18 mans

Hey guys,

I've been playing the 18 mans and this is what it looks like for the month so far:

413 $1 $7 19% $513

And I've stopped pussing out and have started mixing in 16/18s. The play's still awful, I saw this today:

MP raises to 120 at 10/20, I jam QQ from the btn for 1500, villain calls with 66...

I dropped $200 the other day which was annoying but I have to just get over it. The worst that'll happen is that I'll get into makeup which is w/e. I think my game's improving a lot, I've been posting a lotta HH's and getting feedback. I'm still not great, but think I'm doing much better.

I still haven't gotten two grades back from school. We finished exams on the 21st, but my stuff was in for these classes 4 days before the end of exams. It's the 26th now and apparently these two classes regularly submit grades as late as mid January. What is that? Can you really not grade exams/papers within a week or so? It really shouldn't be that hard.

Still picking out classes for next semester. I'm thinking:

Political Philosophy
Philosophy of Science
Nature of Morality
Easy Class/Maybe Math Class/Philosophy and Tragedy

We'll see.

Trying to get back into shape so I've started running. I go back 18 days before other kids for sports so my break's much shorter than most. Gonna go run now and put in another set later.

Thanks for reading,
Yodaddy

Hot Session

Played 180s tonight for 4 hour or so, got in 37 games, +937. Obv ran really hot but it was pretty annoying because I donked off huge stacks at FT's to get 2 3rds, 1 1st, and some other finishes. Oh well, it'll get my online roll up to 3800 or so and I just realized that I didn't cash a check from two summers ago so +1k for my checking acct, ship it.

Got the gf a bracelet from Tiffany's which I think is pretty reasonable for the holidays, but I'll be interested to see what she gets me. Three weeks in she got me a $500 belt so we'll see...

Going home on Sunday, should be good.

Semester's End

Hey guys,

Semester's coming to a close and I can't wait to get home for the holidays. I really wanna make some money in the time that I'm home because I'll have my 30" monitor and desktop (I only have my mac laptop aka no scripts at school). I played some 180s tonight and got a 3rd in a 12 but only ended +10 or sth. I think I'm playing pretty well and submitted the HH so we'll see how I'm doing. I was looking at a cEV push/fold chart and I think I may not have been pushing quite wide enough in certain spots. It's just that antes are such a big deal in the 180s that they can make a huge swing in your shoving range.

Anyway, we'll see how many games I can get in over the 18 days that I'm home. I would be off from now until the 27th (I know, right?) but have to go back on the 9th for squash. Just brutal.

I've also managed to get through like 3k this semester in spending money so I wanna grind and avoid withdrawing from my online roll. It's nice being able to eat off campus, get drinks, etc and not have to really worry about the cost. I guess it's a small thing but some kids probably stress over it and I just don't think about it too much.

I checked out my SS for the last 2,000 games (all 180s) and here are the results:

Yodaddy379 2,000 $3.07 $7 35% $6,143

So it's good, I just have to really get on my grind over break and make it happen. I think 1000 games in 18 days is a good goal to shoot for. Hopefully I can get at least 3/game over that span and get a bit more spending money.

Not much else is going on in my life, but given where I'm at, no news is good news imo.

Happy holidays to everyone,
Yodaddy

Update (finally!)

Hey guys,
I last posted in July so a lot's happened since then. I'm a ton happier this year than I was last year and I think that's attributable to a few things: gf, better circle of friends, ton less schoolwork/class given that I'm doing phil instead of math. It's been a lot of fun and a lot less stress.

I haven't played much poker since I've been at school but I've started putting in a few sessions here and there. I don't have 5 hour blocks to play 180s so I'm learning the 18s. I guess there's good news and bad news. The bad news is that I'm sucking at 18s right now. I'm just not that good at them. The good news is that I have great resources at my disposal and I'm willing to accept that I suck right now. I think this is a pretty big strength because a lotta guys are pretty biased when it comes to their own abilities. If I send in a hand history and Reasons/Whoopsy say I'm missing a ton of shoves, I'm not gonna write it off as a bad game. I'm sure I'm missing shoves in loads of spots. So we'll see how that goes, it's nice because I can finish a set in just over an hour.

It's weird but this semester is almost over. I have three papers, a presentation, and a final until I'm done. It's basically one week of class, a week of reading period, and then exams. Should go by pretty quickly.

Sports have been sort of annoying because I've been plagued by injury. I'm just beginning to get healthy now and our season is really kicking into gear so I'm gonna have to get fit quickly. We have lift 3x/week in the morning and practice 5 days a week but I want to get in some runs/sprints in the mornings that we don't lift. I'll probably do something like:

Mon: 3mi

Wed: ghosting/court sprints (1 min on, 30 sec off x 4), break, 4x 20 lengths in under 60 sec

Fri: 3 mi

And I'll work up from there. Our team's gotten much more serious as it's improved (we lost our 9 and have two freshmen playin 4 and 6) so I've got to keep up. We also have a great shot of beating the #12 and #13 which would be awesome. We'll see how it unfolds.

The gf wants to go to vegas and I have to do some trip planning. I'm not sure how much it'll cost me but I may have to grind a bit. I have 3k online and 3k in my checking account for the rest of the year. I'll probably spend at least 3k in the spring but I'll try to grind some on Christmas break. I think we're going to the Carribean, not sure though.

Finally, I'm debating whether or not to study in London next fall. On the pro side, going to London would be great, classes come back pass/fail so I could really slack off, and I wouldn't have to put work into two boring phil classes for my major. The downside to going is that I'll have to apply for jobs in the fall and wont' be able to use my school's resources if I'm abroad. I also wouldn't be able to write a thesis, captain the team (if I get elected) and live in one of the best houses/locations at school (off campus, great house). I'm going to apply and give myself the option but I'm really torn at the moment. Thoughts would be great.

Holler,
Yodaddy

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