Score

Today was a good day like an Ice Cube rap song. I made my goal that I set earlier this month to make it to $4,500. Sad part is that I may not be able to celebrate so soon. My girl’s car is breaking down and of course, it’s falling back on the boyfriend so I may have to cash out some to help her with that. Hopefully, I can play out the rest of the month and cashout then instead of now and possibly continue to play at the NL100 level. All in all, I’m happy for the moment no matter how short lived this may be.

-Locks

Casino Royale

Today was interesting evening. I tool in an 11:00 a.m. service and enjoyed a nice brunch with the wifey. Then me and my cousin Brian watched Casino Royale. James Bond seems to embody everything that a gentleman should have. Suave, wit, a classic sense of style… In essence, a true fictional character to look up to. I mean, who doesn’t want to always get the beautiful woman or women as you can so easily put it in his case?

I enjoyed the movie highly and really started to rethink my fashion sense. Now, I’m not a slouch in any means of the word but I do have a wide range of attire while his seems a little more cut and dry and doesn’t seem to transcend trends as much. Just wondering, if I should trim the loose ends on my attire or because of my many shades do I also need those to define me? Just ramblings and soul searching. Tired. . .

-Locks

It’s Been a Long Time. . .

It’s been a long time…I shouldn’t have left you… without a dope post.  I’ve been slacking on my posting the last 10 days and a lot of things have occured so here’s a mild update in the world of Jay.

1st off, I got off track of my goal with a huge setback when I jumped up to the NL100 and got set $1,000. (I had about $4,300). I refocused and remember that my goal for the month was to get to NL100 with 45-buy-in;s by the end of the month. I ended up down to $3,300 and I did what I was suppose to do in the beginning… Play NL50 til I got to 45 buy-in’s. I’ve been doing this for the last week and I’m almost to my goal with about $4,150 (+/-) so I may be playing NL100 again:-). We’ll see.

A dear ran into my girl’s car. Pretty scary event to say the least because I was driving. It’s a dent or two and a busted up head mirror that’s not even attached to the car anymore. I thought I killed him but it was just a broken leg. The doe was was able to limp back into the woods. Alive which is the good thing.

Suppose to be making it to see Cedric “The Entertainer” tonight. About to get fly. Til, next time. . .

-Locks

Tilt

I never noticed until today how much emotional stability played a part in poker. Yea, sure everyone discusses keeping your cool after bad beats but my friend defines what not to do after you take a rough one. I know my friend is a decent player. As a matter of fact, if there was a poker bell curve, I can honestly say that he lands on the above average WHEN he’s in the correct state of mind. Tilt is not even an animate object. You can’t touch tilt but apparently it’s very close by because it caused him to play recklessly. Reckless play and complaints about why me. Why do they suck out on me? Why do they call me down? Why? Why? Why? Last night he had a bankroll. Today, his opponents padded there bankrolls. I just hope I don’t catch a case of the tilts.

-Locks

Superman Returns

Ok, I’m pretty salty. I just tried to save this post and deleted it and now I’m rewriting what I just wrote. Weird?!?! Last night, I downloaded the return of the greatest rapper alive. Like him, I too traded in the threads of Clark Kent and put on my multi-colored spandex. I was able to use my x-ray to fold the worst hands and put my chips in the with goods. I was able to leap tall chip stacks in a single bound and stop the locamotives of chip grabbers from decreasing my stack.

Interesting enough, I have to challenge myself for next month. Because I don’t know how my rakeback works, I either have $2,763.60 or $2949.10. I’ll take the less amount and if I don’t get my rakeback, well I won’t as pissed and throwed by my numbers.

Operation: Turkey Day

Starting Bankroll: $2,763.60

Objective: To Increase my bankroll to at least $4,500 and set myself for a pro’s bankroll for NL100. I will play three hours a day and attempt to play 300/hrs. I also will attempt to maintain a 6PTBB/100 hands. This should take the duration of the month and shall end December 2, 2006 at 11:59 p.m.  Wish me luck.

-Locks

Just Play

Well, I read an awesome article by GP on building a bankroll and how he advised cashing out so that you increase your win rate at your current level so that you have the proper experience before you move up to another level. I have decided to follow that advise, move away from the sng’s and increase my level of buy-in’s to the pro status advised by Fox. He advises 45 buy-in’s for a “pro’s” bankroll and I think striving for such a high amount of buy-in’s will increase my overall win rate and hopefully help me become a better player.

GP also stated that he doesn’t track his stats as far as how much he his down or up. I think I have focused too much on charts, graphs, and data and not enough on my actual play. Hopefully, me sittin down and realizing this will strengthen my play and how I do in this next month. We will see. . .

-Locks

23 like MJ

Sorry I haven’t posted in a few days. It has been a crazy last few days and I’m here to give a brief update as I’m trying to grind my roll back together.

Okay, on Thursday of last week, I turned 23 years old. (Happy Birthday to me!) It rained that day (which sucked) but for the most part, it was cool. My girl bought me an art set, some Ray-Ban lens, and, a Sean John outfit.

Saturday we had a big birthday/anniversary dinner at Joe’s Crab Shack. A lot of my friends came and we eat and cracked jokes and really had a good time. They embarrass birthday people though. I had to stand up dressed like a hula dancer and dance while the crowd sang Happy Birthday. I don’t embarrass easily though and I shook my moneymaker for the crowd.

That night, Kourtney (a.ka. the wifey, Mrs. etc.) got a room at a resort and spa and we crashed for the evening. The room was very nice and pretty expensive at $250 but she’s worth it. We ended up getting into a fight about bullshit and to say the least, I didn’t enjoy the room to its full potential. That argument rolled on over til the next day and we got into an even bigger fight on Sunday which involved body shots and slaps. It was pretty ugly but we made it out alive and are trying to patch things up. Now before I’m viewed as a womanizer, I would like to clearly state that I in no way started the altercation,  nor do I condone hitting woman, nor did I actually, kick, punch, slap her. I merely defended myself and even that may have been too much.

On a much worse note, my bankroll is now down to $2300. I spent some of my roll on my birthday weekend which included the cost of the room, anniversary gifts, etc. and then my father snuck in the fact that my car insurance is/was due the day of my birthday and he wanted me to pay it so subtract $1k+ from the roll there. I decided to take this month of November and the duration of October and focus on sng’s.  A good sng player at the $33level ($36 if it’s a turbo makes roughly 16% ROI), I want to play 100 sng’s for the rest of the month which is about 15 sng’s a day. At 16% ROI, I will make $5.28/sng or roughly $528 for the week. That’s my minimum for the month and I’ll post the goals for November closer to the 1st.

That’s enough for now.

-Locks

Lost File

Today I spent the majority of my day looking for a contract between myself and a homeowner. This one piece of paper is the difference between me keeping and losing $8k. I’m not in the business of throwing away money but I will admit that this is all my fault. I’m not organized at all and this is capital punishment for not being organized. That form sat around for days, months, weeks, and never moved and as soon as I need it, want it, have to have it. . . It’s gone. It’s a tough spot and I’m going to keep looking and try to straighten my room which swallows everything. It’s a man made black hole which feeds itself on socks and tv remotes.

*********************************************************************

The tables were somewhat fair today. I never caught any big flops or hands but managed to chip up a few buy-in’s. I also made some good folds that saved me some chips. Quick tip that I’m trying to remember is big pots equal big hands and small pots equal small hands. For example: I have been betting strongly at a pot since pre-flop. I bet the flop when there were two flush cards on the flop. I have top pair, top kicker. The turn seems to be a blank and I bet again. Though online, his calls seem to be beating my chips in the middle. On the river, the flush card hits, and he pushes all his chips into the pot. His stack is larger than the pot and now you’re risking your stack on one pair on the river. Will he always make that play with a flush? Not always. Hsve you seen him make a similar play? If I’ve seen him make a similar play on the river with a weak hand and someone looked him up, well I may consider it but the key is, without a strong read, it’s impossible to make such a call. On the flop, the situation changes dramatically. With a Kd 8c 2c flop, and you hold AhKh, the number of combinations of hands that you are behind too are few. They have to either have a set or two pair, and it’s that often people call (though it does happen) raises with 8×3x or Kx8x but if you’re opponent has called your flop bet, turn, and now the river is showing clubs, you can find a better spot to put your money in with.

-Locks

Fashion Show

Yesterday was a pretty dry for the most part. I hung out with the Mrs. that morning and she had a lot of errands to run and I did a few of those with her. She was in a fashion show that evening so she had to get her hair done, and get some fake eyelashes. (weird) Mist of the day was put together of me doing nothing really. I had to pick up a battery for my father’s Jaguar and I helped put it in that evening. (If he would’ve been patient, I would’ve done it all but he’s hard-headed and he had been working on it for 1.5 hours.)

The fashion show went well. My girl was beautiful. Makes me happy that a snagged her up. Today actually makes four years that her and I have been together and we probably do it big this weekend since it’s my birthday tomorrow. I’m trying to get a room at this Resort near here for a night or two. The “sweetheart” package is about $230/night so I better hit the tables hard so I can pay for this.

There was a whack after-party at her college. Well, it wasn’t totally whack but they had food sponsored by the SGA and didn’t didn’t last fifteen minutes. As a matter of fact, they only had 2 bags of nachos, one plate of cheese, and one bowl of punch. At a free event, I’m surprised it lasted that long.

-Locks

The Cooler

A cooler in poker terms is a hand or a situation that you can not get away from due to the fact that the situation dictates you to. Here is an example. (i.e KK in the SB, button pushes all-in for $500 chips. You have $1,000 and call and the BB folds. The player turns up AA.) This is a cooler because you’re not getting away from this hand pre-flop. I had a lot of “cooling” situations today… QQ vs. AA 4 handed in the blinds. Open-ended straight/flush draw with an overcard vs. made straight straight, etc.

My point is this. Cooler situations will arise and and you will be on both ends. Focus on making the correct play each and every time and and not allowing the effects of prior hands and previous cloud your decision makig process for the current. Poker is random. Just because you received a bad beat when you got your money in with AA doesn’t its ever correct to fold pre-flop. Make sense? Hope so.

-Locks