferoll. I won't be playing this weekend because my grandparents are in town. I'm trying to schedule a round of golf with Swift friend but he's being very bad at texting back so that would strike another weekend potentially off the list. Other than that I truly hope to hit the felt again at some point. SERIOUSLY, I MEAN IT!!!!!!!

The last goal has been especially relevant the last week. My first couple of shifts put in close to 20km walking, with steps included (which are the real killers), and doing that out of shape in mid +30 C weather was brutal. My body is slightly more accustomed but hot damn I do not want to die delivering mail hahahaha

It's been great working again and I'm very very thankful for it. I basically can be set for life if I want to be but I really don't think it's a career I want for the rest of my life. For here and now it's amazing to help lose weight but I think it'd be nice to do something else at some point in the future. Poker pro probs off the table forever but I guess we'll see how things go. I could still be stuck at a grocery store so moving up in the world a bit at a time

Movie and book talk! Viewership was down again this month with the full-time mail gig coming into effect but I still managed to cross the "movie a day" threshold of 365 in 2021. I did bang out 93 in January though so the average is going down for sure haha, feel free to skip!


5/5: Wolf Children, My Neighbor Totoro, Kiki’s Delivery Service, Pale Flower, The Witch, Barry Lyndon, and Room

4.5/5: Hero, The Godfather, Boys State, Tokyo Godfathers, and The Last Days of Disco

4/5: Forrest Gump, Pushing Hands, They Live, Mutiny on the Bounty, Kagemusha, The Bridge on the River Kwai, Hard Target, Shoplifters, Ping Pong the Animation, and Dragon Inn


I read five (!!!) books this month to hit sixteen for 2021! At least I'm crushing one of my yearly goals The reason May was so book-light is because I was grinding Dune for the last few weeks. Super weird but solid, looking forward to Villeneuve’s take as long as covid doesn’t push it back again (god forbid). Thoroughly enjoyed The Trial, Kiki’s Delivery Service and Room. The first made no sense to me whatsoever but I think that was the point. Had to read the last two based on them being two of my favourite movies. I think a debate could be had tho on whether cutting back the breastfeeding in Room made it a better or worse movie... Best book I read was Hiroshima by John Hersey, inspired to read by Children of Hiroshima last month. I did try reading a book about the making of the atomic bomb but it turns out reading about the devasting aftermath is a lot more palatable than the literal chemical science behind wtf happened

My best picture hunt continued with Forrest Gump, River Kwai, Mutiny on the Bounty, and Godfathers 1 and 2. I've seen the first and second Godfather before but never the third until I forced myself this month. The original is an objectively perfect movie that I just don’t feel a strong emotional attachment to. I don’t get the second one at all but it’s fine I guess and the third one was on a similar level to number two. Sofia Coppola is not a great actor but hot damn I was there for her all the way

I put in a request for the library to buy Kagemusha sometime in December and it didn’t show up at my branch until a couple weeks ago. Solid movie although I completely leveled myself plot-wise. The whole story revolves around a double for a lord but for some reason I thought there was a triple involved and I didn’t realize I was making things way too complicated until I was two hours deep and my brain was hurting. Need to rewatch but not anytime soon haha

JCVD’s mullet was completely majestic in Hard Target. Goddammit I love John Woo. And of course it turns out I’m a big atmospheric horror guy. Been a while since I’ve seen The Witch but multiple watches helps to overcome the olde english language barrier

And guys... Barry ****ing Lyndon. Absolute legend. That movie and Pale Flower are two of the best gambling flicks as far as I'm concerned


I hope my next time on the thread isn't a month from now and I'm whining about FT bubbling the Big $3.30. Sounds like the dream to me

Absolute shocker that I didn't play poker again... said no one Coming with a slightly premature July run-down because I'm taking off for the grandparent's farm tomorrow after work so July is effectively over for me. What were the goals for this last month?

Well I'm coming to the end of the month clocking in at 239.6 lbs. I lost a little weight but not a ton. Plenty of good stretches but several stretches of poor eating as well. Was fortunate enough to work full-time for the whole month of July so I have been raking in the dough. Didn’t die of heat stroke although I came close July 2 when it hit +40 C in Saskatoon. I was out of commission for the next two days after that Still on the right track although I’m definitely a little frustrated the weight isn’t just evaporating off my body. Gotta stick with it, 200 by the end of the year is still very reachable

I was genuinely pretty busy every weekend in July. Between family, friends in Stoon, and a last minute trip back to Swift for a round of eighteen with my buddy I didn’t have a lot of wiggle room for an MTT sesh. My only round of golf was this past weekend with Swift bud. Turns out he’s having a baby in a few weeks and I had no idea cuz I don’t go on facebook/insta. He’s a pharmacist so I got them an “Organic Chemistry for Babies” book, I thought it seemed appropriate. Low key I have no idea how to interact with kids. On the mail trail this month some seven year old at a lemonade stand kept my five dollars for a two dollar cup and refused to make change. Really had to ask myself if I wanted to throw down with this brat for my $3 (I definitely wanted to) but ended up bailing and letting him keep the money. That kid will grow up to be a real POS I think…

With more friends from Swift moving to Stoon I have been busier and I saw my former best friend for the first time in a while. Not sure that I ever explicitly wrote what he said in the thread but it was definitely like pouring gasoline on the dumpster fire that was my life end of 2018. I thought I played it pretty cool but I was more than a little agitated having to spend time with him and had more dark thoughts than I’ve been used to the last year and a half. Definitely nothing to worry about though, I still feel more than solid and it was basically a small speed bump I barely noticed before feeling back to normal. It is what it is, not sure how often I’ll see him in the future but nothing crazy’s gonna happen lol, just thought it was worth noting

What are my goals for the upcoming month???

GOALS FOR AUGUST

• Weigh sub-232 lbs
• Play one poker sesh PLEASE!!!!!
• Track food on the app, buddy

Pretty straightforward! With my Swift golf buddy having a kid he is not gonna be playing another round with me anytime soon haha. THIS IS THE MONTH!!!!... hopefully. It's still been hella busy at work so cross my fingers I keep working full-time for a couple more weeks although I hear it does slow down pretty drastically around Fall. Would love to get in another round of golf with the Saskatoon geezers sometime this year...

Movies! I watched a few… Didn’t read any books this past month although I started and stopped a couple Had a couple friends express admiration/horror (okay, literal unanimous horror) when I told them I'd seen over 400 movies already in 2021. Had to do something until corona stopped existing (for a few months anyways )


5/5: Mother, Heat, The Shining, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Zodiac, Kuroneko, It Follows, A Serious Man, Maborosi, Kwaidan, Audition, and Like Father, Like Son

4.5/5: Ride Your Wave and Tokyo Story

4/5: Singin’ in the Rain, Freaky, The End of Summer, The Idiot, The Bad Sleep Well, There Was a Father, Apocalypse Now, Full Metal Jacket, Our Little Sister, Twelve Monkeys, Living in Oblivion, The Aviator, and Silmido


Kuroneko is my confirmed new favourite movie, gg Babadook it was a good run. Atmospheric horror reigns supreme once again with The Shining being a million times better than when I last saw it. It might just be because I appreciate descents into madness more now than I did seven years ago Was definitely a Kubrick kind of month, damn that guy made some good movies. Full Metal Jacket > Apocalypse Now all day every day. And I rewatched Audition tonight and completely forgot how hard it slaps, Takashi Miike directed the sh#$ out of it

Bong Joon-ho’s Mother fyi (since there’s probs 500 movies with that title). Watched a couple mega long commentaries for Zodiac and Heat because I’m a hardo but I had to cuz I bought the blu-rays! With steady work I treated myself with a couple movie purchases, only the second real splurge this year. Criterion Sale on for a few more days so probably gonna get a few more things coming up. Here are the new additions to my collection, good luck to everyone and I hope I see you out there this month (Seriously!!!)

Heyo! Haven't played a session yet but I'm bombing in here to say I'll be playing my first one in a little over six months tomorrow!!! Been looking forward to this for a few days now and I'm just looking forward to getting back on the felt again. I've reached critical mass on watching movies I think so hopefully I can start playing semi-regularly on weekends and I'd love to do some studying during the week. Would still love to get into cash games or something if possible that would be much more flexible with my schedule. The "full-time job/part-time hours" promise is somewhat coming to fruition with the mail gig. Summer months are slow in regards to mail. There's maybe been one day a week where I work the full 8 hours/overtime on my shift, otherwise I've been getting off one or even two hours early pretty consistently. The beautiful thing is that as long as I do all three portions on a route then I get paid full-time, whether it takes me eight hours or five Would be nice to grind a bit after work just for something to do

A few thoughts ahead of my return... Updating all of my clients and playing a few free SNGs for logging in again reminded me how lousy the Stars software is now haha, I thought my computer might freeze running two tables lol. Also forgot that 888 changed all their tournament names which was done since my last session. RIP Big Fish, literally my favourite tourney series on the planet, hopefully I can find one that's just as good to me Would love to FT on Party so I can screenshot my shitty new screen name. I miss being able to use PocketPear66 since I just reveal my identity on here anyways (disregarding the fact that 99.9999% of the people I play against are not followers of the thread, all the movie talk was to throw them off my trail ). I canceled my HRC subscription since I wasn't playing enough to justify it. I guess we'll see how often I play/study to see if I'll re-invest. It's not that expensive and I'm sure it's more than justified its cost all the years I've been using it, no rush for now tho

Not sure how many MTTs I'll play tomorrow. I'll probably just start as soon as I have breakfast and hopefully register deep into afternoon. Definitely won't try to overextend myself, might not be able to twelve-table right off the bat. Thinking about buy-ins I can probably play reg speed $22s and maybe $16.50 turbo PKOs. It is so so SO nice to have steady income that I don't need to worry about busting the BR in one sesh and totally crippling myself haha. Was eyeing up 50/50 series on Stars and might fire one just for kicks, I guess that's what disposable income is good for. As long as I don't fire too many big tourneys I don't see the problem with being a little aggro with the BR

Quick update on life in general... not the best month thus far Been having more struggles mentally than I've been used to the last year and a half although it's nothing compared to what I used to experience and it's still well within control. Just forget about me hitting my weight goal too. Despite delivering mail full-time the number on the scale is only going up because of my poor dietary decisions. Still too many self-destructive tendencies for me, I'm just glad I can focus them on something relatively benign and not go full degen/nutcase. Can't win em all I guess! Would really love to be sub-200 someday, almost hard to believe I ever weighed sub two before haha

Gl on the tables this weekend everyone! Hope I can snag at least one FT for a first day back

Had a profitable return to the felt today! Won about $300 USD from 43 MTTs. Made one FT in the $5.50 Big Shot which I guess is the new Big Fish (BF sounds better). I got to be big chiplead for most of ITM until F2T. Came into FT a midstack and immediately lost AK<AQ to be shortstack. After that I stuck with it and am very happy with a third place showing! My other big result was an F2T in the $22 Predator on Party. Once again I got to be a massive stack and was hitting some big bounties left and right. Cashed for about $300 USD but short of the big dough on the FT. Disappointing but still a good result, couldn’t do much about the cards there

I thought I played pretty well! I read a few of my posts in the thread last night before bed and from my last return a year and a half ago I took away the point of not taking marginal spots. I just glanced over my ranges so my only studying was by reading about what I was studying forever ago, must have rubbed off a bit tho. Even tho I took some bad beats in my two big results I think overall I ran pretty well today and I felt like I was able to rack up a lot of bounties in a lot of my PKOs. After all that talk about being aggressive with the BR I mostly stuck to the gameplan I said yesterday of $22s and down. I flicked in a satellite attempt for the 50/50 event today but no dice. Close enough to the real thing haha. I think I’d still like to grow the roll organically. With steady income I shouldn’t need to withdraw anytime soon so hopefully I can ring up a few more winning days and just gradually move up the stakes.

For a blast from the past I saw my old coach in the $7.50 PKO streets hahahaha, good to know he’s still grinding. Today was a very nice change of pace from the last few months. I think part of the problem is that I view poker on weekends as work to a certain extent and I appreciate my time off. With fam and friends in Stoon I don’t know how often I’ll be able to play but I don’t see why I can’t play one or two hundred MTTs a month. Feeling motivated so would be nice to have the side hustle here to stay for a while. GL everyone for Sunday Funday tomorrow

If you fail once just try again! Pretty sure I tried snagging Kuroneko last time I had to change my screen name, tossed in the underscore to get it in the arsenal. This was my only FT in a day where I lost in the neighbourhood of $225 USD after playing 63 MTTs. Happy with my volume this weekend. I thought I'd be rusty but ended up 12-tabling almost immediately, no real adjustment period to get back into it which is nice

Today I felt that I ran worse, especially in all-in spots where it felt like I took more bad beats and lost more flips than I did yesterday. That being said I made several questionable plays mostly revolving around being a station with weak hands and also bluffed off a couple times into fish which I should never do (oh well )

My last hand in the $7.50 Bounty FT was a real gut punch. Stacks and situation were roughly as follows...

BU 15bb $7 Bounty K9o
SB 40bb $100 Bounty A9o
BB Hero 20bb $20 Bounty ATs

Basically what happened was shortstack BU open jammed, CL SB went over the top and I called it of with ATs. The chipleader was being a donkey the whole FT and was letting the chips fly. I knew that both of them were way behind my range so it was an easy call in-game. What made it worse was that, from an ICM perspective, getting it all-in as the midstack was great for me because BU had to beat both of us to stay in the tournament. So on top of being in a prime spot for a near triple up and heads up against a fish, I was a high percentage chance of coming out $100 USD richer even if I lost the hand. Both were dominated which was the dream but the board ran out with both a King and Nine hitting. Still would have lost today if I finished second but that was a high equity spot worth a couple hundred I got really unlucky on. Unfortunate but that's how it goes

We'll see if I study this week and come back for the grind next weekend. I really enjoyed myself and would love to get in more volume in the near future. As has been the case for a while I'm circling the nice scores but no cigar yet, albeit in a very limited sample. Have a good week everyone!

Today was absolutely disgusting. I don’t think I’ve been on the wrong end of variance as bad as I was today. I made a very small fry 888 F2T and other than that I just got absolutely shmoked. I don’t think I had my A-game but I was legitimately terribly unlucky today. Lost a lot of money and I'm 90% sure it set a new PB for me, not the record day I was looking for

I didn’t play yesterday because I ended up golfing with my dad and bro in law instead. Shot a bad 78 at the Willows with 14 GIRs and 36 putts. Only birdie I had was a three footer so I was just dialed in. Golf is shockingly stress-free when your hitting a 100-130y wedge into every green from the middle of the fairway. My mail intel has led me to believe this upcoming week could be my last with full-time for the summer so hopefully I can play a few rounds with the boys before golf season vanishes completely in front of my eyes

I think I’ll probably be back for more next weekend although I’ll have to be more conservative with my BR sadly. FYI I didn’t realize until today that Party put rake back on the bounties in PKO tournaments. Just an all around no good very bad day

HELLO! I did not play this previous weekend because I was a) completely exhausted after working my ass off and b) a friend from Swift moved up so I wanted to hang with him before uni starts this week. I hear that my grandparents will be coming up for the long weekend so I’m gonna be missing out on a lot of the biggest days of poker here. Guess that’s just how it goes! Hopefully I’ll get in some good numbers in the following weekends, we’ll see. Time to break down the last month...

So I guess my biggest victory on this front is that I did play poker again! It's been so long since I did a monthly recap with stats, hope I still remember how to do it lol

MTT STATS FOR AUGUST

• Monthly Profit (CAD): -$72.49
• Monthly Profit (USD): -$491.85
• MTTs Played: 170
• Hours Played: 31.25

Like I said I got absolutely throttled in my last session. I can be happy with my volume in three sessions after not playing since February but results were lacking (in an albeit very, very small sample size). As for the health goals, just disaster. Today I weighed in at 255 lbs which is such a joke when I'm getting as much exercise as I am. I really think I should see a dietitian or nutritionist because I am completely hopeless trying to navigate this on my own even if everyone else has no non-sense easy advice haha. I feel like I might get health care soon with my job so maybe once I know it won’t be out of pocket I’ll check it out!

Anyways...

GOALS FOR SEPTEMBER

• Play 150+ MTTs
• Just TRY eating healthy

Simple enough, yeah?

Turns out I will keep on working full time until at least September 17th. I’m at the best depot in town because it’s all walking routes and once you deliver your mail you’re done for the day. Getting off a couple hours early pretty regularly. One time last week I showed to work at 9, worked until 11, and got paid for 8 hours. It was the absolute dream. No mail for me that day, I can’t deliver a full route in two hours (yet ). Don’t know if I mentioned it but early in August I got stung by a wasp on the mail trail and then a week later I almost got mauled by a dog. I see a lot of friendly cats out there but boy oh boy are there a lot of dogs that want me as their chew toy. Btw my sister got a new cat at the start of the month! Her name’s Belle and I think she’s scared of me because she runs away whenever I try petting her. Here’s a pic!



I read four books this past month to hit twenty on the year! Two of them were the first two of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Complete nonsense that I really had a tough time reading but they were short so whatever! I strongly identified with My Year of Rest and Relaxation about a chick just peacing out to try sleeping for a whole year straight. Felt parallels with the poker journey and my hiatus year haha. Last book was The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank which might be the best book I’ve read this year. It completely ****ed me up, so sad to think that anyone wanted to murder a girl like her. Definitely the most important book I’ve ever read that goes a long way towards humanizing atrocities that have been denounced for eighty years now, crazy how long it's been.

Movie time! Still got in decent numbers hahaha

5/5: Uncut Gems, The Truman Show, In the Company of Men, Ponyo, Hard Boiled, Tampopo, Early Summer, and Columbus

4.5/5: Horse Girl, Inside Man, The Flavor of Green Tea Over Rice, The Assistant, Shall We Dance?, Cure, Brief Encounter, Burn After Reading, Man Push Cart, and The Mummy

4/5: The Green Knight, Magnolia, Lolita, Repast, A Most Violent Year, The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf, To the Ends of the Earth, and Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter


Saw a lot of really great first time watches in August. Cure was not one of those. It was the first movie I saw when I got the Criterion Channel at the start of lockdown last March. I appreciated it but did not feel the weight until I streamed it again and it completely ****ed me up. Kiyoshi Kurosawa horror, same guy that did Pulse, love me some atmospheric J-horror. I tried reading Lolita but bailed twenty pages in and just watched the Kubrick version. Pretty good so might have to retry reading at some point in the future…

I did write a review for The Feedback Society on The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf. I really think I’m going to try reading the books asap. The games are great (Witcher 3 my fave ever) and I think I’ve read two of Sapkowski’s things but I wanna give the whole series a go. I think my bro-in-law has the rest of the books I don’t have even though I don’t think he ever finished The Wild Hunt haha. Here’s my review if you want a quick read! https://www.thefeedbacksociety.com/m...e-of-the-wolf/

Uncut Gems is confirmed one of the greatest gambling movies ever. I still remember almost yelling “No!” out loud when I first saw it in theatres, Howie Bling is such a degen haha. Biggest off the felt achievement this month was finishing watching every movie that I own. For the longest time there were 10-15 that I just did not want to grind through. Forced myself to over the last few months and am trying to sell a few online now. They aren't the hot tickets I thought they would be tho (shockingly )

Here’s my movie haul from this month! Got my hands on my first Ozu’s (still waiting on a few more). I’ve started cruising Kijiji for sick deals so Dragon Ball Z, The Big Short, Get Out, Rogue One, and twenty-four (!!!) James Bond movies were highly discounted! Also had the opportunity to buy The Last Jedi but couldn't bring myself to do it even just to complete my Star Wars collection, god I hate that movie. I got sick of waiting for Hard Boiled to come through the library so I finally caved and ordered it in. 3/5 story, 7/5 action, 10/10 movie! Cannot recommend enough for anyone that loves a shitload of bullets, John Woo at his best! Back on the grind when I'm back on the grind, hopefully September goes good for all of us

I obviously ended up not playing any poker in September. I was just completely fried from the mail gig. After a pretty relaxing summer it has been very busy in comparison at the depot. We had an election in Canada again which pretty well everyone is calling a waste of money since virtually nothing changed. For me it just ended up meaning a shitload of political flyers going to every house for the first couple weeks. The week after Labour Day almost killed me, it felt like my feet were made of broken glass because of the sheer weight of all those election pamphlets Thankfully I didn’t get injured although a guy pretty close in age and a lot better shape than me did get busted up. Gotta keep stretching I guess as this week has been absolutely brutal for me too

For anyone that can't scroll up for my last post...

In addition to not playing poker I also was not very kind to my body. However I have gone four days with no pizza, chips, ice cream, fried chicken, Oh Henrys, Mr. Bigs, Snickers, Wunderbars, M&Ms... you get the point. It is so ridiculous how much garbage I can eat I checked today and the weight gain from last month’s tally was surprisingly not egregious. October is a new month and I am hoping to finish 2021 strong! With Christmas rush starting soon I’m thinking I’ll be full-time in spirit until they get me a legit full-time position. Good for the wallet, bad for the golf game. I only played once (maybe twice?) last month. Courses will be closing soon so the golf window has come and gone pretty much, I miss my golf buddies

I was kind of surprised Sask brought back mandatory masks since I just kind of assumed we would be ride or die with how many people hated the lockdown. I assume we’ll still be one of the more lax provinces for the coming months/years/however long it takes for covid to blow completely over (if it ever does). As always I can be thankful for my job and for my health, at the moment anyways haha. Here’s hoping that I’ll actually get to a healthy weight this time around

I think MTTs are getting to be pretty unrealistic for me. Way too big of a time commitment on weekends if I’m exhausted from the mail grind. I am still interested in cash, and maybe trying PLO cash is the way to go as online NLH doesn’t appeal to me as much. Anyone know if Upswing is still the place to go? Would be nice to get some poker side hustle going here in October. I definitely have the extra dough for a training course if I find something that passes the eye test

May as well set some goals for the upcoming month!


GOALS FOR OCTOBER

• Play poker/investigate cash game options
• TRY eating healthy
• Track food and money expenses in apps

It's been a long time since I've done either food or money tracking although I think both helped keep a lid on gross infractions in the past. If I can keep my eating under control I’m sure I can save a couple hundred bucks a month by not eating out and not making snack runs every day. We'll see I guess

I finished two books this month! A friend of a friend said that I should read Brave New World earlier this summer and I finally got through it. The first 50-60 pages were a grind but after that it became a pretty good, funny, twisted dystopian sci-fi. I also read Ham on Rye by Bukowski. Been trying to find Post Office so I could re-read but have been unsuccessful through the library. Chinaski makes me laugh so of course I'd recommend it to anyone reading the thread

Movies and stuff! In addition to not playing much poker my movie intake was also on a bit of a downswing (relatively )...


5/5: The Grand Budapest Hotel, Hard Boiled, Pale Flower, The Lighthouse, Cat People, Early Summer, The Babadook, Wolf Children, Equinox Flower, and Late Autumn

4.5/5: Onibaba, Moneyball, Casino, and Police Story

4/5: A New Leaf, After the Wedding, Ornamental Hairpin, Marty, Deep Cover, Coming to America, Sound of the Mountain, Antiporno, The Fog, The Straight Story, and The Hudsucker Proxy


Grand Budapest was the 500th time this year I sat down and watched a movie. 2021 has been a helluva ride lol

I did see a couple gambling related movies in September. Rewatched Casino for first time since my last year of uni and it was way better than I remembered, Scorsese at his most stylized (which I totally love). Also saw an interesting new poker movie called The Card Counter (3.5/5). For a poker movie I thought it was pretty well done although I couldn't speak to its accuracy regarding the depiction of life on the WSOP Circuit. Tiffany Haddish was pretty trash and I feel like someone backing one dude and then just following him around all these stops is something no one actually does Oscar Isaac is one of my fave actors though and he was awesome and there was a lot to like so hey, you may as well check it out if not for some semi-decent poker cinema content

With The Hudsucker Proxy I finally finished off the Coen Brothers filmography up to this point although I think a solo-Macbeth movie is coming out this year. I've also been trying to show my friends good movies when they invite me over to their pad seeing as how none of us can find anything to do in Stoon. I was completely rattled because what they like and what I like are basically at opposite ends of the spectrum which has basically been story of my life talking to people about movies. They really liked both The Lighthouse and Police Story though so my efforts haven't been in vain. Just need to get them to watch Harakiri one of these days...

See below my haul for September. Pretty sure that The Diary of a Young Girl is the first book I've actually bought since The Mental Game of Poker three or so years ago. Time sure flies when you're having fun My DVD copy of No Country for Old Men is pretty trashy hence the blu-ray upgrade. Used to be top three in uni although it's way down there now. The Late Ozu boxset took two months to come in, the last three weeks or so I was checking my mailbox pretty well every day hoping to find it. Bought it knowing that Tokyo Twilight and Late Autumn were bangers that justified it by itself. The only film I had yet to see was Equinox Flower which I watched today and is my first film I gave 5/5 to on first watch since My Neighbor Totoro in June 2020. 5/5 used to mean something when there was only fifty but now I have ninety-seven and growing on my list. I have watched a couple hundred (thousand?) movies since then so maybe a 4% perfect quotient is still reasonably unattainable (although of course none of this ****ing matters lol ). Have a good October everyone!!!!!!!

What a great pussy!

Long term on-and-off follower here. Shame about the big fish on 888 - I rarely play there but that was a highlight tourney.

Heyo! Saw The Color of Money tonight and watching Paul Newman get his groove back made me want to gamble it up a little. Ended up playing a 2.5hr/1.3k hand Zoom session on Stars. I won about $20 and felt that things went pretty well just sticking to my usual game. Probably one of the biggest turn offs for me wanting to try out online cash is just knowing that it's a lot harder than MTTs. Micro MTTs, anyways. I'm so used to half the field punting their stacks to me that playing against a bunch of nits with a lot higher talent floor is just not appealing. Judging by today maybe I shouldn't be so quick to write off NLH CGs as a money making opportunity.

Definitely scratched a bit of an itch there and played a lot longer than I thought I would tonight. 14bb/100 is pretty good but super small sample size and I think I ran slightly above EV. I know that I know hardly anything about cash games since I have no idea how to judge a rake trap from a good game (which $.05/$.10 Zoom probably is). October goal was to investigate options so I guess I still have a few days to accomplish that. Not expecting to play in the next few days so I'll save the rest for the monthly recap. Slight spoiler: things are going much better goal-wise this month. Gotta finish strong!


Haha definitely gonna miss the Big Fish

If you really struggle with discipline when it comes to eating you should look into Intermittent Fasting and the benefits it can have for fat loss.

I've lost a shitload of weight the past year first doing IF and then also following a ketogenic diet. I don't really recommend keto to most people as it's not as easy to implement especially if you have a normal social life but IF can be done by most people and is really beneficial in my experience.

Other benefits aside if you can narrow your window of eating down to a certain number of hours where you focus on eating healthy meals it makes it much easier to not eat junk. Losing weight is super hard, and I absolutely love stuffing my face with food, but it really is worth it to lose weight.

Gl with everything

Cash definitely more profitable than MTTs if you can get past the initial learning of curve, as it is indeed more complex to learn 100+bbs strategies than 25-bbs. Also much more of a flexible schedule. As always, GL friend

Mixed in another 2 hr/1.2k hand 5c/10c Zoom session and made a profit of about $50. Having never experienced online cash game success I'm finding it hard to believe that it can possibly be this easy. Granted the last time I was playing online cash consistently was during the Vancouver years when I was a breakeven 1c/2c and $1 MTT player and thought that I was hot **** lol Gotta keep it up I guess!


Thanks Qwut! Have definitely heard about intermittent fasting although I'm not too eager to try it out. I know that if I keep running my calorie deficit that I'll lose the weight. Being essentially full-time at the mail gig helps where I'm probably averaging 14km-ish walks every day. Don't want to deprive myself completely of calories, might be tough to do my job haha. Hopefully this is the time I put the pieces together tho, appreciate it


I definitely knew that cash was the way to go if I wanted consistent results. I think that part of the allure of MTTs is the possibility of just having a sick run over a stretch of tournaments to multiply your BR in like hours/days as opposed to weeks. Might be a sign I'm getting older that MTT variance is kind of scary to me now haha, My 100+bb game is probably not as terrible as I think it is. As always, it can be way wayyy better but I'm not completely hopeless out there. I definitely need a less time consuming poker avenue so if I can keep on putting in a couple hours here and there when I'm bored I could be on a nice trajectory! Gl Dub!

Played another 1.1k Zoom hands at 10c/25c this time. Was down a bit, was up a bit, only came out with another five bucks. Rake's a lot lower and it's not like I don't have a BR to play that level, I could probably play higher no problem. Stars roll has been nearly depleted since my last MTT ass kicking in August so am gonna be shuffling some money around. Already have the 888 withdrawal pending, who knows when I'll be back on that site since I know the cash game scene isn't great! Still lots of room to improve so will probably have to look into the cash game course. Excited to be excited about poker again! Even if I don't play a ton it'll be nice to have the opportunity there. Gnight!

What's wrong with cash game scene on 888?


fwiw, I find WPN to be softer than Stars & Partypoker.
Time of day can also makes a big difference - - ~2pm to 7pm (ET) is the best (imo)
I've also heard that Sportsbetting site is good as well but personally have only a few dollars on there, not even really rolled for their lowest limits (10nl) and only initially deposited a few $'s for some MTT/freeroll promo a year+ ago. Have considered putting a few $'s on there but as I've never made a WD from there, I'm not sure about the whole process &/or if there's exorbitant fees involved.

Played another 5.3k hands at 25NL Zoom the last two days but only up like $30. I'm playing okay but am making some stupid decisions to lose a little money here and there. I'm having a little trouble with two things specifically - overbets and 4-bets. They just do not happen as much in MTTs since you usually end up all in really fast and it sure takes away some of the nuance. Now everyone's ranges are wider than I'm used to and you can 2x pot river and still not be all-in. At 25NL there are still a lot of bad players. Not MTT level braindead but there is still easy money up for grabs at this level.

Another thing that is absolutely rocking my world is rakeback. I feel like I've never gotten to substantially benefit from rakeback before since I guess MTTs don't generate a ton. Pretty sure most of my measly profit at this point I owe to RB which is pretty awesome (I guess )

For just getting my feet wet I'm having a good time and not super concerned with results. I feel like I could easily be up a few more buy-ins than I already am and can still study to get better in a deepstack cash game format. Overbets and 4bets are two weaker points but I think my whole pre-flop could use a little tweaking. Considering rake and lack of antes I am probably playing a little too loose although it's hard to tell at the moment haha.

I've definitely played a lot more than I expected the last few days. Lots of room to grow but I think the cash game path is something I'm interested in now. Need to learn to love thin value, picking off bluffs, and squeaking bluffs through haha. Having fun is pretty sweet

To be fair most of my cash game knowledge is from four years ago so it's basically irrelevant. I'm definitely enjoying Zoom at the moment but I don't think 888 has an equivalent. Need to look into other sites to see where I want to be playing. Party has FastForward but I remember people mentioning rampant bots although that was three years ago. Gotta keep my eyes peeled

OCTOBER WAS POKER PRODUCTIVE, FINALLY!!!!!!!!!

I really hate when this thread is just a glorified movie blog. I mean, I like writing about all the movies I watch, but damn am I happy I could have some poker content to show for my sticktuitiveness. Was considering retiring the thread legit a week ago but am happy to be back on the (part-time) grind!

What were my goals for this month?

On the fitness fronts first I took pretty fricken good care of myself. Had pizza twice (once with friends yesterday so a peer pressure pizza), one bag of chips, and no more chocolate bar splurges although I do go on granola bar benders sometimes. For weight I was 253.8 lbs on October 5th which probably means I was a couple pounds heavier to start the month. Today I weighed in at 243.8 lbs!!! So back on the downswing. I have continued working full-time at the mail gig and have been told to expect to stay on FT through to probably at least January. My job is gonna suck for the next two months with Christmas rush but I can keep on bagging that cheddar and shredding that fat

Tracking calories was not as on point but tracking my expense was. I had a personal goal of spending sub-$100 on eating out and even though I went over that I still did much better than the previous months, cutting down my October expenses by a couple hundred. For sure a huge money and calorie saver since all those choco bars add up after four weeks in the wallet as much as they do in the belly

Now poker! Here's my stats...



This was over 18 hours played over the last six days consecutive. Loving that time freedom. I lost $40 yesterday but won $80 today to end on a positive. Definitely not crushing 25NL as maybe I was a lucky bastard to not do better. and heck, I guess with rakeback I was actually up $135.74 USD for the month and not the amount in the picture. That RB saved my bacon

Lots of room to grow! Here's a graph below if someone wants to interpret how bad/good/lucky I am. Pretty sure getting the redline to move up is how I start crushing cash games, correct? Lots of work to be done



Okay, some goals for November...

GOALS FOR NOVEMBER

• FINISH CASH GAME COURSE!!!
• Play 20+ hours
• Weigh 235 lbs
• DRINK LESS DIET SODA

All very self-explanatory. I would like to do the CG course before I even play again but we'll see how strong my discipline is. Nice to have a weight number to try hitting again. And I'm still crushing 1-2L of diet soda a day which is absolutely gonna have some debilitating side effects if I ever reach old age so I better cut it down significantly while I'm trying to get healthy again.

Movies!!! No books this month, didn't even try haha

5/5: The Silence of the Lambs, Late Spring, Dancer in the Dark, The Tale of the Princess Kaguya, and Sicario

4.5/5: Burning, The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, Bergman Island, Summer with Monika, WarGames, Tokyo-Ga, The Incredible Shrinking Man, Dune, and Blade Runner 2049

4/5: I'm Your Man, The Curse of the Cat People, The Killing, Love & Basketball, Match Point, Clockwatchers, The Sting and Hail, Caesar!

DESERT POWER!!!!!!!!!!!

Dune was everything I was hoping it would be and more! So glad I read the book first so I knew what was happening and I can't wait for the sequel, so jacked it got greenlit. Denis Villeneuve is absolutely one of the best directors alive today. Dune could be a five bagger but Sicario has to hold the fort down until I can rewatch it again to find out

After going a year+ with no first-time five star movies I did it twice in a few weeks with Dancer in the Dark. No idea when I'll watch again since it was unbelievably depressing but what a banger. Pelham was the hilarious 70's version and The Killing was another Kubrick. Really identified with Clockwatchers and the temp worker culture with my mail gig the last year plus and the struggle to get a permanent position haha

That's all for now folks! I am making my brother wait to write this out and feel pretty bad because this has taken like twenty minutes longer than I said it would. Had big plans to watch Kuroneko for Halloween, maybe I can still sneak it in later tonight! Here's a crappy James Bond article I wrote in January and tweaked a little for the release of No Time to Die (which was meh )

https://www.thefeedbacksociety.com/m...campy-moments/

888POker has 'SNAP' format which is the same as FastForward & Zoom.

I haven't played that much on there but it is softer than PP for sure.

Partypoker is okay these days due to there being a promo on right now. There's 2 or 3x player pts. happy hours just about every other hour and there's also some promo where you get a 'spin' every 2pts. earned on FastForward tables. (the last promo they held was pretty much the same but you'd get cards instead of spins. I picked up an extra $300+ in 1 week just from those cards )

WPN also has the 'Blitz' tables. Same as Zoom but their lowest limit is 10nl. Tables are softer than Stars & PP

No poker to report the first week of November! My free time was spent playing a game I bought called Heaven's Vault which I've been really enjoying and also preparing for a meeting with a financial investor. My brother finally talked me into investing the money just sitting in my bank account towards retirement (), now I have a TFSA started whatever that means. I put on a brave face and tried to understand all the abbreviations the guy was throwing at me with limited results

Will have to start setting aside a chunk of change every paycheque now for these other investments. I'll still have plenty of surplus money kicking around, I'm pretty lucky with how few expenses I have at the moment. The guy was really emphasizing how important it was for me to not panic if markets go down and I lose a little money on my investments since they can be pretty volatile. Dude has obviously never tried quitting his day job to play poker full time as a complete amateur

I am thinking that poker will be "gravy on top" money that I can put towards savings or splurges or whatever. If I can become a consistent winner and put in consistent hours in cash games I should be able to make a couple thousand bucks a year to supplement the cash flow. That's my theory anyways, we'll see if it pans out


Thanks for the intel, will have to check it out

Tax Free Savings Account. As Canadians, we accumulate about 5k a year - I forget how much is precisely the yearly amount - and you should have at least 30k+ freed up at this point. Meaning that everything that you profit off these investments, cannot be taxed by the CRA

As a rec poker player that already has (an extremely) volatile hobby in poker, I would recommend to only use your TFSA where you are guaranteed to get 100% of it back and aiming for 5-10% return yearly. Make sure to get a better financial advisor next time if he does not take the time to explain properly your options. I mean, if not, just buy some BTC!!! GL friend