My name is Cristian, a recreational player from the Netherlands. I just finished reading your book 'Reading Poker Tells' which I bought via bol.com.

It was great to read and I'm sure I will benefit from it. Thank you for writing
this interesting book. In time I will also buy your second book.

I may have something to add about the topic of looking at the dealer. When I started playing low stake cash games I noticed that I sometimes used this action as well. I mean verbalizing my betsize directly to the dealer. I started wondering why I did so.

Well, in some occasions I had a pretty strong holding but I didn't want any drawing hands to beat me. So, as you said in your book, I liked to let anybody know that I was serious. But in some cases I was strong enough to get called, but I wanted to use the dealer to direct my energy. I don't like to look at my opponents, even with a strong holding, so verbalizing my bet directly to the dealer and after that looking at the board just made me feel more comfortable. I don't know if there are more players who do this because of the same reason, but it may be worth to consider or to examine.

Unfortunatelly this behaviour made others fold too many hands in spots where I should've been called. Noticing this, I adjusted my play. I don't verbalize my bets anymore in spots where I want to be called. Instead of this I sometimes use a verbalized bet as a semi-bluff or in some occasion where I would like to take the pot right away and I think there's a fair chance of pulling it off.

Of course, I don't overact. I verbalize my bet in a very calm way as if I have everything under control. It worked several times. Maybe it's interesting to add this to the chapter Deception and manipulation.