Come play live this weekend @SR23, you know you want to
Might come down tomorrow night Ging-pronounced-king, but I've been a bit under the weather the last few days. Are you still crushing down there?
Hey, yeah the game has been decent the last few weeks! Although we bricked twice in the last 2 days in massive multiway potswith 2 overs + OESD twice where I had 15+ outs twice which would have given me some monster sessions, but it was not to be
See ya soon mate
Sad times. I'm planning a big April down there - well, a medium-sized April.
Have you abandoned your diary? Perhaps a resurrection including more live spots/discussion?
Update coming soon, hand histories & all I promise
(i) I haven't heard i.'pessimism is the antidote to disappointment' before and whilst I'm (generally) inclined to agree, I'm not being entirely self-deprecating in saying that my play wasn't up to scratch. I did rush at it a bit. It's a bit clunky. It's just a bit...off, for want of a better word. But I didn't write it for broadcast, not really, it was my first stab at a radio play and, perhaps more importantly, ii. I wanted to prove that I could set myself a writing goal and achieve it. My past is littered with half-finished/abandoned writing projects. It's certainly galvanised me and I feel confident about getting this book done by the end of the month. Good times.
(ii) iii.The flips were reasonably flippy/standard: calling 10bb jams w/AQ, jamming with 12 bigs over a min-open w/TT, lumping in my remaining 6.5 bigs bvb w/K7s - that kind of thing. I think (?) it was on @Duesenberg 's thread where you and I were inclined to agree over a bubble spot that was considered standard and I tend to lean towards anti-YOLO'ing and questioning/looking at 'standard' spots with some scrutiny. TBQH, I wasn't really giving too much thought to my play this week and just kind of sailing along and consider MTTs more of a fun diversion from cash and play them more for pleasure than for any sort of profit. That said, I think they could well be one of the more value-y forms of online poker around at the moment so I might put more work into my MTT game. Let's see.
(iii) iv.Still a little under the weather, but with my recreational peccadilloes that tend to come out at the weekends, this is something of a blessing, especially if I want to carry on this industry until the end of the month.
Thanks again for your post.
i. I might have made that up
ii. Ah, I see, makes sense. Congratulations on achieving that goal and (rightfully) feeling good about it - I hope you can resolve your computer complication and make some progress with the book also. I'm not a writer. I wrote a book novella short story once. My German girlfriend had informed me that she wasn't actually prepared to make a go of our long distance relationship after all, I had stopped going to lectures at Manchester Uni (Manchester Met - I couldn't get into Manchester University) I was drinking lots (not in the normal/sociable way you're supposed to as a student) I would sit in my room (at the halls of residence on Daisy Bank Road) surrounded by bottles of cheap Rioja, listening to stuff like The Past is a Grotesque Animal (of Montreal) Gloomy Sunday (The Associates) In Shreds (The Chameleons) I'm so Tired (Fugazi) Needle of Death (Bert Jansch) and reading Moon Palace (Paul Auster)The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe, Crime and Punishment, Der Steppenwolf (Herman Hesse), The Pigeon (Patrick Süskind) and Hunger (Knut Hamsun)... the story was great I'm fine now, I haven't written since
iii. Ssstandard.
iv. Every cloud
Very interesting post. I too had a German girlfriend once and we split up after a heated discussion over how Bukowski should be pronounced. That, and other things.
The first Germans/Poles etc to arrive in America Anglicised/Americanised their names (or they had their names Anglicised/Americanised for them) right? So I imagine you would have said 'Bukowski' with an 'ow' sound (correctly) and she would have maintained it was 'Bukovski' (incorrectly) ?
I only own Ham on Rye by Bukowski... bought for me by my German girlfriend... the pronunciation of his name one of the few things we didn't argue about.
This is precisely correct: you say (well, she said) BuKOVski, I say BuCOWski - etc. My point to her was that if he chose to pronounce his name BuCOWski and if that was generally accepted in the US, then that was how his name was pronounced. "No no no," went ex-girlfriend, "I'm German and it's pronounced BuKOVski..."
And so on.
I'm going to be writing about poker and other stuff again soon.
Erm, the goals are in tatters. I've earned zero points so far this week and fewer than 500 last week, so priority is looking unlikely, at best. Four-figure profit is also looking unlikely, albeit less so. Cold showers have gone out of the window. Ditto meditation.
On a more positive note - and here at my diary we all like a more positive note, all of us - I did do my radio play, have written a letter to Viz, steamed into the book (61,000 words at the moment) and one or two other green shoots.
The last couple of days have been taken up with the breaking scandal surrounding the Facebook data breach, Cambridge Analytica, SCL, Alexander Nix and so on. Quite a while back I used to work for that bunch - some of that work involved writing political speeches and manifestos for political parties, but the bulk of my work was actually spent doing socially benign stuff. I know: far out.
Anyway, I've been doing a bit of writing around that. It's been a bit emotionally and mentally tiring. At the end of my working day yesterday all I wanted to do was go and play live poker, but I quickly drank five small beers and half a bottle of wine (I wasn't drunk, though) and decided playing poker was a bad idea. Progress, readers.
Humdrum update. I've been finding poker a little, well, humdrum lately and have barely played. When I have played, it's felt like a bit of a slog. I've earned fewer than 500 points two weeks running. Have I had enough of it? Has playing 300-plus days a year for the last five or six years finally taken its toll? Is this poker burnout? Hopefully not.
Any ideas, readers, for getting a bit of enthusiasm back? I keep finding myself drifting off during sessions and auto-piloting/cutting sessions off early. Have been deliberately putting myself in spots to see if I can wrestle my way out of them but it all feels a bit forced and gruelling. It's reached the stage where I've been casting glances at the four card game, thinking "Perhaps I should learn that..."
Humdrum update. I've been finding poker a little, well, humdrum lately and have barely played. When I have played, it's felt like a bit of a slog. I've earned fewer than 500 points two weeks running. Have I had enough of it? Has playing 300-plus days a year for the last five or six years finally taken its toll? Is this poker burnout? Hopefully not.
Any ideas, readers, for getting a bit of enthusiasm back? I keep finding myself drifting off during sessions and auto-piloting/cutting sessions off early. Have been deliberately putting myself in spots to see if I can wrestle my way out of them but it all feels a bit forced and gruelling. It's reached the stage where I've been casting glances at the four card game, thinking "Perhaps I should learn that..."
Well this rings a few bells. I could copy and paste this post into my own diary as the overdue update I've still yet to write due to there being naff all to report and feeling like I really can't be a*sed with any of it right now.
I'm afraid I don't know what the answer is but, if you find it, please let me know!
Humdrum update. I've been finding poker a little, well, humdrum lately and have barely played. When I have played, it's felt like a bit of a slog. I've earned fewer than 500 points two weeks running. Have I had enough of it? Has playing 300-plus days a year for the last five or six years finally taken its toll? Is this poker burnout? Hopefully not.
Any ideas, readers, for getting a bit of enthusiasm back? I keep finding myself drifting off during sessions and auto-piloting/cutting sessions off early. Have been deliberately putting myself in spots to see if I can wrestle my way out of them but it all feels a bit forced and gruelling. It's reached the stage where I've been casting glances at the four card game, thinking "Perhaps I should learn that..."
Well this rings a few bells. I could copy and paste this post into my own diary as the overdue update I've still yet to write due to there being naff all to report and feeling like I really can't be a*sed with any of it right now.
I'm afraid I don't know what the answer is but, if you find it, please let me know!
Even though things slightly improved this evening - second in the 6:15pm rebuy, won at cash - March has been a bit of a shambles in terms of achieving goals. Poker enthusiasm has (somewhat) evaporated, my intentions for the month lie in tatters, my book is unfinished, my showers are hot, my bank manager points at me in the street and laughs. That kind of thing.
Still, on a positive note, I've only been drunk once. And I did complete a couple of writing projects. Plus I did make some money at poker. Anyway, roll on April where I'll be keeping my goals to myself. To celebrate not getting drunk for nearly a month, I'm off to do lots of drinking and bonhomie-ing tomorrow, so expect an update somewhere around the middle of next week.
It's a little disconcerting going through my old poker columns for this book.
Within a couple of months of starting playing poker, back in 2012, I'd final tabled a $5 rebuy and scooped up $700. I've forgotten what $700 looks like. Forgotten, in fact, what a final table looks like.
A few months after that, I was (at least somewhat) regularly playing 100NL. Now, I'm a 10/20NL I-don't-know-what. Like I said: disconcerting.
Still, to misquote The Big Lebowski, this regression will not stand. I don't have anywhere near enough dough or skills (or, perhaps most worryingly, enthusiasm) at the moment to make £5/10 live by the end of next month and wrap this challenge up, so fingers are going to have to get well and truly pulled out.
Hi SR, good to hear from you after such a long absence.
+1 to what Dues said. If you want to see hard evidence of this Lex Veldhuis is currently doing an "Oldschool" video series (on YouTube) where he is reviewing his cash game sessions from back in the day. Admittedly, he is currently reviewing 2004/2005 but 200nl then was playing like 4nl now (I'm not even slightly exaggerating). It's actually hilarious to watch and it has inspired me to put more time and effort into the time-machine I've been working on - yes, after whistle stop tours and brief excursions to... like... Ancient Rome... erm... Mexico during the height of Mayan civilization... cheeky peek at the dinosaurs... see if that Jesus fella actually lived up to the hype... etc... I think I would settle for playing poker circa early 21st C.
Hi Steve Good to see you back posting, albeit slightly downcast.,on the bright side., you’re writing, breathing, eating,drinking, sleeping ~ things can only get better right 😊
Hi Steve Good to see you back posting, albeit slightly downcast.,on the bright side., you’re writing, breathing, eating,drinking, sleeping ~ things can only get better right 😊
Hey T-bone. You forgot swimming, coldshowering and smoking but, yes, I suppose I am doing those things, although my decade long on/off insomnia is currently on and has sliced my sleeping abilities to ribbons. Once I get it sorted, the bright side will get a good coat of looking at. It's a pleasure to have you here, as ever, hope all's good with you.
Comments
(i) I haven't heard i.'pessimism is the antidote to disappointment' before and whilst I'm (generally) inclined to agree, I'm not being entirely self-deprecating in saying that my play wasn't up to scratch. I did rush at it a bit. It's a bit clunky. It's just a bit...off, for want of a better word. But I didn't write it for broadcast, not really, it was my first stab at a radio play and, perhaps more importantly, ii. I wanted to prove that I could set myself a writing goal and achieve it. My past is littered with half-finished/abandoned writing projects. It's certainly galvanised me and I feel confident about getting this book done by the end of the month. Good times.
(ii) iii.The flips were reasonably flippy/standard: calling 10bb jams w/AQ, jamming with 12 bigs over a min-open w/TT, lumping in my remaining 6.5 bigs bvb w/K7s - that kind of thing. I think (?) it was on @Duesenberg 's thread where you and I were inclined to agree over a bubble spot that was considered standard and I tend to lean towards anti-YOLO'ing and questioning/looking at 'standard' spots with some scrutiny. TBQH, I wasn't really giving too much thought to my play this week and just kind of sailing along and consider MTTs more of a fun diversion from cash and play them more for pleasure than for any sort of profit. That said, I think they could well be one of the more value-y forms of online poker around at the moment so I might put more work into my MTT game. Let's see.
(iii) iv.Still a little under the weather, but with my recreational peccadilloes that tend to come out at the weekends, this is something of a blessing, especially if I want to carry on this industry until the end of the month.
Thanks again for your post.
i. I might have made that up
ii. Ah, I see, makes sense. Congratulations on achieving that goal and (rightfully) feeling good about it - I hope you can resolve your computer complication and make some progress with the book also.
I'm not a writer. I wrote a
book novellashort story once. My German girlfriend had informed me that she wasn't actually prepared to make a go of our long distance relationship after all, I had stopped going to lectures at Manchester Uni (Manchester Met - I couldn't get into Manchester University) I was drinking lots (not in the normal/sociable way you're supposed to as a student) I would sit in my room (at the halls of residence on Daisy Bank Road) surrounded by bottles of cheap Rioja, listening to stuff like The Past is a Grotesque Animal (of Montreal) Gloomy Sunday (The Associates) In Shreds (The Chameleons) I'm so Tired (Fugazi) Needle of Death (Bert Jansch) and reading Moon Palace (Paul Auster)The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe, Crime and Punishment, Der Steppenwolf (Herman Hesse), The Pigeon (Patrick Süskind) and Hunger (Knut Hamsun)... the story was greatiii. Ssstandard.
iv. Every cloud
Very interesting post. I too had a German girlfriend once and we split up after a heated discussion over how Bukowski should be pronounced. That, and other things.
You've got to pick your battles, I suppose.
I only own Ham on Rye by Bukowski... bought for me by my German girlfriend... the pronunciation of his name one of the few things we didn't argue about.
This is precisely correct: you say (well, she said) BuKOVski, I say BuCOWski - etc. My point to her was that if he chose to pronounce his name BuCOWski and if that was generally accepted in the US, then that was how his name was pronounced. "No no no," went ex-girlfriend, "I'm German and it's pronounced BuKOVski..."
And so on.
I'm going to be writing about poker and other stuff again soon.
Apart from arguing over the pronunciation, I think the dialog about Germans would have made for interesting discussion.
I would post a quote or two but getting it past the filters would take too long.
Erm, the goals are in tatters. I've earned zero points so far this week and fewer than 500 last week, so priority is looking unlikely, at best. Four-figure profit is also looking unlikely, albeit less so. Cold showers have gone out of the window. Ditto meditation.
On a more positive note - and here at my diary we all like a more positive note, all of us - I did do my radio play, have written a letter to Viz, steamed into the book (61,000 words at the moment) and one or two other green shoots.
The last couple of days have been taken up with the breaking scandal surrounding the Facebook data breach, Cambridge Analytica, SCL, Alexander Nix and so on. Quite a while back I used to work for that bunch - some of that work involved writing political speeches and manifestos for political parties, but the bulk of my work was actually spent doing socially benign stuff. I know: far out.
Anyway, I've been doing a bit of writing around that. It's been a bit emotionally and mentally tiring. At the end of my working day yesterday all I wanted to do was go and play live poker, but I quickly drank five small beers and half a bottle of wine (I wasn't drunk, though) and decided playing poker was a bad idea. Progress, readers.
Any ideas, readers, for getting a bit of enthusiasm back? I keep finding myself drifting off during sessions and auto-piloting/cutting sessions off early. Have been deliberately putting myself in spots to see if I can wrestle my way out of them but it all feels a bit forced and gruelling. It's reached the stage where I've been casting glances at the four card game, thinking "Perhaps I should learn that..."
I'm afraid I don't know what the answer is but, if you find it, please let me know!
Even though things slightly improved this evening - second in the 6:15pm rebuy, won at cash - March has been a bit of a shambles in terms of achieving goals. Poker enthusiasm has (somewhat) evaporated, my intentions for the month lie in tatters, my book is unfinished, my showers are hot, my bank manager points at me in the street and laughs. That kind of thing.
Still, on a positive note, I've only been drunk once. And I did complete a couple of writing projects. Plus I did make some money at poker. Anyway, roll on April where I'll be keeping my goals to myself. To celebrate not getting drunk for nearly a month, I'm off to do lots of drinking and bonhomie-ing tomorrow, so expect an update somewhere around the middle of next week.
Happy Eastering, readers.
It's a little disconcerting going through my old poker columns for this book.
Within a couple of months of starting playing poker, back in 2012, I'd final tabled a $5 rebuy and scooped up $700. I've forgotten what $700 looks like. Forgotten, in fact, what a final table looks like.
A few months after that, I was (at least somewhat) regularly playing 100NL. Now, I'm a 10/20NL I-don't-know-what. Like I said: disconcerting.
Still, to misquote The Big Lebowski, this regression will not stand. I don't have anywhere near enough dough or skills (or, perhaps most worryingly, enthusiasm) at the moment to make £5/10 live by the end of next month and wrap this challenge up, so fingers are going to have to get well and truly pulled out.
More less-bleak updates to follow, hopefully.
I wouldn't be too harsh on yourself there. In 2018 20nl probably plays tougher than 100nl of 2012.
Good to see the diary back
+1 to what Dues said. If you want to see hard evidence of this Lex Veldhuis is currently doing an "Oldschool" video series (on YouTube) where he is reviewing his cash game sessions from back in the day. Admittedly, he is currently reviewing 2004/2005 but 200nl then was playing like 4nl now (I'm not even slightly exaggerating). It's actually hilarious to watch and it has inspired me to put more time and effort into the time-machine I've been working on - yes, after whistle stop tours and brief excursions to... like... Ancient Rome... erm... Mexico during the height of Mayan civilization... cheeky peek at the dinosaurs... see if that Jesus fella actually lived up to the hype... etc... I think I would settle for playing poker circa early 21st C.
Good to see you back posting, albeit slightly downcast.,on the bright side., you’re writing, breathing, eating,drinking, sleeping ~ things can only get better right 😊