Hmmm

Well, been at it again. Tonight I have had the worst streak of bad luck I think I have ever had, at least when it comes to playing cards. I entered a few tournaments to practice. I think a total of 6 Sit'N'Gos... I won 2, came 2nd 3 times and 3rd once. 2 of the seconds I was just having such bad luck that I decided to just throw all in on a weak hand to get it over with, since every time I gained ground I would get no playable cards for 8-10 consecutive deals afterwards. It was just brutal... and when I say unplayable, I mean unplayable rags. Unsuited stuff, 3-8, 2-7... and the occasional face card would be a J or Q accompanied by an unsuited deuce or 3. I saw those cards over and over and even played a couple of the face cards since we were heads up or there were only 3 at the table. But, basically, if you can't win one hand in 5 it is almost impossible to break even. Frustrating! The interesting thing was the worst of the bad luck streak came in the middle of a tournament I decided to enter. It was a "Freeroll" tournie, but listed under the play money section of PartyPoker so I am assuming the $250 payout was play money as well. Earlier ones in the evening had had 6000 players. but the one I went into at 1am had 5183. It was an interesting experience... I managed to finish 251st in it, which is in the top 5%. Considering the run of cards I got, I can't complain - if I had had anything good in a run of about 22 straight deals I likely could have cracked the top 100. I am really starting to wonder if I don't play aggressively enough. I have prided myself on trying to be unpredictable, and not bluffing often. I have controlled my losses and gained most of the time but when luck runs bad, I wonder if I should press or just hope for a turn? Heck, I am not even sure I believe in luck really but mathematical probability says I should not have streaks that are so bad for so long. I guess I should be happy with the progress. After only a little over a week of learning, I seem to be good enough to beat 90% or more of the people out there and I guess that means I will win more often than not. I definitely found a few tougher opponents today though. Which is surprising, considering the reputation of Party Poker for having some really juicy lame opponents. Well... its very late. Time for one more round.

Tournies

Today, I did something new. I have been playing online with play money, trying to get lots of experience. I read something, and then go on and try to apply it. There is a problem - I have no idea how representative play money is of how people play for real money. I am assuming that many will play a much looser game since "it's just play money". I actually have been trying to avoid those people like the plague, because I am not learning anything from someone who can throw 1000 bucks around and not take it seriously as at least a way of scoring. Last night, I was reading some things and watching some videos and I found there was some advice out there I hadn't yet tried to follow: Play in Sit'N'Go tournaments, because although some don't take it seriously there are enough that take pride in winning that when the table gets short handed you should be up against some decent players. This serves 2 purposes - you learn to play short handed and head-to-head, a skill which is different from playing with 10 people around a table, and it better represents how people would play if playing seriously (a.k.a. for real money). I played a total of 5 tournaments today. How did I do? I won 2. I came in 2nd once. I came in 3rd once. And in the last I came in 4th. Only top 3 finishers in these small tournies get money. So, 4 out of 5 times I would have won something. For example, had I been playing in the $6 PokerStars games, I would have paid $32.50 to play and I would have made $81. Of course, what I actually earned was something like $4050 in play money, which does not buy a lot of groceries - but hey, maybe the potential is there?

First Post.. But Not Day 1

Look! A new blog! Just what the world needs - another blog. This one, though, has a purpose other than ranting. This is to document my foray into the world of poker. Sure, the nature of the game says I will rant for sure, sometimes... but I'm doing this to record how far I come and how much I learn. A little over a week ago, I discussed with my wife the possibility that I may be able to earn us just a few extra bucks a month playing poker. I've played poker since I was around 8 years old when I learned from some kids at school. Since then, I have played at various times - usually 5 card draw or 7 card stud - just for fun or for penny-ante stakes. I've often been the winner, but never in any serious way. I've played poker video games for ages. So, I have the basics down, or I thought I did. I am sure you are asking yourself now - why would anyone want to try taking up serious poker for money in their late 30s? Mid-life crisis or something?! You see, I have a chronic illness which often keeps me in bed and definitely at home. I can't go out and earn cash like some people can. So, we're pretty poor, and the prospects are decidedly limited. She's in the process of trying to start up a business to work from home and I've felt that I was not going to be able to contribute much other than possibly doing her book work since she is mathematically challenged- I don't mean that in a mean way, she really has a learning disability relating to numbers and it takes her a very long time to do what takes me only a few minutes. Since I realistically would only be doing that a few hours a week, I have wondered about a way to earn some money myself to help boost things around here. Due to my illness, however, there are several problems with work, even working from home:

1) I have virtually no endurance physically. Anything demanding exhausts me. Therefore, I need to be able to do something I can actually do from bed.

2) There are days I can't do much of anything. I need a way to earn money that will allow me to do it when I am up to it and skip it when I am not.

3) Due to the above issues, I need something that will not prevent me from having any kind of life with my family. When you need 14+ hours of sleep a day that leaves under 70 hours a week to do everything else. Add up how many hours a week you spend just in the bathroom or eating, and you get the idea.

I have seen numerous stories and articles over the year about people playing poker professionally - and I thought, these folks are nuts. How can they gamble as a way of making a living? I'd often considered looking into it to understand better, but never got around to it. However, over the past few weeks I had encountered literally a handful of people who claimed that they made a living playing poker. I decided it was time to explore it. Of course, there is a lot of hype and horseshit out there but after checking it out, it actually seemed viable. You see, there seem to be some keys to making a living at it. First, you need a good memory. Although I do have issues with "brain fog", I do have times where it is not too bad and I still am able to retain things at an above-average level. There was a time I had an eidetic memory and it would come in very handy for this, but I can no longer rely on it the way I once could - but its still "good enough", it seems. Especially if I can make notes to help myself. Second, you need to be able to do some math - the faster and more accurately you can do it, the better. You can also rely on that memory I mentioned to memorize a bunch of tables, but that doesn't quite cover things when you get "off the reserve", something that happens often enough in poker to be a concern. In school I was in the top percentages of Canada in the various Waterloo Math Contests back in the day... I am decent with numbers. Third, you need time and patience. Well, other than needing a lot more sleep than most people, I have lots and lots of time and nothing but patience. Fourth, you need to be able to keep your head in a crisis - emotional control. You can't get too high or too low. You can't get angry or upset. I am by nature a passionate person, but it is a controlled passion - I don't go out of control. Probably years of high-stress management jobs back in my teens and twenties have contributed a lot to that - generally the worse a crisis gets, the calmer I am able to be. Those are the basics to start with. Other factors obviously include things like knowledge and experience, but knowledge will be gained by both learning theory and practice, and experience just takes lots of time. I can't MAKE any of those things and they aren't things that are inherent skills, they are learned. I won't be able to implement anything or learn anything until I try, so that's what I have to do. So, back to what I was saying: I discussed trying this with the wife. I expressed to her concerns that starting out could be difficult but I was going to just play very small games and see how it goes. SHE was more enthusiastic about it and confident than I was. To be honest, I don't get it, but I guess she believes in me. Great! More pressure! Anyway, last Tuesday I decided one of the things I needed to do was to get some experience. I began playing online using play money at Party Poker, and a few days later switched to PokerStars after reading some information about their software being certified by a security company. I went on a hunt for books about poker - ebooks, library books - anything I could lay my hands on - and began my education. This weekend I watched everything on TV that was poker related, and discovered video was a big help - so this will be another thing I will use as a tool. That brings me to there here and now. I can't believe how much I have learned in a week. I can't believe how much more I have to learn! I am filled with both hope and dread. Will this work out and help our dreams actually come true? Who knows? Stay tuned.