Economics 101

In real-life economics, money is created when lenders borrow and redistribute assets repeatedly. The details are kind of difficult for me to explain because I don't fully understand them, but if you're interested, you can read about it here.

Money creation is a bit simpler when playing online poker. The FPS ePassporte bonus (bonus code EPASS) on the Party Poker skins is a good example. It's only a $50 bonus (or 10 percent of your deposit) for 250 raked hands played per site, but that can add up.

1. Select FPS ePassporte as your deposit option, fund it with $500 and pay the $25 fee, leaving you with $475 in your account.

2. Deposit $475 to Party Poker for $47.5 bonus (10 percent of $475). Play 250 hands. Withdraw profits plus bonus and original deposit to ePassporte.

3. Repeat step 2 at Empire Poker, depositing the transaction limit of $500 for a $50 bonus.

4. Repeat for PokerNow, Intertops Poker and Multipoker. Eurobet does not offer the EPASS bonus.

5. Be sure to take advantage of the "fish bonus," offered at all NL25 and NL50 games on the Party Poker sites. No bonus code required.

5. Withdraw money and add to bankroll. Profits typically equal $247 (EPASS bonus from five sites) plus $540 (fish bonus over 1250 raked hands).

And that, my friends, is what makes the world go 'round.

Link:
Bill Filmaff's Secret System -- The video especially is pretty funny

P.S. Of course, the IGMPAY bonuses at all the Party skins are better than the EPASS bonuses. But I did the IGMPAY bonuses months ago. Search the 2+2 Forums for details.

Big Game

In Anthony Holden's "Big Deal: One Year as a Professional Poker Player," he travels from his home game in Britain to private card clubs to psychiatrists to the World Series of Poker.

His is a journey of skill, wits and mental strength.

The inner poker game is what interested me most about this book, which I like to include in a kind of made-up trilogy of poker literature, along with "The Biggest Game in Town" by A. Alvarez and "Positively Fifth Street" by James McManus.

Poker is a game of internal ironies. Many people play a monetarily dangerous game because they secretly need to lose. Others gamble in casinos because their real-life bets seem mundane compared to the contrived circumstances of a card game.

Holden gambles with fierce competitiveness to avenge the hard-luck life of his father.

Few people play poker solely for the money -- it's too much of a mind game for that.

The top pros are fearless because for them, the game is not about money; rather, it's more about a battle of wits represented by clay-tinged chips on a field of green. You always hear pros talk about how it's more about the bracelet or the first-place finish than the money.

The detachment from the emotional and symbolic value of the chips allows the best players to play their best game, regardless of concerns about what the chips may signify. And yet, many of those same so-called professionals couldn't play well in a small-stakes game where the chips seemed smaller and there was less at stake.

The fact that there are more losers than winners at poker, and that the losers keep coming back, is evidence enough that hordes of people have more at stake than money.

In several recent blogs (including Poker on Film and Dead Money = AlCantHang), the authors have admitted that they are either poor or losing players. They continue because they have fun playing poker and they enjoy the challenge of improving their games.

Realizing and understanding our true motives at the poker table is not easy because it's so easy to deny reality. Bad players blame bad luck, good players point to variance -- both valid reasons for losing, but often used as smokescreens for underlying weaknesses in your game (not that I would ever do anything like that!) Losing players don't keep records of their net gains and losses because they like to tell themselves they're breaking even, or a little bit ahead. Many pros are known to play a tight, disciplined game at the poker table, but then leak it out at craps or blackjack as they delude themselves into thinking they're luckier than the house.

So good poker players often need to face the truth -- about their abilities, about the pointlessness of spending their time at a poker table instead of living, about the futility of wishing for good luck when the law of averages always prevails.

For me, the hard facts of life as reflected at the poker table are the most difficult to deal with.

How can I play a confident, fearless game knowing my own weaknesses? How can I ignore those weaknesses without falling into a cycle of denial about my game?

What motivates me to play well if the triviality of poker exceeds the importance of social interactions, thus mirroring the pointlessness of many of my activities?

Why should I care about winning or losing when the pixels on my laptop screen here in Chile are supposed to signify money that I transferred from my bank account to an online bank account to a poker site, to the point where it seems as artificial as the "faith" standard the North American currency is based on?

And yet I play on, with a stronger, more educated game than ever before, driven by deeper ambitions that outweigh these superficial neurosis that sometimes intrude on the psyche like tilt on a losing drunkard in Vegas.

I play poker because I need to prove myself, over and over again. I want to win. I want to make the fish pay for being fish, and I want to be rewarded for rising above their mediocrity. My desire is to feel superior until I am ready to humble myself again at the next-highest limit, and then start the rat race to the top over again.

Of course there are many other reasons. Like fun and profit, for example. But I have the most fun when I'm winning, thus satisfying my ego's need for progress, recognition and victory over the mundane trials of life that eternally threaten to put me on tilt.

Link:
Play in Wednesday's WPBT event on Poker Stars

Blinds

I was reading through the PokerTracker Guide today, which I've already recommended and reviewed. Seriously, if you have bought PokerTracker, buy the guide for $20.

Anyway, there's a link in the guide to a post about play from the blinds. The linked page was recently taken down, but the original information can be found in this thread. (Thanks Hank!)

This is good stuff. I've read and studied a lot about poker, but it seems like basic preflop play from the blinds gets neglected. And I know that blinds play will become much more important as I move up in limits and fewer people see the flop.

One important point is that I feel like I've been playing too tight from the big blind.

Here are some preflop highlights:

From the big blind

--"Against typical raises, call liberally with hands that have straight or flush potential, as well as pairs. Get away from big offsuit hands that are likely dominated. 65s is usually on par with KQ here."

--Call with any suited Ax, Kx, Qx, Jx, Tx or 9x

--Call with offsuit Ax, KQ-K9, QJ-Q9 and connectors down to 54

--Reraise frequently vs. steal raises

From the small blind

--Call or raise with almost any two suited cards, Ax, Kx, KQ-Q5, JT-J9 and offsuit connectors down to 54. Of course, tighten up a bit if the small blind is 1/3 the big blind, as in a 3/6 game

Of course, this is just a simple sampling of preflop play, and the actual post goes into far more detail.

Hand of the day:
Keep the aggression vs. small paired board?

Five Stupid House Rules, And Five Good Ones

Home games often have ridiculous ways of playing that detract from the experience and don't make sense. They drive me crazy!

Here's a list of some of the worst home game rules:

1) Five of a kind (with wild cards) beats a straight flush. No, I'm sorry, but I've never seen five of a kind on any poker hand chart. It's not a hand. If you have five 9s, it's four of a kind with a 9 kicker. Where did people get the idea that there's even such a thing as five of a kind?

2) You have to show your hand in the correct order after the showdown. Dudes, just show your cards instead of arguing about it for five minutes. No one cares! For the love of God, just get on with it.

3) You have to call your hand. Please, let the cards speak.

4) There's a max bet but no fixed limit. I guess that's no serious harm, but I'm going to bet the max more often than not.

5) You have to warn people before you pick up your chips to leave. I'm sorry, but where I come from, you can leave with your money any time you want.

And I have to list some rules I love:

1) If your girlfriend calls, you have to pay a penalty and throw money into the pot.

2) No rake!

3) The house is responsible for money missing from the pot.

4) Everyone pitches in for pizza.

5) You can smoke at the table.

Link:
Some notes on reading hands

Tourneys

Didn't I used to be good at tournaments? What happened?

I don't know. For some reason, while I was drunk last weekend, I got the idea that it would be a good idea to play in some tournaments. I guess that was the gambler in me talking.

So I waited until I was sober, logged into Poker Stars and played six tournaments, finishing 0-for-6. D'oh!

But I guess that's OK. Most of them were multitable tournaments, which seem like a crapshoot anyway.

I like to think of tournaments like the baseball playoffs. The Atlanta Braves make the postseason every year, and have won the World Series only once during their 13 straight seasons of winning their division. Some people say this means the Braves don't have what it takes to perform when it's all on the line, but I argue that it means that anything can happen in a short series.

From the Baseball Prospectus Web site: "Once you're there, lady luck is often your dominatrix and all bets are off."

Low buy-in tournaments seem like a fairly safe bet though. I gave my brother $50 for his birthday to open a poker account at Ultimate Bet, and he quickly dropped down to $2 playing $5 buy-in tournaments. But he clawed his way back up through the $1 and $5 tournaments, and is now sitting pretty with a $150 bankroll.

While I'm rambling on the subject, I think the poker community (ahem, Card Player magazine) focuses way too much on the live tournament scene. Only a small fraction of us will ever play in these $5,000 and $10,000 buy-in tournaments, and most of us only care about the major tournaments anyway.

These articles would be more useful if they talked more about strategy, tactics, other games and poker news. I get frustrated by the attention paid to poker celebrities and no limit hold em all the time.

Link:
How many 5 year olds ...

Bad Advice

Sometimes I wonder about Card Player magazine.

Do the authors know how to play poker? Do the editors?

In the recent Card Player with Jennifer Harmon on the cover, a column by Barry Tanenbaum called "Two No-Limit Hold'em Lesson Hands" has some awful advice. Click here to read the full column.

This is the paragraph that is terrible:

The player with the Ahearts Jhearts had a different sort of problem. With a royal-flush draw and a gutshot-straight draw, this player had 12 pure outs. Generally, though, the bet was too large for even that draw to be getting the correct pot odds to call. If he called and missed, another pot-sized bet would again be offering him the wrong price to call. In no-limit, however, there is always an interesting alternative to calling: raising. In limit poker, a raise here, while you sometimes see it, is normally self-defeating. The raiser typically gets called down and has to make his hand. Plus, in limit, any big draw almost always sees the proper odds to draw.

Just awful. If I have a nut flush draw, a gutshot straight draw and overcard outs, I'm going to raise it every single time.

Does Barry Tanenbaum know anything at all about limit poker? If not, he should stop writing about it like he's an authority.

I see this kind of crap in Card Player all too frequently. I like reading the magazine, but when it comes to strategy articles, I'm starting to think it's better to just skip over them unless I trust the author.

Link:
Party Poker bonus

It's raining fish

I despise fish, and yet I should love them.

If not for the fish, where would the money come from?

Most of my profits come from poor poker players, and I try to avoid confrontations with the more-skilled rounders.

By their nature, fish suck out. Their DNA tells them to not fold.

It's ingrained in their behavior, passed down from elder fish, that they play bad cards poorly. They raise when they should fold, they call when they should raise. They win when they should lose, but more often than not, they lose.

I hate fish because I hate losing to fish. And beating a fish is not very fulfilling because they deserve to lose.

Where do the fish come from? I keep worrying that they'll disappear, that someday they'll reform and suddenly learn how to play poker. I fear that they'll start reading books and forums and tighten their game.

Fortunately, these fish are goldfish. They'll always die, and there will always be more. There are plenty of fish in the sea.

My only recourse is to give them what they've been asking for: A quick mercy killing.

Link:
Poker Player Newspaper

Dodging Tilt

I got home from Spanish class this morning and almost logged in to Eurobet.

I desperately searched for any distraction, and luckily I found that the last episode of "Tilt" had finished downloading. I watched that, and it was characteristically lackluster. Fortunately, I'm a sucker for anything poker, so it wasn't too bad.

Then I looked back at my desktop and those 10 poker site icons just sitting there, waiting to be clicked on.

I resisted, and instead read through my new copy of "Baseball Prospectus" in preparation for my fantasy baseball draft.

Then I downloaded some photos that my dad had taken during my family's trip to Chile last week.

Finally I was hungry enough to extricate myself from my laptop and pour myself a bowl of Fruit Loops.

Then it was time to walk to work.

I was avoiding poker because I'm more likely to go on tilt while in the middle of this -175BB run.

I'd like to think I'm saving money right now, sitting at my desk at The Santiago Times, by not playing poker.

Mission accomplished; poker unplayed.

At least until after work.

Link:
Empire bonus (log on to your account to see if you're eligible)

Hookers and Poker

Lee (the consummate gambler), Adam (the hobbit-looking English kid) and I flagged down a cab on the streets of Santiago after our weekly poker game last night.

We all piled in when this woman came running and barged in the taxi door.

"Go, go!" she said in Spanish.

She was obviously flustered: out of breath, panicked and not making much sense. I understood only a little, and I think my fellow English-speakers only caught a little more than I did.

She slouched down in her seat so no one could see her from outside, and she didn't have any money to pay the fare when she asked to be let out a few blocks later. She had been talking crazy, not making any sense, and looking out the window for her unknown pursuer.

When she got out of the car, she immediately ran across the street and jumped into another taxi.

It was a weird end of the night. The only thing I can figure is that she was a prostitute on the run.

Poker itself was a good time.

We ordered the usual 2-for-1 Domino's pizza and played limit hold em the whole time. There was a left-over keg to drink from. I got wiped out, winning only one hand the entire time.

I didn't have any luck at Mexican poker, the winner-take-all game we finish the night with, either.

As Lee was walking out the door, he was disappointed that he had only broken even.

"Anyone want to bet on high card?" he asked.

So that started a wild round of betting on who could draw the higher card out of the deck. At its height, people were making side bets on who would draw the high card! Lee profited more than 20,000 pesos ($35), and I lost a couple thousand.

I even had to borrow my taxi fare from Lee.

Then I gambled some more of that away on high card!

Good thing I had enough left to pay the cab driver -- the prostitute sure didn't.

Hand of the day:
Tight spot for a baby set

Review: Winning Low Limit Hold 'Em

Lee Jones' "Winning Low Limit Hold 'Em" is like diet "Small Stakes Hold 'Em" by Sklansky and friends.

It's a good book, but it would have been much more useful if I had read it a long time ago rather than now.

But that isn't to say I didn't get something out of it.

The section on check-raising was useful because I had gotten into a groove of almost always betting out a strong hand and building a pot. The check-raising hand examples were useful, too. Jones suggests check-raising top pair Q off AQ as well as top pair K off KJ if the board isn't threatening.

The discussion about how to play weak kickers was also enlightening. I like the idea of raising the flop from late position and then checking the turn. This induces a bet on the river, which you can safely call.

Other than those two sections though, I felt like the book was a pale echo of "Small Stakes Hold 'Em." Throughout the book, Jones makes references to Sklansky and Malmuth, and it sounds like some of their criticisms may have led to the revisions seen in the second edition.

I liked it though -- it's always good to have a review of the basics.

The Sunday night HORSE tourney on Full Tilt was fun. I sucked big time!

I blame the alcohol for my misread in razz that led to my quick demise. I still don't know why I lost that hand.

Everyone should play in these events. Everyone's friendly and chatty, and the competition isn't much different from any other game. Check at the World Poker Bloggers Tour Web site for upcoming events.

As for bonuses, Empire poker is offering an account-specific 15 percent bonus up to $100 with only a 500 hand workthru. Log on to Empire, and if you get a pop-up window, you're eligible for the bonus.

Links:
Ax HU
Typical pair vs. overcard

WPBT HORSE

The WPBT HORSE Tournament starts pretty soon, and I'll be playing. Anyone is welcome.

It would be fun to chat with anyone playing. My AIM name is mniesse AP.

Here are the details from WPBT itself:

9 p.m.
Full Tilt Poker
$5 Entry Fee
password: thehammer
Courtesy: Iggy

Yes, the game is HORSE. What does that mean? Well, we’ll be playing Texas Hold ‘em, Omaha Hold ‘em, 7 Card Stud and Razz. If you’re not familiar with the games, get familiar with the games! It will be fun, believe me. And it’s just $5 right?

In fact, here are your first ten levels (courtesy Tao of Poker):

Level 1: Hold’em 30/60
Level 2: Omaha hi/lo 40/80
Level 3: Razz 50/100 + 10 ante
Level 4: Stud 60/120 +10 ante
Level 5: Stud hi/lo 80/160 + 15 ante
Level 6: Hold’em 100/200
Level 7: Omaha hi/lo 120/240
Level 8: Razz 150/200 + 25 ante
Level 9: Stud 200/400 +30 ante
Level 10: Stud hi/lo 250/500 +40 ante

Rakeback Takeback

PokerNow has apparently been forced to stop offering rakeback.

This move has many people worried about the future of Internet gambling: Will my rakeback be taken away? Will the other Party Poker skins follow suit? Why was rakeback taken away?

Here's my understanding of the situation.

The parent company of Party Poker, IGM, decided to do an audit of PokerNow, perhaps in preparation for its initial public offering. The audit found that many players were participating in rakeback deals, which are against the Terms of Service of all the Party skins.

Apparently the PokerNow auditors found evidence that the site was not enforcing its Terms of Service. Payments due to affiliates were suspended pending the decision on the audit, expected March 17.

Rakeback is an awesome benefit for those of us who receive it. It gives back about a quarter of our rake in cash, which really adds up.

I don't think the sky is falling.

I believe rakeback will remain valid at most of the other Party skins. As long as affiliates and their customers don't blatantly disobey the anti-rakeback rules, the status quo will likely continue.

Poker sites can't track payments that affiliates may make to their members unless they deposit that money directly into their poker accounts.

So no big deal. Affiliate programs and rakeback are not coming to an end.

But PokerNow rakebackers are still screwed.

Links:
More PokerNow info
PokerNOW post
Make your own South Park dude

Death, Taxes and Poker

Being a good U.S. citizen and all that, I did my taxes today at a cafe here in Santiago.

And that means trying to figure out how I should report poker winnings.

As I understand it, poker gross profits should be reported as "Other Income" on Line 21 of the 1040. Then you can deduct losses if you itemize.

The problem, of course, is that I don't itemize. The big error of the IRS is that it separates winnings and losses. It would make much more sense to just tax net earnings.

Because I just take the standard deduction, I decided to abide by the spirit of the law rather than the letter of it. I just reported my net winnings on Line 21 and was done with it.

Perhaps this isn't wise, but the other method is absurd and unfair. This way, I feel like I'm still giving the IRS its rake with a clear conscience.

My federal taxes owed came to $215 for 2004. The gambling portion of my income was a shade over $2,000, which accounted for an estimated $200 in taxes.

Links:
Poker and Taxes....This is why there is so much confusion
IRS: Gambling Income and Expenses

Splitting the pot

Anytime you jump into a new pool, you're going to be a fish at first.

I tried the sink-or-swim approach and dived into Omaha 8 without even knowing the rules.

It took a little while, but I learned a few things.

Omaha 8 or better is messed up. For those of you who don't know, it works similar to regular Omaha (four down cards, five community cards, and you may/have to use only two of your down cards.) The difference is that the Lo hand (straights and flushes excluded) scoops half the pot. But there is no Lo hand unless you can make it with a high card 8 or less.

I started out at 2/4 O8 on Party and quickly went down about $150 because I had no idea what I was doing. It took a few hours, but I made that money back at those same tables.

Then I left for this delicious dinner at my friend Heather's house down the street in El Centro of Santiago: bacon wrapped chicken, mashed potatoes, fruit bowls, lots of wine. I stuffed myself silly.

After dinner, I zoned out and thought about O8.

Most starting hands are shit. I looked for starting hands with an A and another low card so I'd have a chance of making the low. You also want pairs in your hand in hopes of making trips, and having double-suited hands are strong. It's rare when you see something less than trips scoop the Hi hand.

Making the Lo hand feels a lot like playing razz. You're praying that your low cards in your hand aren't neutralized by one of those same ones on the board; you wish that a third card that's 8 or less will come on the river to make a Lo hand possible. It's like drawing to a straight or flush, but it's slightly easier to make the hand.

It's a major coup if you can win the Hi and the Lo in the same hand. These pots get pretty big pretty fast because so many people are betting on two different developing hands.

Another thing: raising for value is very difficult because there are so many possibilities. I ended up only raising with very strong hands.

It always makes me money when people don't raise with the best hand on the river. Repeatedly, people would hold the nut Lo and just check/call the river. That's fine with me, but even if you're only going to win half the pot, I think you should raise in hopes that your opponent will either call and put more money in, or fold and give you the entire pot.

After dinner, I logged on to Poker Stars and sat at their Omaha 8 tables, which are 6 max at the 2/4 level. I liked that a bit less because you need multiway hands to build large pots and make a split pot worthwhile.

I lost about $65 on those tables, and then I had had enough.

"Fuck this," I thought. "I need to make some money."

So I sat at some NL$200 ($1/$2 blinds) and pretty quickly doubled up twice.

The first time I made two pair with KT vs. AK and moved in. Then later, a guy on tilt called my flop push with pocket rockets. He only had pocket fish hooks.

The HORSE tournament will be on Sunday on Full Tilt. It will combine games including Hold em, Omaha Hi/Lo, Razz, Stud and Stud Hi/Lo. Find out more information about it on the World Poker Bloggers Tour Web site.

Everyone who reads this should play! These events are tons of fun, and it's only a $5 buyin.

Link:
Poker Stars reload bonus

Review: PokerTracker Guide

I paid the $20 for the PokerTracker Guide e-book soon after it was released, and it was a worthwhile purchase.

For those of you who don't know, PokerTracker is a $55 program that keeps track of your winnings, and, more importantly, it compiles many detailed stats on your opponents' playing styles. When used in combination with a free program like PlayerView or GameTime+, you have a strong weapon in your arsenal to make better decisions at the table.

The book is 64 pages long, and it's filled with information.

I've been using PokerTracker for four months, and although a lot of the information was repetitive, it was a good review.

There was plenty of good new information though.

Here are the parts I found most useful:

1) The player ratings section, which assigns icons to players based on their playing styles. I had been using BisonBison's and Divett's ratings, but these seem more accurate and detailed. I also like how it puts more emphasis on Went to Showdown Percentage, because that seems like it has significant value that has been neglected in the PokerTracker community.

2) Setting filters to evaluate your play to discover whether you fall in love with semi-strong hands too often, and whether you're making the most out of your positional advantages.

3) Instructions on automatically importing PokerTracker notes into various poker programs. I hadn't realized how useful this could be for table selection.

4) Advice about how to review your play on a daily basis using PokerTracker.

5) Filters for finding the big fish.

I only have a few complaints.

I wish there were a way to be able to read the e-book and toy with PokerTracker at the same time. Because of the digital rights management software of the e-book, PokerTracker's functionality is disabled while the e-book is in use.

I think the table selection section should have been expanded. While it's very important to know if you're playing against fish or moneybags, I think it's more crucial for a limit game that you play at a loose game with VP$P over 30 percent for the whole table. The authors fail to expand on this crucial part of table selection.

If you use PokerTracker, this book will be valuable. As always, it's only worthwhile if you read it and follow its recommendations. Non-thinking players won't get much benefit.

Links:
PokerTracker Guide
PokerTracker
PlayerView
GameTime+

Casino Municipal

I saw my chance when the complaining started.

My family's legs hurt from walking and they had to use the bathroom.

I knew the perfect place for some rest: Viña del Mar's Casino Municipal, located on the beach of the Pacific Ocean.

My family is visiting me here in Chile, and we traveled to Viña del Mar on Monday to see the town. How could I pass up the casino?

The casino has a bunch of slot machines but only a few table games. They have roulette, draw poker and blackjack.

Unfortunately, no hold em was to be found. If they had hold em in that casino, I may have never left.

So I sat down with my dad and my brother to play some blackjack.

One thing I really like about the casino is that they mostly use plaques for the betting. For example, a 5,000 peso plaque is a small orange rectangle with the numeral "5,000" printed on it. The 10,000 chip is a pink, thick oval. The 50,000 chip is a larger plaque, maybe 5 inches wide, with a kind of see-through hologram in the middle.

My blackjack knowledge is quite limited, but I knew enough to more than double my 40,000 peso buyin ($69) to 89,000 pesos ($153). The dealer kept busting, and I kept making money. Hello, spending cash for March!

We left after a short time because my family was getting restless. Then we walked on the boardwalk along the beach and through the city before heading to the sister city of Valparaiso.

That's my brother Michael and I in the picture above. The picture below is a shot of Casino Municipal.

In other news, there's a World Poker Blogger's Tour event at Full Tilt this Sunday. It's open to anyone who wants to play some poker with bloggers.

These are the details, lifted from Guinness and Poker:

$5 tourney
Sunday. March 13th
9pm EST
Name of tourney: WPBT HORSE Tournament
password: thehammer

Family Vacation

My family is visiting me here in Santiago, so I won't have much time to get some gaming in.

But I'm such an addict that I found time.

First, I logged in for a 30 minute session and won a huge pot. I made two pair with AQ and bet it out, but I was raised with a caller on the turn. I told my brother: "I'm fucked unless I get an ace or a queen on the river."

Sure enough, the queen comes and makes my boat. The pot is capped, and I take down the pot against a lower boat. Then I logged off, content in my 30 BB win.

Later on, I was pretty drunk after my roommates had a party.

Only NL$100 would do for my state of mind. It was a good choice.

I doubled up immediately with limped pocket AA vs. a lower pocket pair. My reads were spot on for the rest of the session. I split a few pots vs. suckouts on the river, but then I found myself at a great juicy table.

This one guy started raising weird amounts like $4.99. Another dude said those betting amounts were stupid, and the first guy said, "I'm already in your head."

It wasn't long before most everyone at the table was betting odd amounts for fun.

I was happy to play their little game, and I made two pair on the river with KJ and went all in.

Another guy said, "AJ" for a higher two pair. The weird betting dude said, "Call him, you have him beat."

Then he folded.

A nice score in two short sessions.

This family vacation drunken poker playing could grow on me.

Link:
Building a bankroll

Internet Cafe Tour

Before I got wireless Internet at home, I had to travel to Santiago's plentiful Internet cafes to plug in my laptop and get my online poker fix.

One time I went to a 24-hour Internet cafe near my apartment, but they wouldn't let hook in because they didn't know how to configure the connection.

I was discouraged. It was about 2 a.m., and I had a Multipoker bonus to work off, dammit.

On the walk home, I did find an open Internet cafe. A gay Internet cafe.

What is a gay Internet cafe, you may ask? It's just that.

It had a constant loop of Brittney Spears and 80s hits, and everyone who worked there was gay as the day is long. I'm cool with it, but it took me by surprise. I didn't even know such a thing existed.

When I went to pay, the guy running the store was watching some porn. Makes sense.

I finally found an Internet cafe that I was more comfortable in. I plugged in at a table near the window, ordered an Orange Crush and played for hours at 600 pesos ($1) an hour. In between hands, I looked out the window and watched the beautiful chicas walk by in the hot December.

Now I put in more hours and pay much less.

I sit on my mini-sofa beneath my window, trying to earn my stay from fish who live in a different world.

Hand of the Day:
The Call Down Series of Poker

BR $3,000

Like any shrewd investor, I try to reinvest a portion of my profits in projects needing venture capital.

Projects like higher limits.

Unfortunately, this hasn't paid off yet, but I think it will eventually.

I entered 2005 in the middle of my first 3/6 expedition, which was moving fairly slowly -- I hadn't had too many ups or downs.

Jan. 7 was a $650 day, but then came a terrible slide.

First came a $940 drop in limit, followed by a tilt-induced try at 1/2 no limit, which cost me $1,208. Finally, in a desperate attempt to get even, I blew $255 more on multitable tourneys without a single win.

My bankroll plunged to a meek $800 after finishing 2004 with more than $2,000.

That was at the end of January.

Thankfully, February brought in a new era of success.

I recovered all my losses and more.

I thought it would be a much slower climb, but I told myself I would just have to slum it at .1/.25 no limit for a while and gradually move up.

I started by finishing off my bonus at Full Tilt and then moved on to the soft NL$25 games at Party Poker.

The hours didn't seem as long as they were.

But when I stopped to look around, I found that I had reached a new peak.

I had topped $3,000 in winnings and had nearly quadrupled my bankroll in one month. That doesn't even account for my new rakeback deal that will pay me nearly $500 more in a few days.

And the steep climb continues. I haven't broken a sweat yet.

See you at BR $4,000 in a few days.

Link:
Barry Greenstein ranks the skills of the pros

Mexican Poker

At last, I found a live game in Santiago.

I've been dying to get my hands on some real chips, pass a dealer button, eat pizza, drink beer and be able to look people in the eye as I take their money. I finally found my chance Tuesday night.

It was a typical home game, attended by American English speakers who play poker regularly enough but don't practice or know much.

We ordered 2-for-1 Domino's pizza, cracked open the Flaming Cock whiskey, and began playing with a 10,000 peso ($19) buy-in.

Many of the games were ridiculous, ghetto varieties of poker that feel like an embarrassment to play. We'd play one round of 400/800 (peso) limit hold em, followed by a round of dealer's choice.

These dealer's choice games are some of the most despicable debasements of poker: follow the queen, black widow, baseball, five card draw with two dips of two, seven card stud with a low Chicago and wild cards, the four game, and other crap.

I doubled up pretty early when I made four 8s in five-card draw (with wild cards, of course), and the rest of the night (except for the limit hold em, which was easy enough to win) ran fairly dry.

The last game was the best: Mexican poker.

I'm not going to explain all the rules here, but it's a variety of five card draw in which you can trade in your hand for the one on the board, you can trade individual cards in your hand from the one on the board, and wild cards are determined by the size of a progressive pot.

Everyone had to put up 4,500 pesos (nearly $9), and there were limited rebuys, so the pot was fairly large for a small home game. Winner takes all of the eventual $72 pot.

I held a significant lead when the game got heads-up -- I had all three of my original stacks compared to my opponent's single remaining stack (when you run out of stacks you lose. It's kind of complicated).

Then I was dealt a beautiful five cards: AKQT9 -- a flush, and nearly a royal one at that.

I knocked immediately, feeling pretty smug.

But then the other guy, Peden, flipped over four Jacks, using one wild card.

The next hand, he made another quad.

On the last hand, he was dealt a flush.

Can't compete with that.

Even so, I still finished with 13,400 pesos ($25) for a small profit on my buy-in.

I'll definitely be back. It felt good to be back at the card table after so long in front of my laptop.

Link:
Play Poker SAABPO Style!

Off Tilt

It won't be long before I'll be using 2/4 to support myself.

Living in Chile, things are cheap and this is feasible. I spend less than $500 a month, including rent, and I can easily make more than that every month online.

The plan is that I will play a few hours online a day and try to build my bankroll as much as I can before I have to dip into it for life support.

Then, at the end of June, I will move back to the States and go on a whirlwind poker revenge tour before re-entering the real world. I'll travel from Biloxi to Vegas to Tunica and other places, living off my bankroll over a few weeks of fun before I have to rejoin the work force.

I've been aware for some time that I may have to use my bankroll for other purposes than just playing poker.

Feeling this pressure, I've felt it necessary to try to move up in limits so that I can make as much as possible before I'm forced to dip into my winnings.

The unforeseen problem is that this pressure makes the beats seem more severe and losing less tolerable.

If my bankroll stood on its own and I had more financial security, it would be much easier to move on after a couple of bad days.

But psychologically, a hit of a few hundred dollars really sucks.

I think: "Well, there goes all the money I would have used in April. Woops."

What it comes down to is a problem of confidence.

No one can win all the time, and you have to be overwhelmingly sure that over time, the good beats will even out the bad.

I'm not sure of that, and it makes it easier to go on tilt when I lose. I'm more likely to play weak-tight and lose pots that I would have won with stronger, more aggressive play.

So I'm reminding myself that there's nothing wrong with playing the game that I can play well, without questioning my moves or letting the beats get to me: 2/4.

It'll be just fine.

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I highly recommend my friend Daniel's blog, Poker Cats. He has only posted a couple of times, but they're high-quality writings that are worth the read. Please give them a look!

Links:
PokerTracker Guide e-book
Call down vs. paired board (I'm not sure I agree with the advice given here)