Don't call it a comeback...

I know it's been a long time since I posted, but to say I've been busy would be a mild understatement. My first day of my on-call rotation started the day after my last post, 90+ hours of work and a lot of sleepless nights later, here I am. What a week, I bet I could sleep for a month and not notice.

Anyhow, on to poker. I was down to my last $50 not too awful long ago. I've made a nice comeback in the little time I've been able to play. Back up to $200. I've been playing the $1/$2 Shorthanded games on Party. These games are a freaking goldmine, but high variance is the rule of the day. If you can just persevere against what will be the inevitable bad beats you can easily clean up here. Of course, I have no business playing in these games with my current bankroll, but I'm hoping to keep the streak alive long enough to where I'm comfortable.

I've got to go back into Poker Tracker and change my auto rate rules and modify them for shorthanded play. Previously I just used the rules that were recommended by the awesome Poker Tracker Guide, but I guess now I'll have to actually use my brain and make some modifications since their rules are more geared towards full ring games.

At work we just started a new on-call rotation, so no more pager for me for 4 weeks! I'm so excited I can bareley see straight. That plus the fact that I'll be making my reservations for Vegas tonight makes me a happy camper. Hopefully I can turn around and get myself a decent bankroll by the time that trip rolls around. See you all at the tables.

Let the Madness begin...

I love this time of year. I mean what’s better? You got Baseball Season starting, the NBA is starting to look ahead to the playoffs which are in the near future, and of course the NCAA Basketball tournament. Yep, March is the best month of the year for sports. I love every minute of it. Unfortunately I’ve not had a lot of time to do significant research for filling out my brackets. Hopefully tonight I will have some time while watching the Play-in game. I was hoping that Boy Genius would put some opinions up on his blog about who he’s picking and why, since he is far more adept at sports betting than I will ever be.

Had a fairly decent weekend at the tables. Won 2 Sit n Gos, but lost 3. I was up to about $140 at one point, but I ended up dropping about $30 on a Stud table. What was I thinking? Ugg. I know there is some money to be made in other games aside from Hold ‘em because a lot of the players are like me and have no real clue what to do. I will take advantage of this some day, preferably when the bankroll is actually healthy.

I didn’t get a chance to play in the HORSE tournament on Sunday. Mainly because I didn’t want to make a small deposit and waste the 100% bonus I have coming to me. When (if) the bankroll hits $600 I will take full advantage of that. Instead of playing in the tourney I went and played Basketball with my friends. I used to really be into sports when I was in high school, but since my shoulder surgery in 2001 I’ve been what you might call “inactive”. There’s probably a really good reason for this, as today pretty much every muscle in my body aches. I didn’t even know I HAD muscles in some of the places that hurt. I ended up getting sever cramps in both of my calf muscles and actually had to be carried off the court. Luckily it was the last game of the night, so I didn’t feel like too much of a pansy. I’m pretty sure Bad Blood would have been laughing hysterically at me. I did hit a total bullshit luck shot to win one of the games, and that was my 30 seconds of fame for the night.

I wish I had something profound to write about, but I don’t. I’ve not put in enough time at the tables to start getting all profound on everyone. Hopefully sometime this week I’ll spew some more useless rhetoric. Until then, if anyone knows of the best place to make some bets online for some of the basketball games, please let me know. See ya at the tables.

I've always wondered...

When I’m on my death bed, will all the images I’ve forgotten come back to me in a flurry of life? Is that what people mean when they say their life flashed before their eyes? I ask this silly question, because I really don’t remember a whole lot about this past weekend.

Friday was my Birthday Party, all my friends showed up for some drunken debauchery and Poker. Everything was just fine until the “Crown Connection” as I like to call him, showed up. Every year a good friend of mine gives me a nice big bottle of Crown Royal for my birthday. Usually it lasts me the whole year, because I’m not a big whiskey drinker. Not this year baby. As soon as everyone was just a little bit toasty, the shots began to flow like water. Needless to say, I think I need to work on my tolerance. My wife told me about the events that preceded my passing out and throwing up. Apparently, I was playing with my chips, and looking at my cards trying to make a decision. I suddenly looked up and my eyes got real wide. She said I got real pale, and I immediately leaped out of my chair and over my friend and hauled ass upstairs. Approximately 30 minutes later my wife found me on my knees, with my head on my arm, passed out on the toilet. So I’m kind of wondering, if when I die, if my last images will be random moments when I’m praying to the porcelain God?

Enough of me being a retard. I played a little Poker this weekend after recovering from the debauchery of Friday. I continued to lose. I played a Sit n Go, played weak-tight and made 4th. I’m getting quite gun-shy with my new and un-improved bankroll. I need to do some serious studying I think before returning to the tables. I’ve spent a lot of time getting back into the things I used to do more often before I became enamored (obsessed?) with online poker. I got a bunch of new video games for my Birthday, so I’ve been trying to spend some time playing those. Basically, anything to clear my head of poker. I definitely think it’s time for a totally fresh approach. I plan on reading through Small Stakes Hold ‘Em. Finally picking up Super System 2 and reading it, and applying the knowledge in the Poker Tracker Guide to my game. Hopefully it will work out for me. My goal is to get a nice bankroll together for the Vegas trip in June, which I’ve officially RSVPed for. I can already feel my liver quivering in fear.

Last night was the Slipknot/Lamb of God/Shadows Fall show. Was a GREAT time. Shadows Fall’s set was too short, and they didn’t play anything off “Of One Blood” which pissed me off to no end since I love that album. Lamb of God however, absolutely demolished the entire arena. My neck is a wee bit sore this morning after all the thrashing like a maniac I did last night. Slipknot was amazing, they always put on a good show anyway, but with an entire Arena to themselves, they really shined. They played about an hour and a half and I heard pretty much every song I wanted to hear. Was a great time, and well worth the money. The new Bloodbath album and the new Impaled album came out yesterday. I recommend that you immediately run out and purchase them both. You should be able to find both at Best Buy since they are on Century Media.

I think that’s about it from me today. Good luck out there.

One year older...

I truly don't think I'm any wiser. Especially after the beating I've taken at the tables over the last week. It's like I've gotten it into my head that whatever cards I hold, as long as they catch something on the flop, they're good. This is incredibly bad thinking. I'm sure it has quite a bit to do with why my bankroll is sitting at $129.65. Yep, $129. I was up to almost $500 4 weeks ago. I'm not exactly sure what happened, but here I sit, wondering if I should continue to even try.

Losing, in its purest form, is the most frustrating thing on the planet. I don't mean just at cards either. I'm really sort of lost right now as far as my game is concerned. I need to have some kind of confidence builder come along, and soon.

Tonight is the Party that my wife is throwing for my Birthday. We're going to have a Poker tournament. So I can hopefully feel much better about my game after that is all over. If you read back you'll see just how much money I've won off my friends in recent weeks. Hopefully the trend will continue.

I worked my fool ass off on Wednesday to try and get all my work done before I went on my mini-vacation. You know, the one where I sit on my ass and do some honest relaxing. I took yesterday and today off, and it's been nice to not have been going 900 miles an hour for these 2 days. Anyhow, not a whole lot to say. Hopefully, I'll start winning again and I won't whine so much. Don't count on it though. Good luck out there.

Make the bad man stop...

Well, I've lost approximately $150 in the last 4 days. It's not been pretty. Serious tilt kicking in, and if it hadn't been for all the fun I've been having at blogger tables, I'd be seriously disgusted right now.

Started playing Limit ($1/$2) again, was doing fairly well my first two sessions, won 5 and 6 BBs respectively. On my third session, I was about about 10bbs, and then something happened. It's like I suddenly became completely retarded. Not only did I lose what I had won thus far, but I tilted away almost my entire buy-in. I could even feel my brain go into full on tilt mode, but I couldn't make myself get up and just stop playing. Uggg, I gotta work on that self control. All I can think about is how high my bankroll was 2 weeks ago. If I'm not careful I'll piss the whole thing away.

I've REALLY been having a good time at the blogger tables. I played an O8 Hi/Lo table with Al and lost most of my buy-in. But the entertainment was well worth it. My theory is, that <Al started drinking so much while playing one night that he started seeing double at the Hold 'Em tables. And naturally just moved to Omaha due to the "comfort" of 4 cards. While playing at this table, 2 days in a row mind you, there was this one woman named PokerBobbie. I think she's stalking Al. She would chase flushes all day, and hit flushes all day. It was unbelievable, she sucked out so many player's buy-ins. Bigtime fish, and Al respectfully asked us not to tap the aquarium so hard, but damned if it isn't frustrating watching someone else hit miracle after miracle.

Played a little No-Limit style blogger table. Benn playing with SirFWALGMan a lot. We're kindred spirits, he and I. Mainly because we both like to whine a whole hell of a lot about our declining bankrolls and bad beats. However, we both have a good time at the tables, and that's what counts. Also met a really cool guy named Bob, I think he knows Al in real life or something. Either way he's a damn funny dude and went out of his way to tell everyone at the table last night that he was a Shark. It's unfortunate that the Shark got fished out of his buy-in by Mr ATM Big Stack. God that guy was an ass. I don't even remember his name, but SirFWALGMan kept calling him "usmoron", so I'm guessing it was something similar. I will continue to play and lose money at these tables, I consider it an entertainment expense.

So, Iggy and Hank have put out a new eBook about how to use Poker Tracker. I've used Poker Tracker for a long time, but I know I've not used it to it's full potential. I'm quite glad to 2 well known figures within the blogging community have decided to put this out. I've already ordered my copy, and eagerly await my access code so I can start trying to put it to good use. You can check it out here.

I think that's all for now. My birthday is Thursday, so if you want to send me some money to suppliment my bankroll that'd be great! Also, next Tuesday is the Slipknot/Lamb of God/Shadows Fall show. I'm quite excited about that. Other than that, everyone have a good time out there.