Just a quick question;

I want to do the Nevada Chips promotion on PokerSource. Where should I make a deposit? Specifically, I'm looking for which site isn't going to annoy the fuck out of me.

PokerRoom?
Absolute?
Poker Share?
BoDog?

Ready...ANSWER!

Egg and cheese bagel-check
Sugary foofoo coffee drink from Caribou large enough to put a man the size of a houseboat in a diabetic coma-check
Jack Johnson playing in the background-check.

Now where did I place that strap-on...

Oh! Hello. You guys are still here? I'm sorry, that could've been embarrassing.

I'm not gay, but I do play one on Tv. Either that or I stayed in a Holiday Inn Express last night, I never can remember. One thing I do know is that I have been playing a lot of poker the last week, though. And I am ready to write.

About a week ago, I remembered reading about someone in this cute, little community using Poker Source Online . Being that I'd decided a month ago to quit funding new accounts with money I shouldn't be losing, I thought, hey, what do I have to lose?

Why yes, English is my native language. Why do you ask?

Anyhow, I chose the $50 Instant Bankroll option at Titan because of the grand tales of super soft games, and loose women. Or was it the other way around? No matter. Let me say this, though; I've never been happier playing on a subpar site in all my life. Well, save for my stint at Doyle's last year.

The graphics don't suck that hard, and the players are just as bad as I'd been warned. Like, really fucking bad.

For example;

Imagine, if you will, that you're playing a .25c-.50c 6 max table directly across from me, and I've got a stack 3x the size of the max table buy-in. There's no way for you to know that I started off buying in short, though, with $35.

Sitting UTG with $50, you look down at your girly online hole card cam and see pocket 4's. Ah, the good, ol'...two fours. I don't know of another name for the hand, so I'll leave it as that; The Two Fours. Forgive me; I was up until 5:30am this morning chasing down a complete fish. I don't have the, how do you say, um, creativity to come up with something else. Yeah, run with that.

At any rate, you decided to limp with your Two Fours. Reasonable enough, wouldn't you say? Please do. Plink! Your 4 bits splashes into the pot unremarkably. Oh oh, the button--who just happens to be as handsome as he is an incredible .25c-.50c NL player--raises it to $2. Everybody else folds, and since you already have money in the pot, there's no way you can fold until you see the flop, you giany pussy, you.

Flop:6-5-2 rainbow

Not a bad flop for your pre-flop monster, so you decide to lead out for about 3/4 the size of the pot; $3. The button raises to $8. Shit, dude, he's bluffing you, though, so you call. Duh.

Turn: 6

That doesn't exactly help your hand, but you don't think it hurts you, either. But what do you know about thinking? Well, you don't know much and lead out for about 1/2 the pot this time; $10. The sexy man on the button doesn't put you on a 6, so he jams for the rest of your stack. Oh hell, you're probably ahead, and there's a 143% chance that the he's bluffing at you again, so you make the brilliant decision to call off your last $30.

So, let's get this straight; you've been raised pre-flop, on the flop, and significantly on the turn. At what point in early childhood development were you dropped on your head, repeatedly, to make you think you're ahead here? The only way you're ahead is if a rogue wave(sorry, been watching too much Deadliest Catch) comes through the internet and wipes your opponents cards off the virtual table, thus rendering his hand dead. That's the only way.

Of course you look like a genius when a 3 comes on the river to complete your straight to best your opponent's AA. Granted, it's the funny brand of genius requires you to drool on yourself and have an abject fear of anything resembling interpersonal communication, but it's genius nonetheless.

This is just one example of the special kind of stupid I've only seen at Titan. In the last week, I've seen more min-raises of min-raises than I care to count. I've seen people make a min-bet bluff into a $35 pot, and be mad that the got called by bottom pair. The Why Me? Syndrome runs rampant, that's for sure. When you're raising K3o UTG, and get beat by the BB's K2 that two pairs, there's no other explanation than utter retardation.

When I started out last with the initial $50, I--like I should've--started at the micro limit NL tables. .5c-10c, I think. After breaking even there for a few days, I got frustrated and moved up to the .25c-.50c tables. And maybe I've just been lucky to hit an incredible run of cards, but I'd like to believe that I play better when the money matters to me. A $10 buy-in means nothing to me, and that ends with subpar play. Lack of concentration and the Aw Fuck Its are certainly in attendance.

But when the money matters to me, I'm much more interested in what's going on. Granted, a $50 table buy in is not a large amount of money, comparatively, but it's enough that if I double up once, it'll pad my bankroll by a large amount. I don't scour the internet for random bits of nothing inbetween hands, I don't pay attention to the tv, and I most definitely don't get bored. Hell, I played 10 hours yesterday, and the only reason I stopped was because I could hear birds chirping outside my window, announcing that daybreak was not far off.

I have another 400/4500 Titan Points to work off until the bankroll is actually mine, and from there I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it. I've got a decent chunk to work with after a few great sessions last night where I doubled up on all three tables I was playing, and even was tripled up for a bit on two of 'em. I might make a deposit at Absolute and go after that set of Nevada Jacks that PSO is offerering. I am a chip nerd, and I've always wanted a good set of chips. Yeah, it's hard getting a consistant game together, but a boy can dream.

*****

Reason #365 that a popping poker bubble is a joke:

Easter is one of the few holidays where my family all gets together with the sole intention of not trying to stab eachother with an electric knife. It's a chore.

We're not fancy people, oh no. And because of that, I didn't wear what would be considered my 'tail chasing clothes'. It's just not appropriate. I wore a clean pair of jeans and a t-shirt covered by my Party Poker hooded sweatshirt. The only thing I've ever recieved from that abomination of a site, besides the painful syphilis(don't ask), is a stupid hooded sweatshirt.

And I wear the fuck out of it. I wear it to the store; I wear it to the coffee shop; I wear it to the bar, all because it's so comfortable. It's hard to believe that anything pertaining to a site that has monetarily raped me in the past--like Party Poker has--sent me one of my favorite pieces of clothing, for free! The only thing in my wardrobe I like more is my neoprene codpiece.

The whole family is sitting at my aunt's house in S. Minneapolis, talking while the television hummed in the background. I'm not sure how I came away with so little real gamble in me, because both my mom and aunt love to gamble. Give it 15 years and they'll totally be the two old ladies sitting at a bank of video poker machines at 3am, with a Carlton cigarette in one hand and a slack oxygen hose in the other. No joke.

They were were asking me my opinion on the possible law changes against internet gambling, when a Party Poker commercial started.

Need somebody to play with? Ooooooooooooooo....get some real friends.

My cousin's 7 year old daughter immediately looked at me and said "Oooh, that's the same as on your shirt!"

That the product brand was immediately recognizable to a 7 year old is a good sign that the boom is nowhere near being over.

Thoughts on this?

Word of warning; this entry will contain nary a coherent thought, nor will it be all that thought-provoking or mind-blowing. Hey, I know how you've come to expect that sort of thing from me, but I can't be on all the time, now can I? Well, yes, I can, but for the sake of this blog...no, I can't.

But the real answer is 'yes'.

We finally got our internet problems fixed at home, and it only took us a little under 3 weeks to accomplish. Well, it wasn't so much a fix as it was a blatant lie to our internet provider that we fixed it. Suckers. Instead of formatting 5 computers because we're too stupid to figure out which computer was, indeed, infected, we did the next best thing; disconnected the two computers from our router voted most like to succeed at becoming infected, and act as if all was well. Doo doo doo dooo...nothing to see here. Move along.

So far, no more emails from the internet security department. We're genius, I tells ya. Genius. What's the plural of genius?

And because of our inherent laziness(and overall craftiness as lying, cheating human beings) it means that I can once again play poker on my naked lady box. This time through, though, I decided to start out small; only $50 on Stars, and if I go broke, I don't deposit again until...something happens that justifies another deposit. Not sure what that might yet, but it's a nice rule to have just in case.

I've resorted to what I like to call "Pussy Poker". If you're offended by that word, it can also go by "Pansy Poker". If you're gay, well, I'm sorry. That's it; I'm sorry.

I guess you could also call it the Shortstack Mentality; buy in for the minimum and push when you're committed, which happens an awful lot. It doesn't take a whole lot of brain power, nor does it leave any room for outplaying anybody(not that it's ever been an issue with me before), but it is an easy, mindless way to make money. And for now, that's fine by me.

Let's say you have $8 in front and you're dealt AcAd UTG. You raise it up 6x BB. The rest of the table is clearly retarded, and this type of raise will get called in at least 3 spots. And it does. Exactly three people do call; UTG+1, the CO and the button. Both blinds fold. So, there's $6+blinds(I told you this was micro limit, right?) in the pot, and the flop comes down a non-scary 2-6-10(I almost typed 2-7-10, but then I realized the comedy in my error).

As the first to act, what's your line?

If you didn't say "JAM!", come over here so I can introduce a cowboy boot to your taint. Twice. There's something to be said for the check-raise here, and that something is "It sucks". You figure to get it all in here anyhow, so you might as well just get it in first and hope that nobody has a set. There's just no room to find out if anybody does have a set, either.

So, that's what I've been doing, and it's been working alright for me so far.

Plus, it's 6 fucking dollars, you pussy. Damn, I don't know why I continue to hang out with you.
********
A few things that have been frustrating me about poker;

Frustration the one

A few weeks ago I walked into my normal Sunday bar, sat down at one of the ass-destroying barstools, and the bartender had my beer in front of me before I even had to complain about the stool. Before I go any further; yes, I do have a Sunday bar, and no, I would not like to go to a 'meeting' with you.

Anyhow, I'd learned that the bartender plays poker--a lot of it, actually, usually drunk--and that he's had similar bankroll management issues as have had I. Well, sort of. You see, he's the maniac that deposits for $100 and runs that all the way up or down until he either cashes out, or goes broke, all by quickly moving up levels during a session. If he, say, doubles up on a $1/2 NL table, he'll move to $10-$20 limit and then cash out the next morning after passing out. Either that, or he goes broke, but he's only out that initial $100.

"Hold on, I have to show you something" he said as he went to his jacket and pulled out a piece of paper. "I deposited $50 and just couldn't be stopped!"

It was a check for $2500 from Pokerstars.

Granted, we're different types of players, and he'll most likely lose all that in the long run, but where's my big score? What do I have to do to get over this grinding rut?

Frustration the two

The morning after we were lucky enough to attend the part at The Playboy Mansion[studio audience: oOoOoOo] we were also lucky enough to share the car with a WPT Champion.[studio audience: confused look] I'm not going to tell you his name, but I will say that it rhymed with "Gavin Smith". You figure it out. It was cool, not only to see how he played the game, but also to peek into how the game plays when there's a lot of money on the line.

Just for example, the initial raise plus the blinds--just the raise, mind you, no limpers--was just as much as I've won in my biggest pot ever. The average pot was bigger than my bankroll has ever been. It was unbelievable how much money was being shipped around the table, and it almost seemed to play like a .25c/.50c game, rather than $25/$50 game.

Unreal.

Frustration the three

I skim through 2+2 daily for funny or amazing threads, and the big thing lately is to post your Poker Pattern graph at the end of each month. Is anyone else amazed at how much money some of these kids--and a lot of them are just kids--are making? We're talking tens of thousands of dollars per month. True, not normal, but there are still a few people that are making that much. It's sick.
*****

The main problems I have with poker are purely mental, as I'm sure it is for many for you out there. You see millions of dollars of changing hands daily, and it comes to a point where you've got to say; what about me? It isn't fair. I've had enough now I want my share. Can't you seeEEee, I want to live...

What? Oh, like I'm the only one with that song stuck in their hand. I am? Well, not anymore.

I digress.

Has anyone else faced this? Or am I just a greedy twit that needs a slice of shut the fuck up, you greedy twit?

Hello,

I know I've been absent in this time of tremendous activity, and for that, I apologize.

I hope they believe my faux-sincerity. I never was a good liar.

Since returning from Vegas a week ago, I've played zero hands of poker. Nil. Zip. That sort of thing happens when Time Warner revokes your internetting priveleges after someone asshole hijacks a computer for use as a spammer.

Motherfucker. The genius that invented spam email needs to die. And if they've already succumbed to a horrible, painful disease--oh how I hope that's the case--they need to be reborn as a dung beetle so I can step on them with my point heel.

As it is, there's no way to tell which computer out of our 5 has the virus. Well, there technically is, but neither I, nor my roommates, are smart enough to figure it out in a timely manner. And it's impossible to Google any kind of knowledge base on the subject, without an internet connection. We aren't allowed an internet connection because of the security breach, and unless we reformat all the hard drives and start with completely clean machines, there's no way to figure out a solution without that internets connection. Damned if you do, fucked if you don't. Something like that.

I haven't played any poker in the last 9 days, and while that's fine, and I don't miss it terribly, I am having trouble trying to find ways to fill those off hours; the hours that would usually be filled by sitting on the couch, laptop bringing me closer to infertility, a stack of $5 chips from various Vegas poker rooms riffling through the fingers on my left hand.

Breaking news: There seems to be a development in the Poker Champ Debaucle of '06. It's confusing, and I don't like it one fucking bit. Eh, I'm just bitter. Bitter and clueless. Well, bitter because I'm clueless. Fuckers. And apparently 1:35pm is the predetermined mindfuck hour. Am I the only one not in on this? Christ.

Anyhow, I have far too much free time right now, especially considering it's not quite nice enough to run down Lake St. naked. In the past 4 days, I've done 5 loads of laundry, even though I only own 2 loads per week, max. I've cleaned my room twice, rearranged it once. I've taken 3 bags of garbage out the dumpster, even though 1 of those bags was half full, and garbage day was still 3 days away. I just needed something to do.

It's amazing how much of a time-suck poker was for me, and I didn't even realize how much it consumed me until this past week. It became even clearer after looking at my, uh, numbers of the past few months. They clearly show that I've been no better than break-even since the beginning of the year, and it's to the point where I need to re-tool before entering back into this foray again, or it's just not worth it. At all. I'm not leaving--I could never leave you people, even if you do backhand me for leaving the toilet seat up--but it's clear I need a new strategy.

So, until we I (like my roommates are going to fix it) fix this problem, all I can say is "See ya around".

I hate you fuckers.