Scrambled thoughts on poker, not the NCAA tournament

My wife would disagree with me, but really, I have thought about other things than basketball (Rock Chalk Jayhawk!) since the NCAA tournament started.
Like poker, for instance.

And, oh, making sure the twins don't crawl down the stairs.
(Really, what is it with a baby's propensity to commit suicide? The population would be much, much lower if babies were allowed to act on their own. Maybe that's why it's an issue: We really all are lemmings at heart and are just trying to control the population, and our parents, because they've spent a few months (make that 10) getting up three times a night, won't let us plunge off the cliff. Maybe if our wives gave birth three weeks after getting pregnant, this wouldn't be a problem, but then again that wouldn't be as much fun as four months of getting yelled at for cutting a grapefruit in front of her, three months of crying jags and two months of snoring loud enough to wake three states.
Dear Girls: The stairs are dangerous. It's also not wise to shove every throat-sized thing you see on the floor, like the dog food, down your throat. Love, Daddy).

Thought #1 - Don't go to bed angry. That's what our preacher told us during those pre-marriage sessions that the Catholic church requires (along with pledging your first born and promising not to use birth control, the last of course we did with fingers crossed). And yet I have had trouble not taking stupid plays and bad beats to bed.
The problem is you're probably going to have one or the other every time you play an hour or more of online poker. I never play a session perfectly, for instance, and suckouts always happen to me, as they do to anyone who understands that if you are re-raised and you are holding J-K os, you should probably fold.
After waking up still mad and frustrated, I've decided that enough is enough. My health is good and I'm in great shape, so it would be stupid to blow up my heart on stress related to poker. Besides, I don't play high limits and poker, ultimately, is about making a little money while having fun. It's not a job. Not even close.
Once I made that resolution - call it my New March Resolution - I had one of my best runs of the year today, almost 12 miles and feeling great. I hope there's a connection there.
I can't say I'll live up to the resolution - most people don't - but I'll continue to try.

Thought #2 - Usually when I have a big hand on the river, I'm having a hard time these days deciding whether to value bet, check and hope for a bet so I can raise, overbet for value (usually just jamming) or bet lightly and hope for a raise.
I'm usually failing on the side of overbetting because I figure the times they do call will make up for the times I get nothing out of the river bet. Skalansky advocates this as well.
I still believe this although lately I'm having a hard time getting my monsters paid, and I don't think I'm playing overly tight (plus I'm playing at the lemming level where they don't pay attention to table image too much), though that is always my nature.
Your thoughts?

Thought #3 - I have been more aggressive lately in cash games and it seems to be paying off, though I'm still jamming at the wrong times occasionally (on the river, when I have no fold equity) and just jamming with high pocket pairs instead of playing them better.
This seems to be making me money, though I've made two bad mistakes lately that cost me more profit, mistakes I would not have made, because I"m trying to be more aggressive.
I suppose this is what we call learning.
Like learning that crawling down the stairs is not a good thing. The trick is for it not to kill you before the lesson is learned.

There ain't no cure for the post-race blues

Sunday I ran five miles.
Every step was a struggle.
I could barely maintain a 9-minute-mile pace when just a week ago I was running at 8:35 without much effort.
So what’s the difference?
One is that not sleeping as well as I should - two tiny girls have something to say about that for now - may be catching up to me.
Two is I gave blood a few days ago, and that’s literally robbing your system of oxygen. At sea level that’s a slight problem. At 5,000 feet that hurts.
Mostly, though, I’m suffering from something else.
We runners call it the post-race blues, and I think it pertains to my life, not just my running.
The Bolder/Boulder is a tough race, and my body is still feeling the effects of running hard for 50 minutes.
This, though, goes beyond effort.
Training for an event is a tricky thing when your main goal is to be fit for life. You start to see the race, the mountain, whatever, in your bathroom mirror in the morning. Skipping a workout doesn’t happen because of The Goal. You eat well, sleep well (if you can) and take care of yourself. You are focused.
And then the day comes, and then it’s over.
It’s impossible not to have a letdown.
I have other goals for the summer. I have Race for the Cure, a 5K, on July 4. I have another 10K, the Human Race, on July 28. I have several mountains I’ll be guiding this summer. But those goals are distant, and the sense of urgency isn’t there right now.
And that brings me to the twins.
A birth, especially this birth, was much like a race. We didn’t know the exact day, but we worked for it, and when it got here, we worked and worked and worked and ran and charged up hills and got up at 3 a.m. and changed a mountain of diapers.
And then, well, now we continue to do it.
Parenting doesn’t have a finish line. That doesn’t mean there aren’t any letdowns.
The girls have been so good, I’m nervously waiting for the other, Exorcist-like side, to come out. I’m wondering if they’re good only because Mom is here, and when she leaves, will chaos, instead of being kept on the sidelines, will charge off the bench. I’m wondering if I’ll be getting up at 3 a.m. for months, not weeks.
I’ve gotten an invitation to play a home game this weekend. I hope I can make it but I’m thinking I can’t. I haven’t had a good poker game with my buddies in at least a month. I haven’t even seen a movie with them. I miss them. I am wondering how long it will take for Kate to start to view our increasingly clingy and active toddler as Dennis the Menace and not our lovable little guy.
The grind, already, is getting to me a bit.
My poker game has reflected the post-race blues a bit, seesawing back and forth $25 up and down, and yet I still believe I’m playing well. I’m playing, I believe, better than ever, dumping two pairs and sets with abandon when its so obvious my opponent has drawn out on me (and that has happened FAR TOO MUCH lately). Yes, it’s possible my opponents are merely making moves on me, but this being $25 NL, I doubt it. You just don’t see it at that level. Every other time someone else has looked them up, they’ve got their third club or that made straight.
There are days when life gets drenched in the post-race blues. One thing I have learned.
It’s best to attempt to put on your running shoes, put the feet forward, and start churning away toward the next high.
So here I go.

It's not my fault

You've probably already heard about the Cards at the World Series of Poker.

Those cards are Poker-P-E-E-K cards.

I am Poker-P-E-A-K-E-R.

P-E-E-K
P-E-A-K

See the difference?
Good.


In other news, I'm nearly as weary as you might think. The twins are still relatively easy-peasy and are basically sleeping through the night, albeit with some feedings and some 11 p.m. fussing, usually right when Daddy is planning to check-raise his set on a two-flush board.
They also seem to have a knack for shitting when we take the diaper OFF. Sweeties, you've got it backward. At least I think you do. Maybe you're doing it on purpose.
And Allie seems to have a knack for sensing my presense. She sleeps a lot but when I'm in charge of watching them, she pitches a fit and kinda makes it clear she wants to be held. So I hold her, and she looks up at me and whines occasionally until I talk to her.
Is this how it starts?
Ya know, I DO control your destiny right now, little ones. Perhaps you shouldn't toy with me.
Mom has been a Godsend here. I truly don't know how we're going to do it when she leaves in a few weeks.

Now that I'm strictly a cash game player - I haven't played an SnG in weeks, and I only make it out to the Mookie, where I finished a respectable 14th last week - I'm getting a little tired of the see-saw battle. I've been up to $700 on Ultimate Bet, where I'm mostly playing right now, and I've been down to $635 all last month. I would love to blame most of it on suckouts. And, yes, the suckouts have been horrific and plentiful (as an aside, I sure would like to suck out, but I have this darned knack to keep getting my money in ahead most of the time; how stupid of me). But I've also made the occasional stupid play that bumps me back a bit.
Last night I thought I played as well as I ever have and I finished $1 up. Sometimes it truly isn't about the results.

I'm also feeling weary after the 10K race and giving blood for the first time in a year (and, I suppose, not sleeping my full 8 every night). Time to get the energy back up. I need wings!

It may work, but does it improve me?

I had a great week at the cash tables. In fact, other than the Mookie and tonight's event with the birthday girl, I didn't play any tournaments this week.
What I did do is three-table $25 NL poker and did well every night, save for one night when my set got oversetted and a guy sucked out on my QQ with A,J (twice in the same night, eerie).
I wonder, though, how healthy this is for my game.
In some ways I believe it improves me. The money doesn't mean as much, so I'm able to play more aggressively. I believe that's partly the key to my success this week.
But in other ways I"m not sure. Trolling around and waiting for others to make mistakes is not necessarily power poker. Even when I'm bluffing and pushing people off hands every night, for the most part I"m simply waiting for mistakes.
I remember when I was playing the $10 tables at Bodog Poker. I probably made $400 in two months by three-tabling those babies for two hours every night. Was the poker interesting? Sort of. It was still poker. But was it profitable? You bet.
I haven't played $25 in so long, and yet that's where most of my profits probably come from. I have played a lot of $50 and done well there. I"m only slightly ahead at $100, and I think that's because the money means a lot more.
Is it good for my game to play at a low level? I'm not sure. The players are better than they were two years ago when I started. Are they a LOT better? No. Are most any good? Not really.
Is the money good however?
You bet.
What do you all think about this?


In the meantime, here's what I'm talking about:




Hope to see you there.

Crushing the Minnows

I have never "gotten" American Idol.
I don't begrudge too many folks for watching it. But really it's a crappy show. It's an overblown karaoke contest, and the winner gets to release a bad album. I mean did anyone like Taylor Hicks' album? Really?

I'm saying that, of course, not to bag on karaoke, so relax, Soul Brother. Karaoke is fine for what it is. Most of the people having fun in a bar, I'm assuming, aren't out for a record deal.
There's a lot more to singing than just getting the notes right (and half of this year's contestants don't seem to nail that too well). There's expression and mood and, most of all, interpretation, and every single singer, save, maybe, for Kelly Clarkson, are about as interesting as a bowl of Cherrios in skim milk. There's no style, surprisingly little substance and yet it's the top show every week.
I don't get it.
Which is why I love Sanjaya.




American Idol fans recoil in horror at this mess of a human being. Pot Committed, in her brilliant reviews of the show (almost makes me want to watch it, but I've long since been one of her blog's biggest fans, so she could write about the virtues of lawn care and I'd read it), tells us to put Sanjaya out of his misery.
No way, Jose.
Sanjaya exposes the show for what it is. They picked him, now they can deal with him. Vote for this guy every week until he's the winner. Please. Everyone sucks anyway. Let's have some fun with it and embarass the show. It certainly deserves it.



In the meantime, I have been feeding on the minnows at $25 NL poker again. I hadn't played it for months but I've gotten back to it on Ultimate Bet. Why? I deposited $200 there just before the whole Neteller thing went down. Since then I've treated each bankroll on my three poker sites as a separate account. I haven't signed up for ePassporte yet because I'm a little leery after still having $700 of my monies being trapped in virtual land. If others have had good experiences with it let me know.
So now my bankroll is $475 on Ultimate Bet, and so I'm still being responsible with it. Plus the players still are bad there. It's almost hard to resist. I'll start playing $50 soon, once I build the bankroll a little more on UB.
I find myself playing more and more cash games these days and fewer and fewer SnGs. I've found my win rate is much higher in the cash games.
Plus, speaking of the non-minnow crowd, I've found that stuff like the tournament below seems to satisfy my appetite for tournaments.

And here's where you'll see me tonight:




We've had a good crowd the last couple of times, so stop on by and watch me blow another big lead!