1/3 month updataments

Hey guys,
Been putting in some more volume. Internet's now fixed so that's not an issue anymore. Put in 110 games today in 5 hours, -$194. AA < KK for t55k and the CL with 11 left. So it goes. The roll's growing, which is nice and I'm working on watching some DC vids and really starting to think about poker (more than 15bb's deep...weird, I know).

I finished "The Great Gatsby" the other day and didn't find it that great. Everyone raves on and on about it. I started "Slaughterhouse Five" which is supposed to be really good too but I don't really like Vonnegut's writing style. It's really casual and sometimes he just comes across as stupid, or, at the very least, overly simplistic. I actually have a pile of books I want to read but haven't. They include:

The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Mind Gym
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
A Clockwork Orange
Ender's Game

There are some others but hopefully I'll get through some of those this summer.

It's sort of annoying having put in 570 games 1/3 of the way through the month and have -$200 to show for it but that's the nature of playing mainly 180s. I did 888 last month and had 2k prof. so you can see where I'm coming from. Just gotta keep grinding.

Reasons pointed me toward a thread (http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/36/stt-strategy/account-hacked-529537/) about a guy who's been a regular in the STTF forum forever. Apparently he's a really nice guy, plays for a living, and got hacked on Stars for 14k. He has a wife and daughter, etc so obviously this is devastating for him. People on 2p2 usually piss me off (with super short, unhelpful responses like "ez call" or just by being dicks) but SSTF has been surprisingly good about this. Everyone has expressed their condolences and they're organizing a 10+10 tourney (where the 10 in rake goes to kevstreet, the guy who got hacked). I'll be playing in it, so will Reasons. If I can't make it, I'll ship him some money. I just can't imagine what it would be like to lose 14k, especially when it's money he relies on to support a family. Just brutal. Check out the thread and the tourney.

Gotta watch the end of Airforce one. Also, congrats to wbmustang on 10k prof. Nice work.

Later,
Yodaddy

Getting Some Volume In

Hey guys,
I've been getting some good volume in recently. I think I've played ~350ish games in the first week of July so that's pretty solid. I've been mixing in more 12/45s and less 2/180s so there's more variance (higher buyin + lower absolute roi). I was kinda pussing out before because it's nice to just learn one game and not have to be super concerned about bubble factors but I'm on a stake, I get more rake this way, and like Manhat says, "30% of $12 > 100% of $2." We'll see if I'm 30%...my guess is that I'm more like 15-20% tho it's really hard to tell. The play in 12/45s is pretty bad but I'm significantly worse at them than I am at 180s.

Work with Shen has really started to pay off and my HH's have had less and less mistakes. I'm still making some, to be sure, but far less than I was initially. Now, if only the results would follow...I think I'm breakeven over the last 900 or so games which is sorta frustrating. I think downswings/BE stretches force people to respond in one of two ways: Group 1 gets motivated by a downswing and grinds harder (think Lipo's marathon sessions when down). Group 2 gets a bit disenchanted and takes it easy poker-wise. I think I'm definitely more a part of group 1, but I can't totally commit to grinding b/c I have other stuff going on.

It'd be nice if I had a two week+ period where I could just grind and see how many games I get in and how much $ I make. This may happen at the end of the summer, after my research/job is over.

On a different front, I've thought more and more about next summer and have realized that I at least want to check out banking/finance firms. I know it's a long way away but I have to basically start getting my stuff together in the fall and plan for the interviews and all that they entail. To that end, I think I'll take at least Probability (if not, another math class in addition) so I can market myself as a math major instead of a phil major. It's sort of weird in that the difference is one math class but on paper, which looks better to a prospective employer?:

Yodaddy
Good Uni
Major: Mathematics
GPA: 3.9

or

Yodaddy
Good Uni
Major: Phil
GPA: 4.0

I'm sure all of these firms would take the math guy with a much lower gpa (as low as 3.5 I'm guessing) any day. Even though I think philosophy can be v. rigorous, the public conception of it is that it's a lot of bs'ing and dicking around. So even though I'm not sure that I want to be a math guy, I'll stick with it for at least one more class to set myself up for the summer.

The economy has obv. hurt a lot of investment firms but they offer a ridic high percentage of interns full time positions upon graduation and the internship compensation is pretty nice (someone I know is getting 11k from a top firm). I'm not saying I'm committed to this route, just that I'd like to check it out and it's nice to know that if I do a good job and like it, I can probably land something nice. It'd also be interesting to see math applied in the real world. The further along I go in math, the weirder and less applied it seems to become. Linear Algebra was really like this and I've heard it becomes more so in other classes later on. It's pretty cool (although I'm not particularly good at this kind of math) and it really makes me feel like I understand a proof/problem when I finally get through with it. I think a lot of disciplines spoon-feed students answers/ways to go about problems but math is one of the few that bucks this trend. It's like:

Econ 101:

Set Marginal Cost = Marginal Benefit
Find equilibrium
Repeat as many times as professor wants

Often the student doesn't have to really understand what's going on to do this sort of calculation; he's just being told what to do and following the prescribed algorithm.

Having said all this, I don't want to ditch phil just because of how it would effect my job prospects/resume.

I read a quote the other day that said "Make sure that every step you take on the ladder of life is one you enjoy." It went on but the point was that if you follow this, you won't find yourself in a situation you don't like. But it seems sort of simplistic to say "Just do what you like, that's all that matters." I can think of loads of scenarios where I do something I don't want to do for something that I'll REALLY enjoy down the line (or, to put it in more economic terms, where Marginal Cost > Marginal Benefit for a while and then MB>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>MC). It's a sort of complicated issue but I guess it can't be that wrong to just follow your interests.

Thoughts?

Thanks for reading,
Yodaddy

Getting Better

Hey guys,
Sorry I haven't updated in a while. I've been pretty busy between math research, my shitty job, and playing. I'm getting pretty comfortable with my 180 game and FT stuff. Here's my July:

Yodaddy379 888 $2.39 $8 39% $2,118 Super Tilt N/A PokerStars <1Mths SNG Only

Not bad, especially considering that I've been playing mainly 2s and 12s. I've been posting my HH's with Mentors and getting some help from Shen which has been really helpful. 2k's not a bad month so hopefully I can get some good volume in in July.

July Goals:

1) Play mainly 180s.

2) Keep posting HH's

3) Get sessions with Vers/Shen

4) Get over 1k games

4 shouldn't be hard it's just that I have a bunch of other shit going on. In other new, I've finally set up my 30" monitor/PC/scripts and it's so convenient. Debustifier is great and I have yet to set up my HUD / SFSO but I've been able to 16-18 table (occassionally getting up to 20-tabling) which has been pretty nice. Instead of tiling, I've been using 4 stacks (a custom setup) and it's worked well. It's nice not to squint to see stack sizes/player names and the script makes sure I never sit out so that's not an issue (it was before).

In other news, I'm somewhat excited for the fall. I may not take any more math (maybe just probability). There are some cool phil classes. One of them is "Measuring Value" and it's basically decision theory applied to ethics. It's a grad-level class so we'll see how much work that is but the professor's good so it should be interesting. The other phil class I really want to get into is called Rational Belief. It's about when we can believe certain things and when we can't. Here's an interesting question:

Is it reasonable for two perfectly rational people, given the same information about a topic, to hold different beliefs about it?

I'm taking a few easy classes too so it shouldn't be a super tough semester like this past spring.

Anyway, Wimbledon's on and Roddick's at 3-3 in the fifth with Hewitt.

Gl,
Yodaddy

yeah boi

Hey guys,
Sorry I've been so bad about updates. Life's gotten pretty hectic lately so it's been tough to blog.

Parents forced me and my brother to get shitty jobs so we're doing that 20hrs/week which is ridic for a few reasons:

1) I'm already doing math research this summer

2) I make way more playing cards

3) Job is so miserable (we're cutting meat at a deli)

Semester ended up better than I thought. Somehow I've luckboxed my way into like a 3.9 over 4 semesters, though that'll likely take a precipitous drop in the fall given what I'm taking.

Onto the poker side of things: I've been grinding but my heater sorta came to an end. Even so, I have 3k on ftp right now as my own roll and I'll just keep playing games on my mentor's stake and building the roll. I think I'm learning a lot. I mean, whenever I get a top 3 in a 180 I just send the HH in and Vers et al review and I get feedback on where I can improve. I really think my game has come a long way and I still have leaks to plug but have to think that, over the long run, I should average $4/game at the 12/180s. We'll have to see.

I've started mixing 12/45s in for a few reasons:

1) The next jump in 180s is to the 36s so that's a pretty big jump from the 12s

2) the next jump in 45s is the 27s (a jump, but i imagine the players will be worse than int he 36/180s and my roll can handle it better, we'll see when i get moved up)

3) i get more fpp's/vpp's with 12/45s than with 2/180s

I've gotten up to 16-tabling which is nice, if a little hectic at times. My computer is fucking finally coming tomorrow which'll be great. I've had the 30" monitor sitting next to me for like 2.5 weeks and it's just killing me. I also will be able to use scripts/debustifier/etc which'll make me able to play more tables at once. MSUSYR's doing up to like 30-35 tables at some points which is so sick, both in terms of fpp's and just volume.

I'm working with Shen in a few hours which is super helpful b/c he's obv a 180s baller. I can't wait to finish off my stake and hopefully start coaching for mentors once I iron out my leaks in my game. For now, it's time to get in some more volume.

I'll let you guys know how it goes.

Holler,
Yodaddy

Update

Hey guys,
Sorry I haven't blogged in a couple of weeks. I've been pretty busy with finals which were a huge pain in the ass. I finished yesterday and it was such a relief. Semester ended up alright, I'll ship a 3.5 or a 3.75 so we'll see how that turns out. No idea how I pulled off an A in that math class but w/e, I'll take it.

Onto more interesting things: Poker's gonna start heating up for a few reasons: I ordered my desktop a week or so ago and it should be there when I get home today, I ordered my 30" monitor today, and I have a ton more free time now that summer's officially started for me. I also want to grind pretty hard for the next couple of weeks to see if I can make enough bank to go to Vegas. I have around 2k of my own money but I don't want to totally busto myself to go. I should be able to get in 1k games and hopefully ship 2k+. We'll see how it goes.

I played a lot last night. Started around 8:45 and went until 4:45. Played the mini-Ftops event and sucked out AQ>AK for 10bb's but then lost KK
I'm looking forward to grinding this summer and making some bank. Reasons has set the bar kinda high by putting a ton of work into his game and grinding hard so I've got to follow suit. I'm hoping Vegas works out because it'd be a ton of fun to go out at night, play live MTT's or cash games during the day, and meet Vers, Draqq, etc IRL. We'll have to see how I run over the next 1,000 games though.

I'm starting to like philosophy a bit more. Here's an interesting problem we came across in class:

Two men, A and B, want to kill someone. Each points his gun at a man, thinks his gun is loaded, and pulls the trigger. It turns out, only Man A's gun is loaded and Man B's gun is not. While A is a murderer and B is not, it seems that they are equally guilty because they intended to do the same thing, held the same belief (that their gun was loaded), and took whatever action necessary to do so (pulling the trigger). That there were different outcomes seems moot. Of course, it's far from moot in a court of law, but it seems weird to penalize one man without penalizing the other. Thoughts?

I'm also starting to realize that there is a lot more depth to most subjects than I had previously thought. Math is just one example but it goes way beyond what I thought "math" typically covered. The majority of people probably think of math as numbers and solving equations, but even something like multivariable calc. isn't concerned with that so much as really developing an understanding and intuition for what's going on. I'll definitely check out a few courses in the fall to see if any courses pique my interest. Here's a problem from abstract algebra, a course I might take in the fall:

Anytime you multiply 9 by an integer, you get a product. The sum of this product's integers is always a multiple of nine. EX: 9 * 3 = 27 and 2+ 7 = 9 = 9 * 1. Prove that this holds for all integers.

Pretty dope problem and, without such a course, I would really have no idea how to approach this problem.

I'm also starting to realize that there's a huge difference in innate ability for math. I went to the Math Resource Center and was getting help from a freshman from Bulgaria. I made some joke about how she was probably on the national math team there.

Tutor: No, I didn't do stuff like that.
Me: Eh, I don't buy it.
Tutor: *mumbles* alternate...

She was a fucking alternate for the Bulgarian International Math Olympiad team. For those who don't know, each country administers tests to figure out who their best young mathematicians are. So each year, all across the US, honors math kids participate in these contests. So in a public school you have to be in an AP math class and in a private school you have to be in the honors track to take it. So I took it and did well enough to get into the next round (the AIME contest). Now, only 5% of kids qualify for the AIME so it was pretty cool. That was, until I took a 3 hour, 15 question test and got 1 problem right. After this exam, they take the best kids (top 100 or so) and give them another, longer, harder contest and from this group, the top 10 are chosen for the team. 9 and 10 are the alternates. This girl was a Bulgarian alternate. Jesus.

Here's probably my favorite story, though:

Paul Erdos, a mathematician, sat down with some other math guys for dinner. They were all specialists in a field Paul knew nothing about. They were discussing a famous unsolved problem, one that had eluded experts for ages. Paul began asking questions about definitions so he could understand the problem. Ten minutes later, he had the solution. Right then, right there. Unfuckingreal.

I'll update again soon,
Yodaddy

180s imo

Hey guys,
I haven't played a ton recently because of work but I did manage to play over the past 3 days. I think I'm +$1800 over the last 200 games or so. I've been playing well but I've also run pretty hot. Needless to say, my sharkscope graph looks insane. Obviously, there's a ton of variance in the 180s but I'm trying to get better at just making the right shoves/calls and forgetting about the outcome. It's much harder to do than I would have thought and I still haven't gotten to the point where losing AK to A7 aipf for massive CL doesn't tilt me but I definitely think I'm getting better at it.

I really don't see any reason to play 18 mans. 45 mans are way more profitable and if I really need to load a lot of games at once I can just mix in the 6s. As of now, I'm just playing the 12/45s and 12/180s which makes the most sense, I think. I may start mixing in the $16 turbo mtt's (the kind that jbrown shipped for $4.5k), but we'll see.

Also, my brother who is a total fish wants to get into poker. He's been asking me about it fairly consistently for the past couple of weeks so I'll be sweating/teaching him MTT SnG's this summer. On the one hand, it seems like I can just explain push/fold and he'll be profitable from the get-go. Having said that, he really has no background at all in poker and so I'll have to really build from the ground up. On the bright side, most of the profit in these games comes from push/fold so it's ok if he isn't maximizing value at the 10/20 level. At the moment, I have him watching "Math of NL Holdem", "Push", "From the Ground Up", and "Last Man Standing." I'll probably start him at the $3/45s and hopefully get him up to the 6s before the end of the summer. We'll have to see how it goes.

On the fitness side, my roommate and I ran 5 miles on Monday and Wednesday and plan to do 6 miles tmrw. Five was pretty rough yesterday (not exactly sure why) so I'm expecting six to be pretty brutal. It'll be great to be done with it, though. We lifted today and it turns out I'm a bit stronger than I thought. I'm super tall (6'7" ftw) so benching is harder for me than for most but I managed 3 sets of 10 reps of 85lbs. Not super impressive, but we'll kick it up to 95lbs. on Saturday and see how it goes. My max right now is probably 140lbs. so it'd be nice to get that up to around 180-200 but obv that's a long way off. We'll probably do 6 miles 3x next week, so that should be fun.

I'll keep you guys posted.

Funny manhat story to come.

Holler,
Yodaddy

fitness and spring weekend

Hey guys,
Been doing some more fitness stuff though I haven't been lifting 2x/week and running 3x/week every week, so that's been a bit disappointing. My roommate and I went running on Friday but didn't get in five miles because I had to go file math at 4:30 blah blah. For whatever reason, his gf decides to tag along. Now, she hasn't done a single athletic thing all year, so she just has no chance of keeping up with us. Imagine like...Vers. Yeah, that's it. Just no chance at keeping up. So we're running on a track where 8 laps = 1 mile. So we do the first two laps and this girl is huffing and puffing and barely able to keep up. Chris (my roommate) and I are holding a normal conversation and his gf just can't contribute because she's so winded. As we complete the fourth lap, she drops out. Keep in mind, we had been doing like 9min/mile pace and giving her the innermost lane just to maximize her chance of staying with us. No dice.

Now, instead of admitting defeat and throwing in the towel, she lets us run a lap and then tries to hang with us again. Can you say GTFO? Seriously. I mean, I really have no idea a) why she would suddenly feel inspired to run (she's never done this before) and b) why she would think that she'd be able to run alongside us. Totally ridic and a bit tilting because Chris and I had to slow down for her. Anyway, she keeps alternating between walking a lap and trying (read: failing) to run with us while Chris and I keep going. We ended up doing 4 miles at 7:55 min/mile pace which was definitely our hardest run so far. This week we'll prob shoot for 5 miles, 5 miles, 6 miles (all at about 9 min/mile pace). I really do hate running but it feels great when I finish and it's cool working toward a concrete goal.

This weekend was also pretty crazy. I didn't do much today but on Friday I went out with my friends to see Nas (he came to our school) and that was a lotta fun despite not knowing any of his music. It was sort of funny that this badass, thug rapper is getting gigs at top schools. It's like...oh rly?

The concert officially started at 7 but Nas was supposed to come on around 7:30 and we wanted to pregame before it. So it's 6 and Stephanie, my roommate's gf, says that she has to go shower and change back in her dorm and then she'll come back blah blah. At 6:15, she still hadn't left. I ask, "So steph, are you gonna go change so we can pregame before Nas?"

*cue gay voice* "Yeah, like totally."

Then she started having a babytalk session with my roommate for the next fifteen minutes. At this point I'm bitching to Reasons cuz this is tilting me hardcore and there's not much I can do about it. It's like right...you guys can do whatever you want as long as it doesn't fuck up my plans. Ofc, they didn't consider that I'm just sitting there being like "can we go....can we go....can we go?"

So anyway, Chris and I start drinking and have like five or six shots before heading to the concert. Concert was good but I get a text from Stephanie at like 10:45 (Nas didn't get on until 10) that they were in the back and couldn't really see and that she was getting cold so they left. Now, this has happened pretty consistently for the last six months. Any time we go out together, they leave early because they're not out trolling for ass. I get that. But for whatever reason, they feel obligated to make up excuses to go back and have sex.

It's like...it's 65 degrees out...you're not cold...anyone could have gotten within 50 feet of Nas. And they know I know this, so it's just insulting for her to shovel manure at me like that. Ugh. So I end up going back around 11:30 and meeting up with one of my friends and her roommate. One of the frats that a lot of my teammates are in was throwing a toga party and obv I run bad at togas so I had her help me tie it. We head over, they know the doorman, we get in ahead of 100 people in line. I run good, fwiw. So we're there and the party's sick. Lots of people, I know a good number of them, dance floor's packed, good music, just a great time all around. End up dancing with some girl, going back to her place, and hooking up. I wake up at 12 the next day dehydrated, without my shirt (I left it in the room of the girl who runs good at togas), and without my phone. Now I have few problems:

1) I'm worried I lost my phone because I just lose shit when I'm drunk.

2) I have to walk back to my dorm (across campus) without a shirt on or wearing a toga. Bad and worse options.

3) I have to deal with the awkward post-hookup conversation. "yeah, i'll see you around...right right..."

Just brutal but a great night on the whole.

Next post'll be poker-related.

Holler,
Yodaddy