rk

Anyway

2005-09-28T00:55:00.000-07:00

I dont think its a crisis of confidence that has lead
to the cessation of this blog. But it just doesnt look
any good and well its good to start afresh. As for
removing posts i guess its pointless...

Anyway there is now rk index
(not anything like jeems index)

ists ?

2005-09-25T19:25:00.000-07:00

Since 2000 i have been labelled a fascist, communist
and a sexist at various stages . Is it possible to be
all 3 at once i wonder ? At least i havent been called a
racist. Anyway i dont think anyone was too serious,
when they said it.

Which ist are you ? Capitalist , industrialist etc.

Hmmmm

2005-09-25T19:21:00.001-07:00

this blog seems 2nd rate , one no one reads it, which is
quite justified. And i dont find any of the posts interesting,
may be ill try something different, does anyone have any
suggestions ?

Hmmmm

2005-09-25T19:21:00.000-07:00

this blog seems 2nd rate , one no one reads it, which is
quite justified. And i dont find any of the posts interesting,
may be ill try something different, does anyone have any
suggestions ?

Poker tournaments

2005-09-22T17:30:00.000-07:00

Ok barter apparently will organise a place for me to outline
tournaments etc. coming up worth playing , but till then
ill just post some information here.

2 tournaments worth playing .

Aussie Millions Free Roll - details see link

First you need to go to the PokerNetwork Noticeboard and sign up, if youhaven't already done so.Once you have a login, login and click on the blinking 'RegisterSatellites & Freerolls' on the menu. Fill in the form with your TitanPoker details including username (eg. TTR343242343) and nic.The list is extracted every 24 - 48 hours and sent to Titan so it maytake that long until you will be able to register at Titan.

http://www.pokernetwork.com/satellites.cfm
The free-roll is on Sunday at around 6.30, tho
u will need to register earlier, through pnw ,
prefereably by saturday. more info here.

http://www.pokernetwork.com/Nnoticeboard_reply.cfm?Summary_ID=3028

Anyway aussie millions free roll is a must play, get
a free seat to the 10k even in melbourne in january,
prize pool near 5 million !

CRUISE !!! - to play in the cruise free roll u need to
be a member of pokersource online , which is easy,
and sign up with absolute poker. Anyway, they are
having a freeroll
http://www.pokersourceonline.com/tournaments/freeroll_poker_tournaments.asp

Date of free roll is 25/9 - 9pm est = 26/9 11.30am - if u
register im willing to play multiple free rolls, after all
can just try and double up and see what happens !

weekend

2005-09-19T19:33:00.000-07:00

last night beers at the exter were good, other than
that the rest of the weekend was disapointing,
crows lost, and i was bored for the entire duration.
i was out. I blame that on myself , friday
night poker i was stuck on my own table, (tho
dg was funny - "you are a river rat")
saturday when i was out i was bored, on sunday
when i was out i was bored, seems like everyone
watches tv whenever i am over.

On the upside i improved my ring poker, and learnt
a few more things. Everytime i lose or win a decent
pot esp, i work out whether i played it well or could
have played it better.

This morning, played a nice hand with Ks. Three
ppl limp , guy raises it to 6x BB, the button calls,
I call, the first limper calls, and so do the other 2.

Flop comes J-8-3 rainbow. I check and the early
limper bets 1000 into 800 pot. Now i was considering
betting but with so many ppl in the hnad, i like to
get as much information as possible. Now as it turned
out everyone else folds all the way to me. See if
i bet and got called, i could be up against a set, or
may be aces, and not know where i stand, however
as it turned out now I just need to analyse one persons
hand correctly. My biggest concern is he has aces,
he limped and called a large raise, but i can prolly
rule that out, coz he chose to call the raise, after 3
other ppl came in and 2 other ppl would call,
meaning if he had As, it was an excellent spot to re-raise,
and he didnt, his call seemed for value. Next question
did he have a set ? His overbet seemed to want to drive
ppl out of the pot, not induce a call. If he flopped a set
of 8s or Js, surely you would want action with so many
ppl still to act, he had an excellent opportunity to check
raise, and therefore i concluded he had something like
A-J. I check raised all in, he had Q-J, and took it down.
:)

Hmmm

2005-09-18T23:15:00.000-07:00

I cant shake the nagging thought, i might have
played it differently 3 handed if it was my
seat i was trying to win. How ghey is that,
i definately didnt ghey it on purpose. But
did i lose sight of the goal to come in the
top 2. Not to take out the aggressive guy,
my nemesis, with what i was sure was the
best hand. Or would i have made the same call,
i mean did i just make an error. Im sure if
i folded and the other guy came back, id have
regretted it, but he was weak the other player.
He sat back and waltzed into the world series.
Definately playing to win it was the right , playing
to come in the top 2, arghhh.

$2 ...

2005-09-18T22:11:00.000-07:00

I cant believe it, lets rewind a little. Sat
Night , 1.30am, Barter is playing in a multi
tourney. Im still up wondering how im going
to play in the paradise poker tourney starting
at 3.30am. The plan to is have a nap, and wake up.
Barter's tourney is $2 multi sub qualifier for
the wsop ! $2 tourney, has everyone gone mad ???
Frage was playing $5 stt. I ended up sleeping through
the day, but barter hung in till 4.30 to win a seat,
the top 3 got $100 seats in a monday morning multi.
Funnily enuff, 7th place got $2.40, a 20c profit on
3 hours of work, asian sweatshop kids would demand
a higher rate.

So the catch is barter cant play in the multi , coz
he has work, and since my work and playing poker
are one and the same, he asked me to play.

Ok its 9am start for the toruney , or so im told,
9am comes, it starts at 10, ghey. Could have slept.
10am, tourney kicks(wrong word) off. Absolute poker,
$1500 chips , blinds are gradually increasing but
happen every 10 mins. 280 ppl top 2 get wsop seats.

Get little to start off with. In fact the notes on
barts must be this guy is a rock, fold to everything,
coz i cant get anyone to call a raise. Later AK, Js,
AQ all go to wast coz everyone folds. Start playing
6-7s and raising with 3-2. Play "absolutely" clinical
poker, just picking up pot after pot, with little heat,
win a nice pot when my Qs take an AK short stack out,
and im dbl average. Here i sit for ever it seems.

17K in chips was dbl average, now its almost average,
and now its below average. But at least there are
only 3 tables left. In fact the card drought im on
is getting ridiculous. Cant i pick up a hand? constantly
ppl move all in, and im forced to raise with j-3 to pick
up the blinds and stay alive. Now the guy on my
right is the most aggressive player, which would
sound like thats good positioning but he raises my blinds
every time. Every time, from the sb, and the button,
relentless. Now i could move all in over the top with junk
but his raises are so big, that hes committing himself
to call me. Down to 2 tables 15 ppl left, times are tough,
im almost 1/2 average. Series of raise and folds.
I move all in and get called for the first time. Arggh
A-5 vs 7s, flop 9-3-2, - 7 (oh god) - 4 oh my god !! Rabbit
out of the hat. That stroke of luck keeps me going for
a bit longer.

Cmon where are my cards, still nothing. Key hand comes up
at the end of the 2 tables. I have k-9 on the button,
aggressive guy just limps which is weird i suspect something
fold. Flop comes k-9-x, he takes out two ppl with his aces,
and my k-9 woulda doubled me up , argggh.

Aggressive guy is on my right again, basically for the last
50ppl we have been in the blinds together , ffs.
He raises again, i have 4s, decided to call
1/3 of my chips off, flop comes A-Q-3, he puts me all in
i fold, he shows A-10, dang . Good fold, but the idea
was right, try and make a steal if he missed, but he didnt.

Now i have come up with a new strategy to deal wiht aggressive
guy, its important sometimes to get more info by talking. I get 3s in
the bb and instead of calling, his over raise, before he
gets the chance to raise , i say im all in if u raise. He
thinks about it and he folds. Then i manage to use this trick
when i have crap another time, and buy a free blind. But
i get no cards, literally and am virtually dead. And someone
always seems to raise. I pick up an A high, get called by
a K high and then dble up. Here is where it all goes mental
in a short space of time, i keep re-raising the aggressive
guy with A-k, and Js and another hand, and suddenly im back in
it. Soon after i take out the 4th guy wiht A-5, and its
3 handed , 2 ppl get to go to the world series. Oh my
god. Which means barter will be going to the wsop ! In all
my attempts totalling up 6K, to get into the wsop this year,
i have never even got this close. Unbeliveable. Does
this affect the way ive played up to now i hope not.

But then as quickly as i rose up it can all come crashing down.
3 handed i have 170K, aggreesive guy goes all in for 145K ,
3rd place guy 100K has folded, i have AQ i make the call,
he has 4s, hits trips im crippled. Cant pull another miracle
out and just like that vegas on a $2 ride for barter disapears.
I coulda folded and grinded out the other guy. But AQ was
too good to pass up, and i thought about it later, and I
had to call. Either 50-50 or quite possible dominated.
Unreal, surreal, so close and yet. Yet if the goal was
to come in the top 2 why not fold, and let him dictate
the play till the other guy has to stand up, but thats
bs, coz im not folding aq 3 handed to a maniac, when
i think its the best hand, i cant and i wont.
But now there may be no world series...

:(

Oceans 11

2005-09-14T19:38:00.000-07:00

Ive been watching oceans 11 and oceans 12, and
ive learnt the importance of getting a good team
together. U get a lot more done. And u need ppl
who can do different stuff well, at least
relatively speaking. If u dont have good ppl
u go backwards, and ur better off by yourself.
Like the frenchmen in oceans 12 he was good by
himself. However its more fun in a team and u
have to be extremely talented to go solo.

So far RK's 11 (well may be not 11 and may be
not RK's)

- RK
- Nai

Nai synergised my machines , so much better now.
Already the wheels are in motion ...

Wats ghey

2005-09-14T19:34:00.000-07:00

1. Party poker
2. Limit tournaments
3. Chad
4. Dayle
5. Ghey matchmaker
6. Quads
7. Indoor soccer teams with 10ppl
8. Sporting tickets

$2 , $5 , $20 ???

2005-08-31T00:23:00.000-07:00

Walking through myer centre with nai, and i glanced
over at this girl and her friend. They were young,
about 19 and reasonably attractive, but dressed up.
One of them went in the store, and the other then
came up to me. Which was kind of weird and said
do you have $2 ? Thats kind of strange, they're going
shopping why do they need $2 off me. But i dont really
say no. So i looked in my wallet, couldnt find any
coins (i throw my coins into this jar), and said
sorry, and then she said do you have $5 , and i
was looking at her puzzled, then she said do you
have $20. I laughed said sorry and left.

Why didnt i ask why do you want $2, then suddenly why do you
need $20 off me. And what do i get for my $20 ?
I mean is it unfair for people giving money to
get something? I had $300 in my wallet at the time,
the possibilities were endless...

Which office animal are you ?

2005-08-30T19:05:00.000-07:00

article

Frankly i dont think there are enuff animals. Like pandas - loveable
but lazy. Leach - parasitical , feeding off the work of others.
Ostrich - goes missing in times of crisis. Fish - has to be
constantly reminded to do things, bad memory. Peacock -
poser, all show , no work ethic, tries to be centre of attention.
Meerkat - hard working head down a lot of the time , does pop
up occasionally. Penguin - hard working , diligent doesnt complain.

Which animal are you ?

Poker craze

2005-08-30T18:17:00.000-07:00

Is everyone playing poker ?! My cousin asked
me for 4-8 advice, my younger cousin asked me
for free-roll advice (he got grounded b4)Ppl
ring me up about poker, ppl ring me up on
behalf of other ppl about poker. Mitch and
his housemates are playing, going to the gutshot,
should I be helping to spread this craze or not ?!
Well its nice to be enthusiastic about what you
do , its not my fault its contagious. Hmmm

Thanks for the emails

2005-08-25T18:35:00.000-07:00

Emails have provided me a sudden burst of energy. I need
to bottle that feeling, save it.

Void

2005-08-24T19:04:00.000-07:00

there is something missing, i dont think its structure,
but theres something. Perhaps its fear. Typically fear
of failure, fear of having not enuff money, fear of
blah blah, can drive you on. What do i fear ?
Nothing comes to mind. Or perhaps its desire ? You
want to be really good at music or sport, or do well
at studies, i dont seem to desire anything strongly.

hmmmm need to snap out of it.

Melbourne !

2005-08-23T00:13:00.000-07:00

Melbourne vic poker champs.

Friday night - hot shots tourney ! Lot of ppl who thought
they were good, well it seemed that way.

Rk - first hand, looking to take it easy , get aces,
grayte. (start with 4k in chips, blind 25-50). Raise
to 150. Limper calls. Flop comes 10-10h-5h. He
checks i bet 250, he check raises to 1500. I re-raise
all in ! He eventually folds, heart racing.

Then i got a message from Chad, first thought idiot,
y is he sending me a msg, they said dont use phones
at the table. Then second thought perhaps he has quadrupled
up in a pot. Read msg (out ! flops top set, somehow
gets out setted and busts out)Final thought - see first
thought. Funny thing, just b4, i was looking at the screen,
and the number of players had clicked down from 170 to 169,
thinking, who was the clown who got knocked out first!

Oh well unlucky, which summed up the rest of the night. Lap
gets knocked out with AK v Js. I call a short stack all in
from sb, when im in bb. He shows 2-4, i have q-10. Flop
comes 2-2-2 Argggh. Hang around get a little bit short,
try to steal some blinds, push all in with a-10, called
with k-q, flop sees a K , cya later.

Friday night met up with the girls went to some pub,
met a phil ivey look a like (didn’t play poker) and
left around 3. Phil ivey was out till 6am waiting to
catch the next train home.

Saturday - play in the qualifier. Rebuy event. $70 buy
in $50 rebuy / $50 add on. Start with 1k.
Early on I pick up Js, raise to 300. One caller. Flop
Comes J-3-2. I check, he pushes All-in, I call straight away.
He shows A-Q nothing , no flush draw. Turn 5, reach to scoop chips,
River 4, argghh Straight ! 97 to 3% favourite, bs !
Oh oh not my day. Rebuy. Pick up a few hands survive through
And get the add-on. Chad amzingly is still in. Lap too, tho
Lap is short stacked and gets knocked out when Qs run into As
I then just play patiently occasionally raising with random cards,
Picking up the blinds. Chad gets eliminated after running low.
Im running low as well. Get some chips when I win a hand
From the blinds. Then a few hands later get 5s in the bb,
Flop comes A-5-5. Two chip leaders in the pot, one limper.
Cmon ! Everyone checks both round, I bet the river, and
Everyone folds. Ghey !. Next hand A-K , chips leader who
Is a fish, limps, I raise, he re-raises, oh oh. I re-raise all in.
He has A-Q , I win, and im in the comfort zone. Cruise
Into the final 12, and win my seat !

Saturday night , watch the footy at the crown whilst playing 4-8,
Head back to apartment, decide to take it easy. Comedy – on the walk
back go into an indian restaurant asking whether we can buy beers
To take back to the apartment. After talking for a few mins, he tells
Us there is a bottle shop next door, literally. The shop next
To the indian restaurant is a well lit large bottle shop. Idiots. Buy
Some grolsch. At the apartment watch the bodyguyard. Suppose
To go out at 12 to meet lap, I decide ill take it easy. Chad goes off to
some club, they pretend they’re pilots, whilst I stay back watching romeo
Must die and reading volume 2 of harrington. Its like having to work
The next day I guess. Apparently the main event can go till 5am , so
figure I may as well get some rest.

Sunday - Ready to go. Get to tournament area, see my seating postion,
Go to my table. No known ppl on my table. One person raises the
First 4 pots. No aces first hand I can take it easy. Towards the end of the
first break, two ppl get moved to my table. One of them is my “clone”.
I often get mistaken for him , apparently all tamil ppl look the same.
Thing is hes pretty damn good. He won the poker platinum event (200K)
And apparently had 5% of the WSOP champ (500K) !! I played well,
Doubled my stack from 5k to nearly 10k in the first break. Things
then started to go pear shaped. Picked up AK twice, raised, got
Nothing and other ppl bet. Raised with 10s, got re-raised all in by my clone,
And decided to fold. He had AK os, didn’t want to race so early.
Moved to another table. Running shortish, guy with about 6K, moves
all in, I have 4.5 K. I have A-Q, in sb. Blinds are 200-400.
I think about it and call . He has A-10, excellent, call ! Then lost
A few in blinds on 7.5K in bb this time with A-Q. Guy in late pos,
Raises , I re-raise all in. He has 6.7K. He has raised to 1500. He
Calls straight away with K-J. Loose call, but he wins im crippled,
And head off to the break virtually out. 825 chips, Average stack
10K, and blinds 300-600.

Come back and then play as aggressively I can. Find A-Q tripple
Up. Re-raise all in with 9s, winning a pot uncontested, and re-raising
with AK forcing someone to fold. Then on about 9K, new lady raises
To 2k I have Q-10in the bb. I call. Flop comes 10-7h-8h. I bet 2k
She goes all in. I think about it and call. I figure I have her. She
Has 6s ! Another good call, up to 18K.

Then keep the momentum up. Get moved to a table with Mel Judah
WPT event winner, and 3rd in wsop. Early on in the table I raise with
A-K on the button, guy reraises all in, for about half my chips in
The sb. I call , he has 10s and I win. Then take out mel judah,
When he re-raises my Ks with AK, for a 1/3 of my chips. Cya
Later ! Some guy on the table said to me hey isnt that the WPT winner.
Yah, and your next buddy ! ( I didn’t say that).

Sitting comfortable on 50K, all the way back from 825. Perhaps could
Have been more aggressive in this period, but I didn’t really have
many opportunities. Make it into the final 30 ($$$), then final 20, stack
sitting stable. Pick up Aces, and make a raise, everyone folds. Dang.
Moved to what will be the final table with 20 left. Didn’t pick up
anything, here and had some tough decisions. Unfortunately had no info
on anyone, and perhaps missed an opportunity to re-raise all in with
A-10s from the blinds. Running a bit short, blind 3k-6k (1k ante),
8 handed I push all in late position with A-J (30K), run into Qs on the
button, and sayonara (appropriate coz it was a japanese guy who eliminated
me). 12 hours later I was close, but not quite there, still good experience
and I got 3 chips for my effort (1k, 1k, 500). At the cashier, some
guy ahead of me was cashing 2 15K chips out. Wouldn’t want to lose
them.

rk makes pokernetwork :)

SPECIAL THANKS – to the support team of lap and chad who were
There for a lot of Sunday . I heard them cheering when I came
back from the dead in the middle of the tourney. With their arrr arrrrs.
I think some ppl were wondering what was going on. Also they
Gave an RK survival pack during the tourney, consisting of bananas,
Sustagen and orange juice, also pizza head later ! Thanks. Wish
I could have done a bit better, but other than perhaps not re-raising
With A-10 I don’t think I could have done much else, so I was
Pretty happy with how it went.

Monday went had a big lunch, marinara entre and steak , hmmmm.
Watched the new zombie film, listened to some interesting stories
from APA guys, and flew back.

Sydney ?

2005-08-23T00:05:00.000-07:00

Anyone want to go to sydney next weekend, watch the
soccer saturday (sep 3), nothing much else planned other
than that ?

Sifu training

2005-08-22T23:08:00.000-07:00

I usually dont bother explaining things like blackjack
and poker to ppl, coz everyone has their own fixed views.
Sometimes it can be a grey area, sometimes its virtually
black and white. I dont think its ppl being stubborn,
its just my inability to explain something properly and
perhaps ppl not being ready.

Its like tyring to explain the earth is round, and someone
is adamant its flat, why confront such ppl ?.

For example in the karate kid, he wants to to get trained by
MrMiyagi, Mr Miyagi doesnt pull him aside and train
him up. It was also similar to when I was in London, I
tried to talk to the lee_nelson when i could to
understand how he thought through things, and I learnt
valuable lessons. I guess he could see that I was
keen to accept and understand his point, even tho i
was questioning his decision to go/call all in with 6s,
and this the day after he took down the competition.
While i am no leenelson, or mr miyagi i have learnt
a useful lesson from the masters.

The master is like a flower, and students are like
insects buzzing around. The flower does not seek the insect,
but the insect seeks the flower. Then if the flower is open,
and the insects timing is right, the nectar can be obtained.

Bummer

2005-08-18T16:44:00.000-07:00

Had a few posts i should have made over the
last week. Then had a down poker
week, and found out yesterday didnt get the appartment we
applied for. It was so gooood, whhhhyyyyy ??!

Is it because they thought brad and i were gay, or
i play poker. Watever it was, its ghey.

Off to melbourne ...

Axioms ?

2005-08-16T18:39:00.000-07:00

Whats the point of making rules if you cant even listen
to them. Lessons can be very expensive. If i listened
to my rules i prolly would have saved some money,
idioot. U know its not ur day when u fold 3s and
u flop qudas and theres a monster pot. Nothing more
frustrating than repeating mistakes. They were
at least marginal situations . But hyper aggressive
player makes it so tuff, unlucky he has As,
when i make a move, and basically every other time
he has rubbish.

ipod

2005-08-10T21:22:00.000-07:00

Ipod ppl rang me up and said for $99 warrantee
thing, they'll fix it up ! Sic !! Been a while without
music and ipod, i think ill delete any files if they're
still on there and start from scratch :)

Whats ghey !

2005-08-10T17:44:00.000-07:00

1. ppl and inability to make decisions. I know
I am just as bad as the next person, but it certainly doesnt
help hanging out with a bunch of indecisive desmonds!!
Fking contagious.

2. Amazon not having books in stock. I need it soon !

3. Chad

4. Raining whilst playing volleyball and losing GF.

5. Wait on food at belgium beer cafe (food was good tho)

6. Little mario soccer dudes, that think they can beat you
up.

7. Ppl organising parrallel meals on the same day with
the same ppl, at different times, and noone knows whats
happening.

8. Exeter moving live music into the dining room , Exeter
ppl explaining how popular curry night is and how long
the wait will be.

9. PP continual ban on me and lack of communication.

10. Ppl who dont make any decisions and are indecisive :)

Melbourne !

2005-08-07T22:39:00.000-07:00

Going to melbourne next weekend Aug 19th to Aug 22nd,
have already booked accomodation(pending), in this 3 bedroom
apartment, overlooking / next to the crown in the heart of
the city. At the moment its just lap and i - on
this poker / party jaunt !! If anyone wants to come over,
its going to be good ! Poker tourney events on fri,sat
and sunday. Anyway all u have to do is book a plane ticket
and the rest is taken care of...

Also willing to subsidise event entry fees for % of winnings,
tho have to come to a 101 tournament crash/review course.

Nothing good in adelaide that weekend except may be brunatex :)

AP: Hey there you are? (walking in and pointing to random stranger)
X; Do i know you?
AP: No, but thats where you are, over there

ha

sat night ...

2005-08-07T19:07:00.000-07:00

Watched cricket on Saturday night, as i was over at aunts
place of dinner. Coz my cousin is getting married,
its kind of one of those bizzare meet the other parents
type thing. And coz my cousin(S) and his fiancee(Sh) are in
london, it was just "adults" (parents), me, Sh's sister
and my cousin(g).

Its kind of funny now, coz my parents pretty much have
to say im a poker player, coz thats always the type
of conversation that comes up. What does your son do?
Which is something, if you were Indian wouldnt be the
best thing to say your son does. Did you know so and
sos son is a gambler ? Thats just how it is.

And Sh's sister was asking me so what do you do, are
you studying or working ? Ha, its like those are the
only 2 options. Anyway I said Ive finished studying,
and ive finished working. Which i usually get
puzzled looks, but my cousin was like, yeah its true,
we dont really know what he does.

And then i said i was a professional poker player,
and that just makes no sense to the average person,
really ? how ? can you make any money ? Then i
told about London , coz i also managed to visit my
cousin and fiancee when i was over there. And she
was like waddya mean, i never heard about that.
And then i said yeh i was on tv too, ha it was all so
funny. Ive finally got something decent to say to ppl when
someone says what do you do ! No more blah blah,
accc, law, computer science, rubbish.

Later we were playing heads up poker whilst watching
the cricket. Grayte thing about poker, is ppl always
for some reason get into it?! It exceeds most sports.

[Final hand - raise with qd-7s, flop came qs-js-4s.
Bet called. Turn a 3d. I bet big called again. River 7.
Push all in, get called. Flips over j-4, my two pair
on the river takes it, phew that was lucky :)]

Anyway poker is in some super category. If u like sports u like
poker, and if u dont like sports, u can still get into
poker. Perhaps it gives ppl a chance to compete on
a level playing field, irrespective of who you are ?

Anyway somehow got onto wat u keep in the boot of ur
car, sh's sister's boot contains:
- random golf clubs
- hockey stick
- cricket gear
- tennis racquet
- afl football

Gold ! My brother and i are basically like brothers to my
cousin, both genetically (his mum and my mum are twins) and
coz we grew up together. And coz we prolly would have had to do
stuff with Sh's sister, it'll just be a hit of golf, may
be some tennis, ah easy. Ah this whole wedding thing suddenly seems
like a breeze. And then Sh's mom by the end of it was
asking whether it was possible to watch me playing online.
Who would have thought convervative indian doctor types could
get into poker !

Its good being surprised :)

Girls and sport ?!

2005-08-07T18:58:00.000-07:00

Some girls get it some girls dont, and some girls
just don't care.

Its kind of weird how a group of people(typically guys)
can be so into following sport, and another group
of ppl (often girls) can just have no interest whatsever,
to the point it is physically painful. TV shows for example,
people can often watch crap and not be pained, but when
it comes to sport, there is just a diverse level of enjoyment
that ppl experience.

Saturday night there were girls who were into sport
and Sunday night, poor cb looked like shed rather be
at the dentist then watch the cricket !

Sporting highlights !

2005-08-07T18:50:00.000-07:00

Crows dominated once again. Its finally safe to
jump on the crows bandwagon. Even tho its pretty
full, i think i can fit. With 2nd place almost
a lock, there is a good chance of playing 2 home
finals. As a result im already in the process of
trying to secure finals tickets. Who wants to see
regular season games. Its like playing a poker
tournament, where u can just sit down at the final
table or play all the lead up days. Anyway,
tickets please anyone ? :)

Ashes, prolly one of the best test matches ever!
Test cricket is believe it or not the most exciting
sport, when its close. Australia fall 2 runs short,
unbeliveable! Anyway its good for the series , and
im hoping that it goes to the 5th test 2-2, and
the 5th test is tied, with england getting run out
going for the win, coz the batsman colide mid-pitch.
Well u can always hope.

11.15am

2005-08-07T18:44:00.000-07:00

Approaching 11.15am. This is a small milestone, coz
it means ive been up for about 7 hours now.

I think after 7 hours of being up i start to get wrestless,
and hassel ppl. And other ppl are only early into their
working day, plus its monday, days of the week have no meaning
to me. In fact the Super Tuesday tourney is played on Wednesday ,
im slowly slipping into the American calendar. Another thing,
is there is another 1.5 hours to lunch. Also its raining outside,
could go for a run, may be ill join the video store.

Credit cards

2005-08-07T18:35:00.000-07:00

Applied for a frequent flyer card and credit cards,
dont know why, but it seems to make sense to get
something back if ur using them. U do have to spend
a lot to get anything back, but its kinda free!
When filling up the form tho, they ask you what
you do, i put investor / poker player. Then they
had to ring up chad who was my "accountant", and
he was half asleep when they rang him, but i think
he told them what they wanted to hear. Anyway they
give cards to uni students, why not to me ? Some
ppl missed out on virgin cards i remember, ha,
assif they are ppl who shouldnt have credit cards,
isnt that their goal to get ppl in debt, and paying
them back for the rest of their lives, especially
if they have a job.

Poker 101

2005-08-07T18:34:00.000-07:00

Monday night, anyone wants a beer , and poker
101, I am free. Perhaps a live game, perhaps
perhaps perhaps.

3 person spectrum theory

2005-08-07T18:32:00.000-07:00

I dont know what that title means, but it was
one of the headings ive used in the past. I
cant shed any more light on what it is, but
it sounds interesting.

MSN

2005-08-07T18:28:00.000-07:00

Sometimes MSN needs more settings, ppl appear online,
but really they're not paying attention. I mean they're not
away but they're not really "online". You should be
able to type in the setting, like "out to lunch" and
"on the phone" are defaults, but there are other things
you might be doing. My main objection, is people who are at work
and online, but really you can't carry out a conversation
with them. I mean im at home with nothing to do occasionally,
cmon, it should say , free to chat, dont bother me unless
u have to etc., otherwise its very unsatisfying.

May be i need to get out of the house ...

ipods

2005-08-02T23:36:00.000-07:00

Yah ipods are cool, they're all wonderful and exciting
and hip when they work, but when they dont , they're just
a useless white lump. Thats what ive had recently, and
i decided to give it back to the apple store. After
a week, they informed that the prognosis for my white
lump was not good.

Prognonis: IPOD has a damaged component which needs
to be replaced.

Me: Ok thats not too bad is it ?
Cost of component : $400 !
Me: (Fark), thats a lot isnt ? I mean cant i buy a new ipod
for that much ?
Service guy : Yeah
Me; So thats pretty much useless ...
Service guy : Yeah
(thinking theres must be a solution to this problem)
Me: Cant you get an extended warrantee for the ipod,
i wasnt offered one when i bought it.
Service guy : You can but you need to get the warrantee,
while its under warrantee, your warrantee expire 6 months
ago.
Me: hmmmmm
Service guy: hang on let me check, (comes back) ok we
can put you under warantee for $99 and then we can
fix it .

Its weird but there is always one particular question, you
can ask that unlocks a solution to the problem.
Most of the time you dont know what it is, but sometimes
you can work it out! Hopefully RK 1 - Apple 0.

Phones

2005-08-02T00:22:00.000-07:00

Apparently talking about how ghey your phone
is in. Anyway im thinking of getting a new phone,
coz my phone is no good. I have often been forced to
use a system of beeps to communicate to ppl, coz they can not
hear me speak, but can here a beep if i press a phone
button. 1 beep = yes 2 = no 3 = i dont know . Well , no more !

Sony Ericsson

Thinking of getting the above phone, went into the vodafone
store, the guy said it was the best one to get which was also
small. After convincing me for 5 mins to get it, (im easily convinced)
i say ill get it ! He tells me they're sold out. Grayte, went
to other stores, costs $100-150 more there. May as well wait,
till they get new stock.

Other ppl have boght new phones , anyone recommend
anything else good ?!

Re-vamping

2005-08-01T23:59:00.000-07:00

In the process of re-vamping my blog, so far have
stolen/borrowed tilda's template, tho i like mitch's
template the most. Work in progress. Courier font
might get irritating after a while, but it looks like
a script, so i dont mind it for now.

beers anyone ?

2005-08-01T00:01:00.000-07:00

beers monday nite anyone ?

Reasons ?

2005-07-28T00:29:00.000-07:00

Actually i might have worked out why i was suspended,
coz there was this one time in particlar I was watching
some ppl play against Dayle in a $10 tourney. And i
was being especially annoying, giving them all a hard time
saying how prophecy said some of them were really bad,
after a while they were begging for me to leave, and they
were all on tilt, but may be they complained, damn them !

Yesterday

2005-07-28T00:19:00.000-07:00

Had 6 ppl (including me) turn up for beers and dinner,
wat a turn out ! Silks food is good, except i dont like
the fact they keep trying to take your food when your
still going. They attempted to removed my dessert 3 times,
clearly i hadnt finished !

Also yesterday i developed new bird squaking add-on.
It starts off as a bird squaking, then it turns into
a crazy monkey. Labelled BSMICM (bird squaking morphs
into crazy monkey) Yesterday was one of my more productive
days!

Beverage and poker ?

2005-07-27T23:29:00.000-07:00

I would grab a few beers at some pub
and then head down and play some 4-8 semi-
drunk at the casino. Being drunk would help
me lower myself to their stupid level.

Anyone ? at least a beverage !

In the wilderness

2005-07-27T23:20:00.000-07:00

I woke up in the morning today, logged onto to pary poker.
Said "i couldnt log on", checked my emails, saw two emails
saying all my money in party poker had been thrown into
a neteller account. ARRGGGH , WATS GOING ON ?!!!!

Apparently using poker prophecy is illegal, its some stupid
program that says how well people have been going. Its like
Australia playing England in cricket, and Ricky Ponting being
banned for checking up how England did in their last test
match. Its bizzare, anyway, I didnt even really use it, but
i cant play on party poker anymore. Hopefully they let me
back in, but its a bit disconcerting.

As Jon said its like rocking up to work and finding out they
have changed the locks on the door, and ur not allowed in.
Its strange at my old job, Ive had mushrooms , drank at work , played
soccer and cricket at work, had porn banners popping up on
my screen, left to watch the test match during work hours,
made a movie at work and nothing even happened, and i use
some stupid program on party poker and they kick me out !
Apparently i got warning emails, but they never came thru.

Live and learn : )

Clean sweep

2005-07-27T19:17:00.000-07:00

Won both beach volleyball games , hoh and we dominated,
even if its not a high grade, but there were
amazing points and spikes etc. etc.

Then indoor soccer in the evening, on the back of
some beers and a big dinner. We hadnt played in a
while due to missing players. And we started off
so retarded it was embarassing.

30 seconds in- i pass to Barter the ball hits the side of his
leg instead of his foot, the ball ricochets out. Desmond.
60 seconds in - the ball goes towards the base line,
i believe someone is in pursuit so i shepherd the ball
towards the line, also decide to put some fancy goose steps/
side steps to confuse my opponent who i believe is in pursuit,
in, I stumble and almost fall over, the guy was about 5m behind, so
egg !

2 mins in we'ere down 3-1.

We come back and win 12-4, we rock !!!

Key to indoor sports is to start egg, and lull them into a
false sense of security, then attack !

Beers ?

2005-07-26T23:05:00.000-07:00

anyone want a beer at exeter or somewhere
after work ? (wednesday)

ill have one.

Melbourne ?!!!

2005-07-26T19:16:00.000-07:00

wHO wANTS tO hAVE fUN ?!

Leaving for Melbourne - Friday Aug 19th afternoon
Comine back Adelaide - Monday Aug 22nd evening

Vic Poker championships are on, the world champion
should also be there.

Playing poker friday night tourney, and during the day
on the weekend, plan to hit the town at Fri / sat / sun
night !

If u want in or want more info, quickly spk to me me soon,
coz im going to book accomodation this week at that
place which is cheap, and near the crown.

So far lap and i are going, if your going to be ghey
and sit on your hands at home, dont bother telling me.

Also if no one else is coming, i might just stay at the
crown, its a joke anyway !

Should be good i hope !!

Poker corner

2005-07-25T19:08:00.000-07:00

May as well write something here. Went to the
twilight zone on the weekend with Jon. Although
its official name is the poker zone, it really
is a place which just sucks a lot of time, and
if your unlucky , money as well.

Sat down for almost 7 hours without really getting
up, and even ordered some toastie cheese sandwiches
at the table, by the end of the session I had lost $180,
and the people who won were complete idiots !!!
The gap in skill was pretty much the same as me playing Roger
Federer in tennis, but in poker u can still lose ! Not
that im the best at poker by anymeans, but i have never
seen much worse at poker, and im not the world's worst
tennis player. There were the usual idiots there, the drunk, the
stoned guy, the guy who turns his cards over
at the river with people still to act, the guy
who calls the river with 9 high, and the guy
who doesnt raise with a straight flush !

Whats the best strategy? Have fun, order some drinks,
play tight, and amuse yourself with the crazy antics
going on.

WATS GOING ON THIS WEEK IN POKER
Tonite (Tuesday) - Noble Poker qualifier for Vic
Champs ($65) - winner gets a seat in main event,
and $500 travel money !!!

Wed - Sat - Poker at Adelaide Casino
Get there 30mins b4, start times are
Wed - 7pm, Thurs - 7pm, Fri - 8pm, Sat - 8pm

Sunday morning - Party Poker Million dollar plus
tourney ($640), but play in a smaller qualifier!

Sunday evening - matchroom ? Havent been in a while.

GAMES IVE BEEN PLAYING
Have been pretty slack, but playing more ring. 10-20
Ring NL. Play for an hour, do ok, then call it a day.
Lost a hand today, when i had As and he hit his flush
draw, but all u have to do is keep making the right
decisions and u win at cash NL. Another hand i had Js,
called the $100 raise pre-flop, flop Q-7-2, He bet
$175, i thought about it ,decided i could well
be ahead, so i called, see what he would do on
the turn. Prolly could have raised. Then Turn
comes J. He pushes all in, i know he has nothing
at this point, plus i have a set, he shows 6-7,
drawing dead. Scoop up a nice pot. Good test of holding
your nerves. Will try and play some multis this week.

Poker has arrived !

2005-07-20T18:16:00.000-07:00

Ooooo, its here, Poker has come to Adelaide Casino ! In
the form of the "poker zone". Like we used to add the
suffix city, to everything, like wind city etc. , the
casion likes to add the word zone.

The poker zone is next to the grandstand bar, and it
comprises of 7 tables, surrounded by a bar / rail,
which allows spectators to view the action. Its pretty
crowded in there, but once your sitting down, your
fine. They kicked it off with a tourney, 60ppl , $50+$15,
which is a bit steep on the rake.

Went and put our names down on the omaha list, went to dinner
at rigonis, then came back. There was little chance of
them starting omaha, but they had lots of 4-8 holdem
going. So had to transfer our names on teh 4-8 list.
Took a while to get on, but as the tourney progressed and they
lost a table, they'd add a new 4-8 table.

Chad got dispatched by himself to some table, which had a couple
of matchroom guys. Barter and I got put on the new table,
which could prolly not have consisted with ppl who had less idea.

First hand small blind calls, big blind checks no one else
is in the hand. Flop comes A-J-8. Small blind bets, Big
blind calls. Turn comes a 5. SB checks, BB checks. River
comes a 4. Now the SB, says i check and turns over his cards.
But the BB hasnt checked yet. So he looks at the SB's cards
who has turned them over. Then the BB decides to make a bet.
The SB says i check. The BB looks at the cards again, takes
his bet back. The SB has turned over 2-3 for the nut straight,
the dealer asks him wheether he can beat the straight. He
says no. Dealer pushes chips to the SB, and he says oh i thouhgt
you had the straight. Barter and I are looking at each other
trying not to laugh out aloud.

Anyway it was amateur hour there, but you still need cards,
we didnt win or lose much, tho chad did ok. Anyway its
reasonably well organised, and should be interesting to see
the standard of play in future weeks. Perhaps u need to play 10-20 to
get anything resembling a game...

We are the champions !

2005-07-17T18:22:00.000-07:00

If you are an australian, then you can say "WE" proudly
have the WORLD CHAMPION OF POKER. I mean can this
country be any greater ? We produce the most beautiful
women in the universe , i really didnt know how
that worked out, i mean are other galaxies represented.
They're ships on the way ? May be thats what independence
day is about, bunch of ugly aliens , pissed off they
werent invited too the miss universe pageant. Fair enuff,
perhaps blowing up the earth was a bit extreme, but we'll
invite u next year. Ok , so we have Miss Universe (no offence
other galaxies), and now we have the WORLD CHAMPION OF POKER!
Amazing, are words that dont even come close to
describing his achievement. Whilst i was desperately close
to making it to vegas, and wish i could have been there,
to participate, the disapointment was largely washed away to
see an Australian dance through a field of 5600 and
trump, and it still is surreal.

I listenened to the entire 14 hour live broadcast on Saturday, and wow,
he did really well. Every time he raised, basically someone would come
over the top. He was getting drilled, but somehow he hung in
there had a piece of luck , took down some key pots and evenutally
was the champion. The final hand was great, calls a small raise pre-flop
flops a straight, gets the guy to hit top pair A on the turn, and
put all his money drawing dead.

I was hoping that Andrew Black from Ireland, would win, the guy
lost a massive pot in 97 world series to eventual winner stu ungar,
disapered for 5 years became a buddist. Came back recently, dominating
over europe, then played unbeliveavebly well . He put a 4th
re-raise with a-2 against ivey. Called a massive pot with 9-10, on
9-6-2, and the guy sucked out with 2nd pair(a-6) and hit A on the river.
Absolute BS. He deserved so much more.

But the great thing esp. about the last 2 champions are they are
true gentlemens of the spot. Lets face it , Arieh who came 3rd,
in 2004 would be the worst world champion to have, as would Mattusow,
the guy whilst entertaining is just such a chump sometimes. Sits
there table talking on big hands where he is not involved.
But Raymer has been a great boon for the sport, and i hope Aussie Joe,
is just as good, coz he seems like it. It seems nice guys finish first at
poker! Go Australia !!!

The Bubble

2005-07-17T17:46:00.000-07:00

Ok back to whats being going on in the world.

Lets just take a step back, recently I was
accused of living in a bubble. As in
a " A protective, often isolating envelope or cover"
previously i was living on the bubble "an annoying
position in poker which takes you to the closest
point without winning anything, ie. the ultimate
loser" But during that period i slipped from outside
the bubble into the bubble. Its like being in
a nutshell.

As a result of being in this bubble, i was
isolated from some of the major world events.
"Major" events is somewhat of a term which is
thrown around quite loosely i believe, there
are so many , how can they all be major ? At
some point these major events have to become minor
events, and at that point Im forgiven for not
knowing about them. So i was at lunch, and ppl
were talking about Live 8. There is a classic
saying my teacher told us at school "it is is
better to keep your mouth shut, and let people
think your a fool, than to open it and reveal
all doubt". This would be one instance where
i would have been best served to apply this rule.
You see i didn't know anything about Live 8? And
ppl at lunch thought i was joking, but each subsequent
question just showed how deep i was in the bubble,
and they were shocked. In fact the only thing i had
heard of live 8 was when i saw it was in the tv guide
and assumed it was another reality show . But
after finding out it was G8 related, it would
seem unlikely that it was reality tv show.

Unless it was something like, G8 meets BB:

USA (bush): "id like to vote Jacque Chiraq for 2 points.

BB: "you have to give a reason ?"

USA (bush): "well when we're in the kitchen during lunch,
he brings out these really smelly cheeses, and he doesnt
clean up properly afterwards, and the utensils still have
these smelly cheesy parts on the knives and other cutlery,
plus he has that really annoying French laugh. Also he
is a little hostile, yesterday he told Tony Blair, his country
had the second worst food in europe behind switzerland, i
mean who eats frogs legs and brains anyway, he is so hypocritical."

BB: How does this make you feel ?

USA (bush): Well , it makes it hard for me to express myself,
and he is also too intelligent for me, so i find it hard to
relate to what he is saying. I asked him the other day, and
I said are you with me or against me ? And he said sometimes
i will be with you, other times i will be against you. Like
what the hell does that mean anyway? He said there is a thing
called a grey area. I said like my hair ? And he just left.
I hate the french...

BB: Ok you can leave now george.

USA (bush): One more thing BB, with these automatic sliding doors,
it feels a lot like a space ship sometimes, and you sound a
lot like Leonard Nimoy , is that you Leonard ?
(bush apporached the camera)

BB: Leave !!!

USA (bush) : sorry ....

Is the bubble that bad , i wonder ? Well ok i missed out on
a couple of events. I wonder whether all that singing made
a difference, i dont see why they couldnt raise money at the
same time as well, kill 2 birds with one stone. Ok wat they
collect dwarfs into insifinicance in relation to the debt,
but still its something.

I now read www.news.com.au more regularly, i used to read
it all the time, except that was when i worked and i had
more time then. So feel free to talk to me about current
events, im hip, im cool.

Who wants $50 ??!!!

2005-07-17T17:41:00.000-07:00

This doesnt follow on from the last post, but ill
pay $50 poker money if someone tidys up my kitchen
and cleans my dishes. Due
to my ill crippled state and straining my neck,
i really can't be bothered and have no energy,
and its getting out of control.

$50 - clean dishes - today(Monday 18/7) !!!
Easy money, i know thats 1/2 some ppl's rent.
For like 30mins work.

Person must be enuthusiastic, and prior
experience is preferred.

Be first to comment - to secure this is exciting job.

So wats the deal

2005-07-17T17:32:00.000-07:00

Alright no blog posts in a while. Anyway i havent
got a lot to report, which is sad, but mainly
due to being struck down with the plague. Well
perhaps it was not 'THE' plague, but it was plague
like.

I wonder what the plague was like, it sounds so
evil and contagious. I guess this was just a flu,
fever , cough , cold, etc etc. thing. So since
i havent being doing a lot, may as well talk
about other things going on...

101

2005-07-03T22:21:00.000-07:00

if anyone wants 101, tonite - monday.
then reply and ill see.
If there are enuff ppl
for a game , perhaps a game.

being sick

2005-06-30T22:26:00.000-07:00

being sick is no good, also just missed out on vegas qualification
yesterday. Arghhh. 13th, top 6 get seats top 9 got money,
again !!! Thats two 13ths and an 11th so far.

once vegas qualification finishes i feel there will be a burden
off my shoulders. I dont even know y i think im good enuff,
i cant even make it through a field of 300 idiots.

by my calculation i seem to waste a lot of money playing tournaments
and time. I guess the idea is to improve, and to play in a live
tournament and do well.

i need balance as well. would be good to go on some adventures,
is it my imagination or are ppl becoming less adventurous ?

As frage said its hard to fly like a swan when your surrounded
by geese. May be i am a goose. A disorgansied goose.

I think im weak willed, i ended up watching 3 episodes of deadwood,
on monday night, wat was the point of that. 1. deadwood is kinda
boring, 2. its not a period im interested in. 3. there are
better things to do then distract urself for 3 hours with.
Sitting around watching tv, kills all creativity. Its ok for
other ppl, they had a tough day, wat did i do ? Theres no
sense of accomplisment after watching tv. So its good to have
achieved b4.

I also dont know wats happening in the world, i feel out
of focus like in deconstructing harry. Hes there but
hes just out of focus.

In the positive side i fixed up my poker game, to the best
its been, other than the occasional lapse in concentration.

Hey and we won soccer on wednesday, finally we won a competition.
Technically we didnt win, coz the game was called off at 4-4,
when two players got sent off and the team walked off, but
u know, cant be fussy.

I cant believe someone spiked themselves on the zoo gates,
after stealing from a vending machine. It doesnt seem right.
Why ? Such a waste. Apparently there were two of them, and
the other person left him , impaled.

How come it started raining the day after i bought my bike i wonder.
I guess bike sales go down in winter.

I watched when harry met sally , u can put in requests to james,
and he'll burn u the dvd. Hes good like that. Everyone remembers
that one scene. But the rest of the movie is pretty funny. Harry
says its impossible for a guy and a girl to be friends. If
they are friends they dont really want to be friends, unless they're
both in a relationship. Then its possible, but not really coz
why do they need to hang out with each other outside of their
own existing relationship, unless something is missing ?? So therefore
it breaks down again. Anyway it does seem to be the exception rather
than the rule. Ppl might say, oh , we're friends but are they? And
wat ppl class as friends can seem quite broad anyway. Once in a while
socialising i dont think really counts. Which then lends credit
to the idea, of the happy monkey society, where they do what they
want, they're all friends and no one is any relationship. Perhaps
ppl just kid themselves their friends ?? Anyway its a good movie.

The new life

2005-06-27T17:29:00.000-07:00

Last week, was the first losing week, ive had in
a while, and man it was bad ! Everything seemed to go pear
shaped, and eventually it impacted on the way i played.
By friday i didnt even know what to do.

Imagine going to your regular job, and having that feeling
that if you sit down at your desk, you'll just lose a
lot of money. Well thats the worse state of mind to be in.

Its happened b4 , when ive lost my golf swing, and i look
down at the club and i dont know where the ball is going
to go. Im just hoping that the stupid ball will go relatively
straight and not off on a 45 degree path. My dad had a good
way of explaining handicaps to me when I was young. If your
off 8, youd have an 8 degree variance in your shots from
its intended trajectory, and if you were a high handicap player
your shots could vary as much as 32 degrees. So if u wanted to
be good, off a low handicap, u had to consistently hit it
straight ! Well handicaps stopped at 32, and my shots on these
days would vary by 50 plus degrees ! Argh it was terrible.

And the same situation seemed to come in with me for poker.
Ppl were saying i needed a break, and may be they were right,
but for golf, when it happened i just had to keep it balls
till i rediscovered wat i used to do.

So taking that mentalitly into poker, i kept playing. And not
surprisingly it didnt improve. When losing b4, i didnt mind,
its part and parcel of the game, coz i knew most of the time
i was playing well, i could feel like i had been unlucky. But
here something was wrong. In a series of 14 games yesterday,
i finished 4th 6 times !! 4th pays nothing. Im sure its not
inconceiveable but wat was going on ??

In golf, when things arent going well, u can see your coach,
and he can help sort things out. In poker , i guess im my
own coach, and i didnt have any obvious answers.

Towards the end of the week i had lost everything i made in
the first 2 weeks. Wow this was a good start to the new job.
But it allowed me to sit back and say wat do i really want to
do ? Getting perspective sometimes is important. Whilst I still
havent got any answers but hopefully im getting closer.

Vegas fading

2005-06-19T21:32:00.000-07:00

The chances of making it Vegas by the 7th of July
for the World Series main event seem to be fading.

Sat down with barter last night on 8 different tables
on pokerroom in an attempt to be there when the
billionth hand went off ! Unfortunately we missed
by a hundred or so. Perhaps playing omaha was a bad
choice.

Played in the qualifier for Veagas off fult tilt.
I won a qualifier for the $500 seat, and with 800+
ppl playing they were giving away 35 seats !!
Unfortunately it may as well be the WSOG for me
(world series of gheyness). Stupid JQ hand
hit nut straight got counterfeited on the river
by a higher straight, lost AQ race to 10s, then
flopped a straight which turned into a full house.

Anyway ive got a few more qualifiers this week,
otherwise its adelaide for me.

101 tonite

2005-06-19T21:30:00.000-07:00

Monday night - 101 from whenever. Reply if interested,
to make it easier.

Holy schmoke !!!

2005-06-08T17:19:00.000-07:00

[ppl's names might have been changed slightly to protect
their identity, except chad's , chad refers to chad]

Stop the press vicki vale. Imagine your brain cluttered
with a 1000 thoughts running through your mind at the
speed of light, key words - shit , holy shit, poker,
chips , police , fines, law, jail, hahaha, flee the country,
marbles, bull ?!

Alright that doesnt make much sense, so lets take a step back.
I was born in 1979 in Singapore, i enjoyed playing marbles
as a kid, hang on this sounds like the chad introduction. Lets
skip forward a little.

Ok, last night was the beginning of the SA Poker championships
run by the Australian Poker Association (APA). This was suppose
to be an event run from Wednesday through till Monday, with
a series of tournaments run each day, with various buy-ins.
The final event, being the Main Event on the Monday , with an
$1100 buy in. APA home page

Now this tournament wasnt some secret underground event, known
by only a few mafiosa and other underground types, spread by
word of mouth, run at a secret location. This was targeted
to be the biggest event ever in South Australia, and outside
of Melbourne, one of the biggest events in Australia. Advertising
through the internet, and at casinos was readily available. In
fact apart from Adelaide casino handing out flyers about the event,
Melbourne and Sydney casinos, ran events for ppl to qualify for
the SA poker championships ! Clearly this was perceived to be
an above board event. Casinos dont run qualifiers to illegal events,
that bad business.

Anyway, im eating dinner at Amalfi, theres about 10 minutes to go
b4 the event. Bartofski rang me up saying there were a lot of ppl there.
There being the Italian club in the city, in fact the event got
moved due to being too popular. I have to scull the rest of the
beer at the end of the meal as per usual, walk down there with
doyle. We're walking in and im telling her, i think we're at the
wrong place, this looks all so formal. May be they didnt
change venue. They have security, some door bitch, and a lot of
smartly dressed ppl, it feels like we've walked
into a conference. Tho as i walk a little further i see poker
tables, and know that ive rocked up at the right place.

Just a quick step back, the only reason I was so overwhelmed by the place,
was typically the APA runs out of a dodgy place that resembles a pizza bar.
In fact it is next to a pizza bar, and looks a lot like the neighbouring pizza
bar except with some of the equipment removed.

So we walk in, and register for the event, seems all very formal
and organised. Give your name, get a name tag, seat allocation
etc. They have 15 tables set up, with a capacity of 150ppl, and
for this event 120 ppl turned up. The tournament was a fre-roll,
meaning it was free to get a 1000 chips, $20 in the first hour
to rebuy 1000 chips, and at the end of the hour if you still had
chips you could pay $60 to rebuy 3000 in chips. So it was one
of these tournaments that you could pay a lot to buy in or absolutely
nothing, it depended how u felt and how lucky u were.

So the tournament gets under way, ive been drawn to table 12 seat
5. Ok this is largely irrelevant to the story, but early on i
pick up pocket Qs on the button. In free-roll tournaments , ppl
want to see the flop, so it pays to make big raises to make it
expensive coz u know ppl will call. I raise to 300, blinds are
25-50 , so thats 6x the BB, usually i wouldnt do that, but anyway
i get 2 callers. Flop comes K-5-3. Two spades. I have the queen
of spades. One guy checks, one guy bets a 100, i call. I put him
on a K, but i have the spade draw as well, and theres a lot
in the pot. THe other guy folds. Now the turn comes another
spade he checks i check. The river comes another spade, ive hit
my flush, he checks, i bet out 300, he calls, shows k-j, no
spades, i take down the pot. Quick example of showing how to
play against ppl who r likely to call. Keep the betting to
a minimum when u have the worst hand and raise it up when
u have the best hand. Coz i bet 300 pre-flop and on the river
when i had the best hand and called only a 100 when he was ahead.
Now that seems obvious, but trying re-raising plays say on
the flop, when i was behind or a big bet on the turn when
i perhaps sensed weakness would have just been a waste of money.

Anyway, things are all running pretty smoothly. The crazy thing
about tonite as well was that we were supposed to play indoor
soccer ! We had a 9.30 game, but made an executive decision,
to abandon the game, we were sitting on top of the ladder, and
figured throwing a game wouldnt be too bad. Anyway it meant
mun, jimmy , bartofski were all playing poker at this event
rather than running around the soccer field ! Oh well i didnt
tell the lady we coulnt play coz of poker commitments, but at
least that would have been a different excuse. Anyway
back to the fre-roll, im crusing along nicely. When i get
moved tables. I play this hand against a calling station, and
i tried to bluff with the best hand, but i get called, he hits
runner runner flush, to knock me out. Very ghey. I decide
to rebuy. On tilt , i decide to call an all in with 7-8, i was
getting pot odds. Win that pot, and i end the hour not
doing grayte but not out of it. I definately think that sometimes
ppl annoy me, and i just want to beat them in a pot. Hmmmm.

So the hour is ended, jimmy had to borrow $20 off me to rebuy,
doyle got unlucky again, everytime i watch she gets unlucky.
Last time at matchroom, bad beat, then time b4 Qs lost to Js,
online another bad beat, today another bad beat, oh well.
Perhaps this was a blessing in disguise, cause j picked her
up in the interval.

Sitting down at the table, i start to be a little aggressive,
raising with 6s a few times, and then re-raising with A-10.
Im getting some momentum. On my left is the part owner of
ballroom, two to my right is one of Australia's most famous
poker players, like the godfather of poker. I met the latter
overseas, anyway we're having a relaxed time as well. When
the ballroom guy says "police" in a very casual tone. Now im
thinking initially he was talking about the band the police.
So im like haha, yeh, "police". They were playing music at
the time, all be it nothing that resembled the band the police,
but anyway. Then i look over and i see a police officer. And
then i look around, and oh my god. Wat the hell is going on here,
there are 30+ police officers just walking through the door.
Now when u see one police officer u think , ah, prolly just checking
it out, but when u see 30, u know theres some shit going down.

Usually when u see a whole heap of police your on the outside
looking in, going i wonder wats happening there. All i can say, is
its a completely different feeling when your on the inside, looking
out. Coz while i was sitting down shuffling my chips, it dawned
and me and everyone else that the police werent here to sit down
on spare tables 13-15, they were hear to bust this operation up.
They were here for the poker, they were here for us. Most ppl genuinely
belived this was just a misunderstanding, and that we would keep
sitting down, the 30 officers would come and walk around see wat was happening,
let us continue with our game , and then we would all laugh it off and
say well that was a waste of time. But I couldnt shake the nagging thought
that the k-5os i had just folded was the last hand i was going to
see for the night. Coz you just dont bring 30 police officers around
to have a look see and then on your bike. They're here for a purpose,
and this party was over.

But why ??? Well im presuming the senior constable in charge was the
one talking in the microphone, but he said to everyone "we have
reason to believe there is unlawful gaming occurring here, we
will be questioning everyone and you will then be free to go"
Meanwhile the police officers, kept swarming in, some were carrying
video cameras, recording everything for evidence. Im sure ms, was
prolly still doing chip tricks to try and gain some air time.
Chad said the hot female officer was there to carry out strip searches,
but perhaps he made that up.

So we're all just sitting on our tables for a while wondering wats
going on. All the senior officers were questioning the ppl in charge,
and they(juniors) then began to question ppl on each table. Interestingly
bartofski, was one of the first to be questioned. They seemed to
really ask him a lot of questions. I was sitting near him, but i couldnt
hear wat they were. Some of them he mentioned, related to height, weight,
age etc. but they were asking him specific questions about the game.
Im pretty sure he got to say K-3 of clubs was his favourite hand as
well. Perhaps he can comment and fill in the blanks, but it seemed
like they were trying to find out whether it was a game of skill or
chance. When i saw that he had to put his chips in a plastic bag, i knew
the game was definately over. In fact bartofski , had to state the chip
value he had, and the number of chips, and they even bagged his two hole
cards. Apparently its an offence to play k-9 under the gun !
Anyway apart from being cavity searched, they seemed to be
pretty thorough with him, actually when he got escorted out, i was
wondering where they were taking him, but he left ok.

Back on our table we're all hypothosising wat the problem might be? I mean
is it really illegal, the godfather of poker didnt seem to think
so, he had been in all sorts of places, and as far as he knew this was all
legit. The ballroom guy thought it was a conspiracy by the casino to
shut down competition. No one had any idea. On another table, some guy
said he had to go home to take his heart medicine, another guy called
his lawyer, and was told he didnt have to answer any questions other
than your name and address, unless you were being charged. In fact
i remembered that from law school, but the rest didnt really come
rushing back, damn.

Apparently they were asking ppl about the game itself. Like "how
do you play the game". And someone said "well, it usually depends
what position im in, id prolly play strong cards from earlyish
position, then average to strong hands in medium position, possibly suited
connectors in late position. Then it depends on whether the pot has
been raised, and how many ppl are in the pot. I then look at the
level of chips i have to commit in respect to the blinds and to
the percetnage of my stack and my opponents stacks. I also like to factor
in the ratio of strong to passive players involved in the pot whilst
keeping in mind the pot odds, the number of outs i have to hit and what
the chances of succesfully bluffing the pot is against my oppponents.
Are you getting all of this down? " hahhahaa

Anyway the place had pretty much cleared out, no guns had been
drawn, and it was my turn to get questioned. Ok this is where
it got interesting. U see a lot of the officers were obviously
juniors who had been told that they were going on a bust to raid
this illegal poker operation. In fact im pretty sure a few of them
would have thought it would have been in a seedy den, with a lot
of smoke and pacino dudes chewing on fat cigars. But no, it
was in a smoke free, clean hall, with a large projector which
had the blind structres, and time left on levels. Ha.

Anyway luckily i got questioned by a friendly police officer who seemed
to know a bit more than the average. He asked me my name and
address. Then he asked me what to do i do? Now this is kinda
funny, becuase when i usually get asked that, I say ive quit
my job, and im a poker player. However i didnt think that would
be the best response. So i had said "ive quit my job" and then
i paused, and he said wat do you do? And i said well actually
i work as a market analyst for the ACCC. Then i tried to back
pedal and say i quit in a month. And then he said so wat
will u put on your tax return. I said "market analyst". Mental
note think before talking. Then he went on to ask me about
whether i was aware this was illegal. And i said i dont
believe this is illegal and still dont believe it is. And he
said it is illegal, and i said i dont think it is. And i asked
him to explain why it was illegal? I said hows this different
from a chess tournament, where ppl pay an entry fee, and
the prize pool gets redistributed ? And he said it was
different, coz this was a game of chance.
me: "i believe its a game of skill"
officer: "chance"
me: "skill"
officer: "chance"
me: "skill"
officer: "chance"
me: "skill"
officer: "chance"
me: "skill"
officer: "chance chance chance chance"
me: "skill skill skill skill skill"
officer: "chance x infinity"
me: "skill x infinity + 1 "

Ok that last exchange didnt occur, but i obviously felt
i couldnt convice him it was a game of skill, so i asked
him where did it say that it was chance ? And apparently he said
there were both local and international precedents that stated it
was a game of chance. And here is where my legal knowledge
failed me, coz i had nothing to state otherwise. I was
drawing dead. So i said "really". Thats all i had, 4
years of legal school, and i had "really".

Then he said that i was possibly going to get a court
summons, but he was cool about it and said, look there
are 100+ ppl here most likely the worst that will hapen
is a $50 fine, or perhaps nothing, depending on wat
they decide. So flashes of having a large steel ball chained
to my leg walking through alcatraz, playing poker for cigarettes,
even tho i didnt smoke, faded from my mind. I did say
(whilst pointing to chad), that he may have illegal gaming
equipment hidden on him, and u should search him, well
it crossed my mind anwyay.

But i was still curious as to y, they had done things as they
had. I mean this was advertised for a long time, y did
they chose to bust this operation one hour in, instead
of shutting it down b4. It obviously wasnt a spur of the moment
idea. 30 cops sitting around, one of them saying, hey i think
theres a poker game down the road lets bust that up ?
He said that was a good question. Unfortunately i didnt get
a good answer. I also tried to press him on the motivation
of this bust. I mean its been running for a few years now,
why now ? Was this pushed by the casino ? He said absolutely
not. This was when he told me he was part of AVTAR, or some
similar named organisation. This organisation was designed to
target bikie gangs and bikie related crime. Now this seemed
bizzare to me. Here you have an association which is non-profit.
He said thats rubbish they're siphoning money out to bikies,
and that its run by organised crime. Seriously, the APA take
out some money, but i dont think they could be making much
money out of it at all. It seemed ridiculous, but this officer
was convinced that it was bikie related. He said the ppl in
charge were crooks with convicted charges, and most ppl here had
no idea. I had nothing to say in response, but i was stunned. I
mean ok, may be they thought it was a game of chance, therefore
illegal, but , organised crime behind this as well? A sinister
evil plot, get out of here! Anyway with my chips in a plastic
bag, i was free to go.

He said i should prolly leave, but said Id wait around for Chad,
so he got interviewed as well, no doubt to get rid of him quickly,
as he managed to annoy a group of police officers earlier. Rewind
30mins. Chad is sitting around, hasnt been interviewed, and needs
to go to the toilet. However the toilet is just outside the entrance
to the main room, and the police officers arent letting u leave till
they have all ur details. So Chad goes up to an officer, expect he
has gone up to the senior constable. And says i need to go to the toilet?
The officer says if his name hasnt been taken then he will have to wait,
till it is. So he waits 30 seconds, then he asks again, how long will
i have to wait? The officer is getting annoyed at this point, so he
says he will find someone. Waits a little bit longer, and then he looks
at probably the second in command , and asks the senior guy whether
he can take me to the toilet. Now this pisses this guy off as well, and he
steps forward and says does it look like ill take you to the toilet,
being tuff and all. Then a little bit later, chad is asking them
whether its a breach of civil libities for him not to be allowed to
go to the toilet, and its a civil right for him to. Anyway imagine
telling these senior officers that its a breach of his civil libities
not for him to be able to go the toilet. Well i think thats the final
straw for the officer, and they find someone. The officer then escorts
chad all of 3m to the toilet, and he enters. Chad powders his face,
i dont think he even needed to go, ha! Actually he did go to the toilet
but still ridicilous. It would have been gold after all of that, if
he said "the damdest thing happened, it went away".

So we are both walking out, and we get halted , by the video
camera guy. Chad puts his arm around me and says we're together,
ha, idiot. Im sure i say quite clearly that we're not, but anyway
i guess thats on some tape as evidence somewhere. We then have
to state our name to the camera and we 'can go.

Outside the organisers are talking amongst themselves. I cant help
think r these guys bikie guys, really ? Wat bikes do they ride?
Wat percentage of APA profits go to servicing harleys? I cant believe
it! They're still adamant that they can somehow continue, i dont
know how, considering all their chips and laptops have been confiscated.
Apparently the casino offered to be a venue, tho it was very expensive,
i guess that puts an end to that rumour, the casino were behind this.
And at this stage thats they're only option of continuing on. As
we walked off, we saw the street had been blocked off, yelled something
to the police officer. "you may be able to our chips, but you will
never take our FREEEEDOM".

We went back to CHS yelled at elfargen a lot, which seemed to unsettle
him, but we were still buzzing. But the night was still going, Chad
decided to ring Bob Francis. Chad is waiting on the line, when he comes
back into the room. And we're asking him when he will be on ? And
he says soon. And then we hear on the radio:
Bob : "ok next on the line is chad? hello chad are you there?
(meanwhile chad is running back to his room to pick up the phone)
Well chad is probably one of those assholes that rings up and then
decides to hang up. Frankly we're sick of them here at radio adelaide,
ok next !"

Chad in his room, hello hello hello ? They've cut me off. Gold!

Anyway he rings up again later, and he gets onto the next guy's
show. This is where the pain begins. Someone said it was like
the office but on radio and not funny either.

Chad (talking to the radio guy): "did you play marbles when
you were a kid? - ya - "did you play for 20c or just the marbles?"
(meanwhile we are wondering where is he going with this ??) Anyway
about 3 mins later after explaining, all sorts of things about poker,
he starts to get to the crux of the story. Then hes trying to convince
the radio guy why it shouldnt be illegal. But the guy is having
none of it, hes saying its either illegal or not? And then chad
says lets hypothesise about whether it should be legal? Then the radio
guy dumped him. hhahaha Oh well it was good to put it out there, and
a subsequent guy who was there also called. And who was a little less
painful to listen :) Nah good on chad on for calling, would have been
good to get bob francis, coz this guy was frustrating.

Got home, still buzzing talked to mun about it, mun could be in
the biggest trouble, he told his dad, oh well i guess no poker
at restaurant tonite. Also told pcock, he couldnt believe it
either.

So this morning i woke up earlier, wondering wat to think of it. LN
(one of australia/world's best poker players, and semi mentor while i
was overseas) i believed was going to leave today, for me that was
the biggest disapointment. I was looking forward to perhaps playing
against him in the main event. Oh well.

Whilst i was doing some reasearch online, here are some key points:
(SA - lottery and gaming act)
"unlawful gaming" means--

(a) the playing at or engaging in any game with cards or other instruments, or with money, in or as the result of which game any person or persons derives or is intended to derive (other than in his capacity as a player) any part or percentage of any money or thing played for, staked, or wagered; and

(b) any contravention of or failure to observe any provision of this Act, whether that provision relates to unlawful gaming as hereinbefore defined or not.

And earlier it talks about games of chance and games of skill.

Apparently there is a legal precedent stating that in SA poker is a
game of skill according to a post on the pokernetwork, but I didnt
find that case, and would appreciate it if someone told me which case
it was if they did find it. If that was the case cops are stupid
heads. Internationally there are legal precedents to suggest that
poker is a game of skill, and is analagous to bridge, another card
game widely acknowledged as being a game of skill. The complication
comes with the wagering aspect as well, but I still have much
to find out.

Unlawful gaming and playing of unlawful games
61. (1) No person shall be guilty of unlawful gaming.
Maximum penalty: $2 500.
(2) No person shall play at any unlawful game.
Maximum penalty: $2 500.
(3) No person shall--
(a) be present at any unlawful gaming or at the playing of any unlawful game; or
(b) be in any place in which any unlawful gaming is taking place, without lawful excuse (the proof of which excuse shall be upon him).
Maximum penalty: $750.

If I cop all those fines, its going to an expensive night! May be
they'll mail everyon their chip stacks back to them :)

End of the night tallies b4 the bust.
Barts - 16000 - doing well
Chad - 12000 - survived a tripple call all in
Me - 10000 - fighting back
Lap - 18000 !!! - no rebuys either , cost to him zero dollars.
Unbeliveable !!!

Is this the end of the APA, i hope not ? May be we can help
out the APA in some way, coz it was such a fantastically organised
tournament, except for the obvious question of legality? Time will tell
wat happens to all of us and poker in SA. As for someone who is
in their first week of a new profession, i guess i should be a little
bit concerned. Also my dad just came back from a month of holidays,
and he is prolly reading news.com.au and wondering wat im
i getting up to ? Also it seems that stage 3 of Jon's law and order
prediction (chess - gambling - crime) has come a little quicker
than anticipated!

101 tonite

2005-06-06T23:14:00.000-07:00

101 tonite after work, till 8.30 (leave 4 soccer).
Come and have a beer , come and pick up some tips. 101
all u can play poker !

day 1a

2005-06-06T19:11:00.000-07:00

Since im playing a bit of poker i may as well include
soem poker for those of u are interested. For those
who dont care, oh well.

Misplayed hand where board was 8-8-9-9-10. I only
had an ace and thought some aggressive guy was bluffing,
he put me all in and i called. Was stupid coz i didnt
have much in the pot, he just irritated me. He had
pocket 10s , ha. It was a good bet he made, coz it looked
like a steal. Making big bets on rivers sometimes with
big hands are good, coz they can look like steals but
u have the buts.

Betting the river, watched chad do it earlier then
i did similar. Beware of value betting the river.
In my case i had a set but there was a possible flush
and the guy kept checking it. Still if he wasnt
holding the nut flush then betting the way he did made
sense, and checking the river would have save me chips.
Chad's hand he had AK, top pair with top kicker, no
reason to bet the river once it was checked to him,
the guy had a set, but could have been worried about
bigger set, or straight.

Also made some excellent calls.
Hand 1 - raise in late position with 10s. The limper
does a small re-raise, tho i had a feeling he was fooling
around and didnt have a hand. Flop came q-5-2. He puts
me all in, big bet of 500. I think he has something like
A-J, he has A-10. Excellent call. Turk K river J,
straight and out.grayte

Hand 2 - AK raise one caller. Flop q-q-9. I bet he raises
a little. I call. Turn comes blank. He puts
me all in. I think about it best he can have is 10-J,
dont think he has a pair. I call, he has A-J. Perfect
3 outs , river J, cya later. argh.

Hand 3 - AK again i raise , flop is junk, he bets I call.
I believe he has 2 high cards putting me on 2 high
cards and thinking i will fold. More junk he
bets again i call. Now when he makes another
big bet on the river im convinced he has nothing i call
he has AJ, i win.

All examples of how to win with AK, when u dont hit. Tho
i did leave out the hand where i re-raised pre-flop,comes
2-2-8. And i bet the flop and turn and he had quad 2s, oh well,
sometimes ur goign to get busted :)

Day 1

2005-06-06T16:33:00.000-07:00

Monday/yesterday was day 1 of X, where i dont have a
job. Thats not entirely true cause technically im
on holidays so really i have a job till the end
of the month. And if i was to get arrested in the
next month or do something equally dramatic, i could
be fired and hence lose a lot of money.

Anyway for all intensive purposes i have no job.
This was re-inforced when i wondered into the
night in search of food. Quickest tastiest meal =
a yiros. The guy at the store seems to like me,
he always thinks im some international student,
and asks me wat language i speak. And then he asked
whether i had finished work, which i had to reply
i dont work anymore, which is a strange sensation.

Back to day 1, had to wake up early, which i guess
makes me a lot harder working that a few ppl, there
is an ssumption its all beer and skittles. Skittles
are no good anyway. Everything went pear shaped
for most of the day, which i was told wasnt that bad,
coz pears are tasty, but i was reffering to the shape,
not the flavour. In any case day 1 was look hopeless.

I wonder wat drives ppl over the edge, where is that
futurama vending machine. Wouldnt it be interesting
if no one actually cared about ur existence. Sort of
like that piano guy. U could disapear and no one
would wonder were u went. It would free up your actions
a lot more, tomorrow, u could be gone, and everyone
would plod along with little thought as to your
absence. When i was young i thought it was distrubing
that, ppl didnt seem to care. Surely a care free
existence is better. May be if someone wants to die, let them.
Im all for trying to save everyone but, save the ppl who
want to be saved first. For example in big brother yesterday
it was considered inappropriate to talk about the shopping
after someone had been evicted. I mean hes gone get on with
it really.

Yesterday i was reading a new blog, which seemed to be
critical of ppl who played poker, quit their job, and
bought cameras, hmmm me,me me. I mean i dont think the post
was serious but behind every semi-serious post is an
underlying element of truth. The thread seemed to be
about how unproductive and how degenerate gamblers
type these ppl were. And the comments were about how
u should do something constructive with their lives.

Well may be ur right, perhaps i am a degenerate gambler,
who adds nothing to society, and well i guess only time
will tell. According to jon, stage 1 - chess prodigy
stage 2 - gambler , stage 3- criminal. I dont know
where he got that from, but i guess time will tell.

Where is my mind?

2005-06-02T21:48:00.000-07:00

As i listened to one of my favourite songs, the music
floated through my apartment and I shut the door
on a world that was completely comfortable and
safe and stepped out into the abyss.

Today the abyss took the form of a pleasant
Adelaide day, 20 degrees and sunny and perhaps
didn’t seem as daunting as I thought It might be,
it still felt completely bizarre.

The truth is as happy and excited as I was suppose
to be, I mean I was retiring at age 25, I always thought
retire age 25, famous by 26, dead by 27. Well hopefully not the last,
one, and I didn’t care much about middle one either, but u can
never really be sure wat will happen. And the word “retire”,
well wat does that really mean anyway? I plan to work harder
than I did in my ‘work’ days, which thankfully wasn’t too
lofty a goal to achieve. In fact in some ways it would be
near impossible.

I felt sad, engulfed in this strange feeling of pain and
disillusionment. It was like this, imagine being on a
merry go round carousel at a fair, spinning around with
lots of ppl you know. Sitting on a colourful shiny horse,
bobbing up and down gently to the music, when snap ! The column
attaching your horse to the carousel breaks into two,
sending you horse with you on a tangent, at
a rate of knots! Why the horse leaves at a high speed, I
do not know. But that’s what it felt like in the morning today,
I could hear a loud snap. And as I looked back on my
tangential horse I could see my the ppl I knew happily bobbing
up and down and I was flying out of control.

In many ways it was similar to when I jumped out of a plane,
the first 5 seconds of fre-fall are a total sensory overload. I don’t
know of anything that can prepare you for it. And whilst in
the back of your mind you are suppose to arch you back and
bend your arms and legs, I was just completely overwhelmed
of the feeling of spinning through thin air, with a back pack on.
Except then it felt wonderful, and today it was scary.

It occurred also to me that if I can make it to vegas, ill prolly
be going by myself, into the lion’s den with little support,
little ammunition and little know how. Sure its exciting,
but after reading the moneymaker book , I realised that he
had good support with him, and im sure it makes a difference.
This only served to accentuate the flying horse feeling.

Its like when buying little hole card cameras for poker. Apart
from some lighting issues, I thought they worked well. But
you always have ppl saying, that’s ghey , that’s a waste. I
mean, I actually picked up some useful plays and ideas,
just after watching the first trial. It was very interesting,
but y do ppl need knock things down?! I mean at the end
of the day ppl do what they want, but ud be surprised how
much can be achieved working together. Must stay Positive ! I still
owe the elf for moral support during that world open qualifier,
I could have come 2nd, got nothing, never made it to London,
never learned a lot about poker, and not taken my roll beyond
three stacks. And whilst brad is generally bitter about me doing
well in poker, I still appreciate all the work he has done for
me over the years, when I was prolly reading cardplayer online.

I always thought I understood wat simon was talking about b4,
tut today I really understand wat he was saying. Sometimes
u do something different, and it seems like no one is behind
u, no one is against u but no one is with you. The path least
travelled is the hardest one of them all.

But the one great thing is the opportunity, and I guess
that’s the best thing about today is the chance to do something
productive. And whilst listening how ppl plan to blow large
sums of money on junk, when just a little could make a big difference
to someone else, and Brad telling me how 2million north Koreans
will prolly starve to death, perhaps, flying away on rogue a carousel
horse into the abyss is not all that bad…

Watch what you watch and read?

2005-06-01T18:59:00.000-07:00

There is a definate correlation, to how i play
after watching wpt or reading a book about
the world series. In the tv episodes u see
a crazy play they make and then suddenly u feel an urge to
replicate the craziness. I dont really do that
monkey see monkey do much anymore, but reading the moneymaker book,
prompted me back into crazy mode. I played a little
in the morning, and after bluffing 40% away of
my chips on A-Q against a maniac on a nothing
flop and turn i was like hmmmm. But that didnt stop me from
calling chips of in three tourneys into dominated situations.
Coz i was reading the chapter where he pulls
the great bluff against farha. Idiot he didnt call
his chips be bet them ! Ha, luckily
i came out of it slightly up, but god i played
like junk.

Anyway lesson one, reading and
playing is prolly not a good combination. But
its important to realise that one hand out
of 13 hours of play where he pulls of a great
bluff, is just a drop in the ocean. Ppl see
a drop and try and turn into a wave. Actually
wat the hell does that mean, point is dont see
crazy plays and try and use them, coz they're
to be used sparingly at best! That was one important
lesson i learnt from watching all those heats
in london. There was only 1 player who really
played crazy and well, damn, he was entertaining
to watch ! He was this super nice guy from ireland,
that ended up coming 3rd. Highly recommend
watching his episodes. It is fun to mix it up
but be aware and beware !!

p101 & moneymaker

2005-06-01T18:56:00.000-07:00

Almost got one person to p101, actaully
i think that person was only visiting, oh well strange,
ppl registered interest but i guess the time was
bad. Ended up reading the moneymaker book i
bought from borders yesterday. Hoh ! its good,
its really really good. I mean he hadnt won
anything b4 the world series not even an online
multi tourney, nothing! Its simple, not that exciting,
but its real. Written by a person who could
be u or me or anyone competing in the world series.
for the first time. Almost finished.

Poker 101

2005-05-31T18:56:00.000-07:00

Tonite from 6.15, ill be conducting another
poker 101 class, if anyone is interested.

Yesterday i was paranoid that the students
would get better than the teacher, but i
guess thats the goal of any good teacher.
But i guess i wont teach them the fatal
5 palm exploding heart manouevure just yet.

I know any of my friends could be taught
to be a winning player on pp, as long as they
have a little bit of discipline and patience.

It helps if ppl tell whether they're coming
or not. Feel free to bring a cable/laptop,
as u can be hooked into ze network.

Vegas

2005-05-30T22:53:00.000-07:00

Is anyone going to come vegas in a month? Pls?
Anyone ? Im 95% going. Prolly go from the
2nd to the 17th of July. If u come along
ill pay for accomodation and food, depending
who u are :) Live on the edge cmon ! I guess
im happy to go myself, but would be good.
If u dont want to go coz u have to come with
me or its not ur cup of tea thats a good reason,
if u dont want to go coz its too short a notice,
you should look in the mirror and look wat
uve become :)

Vegan Brad

2005-05-30T22:24:00.000-07:00

Vegan - a strict vegetarian : one that consumes no animal food or dairy products
Brad - semi-carnivore - likes to a consume meat, preferably rare cow,
favourite drink - ice coffee

So "vegan brad" - would seem to be an oxymoron. Which is why
when Brad said that he was going over to melbourne with the
rest of work and told me bad luck, there had to be
repecussions. This came in the form of replying to the
email sent by the melbourne office asking for any special
dietary requirements to be passed on. I replied from
Brad's account saying that he had recently become a vegan,
and would like a vegan meal. Then i deleted the sent item...

So when brad said how much he was looking forward to dinner
earlier that morning b4 flying out, i could only smile. Unfortunately
the facts are thin at this stage, coz brad still seams
to be bitter about the embarassment caused. I know
that he ended up eating his steak. I know that some
waiter was trying to force him to eat a vegan meal. Asking
for brad harrisson, and then saying there is a vegan meal
for him. Which brad could only reply that he was brad, but
didnt order a meal. I also know the head of the accc energy section
was seating on the same table as brad and another senior
person, both whom hardly knew him, and saw brad complain
about this vegan meal which had been specially prepared
for him. The girl who organised this, was freaking out
a little, coz she saw brad eating a steak, and thought
he was vegetarian, so i guess there was a little havoc
caused, but i wish i could have been htere :)

Borders

2005-05-30T22:19:00.000-07:00

went into borders after lunch with frage. Looked
at the poker books section, found a moneymaker book
about 2003. Gave it to the shop lady at the counter.

lady: i watched the poker on saturday night
me: yah, i ve seen them all
lady: its really interesting
(me nodding)
belfrage (in the background loud enuff of for the
lady to here): hes been on the show
lady: you know they play for a lot of money
belfrage (in the background): hes a poker player
lady: well good luck, may be one day you will get
on there
belfrage: (in the background) hes one of them
me: thanks

Funny, i dont think that lady believed anything
belfrage said, funny

Happy Monday

2005-05-30T22:02:00.000-07:00

Its over ! Work have decided to release me, and let
me go into the abyss. Ive got leave as off this friday
till i finish. Wow , thats it! Boss asked me today
what i had planned, at the moment not a lot,
Booyaalakasha!

Lunch ended up getting 2nd lunch at sushi train.
Sushi train seems to have a lot more girls there
than guys, which is probably why brad keeps going
there, not to mention the japanese girls who work
there. Wondered around town after lunch, looking for
gloves with dayle, obviously bored. Discovered a
pair of sunglasses i might buy at Myers, after
i broke the last pair jumping over the CHS fence.

Gave blood in the afternoon. Tell u wats stupid !
Ppl requesting their tsunami donations back over
the corby case. Looked thru the time fashion magazine,
need to re-decorate my house somehow.

Got roped into law 101 with Maja. Well its been
a while since ive done any law stuff. Ate at
european cafe, not bad. Got the dvds i was suppose
to get off james. Then went to spatz, good desert
- banana crepes. Ordered mocha, i dont know why
i dont like coffee, i couldnt drink any of it,
so that was a waste. I think i ordered it
coz of the name.

Goran and james came over to watch the end of
the apprentice, only part one of two. James
took some random photos of skateboarders,
not sure why.

Yes!

2005-05-29T19:53:00.000-07:00

autrographed rounder's script coming my way, actually
im quite sure they're photcopied autographs, but who
cares, or perhaps they're genuine !!

wheels are in motion

2005-05-26T22:53:00.000-07:00

I got an email from the party poker ppl, checking
my address coz they're sending the dvd. Its
coming ...

Rounders !

2005-05-26T22:35:00.000-07:00

Cant remember the quotes from the film? Then
look no further than the rounders' script !
Nai found one on ebay, autographed by the 3
of them (kgb, damon, norton) currently ive put in a bid, and
with a bit of luck it will be ours !
Also getting any copy of the script is quite difficult,
only a day to go, weeee :)

Pity

2005-05-26T22:28:00.000-07:00

Whilst i sat in my office by myself, some lady came
up to me who works in a different area, and was asking
where everyone was (they're in melbourne) and she
said y i wasnt there? And i said im not joining up.
Which she seemed shocked by and asked whether it was my
choice, and whether i had another job lined up. I said
I didnt really have another job lined up, and her
eyes seemed to say oh u poor thing, u have no job to
go to. And she wished me luck in a comforting tone.

Its funny, but ppl assume not having a job
is the worst thing in the world. I didnt say i was
going to support myself playing poker, that i prolly
earned more than her in few hours than she did in a week,
i just accepted the pity, and we were both better off
for it :)

Thursday hijinks

2005-05-26T22:20:00.000-07:00

caught up with luke and finch for lunch, always entertaining.
Showed off where im living, which he was thoroughly
impressed. Apparently he lives almost across the road.

Luke - Practising lawyer, who wants to be a musician/actor
Finch - Non practising lawyer, unemployed wants to be
script writer / novelist / may be actor
me - no idea about the law, soon to be unemployed , poker
player / wants to do be film maker

Its a good blend. He sent me a msg in the morning saying
he saw me outside my window throwing keys out, and said
i should start a takeaway store where i drop food out the
window. Enter Frage, whom i threw the keys to. He
spends 5mins trying to work out how to open the door,
b4 i realise he'll prolly never work it out and i have
to run down and open it. Win a ST tourney, high 5, grab
a beer off to CHS. Except ive been challenged to wear
my robe and his russian hat. So i walk through the city
with bathrobe and a russian hat, prolly got the most
reaction when i was walking past the greek restaurant.
Lot of "did u see that man, he was wearing a robe!"
Thankfully jon dropped me home, because when we were
at the lights, some strange desmond was peering into
the window, i fear for my safety sometimes.

Tournament credit contribution

2005-05-26T20:10:00.000-07:00

Following on from the last post, Ive been thinking
that it might be unfair, with the increased tournament
buy-ins. Even tho the game is probably a better standard,
is it unfair for people to fork out $50 etc? One
reason is the average person prolly plays $20 or so
tourneys, and I play $200 (/$400), so someone is
paying 2 x as much and Im paying an 8th or a quarter.
But i still think we're better off playing the higher
stake ones a bit more, coz we all improve, me
included. So as an encouragement for ppl to
play, im offering a 50% tournament creditation system
from high stakes games ($30 or more).

Its unfrotunately painful to calculate. But wat
happens is this, if you pay $50 for a ST tourney,
and say i win. You get $25, going towards a stake in
a seat in a tourney i designate. So for example
say i play in the $500 tourney next week in melbourne.
1/2 your buy in on tourneys where u dont cash gets credit.
Complicated perhaps, but seems fair : )

So far ppl with credit are:
dayle - 25
brad - 25

Poker Tourneys

2005-05-26T20:00:00.000-07:00

High stakes or low stakes ? We played a tourney
yesterday, where we started with 2000 in chips,
with blind levels of 8mins. It actually worked
well, coz it was finished in 75mins. The
buy in was $10.

The blind levels were - time gone :
25-25 - 8
25-50 - 16
50-100 - 24
75-150 - 32
100-200 - 40
150-300 - 48
200-400 - 56
300-600 - 104
500-1000 - 112

Perhaps a $20 or more buy-in would have yielded
slightly better play, but the compromise is between
people having fun. With this kind of structure its
quite easy to run two events, one with a higher
buy in and one with a lower buy in, or say two of
$20. People were encouraged to play quickly coz,
it meant u could get more hands in.

A new day a new lease of life !

2005-05-26T19:44:00.000-07:00

A good poker player is always looking to improve, and
perhaps that is one of my strengths, usaully im
always looking for new opportunities to improve my game, and try
things that might work. But i probably dont do that
in my normal day to day life. Looking back in the
last week, ive been a sooky la la, despite winning
a lot at poker, someone called me a "whiney whinger".
And i guess in many ways thats fair. One cause
could be work dragging on longer than it should,
but frankly thats a poor excuse. Anyway im going
to try to move towards the happy monkey society (HMS).
Unfortunate problem about the HMS, is that its
ideals are quite radical in today's framework,
but everyone would be a lot happier if it was ahered
to.

Work alone !

2005-05-25T19:17:00.000-07:00

Im the only one at work, everyone has gone to
melbourne, and since im not moving over to the
new organisation i wasnt invited. Oh well. Brad's
given me two things to do over the next 2 days,
and the IT guy has given me one thing. I wonder
whether i can set up poker here ? i did
bring in a poker book as back up.

Seinfeld esque lunch

2005-05-25T18:58:00.000-07:00

Between finch and myself we seem to have a lot
of the seinfeld characteristics covered, ive probably
got some seinfeld / kramer traits and hes probably
got the george / elaine characteristics. Especially
george coz he is unemployed. Which makes
lunches entertaining, and typically wacky. Anyway
he was telling, me how he was buying flowers for
mother's day. Which he has to buy 3 lots, 1 for his
mom, his grandma and his sister. Hes on the parade,
and goes into a flowery or nursery. Bunches of flowers
are $10, which he figures are way too much. He
offers the lady, 3 bunches for $20. She says no,'
so he says he will go somewhere else. She says $28.
He says he wont go over $21. She offers $25. Eventually
get down to $23, and then he says bugger it, i dont
want your flowers and walks out. He walks a few
hundred metres down the road, and there is an
italian lady selling the same flowers for $5 a bunch.
He buys 3, finds $12 in his pocket. She says $12 is
fine and everyone is happy. Then whilst driving
up the parade he sees the other lady standing out
the store, and he grabs the flowers winds downs
the window and starts shaking the flower at the lady.
She shakes her fist back at him, actual fist shaking
by an older lady. He accidentally dropped a single
flower out the car whilst shaking, which his mum was
curious as to why one was broken
off, ha.
I can picture it now, so immature its gold !

Luke's Back!

2005-05-25T18:52:00.000-07:00

Hooray, although its been tough to organise a
time to meet with him, and we virtually
crossed paths in the air, as he flew into
australia, and i flew out to london a month
ago, hes back from his 2 year adventure, and
we get to meet up !! Wow 2 years is a long time,
if i handnt gone to england a month ago, i
dont think i could have said ive done anything,
phew.

Poker table arrives !

2005-05-25T18:51:00.000-07:00

The poker craze continues, now we have a poker
table !! This is in addition to our poker chips,
and poker books and poker know how! Actually
i think only the latter is missing.

Two nights ago i had a dream where the poker table,
was at my house and i was sleeping, and everyone
came over to play a game, and didnt wake me up.
And then i woke up and they wouldnt let me
play, and I got very angry, and I kicked everyone
out of the house along with the table. I predict
the table will bring dooom and glooom, i think
it should stay at dooon...

Tho it did look quite good at CHS :)

Gheyness

2005-05-25T17:35:00.000-07:00

Tuesday.

1. Lunch - gays - order eggplant
parm, believing it to be egglplant and chicken , but its
just eggplant. $14 for eggplant parm, bull! Order another
meal on my way back.

Wednesday.

1. Beach volleyball - we play pretty well, slow
down at the end, lose in the final set. dang.

2. Post work drinks - mansions, sometimes i
dont think ppl listen to me, anyway, i
over-reacted, but i refused to drink there.
Its underground, very empty, but the worst
thing is the flashing lights and the pokies.
Next time they will probably drink at KKK
head quarters, another place where im
unlikely to have a beer.

3. Indoor soccer - depleted team, stupid
referee (called a goal in after hitting
the post twice), niggling team, we lose
our first game.

4. Poker chs - out first hand ! Wat a joke. A
$5 game unfortunately is the equivalent to playing
table tennis with the bat in your mouth. Imagine
if we did that, no one would play? At least
that would be in funny. But in poker
playing ppl like to that kind of game. Here is
the hand. I raise to 100 (blinds 25) - chad
thinks about it and calls the bet. I feel hes got
nothing good but hes hoping to get lucky. 5%
of your stack prolly fair enuff.

Flop comes 3d-2d-5d, he checks i bet
150, he comes over the top for 800. Ok, this
is the first part of stupidity. Currently
there is 375 in the pot, so a bet of 800 is
ridiculous. Theres nothing wrong with over
betting but 500 perhaps, 800 is way too much.
Then I re-raise all in, believing his hand contains
no diamonds and he would have a tough call.
He instantaneously calls. Flipping
A-4 off suit no diamonds. Im in trouble and
I lose. I have no qualms about the call, its
just not an instaneous call? I mean A-4 off suit,
is drawing dead, to a made flush. And i would
have bet the hand exactly the same if i had
a made flush, even if i had the AK of diamonds.
Coz he could have 2 pair/set, and y let him try
and out draw me, after that first bet. A $5 tourney
brings out $5 plays, im happy to play $5 tourney
but does it have to be ridiculous? Also the call with A-4,
i ve raised in early position, and a-4 is a hand
thats easily dominated, and is much more likely to get
you in trouble.

Negreanu had a similar hand
in the tournament of champions where he made
a slight over bet of the pot(1/2 his chips),
on a 7-6-5 hand with two pair, and lederer came over the top
with his king high flush, and negreanu thought
about it and folded. The emphasis is on the
THINKING. Ihink and make a call, dont just look
at your cards and go, ive got a straight u
might have anything, i could be drawing dead,
wat the hell ?!

Sorry but ppl who say the buy in doesnt affect the
game are in lala land, two weeks ago he folds AK,
this week he calls A-4, makes a massive over bet and
calls straight away possibly drawing dead, hmmmm.

Im willing to admit I shouldnt be fussy about
the quality of games, but for someone who plays often
and wants to play in the june event, id hope
for more! We should be helping each other by playing
at a decent standrad :)