Well, that was two and a half hours wasted. How does anyone ever win, seriously? You have to win like 20 coin flips, not to mention never get sucked out on when you are a huge favorite. It seems that impossible. To start with, you have to get good starting hands, which I almost never did.

In the $11 tourney, I won 3 hands in the 100 minutes I played. And two of those were basically just the blinds. Every time I had a marginally playable hand, it would get raised and reraised before me, so I had to fold. Then I would see guys racing 88 versus A9 for like 75 BB. What is wrong with people these days? How much do you have to gamble to win tournaments?

I don't know how guys like Ciso do it, but if I played tournaments every day, I would become a very bitter person very quickly. No more of that, please.

I'm thinking of just cashing out of Stars and going to play live. The thrill of sitting in front of my computer for hours on end somehow isn't what it used to be. Maybe it's...

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Well, much to my surprise, I finished my guides for 7-Stud and Razz all in a single day. I appreciate the comments from Geno, Gunslinger, and others who encouraged me to write them. Special thanks to crack for adding his input to both guides. It's very nice to have the opinions of a mixed game player who plays more often than I do.

I've had some ups and downs at $25 PLO in the last few days... what else is new, right? Today, I just couldn't get things going. My wraps/fd's were missing, sets were getting outdrawn, overpairs+fd's getting beat, etc. I went on a bit of tilt and lost like four buy-ins. This sent me into my frequent tilt mode when I don't have a lot online: I bought into a bigger game with the intent to double up or go bust. I think that's maybe worked once in my history of playing online.

Anyway, I didn't do either. Of the $88 I bought in with, I left with $34, and then went to dinner. When I came back tonight, I bought in to a $0.50/$1.00 NL Hold'em game. Got...

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Today, I got all my final papers in, and it's out of my hands now. I don't have to be back on campus until the end of January, so it's time for Poker! First semester was pretty enjoyable, even as it was a lot of work... 1/4 of the way to my M.A. now.

Deposited on PokerStars again today, played about any hour of 25PLO. Ran up another buy-in in that time, and it all seemed pretty easy. The competition at the $25 doesn't seem to have improved in the last few months. I will probably run this cash up for awhile and follow a pretty aggressive strategy for moving up... probably 10-15 buy-ins, moving down if I lose half. It's risky, but I could make a lot over the break if it all works out. I will probably play some tournaments too, maybe using my FPP's to try and freeroll into the PCA. That would make a pretty nice vacation, but I'd probably still sell it anyway.

I'm sure I'll be playing live a fair amount over the break, too, but I have a new outside interest as (well, an old one)....

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I know I haven't blogged much recently, mostly because I haven't been playing much (not at all online), and I'm furiously working on several papers, one or two of which I may try and get published, so it's been busy.

The last few live sessions, I've been on something of a hot streak, but I'm happy with how I've been playing. Not that it's hard to beat up the donkeys in these live games, but I have definitely felt calm and under control. I've avoided doing stupid things I have sometimes done in the past that have cost me a bunch of chips.

Today, I had a good spot of luck thanks to an insane player. Let me set the stage, because it makes for a fun story. The guy on my immediate right, let's call him Tony, had been playing crazy and had built up to about $800. A guy across the table, a sick Asian gambler (SAG) had about $900. The two were heads-up in a pot after a raise to maybe $20 preflop, so there was about $40 in there on a flop of T-T-3. The SAG checked, and Tony nonchalantly...

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Played yesterday at the local cardroom, intending to go for some 3/6 No-foldem, but there was a really good 1/3 NL going, so I sat down. Bought in for $150, cashed out for about $530.

Early on, I built up from a few good pots raising preflop and taking it down on the flop, and one rivered flush where I had a 15-outter on the flop.

One guy was crazy--going all-in preflop time after time after time. I got him good. We both had about $250 going into the hand. I was in the BB with [Ah Ad]. He limped from EP, one guy raised to $11, one caller, I bump it up to $45. Villain says, "you're going to hate me," and shoves it all in. The guy who raised to $11 is now agonizing over a call and I'm just praying for him to dump in his $150 or so. Eventually he folds, the other guy folds, and I snap call and turn over my Aces. "Unless you have that," the guy says, and turns over his AK. I hold up, drag $500 pot.

Biggest loss of the night, I am in the BB with [5c 5s]. One or two limps,...

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