Nice job on those results and good luck with the ME.
Well done to #1 son as well. It doesn't matter where you are it seems, qualifications are a nightmare to follow.
#2 son...sounds familiar... 
Notifications
Clear all
Busto in the main event towards end of 6th level.
Had just been transferred from a table that I was card dead at and immediately got a hand with an Ace in. Had to look twice as I hadn't seen one of those in my hand for about 3 hours.
Two hands later I was out with pocket Queens in the SB shoving into the button who had raised two limpers. Given my stack size and amount already in the pot he reluctantly called and showed A :club:6 :club
His words were. "Queens? I'm due for a 70:30 to go my way...."
Flop 4 :spade:5 :diamond:7 
Turn 10 
River 8 to give him his straight
Overall enjoyed the experience. Relatively cheap given the satellite entry. And a useful learning experience.
Back now to grinding SNGs for a while and maybe fit in the odd micro-millions while they are running.
Originally posted by Hamishk
... November's goals..
[Done ] ... Play in satellites for APPT main event in Auckland. Budget to allow for 3 satellite entries (of the satellite to a satellite variety). Yah!. Played two mini-satellites. Earned entry to a mega-satellite and then entry to main event for (from memory) around $220. Busting towards the end of day 1b didn't hurt as much due to the relatively low cost of entry. Did enjoy the experience.
[ ...] complete some work on the carry over goals re Mental Game of Poker, MGOP2 and the Math of Hold'Em (vague wishy-washy goal that I will definitely be able to tick off!!) Continued to procrastinate on this one. Instead i branched out and had started to follow acoimbra's blog. And have watched a few of his videos. Now my interest in acoimbra has petered out a little but I would like to view a few of the video sessions he has had with his coach
December's goals
[ ] Resume playing some live tournaments
[ ] Buy myself poker related Christmas presents
- Janda's book
- tablet to read my kindle books on while waiting for a cash table at the Casino
Spoiler
Buy jbpatzer's book. ♠_tongue:
In non-poker news, son #1 has
- turned 18 (sadly I gave up drinking 6 months or so before he turned 18 so am unable to take advantage of NZ's lax alcohol laws and send him out to buy me some booze. The ex contemplated doing this until he announced he would impose, what he called, a "bitch tax". As in, "If I'm going to be your bitch, you will have to pay for it")
- finished his final year at secondary school
- purchased himself an electric guitar
- landed a job as a regional life guard for the summer vacation period. He will be spending time at beaches like:
[a]ruakaka (couple of hours drive north of Auckland.
Kariotahi One hour south of Auckland. Isolated spotFor both of these places he will be living in the Surf Life Saving Club during the week and then coming back home for weekends. Christmas day will be spent on the beach working....
- had himself knocked out by a dirty rotten scoundrel during a lacrosse game
#2 son
- turned 16
- has had two auditions for TV series and one audition for a commercial, but alas, has yet to land a paying job. Summer looks like being one long period of attachment to the electronic teats of Xbox and League of Legends
- Has displayed an interest in picking up #1 son's guitar
The drama in my life over the past month has been related to the wind up of my father's estate. My father's will was fairly simple, with a 3 way split between the 3 children (myself, my brother and my sister)
After six months from the granting of probate, the executors can vest portions of the estate to the beneficiaries. That date came and went on November 3rd.
As my sister is living in one of my father's Greymouth properties, and has indicated she wants to take one or more of the properties as part of her share, my brother and I have found that her lack of decision making ability has thrown up a predictable roadblock. She disputes the valuation the executors have had provided by a registered valuer for the property she is living in. And has refused to sign off on taking that property or another one. (Unfortunately, compared to Auckland's housing prices, Greymouth's are fairly poor). Therefore the lawyer (a co-executor with my brother), was reluctant to distribute any dosh.
My brother has placed some pressure on the lawyer. Greymouth is a small town (around 10,000 people), and the lawyer has said a few times "I have to live in this town...". This response has been forthcoming when my brother is pushing for the lawyer to issue a notice to vacate to my sister so that the property can be sold and there be no dispute to the value.
My GP friend, when told this story, remarked that, while being an unpleasant task, it would be part of a lawyer's role, and doesn't compare to some of the tasks he performs on a daily basis
Spoiler
with digital rectal examinations being the example of an unpleasant daily task he chose to illustrate his point with, all the time waving his hand around with all fingers clenched apart from the index finger
After my father went into the rest home he spent his final days at, my brother arranged for Sky Tv to be installed in his room, a phone line to be installed in his room, and the home phone number that he had had for 45 years to be transferred to his rest home room phone. My sister promptly switched the phone number back as she "didn't want him to be hassled by his ex-patients". And that she could arrange for any phone calls he wanted to take to go through to his new number.... She also ran his affairs for a few years after he went into the rest home until the day she announced "we will have to sell a property to realize more cash ... ....". Long story short was that my father then made my brother his Power of Attorney with respect to financial matters and chose an ex colleague to be POA for health related matters. During the period she managed my father's affairs, her #2 son had several years of university education funded, plus regular withdrawals from the bank of dad via a credit card....
During the period from my father going into the rest home and my brother taking over POA, my sister, while living in the same town, visited once or twice a year. My brother went in 2 to 3 times a week and drove him to specialist appointments etc.... (I view my brother as a bit of a saint and, if my father had split his estate 2/3 to my brother (or more), I would have been quite happy with it...)
This has little to do with poker, but has been a fairly major issue in my life over the last month or so.
The bright side to my father going into a rest home is that I have been able to use his decrepit state over the final years of his life as an illustration for my boys of the dangers of:
- drinking too much
- smoking like a chimney
- taking no exercise
- being over weight
I suspect they are both now praying that the genes handed to them by my ex will counter-balance any genes handed down from my father.
Have given myself some early Christmas presents
- Janda's book
- JBPatzer's book
- A couple of books from Ed Miller
- Hold'em Manager - Will have to spend some time fiddling with this over the next few days.
- Flopzilla
- SNG Wizard
Had a binge on live poker this week and did about 4 buyins in the first part of the week. And recovered 3 of them tonight.
Hands of interest were not at my table
Someone getting short stacked at an adjacent table blind straddled for 72 dollars. Called by someone with pocket 5's
Table roared when Aces turned over by person who had straddled.
Flop came:
A-2-3
Turn came 4 (5's now in front)
River came 2 (Full house for straddler)
Gamble, Gamble.
Then towards the end of the night last night, a reg went balistic when another player made a string bet, using a $1 chip and a $100 chip. The reg's view was that it was an angle looking for a cheap card.... The bet stood at $4 as the $1 chip had been the first chip to hit the table.
We did have a tourist from Colorado at my table last night who remarked, after seeing one of the locals slow-roll several times in a row, that, where he came from, such slow-rolling behavior would be dealt with in a physical manner. The dealer suggested that this reg has been doing it for so long that the locals would almost be disappointed if he didn't do it.
Having been slow-rolled a few times myself, and knowing the tourist wasn't going to be around to share the information with any locals, I took him away from the table and let him know a tell that the slow-rolling reg has. The tourist subsequently took most of the local reg's stack away.... Perhaps there is karma....
Wow, seems like life is throwing a few curve-balls at you lately. Maybe a bit of poker time can help free the mind of some clutter, so to speak.
I have little experience with live play but I suspect slow-rolling to be common enough. I like the way you dealt with the situation though (albeit maybe a little sneakily? ), it must surely be entertaining to have been there. ♠_love:
I certainly hope things get calmer for you at least, but I fear they won't if JB sees his book is 2nd on the list. ♦
Run good,
Mal.
continued my binge with live poker this week. And have a few dis-connected observations.
1) Some up and down. With the downs being a couple of reasonable pots lost with pocket kings. OVerall down on tournament play and slightly up on Cash play with a net -ve (due to tournament play)
An example of pocket kings not being kind:
UTG open raises to 12 (3X BB)
Button pops to 25
I repop to 80
UTG comes along for 80
button comes along for 80
Button now has 155 left behind
Flop comes 789 rainbow
I throw out 180
UTG folds (later states he had AK)
Button starts thinking out loud
"I have 6 outs..... How much is in the pot.... Hmmm I think I have the right odds.... Call" and throws 155 into pot of 395 (if he had had 180 behind, pot would have been 420)
Turn comes a 10 and he says "I've hit" and shows pocket jacks.... 
2) I normally play the 2-4 tables. Every so often a 5-5 table is started when there is enough interest from people with deep pockets and an urge to gamble. A couple of nights ago I dipped my toe into the 5-5 waters and had a session where I managed to come out a wee bit ahead. The interesting thing for me was one hand I wasn't in.
There were about 4 in the hand.
The guy to the right of me was in late position.
Pre-flop everyone called a bet for $25 so about $100 in the pot
Flop came 6 :club:9 :club:K 
SB leads out for not very much
MP1 raises to around 160
MP2 shoves all-in for around 300
Guy to right of me tanks for a long time. With some uncomfortable body language. Then says "Ok. lets Gamble" and shoves all-in for about 1200
SB folds
MP1 says to guy on my right "Ok. You're most likely on middle set. And folds,
showing pocket Aces (He had about 850)
Hand plays out and guy to my right shows pocket 6s
MP1 says "Whenever you haven't folded with-in 20 seconds, I know you have a set...."...
I silently thought to myself "Thanks for sharing"
3) Last night, towards the end of my session, the most drunk guy I've played with sat down to my right. The stench of alcohol was striking, and the guy played very slowly and purposefully. I was bemused as to how he could possibly still be functioning other than sheer willpower. It didn't take too long until he had donated his stack to the table.
4) Slight commotion at the table next door from time to time as a chinese gambler went "All-in" at regular intervals. Haven't seem him before so suspect he might be a tourist rather than a local. At one point the button had thrown in a 3X BB call out of turn, the gambler went "All-in" and the button wanted to retrieve his 3X out of turn bet. The dealer pointed out he needed to be aware of the action and if he acted out of turn, the money stayed on the table. He could either fold or call the All-in. The button was Not Happy.
At the end of the night the All-in bot was up 6 Buy-ins+.
5) I've been playing a few live tournaments this past week without getting very deep.
A couple of times I've been in the BB with top 15% starting hands and everyone has folded apart from SB who completes. Each time I've shoved. Which, apparently, is generally not done too often at this Casino at the stack level I was shoving at.. However, the tournaments resemble on-line Turbo tournaments as the number of hands you get over the first 4 or 5 levels is not that many. And if you haven't built a stack it rapidly gets to shove-fold time. So I've decided to be aggressive in those SB V BB scenarios to a) either double up or go home or b) scare people from limping my BB (unless they have a premium hand, which I expect someone will do sooner or later).
6) Two nights ago I had to pass a little gas from time to time. I tried to do this in a way that would be kind to my near neighbours and stood up from the table when I had folded my hand, wandered a few metres away, let the excess gas escape, then return to the table. Unfortunately, there was a flaw in this sceme as, when I sat down, the released gas, which had managed to stay within the confines of my pants, was expelled upwards, escaping through the now looser gap between my belt and my body. The guy to my right showed a look of disgust a couple of times and put his finger to his nose. And, as I'd stood up to leave the table, at first thought I'd left to escape the smell and looked with disgust at the other guy sitting near him...
Have been watching some TISM videos. A blast from my past.
Listened to this one many times on my daily commute. Lyrics here
Hadn't heard this one on the radio for some reason
Have been sitting at a table with one of the better regs several times over the past week.
He gave away some behavioral tell information that (hopefully) will end up saving me money long term
Scenario:
(Hand I didn't play in)
Reg in SB
4 limpers for $4
Reg pops to $25
2 limpers call to $25. 3rd limper looks like he was going to fold, then Button acts out of turn and also calls for $25. 3rd limper then also calls
Flop comes Q :spade:3 :spade:7
SB leads out for $70 into $125
limpers 1 &2 fold
limper 3 raises to $200 leaving about $100 behind
Button folds
SB then says. "You hit your set of 3s didn't you...."
limper 3 doesn't manage to fully suppress a smile
SB then says "I'm going to fold this hand. Most people at this table wouldn't. You were going to fold until the button called out of turn and then you were priced in with your pocket 3s...."
Didn't get to see limper 3's hand but, from the behaviour, I'm pretty certain he had hit a set.
Two nights later, I saw this behavior again, this time from the SB in the first hand.
He was 2nd limper in MP2
Button raises to $17. BB calls, MP1 calls. Reg calls and completes the action in MP2.
Flop came A-5-Q
BB leads out for 35.
MP1 folds
MP2 calls
Button calls
Turn come K (rainbow)
BB leads out for $70
MP2 raises to $175 leaving about $50 behind
Button folds
BB thinks for a while. Says "Have you got JT?" No read
BB then shoves
MP2 says "You must have a bigger set than my set..."
BB has AQ for two pair.
MP2 has a set of 5s
BB lost (didn't hit any of the remaining Qs or Aces)
updates on my Christmas gifts.
a) My books have not arrived. Any book review of jbpatzer's book will have to wait until the shipment from Amazon arrives. (I chose the hard copy version as I like to read in the bath and have yet to find an electronic reading device I trust myself enough to take into that environment...)
b) I like flopzilla. A lot. 
c). Exporting 18 months of pokerstars history from Pokertracker and importing it into HoldemManager is a good way to make your laptop unusable for several days Perhaps a wiser course would have been to export/import the last 6 months worth of data...
d). I have gone back to Pokertracker in the meantime. I think I need a more robust computer and will wait for a computer sale to coincide with enough motivation to actually go out and buy one before I give HoldemManager another try. And I think I'll have to do a bit of detective work into an optimal HoldemManager setup as well.
I continue to suck at live play.
Tournament wise I have done poorly. I have yet to adjust to many of the locals that like to limp with big hands. Or who limp with so-so hands, then call shoves from the likes of KK/AA and suck out with A-3 suited / A-10 suited / KJo
Cash wise I have runbad, poor hand selection, and a need to be more aggressive. I can work on two out of those three items during 2014.
My books have arrived. I now have some fresh reading material when splashing around in the tub. 
I managed to lose most of my stack running a bluff tonight after being card dead, hungry, and suffering from entitlement tilt. Then lost the rest on a hand where there were 5 limpers and I was in the BB with AJo. I shoved the remainder of my stack - about 15 BBs.
To my surprise, there were two callers. The Cutoff (with AQo 
) and the Button (with KK )....
Unfortunately my hand didn't come from behind.....
Well I gave Holdem Manager another try today and again went back to pokertracker.
jbpatzer's description, on page 62 of his book, of his holdem manager configuration, inspired me to give it another go. Unfortunately, the subscript on page 62 proved to be only too true for HM. After about the 5th seizure of my laptop for a minute or two, I had to admit my laptop and HM2 just don't get on.
I've been watching the live stream of Pokerstars Carribean Adventure. The feature of the last hour or so of play were the antics of Roger Teska.
I am bemused as to how he has managed to get through to the end of day 3...
Hey Hamish,
Stick with pokertracker man, HEM2 will fry your computer unless you have a mega spec P.C.
Originally posted by tightfish19
Hey Hamish,
Stick with pokertracker man, HEM2 will fry your computer unless you have a mega spec P.C.
Yah. That had been my plan... Which I deviated from when I saw the section in "The Education of a Modern Poker Player".
I suspect HEM2 developers only work on mega spec'd PCs. And have no idea what pain lower spec'd users of their software go through.
For some reason I don't get those same seizures with Pokertracker.
I may have to paper my poker rut with that variant of wall-paper known as "tinkering with software" and see if I can get Pokertrackers HUD to display as per the description by jbpatzer.
Then again I might procrastitask and just ask some questions on both the pokertracker ("Can you show me how to get a HUD that looks like this") and HM2 forums ("Can you advise on how to make my laptop and your resource hog piece of software work together in such a way that I can actually play poker without wanting to scream?")
Yesterday I had a deepish run in the big $11 - finishing 54th out of 10,000+.
some luck boxing when I ran Queens into Aces that would have seen me out around 110th place. Then a bit of fishy play that saw me out in 54th.
(post Edited to put links in to boomplayer links to the above mentioned hands)
Yesterday also saw the release of NCEA results (NZ's National Certificate of Educational Attainment).
#1 son's final year of school in 2013 and his results were good. He rang from his Regional life guard job at Ruakaka around midday to let us know he had done well enough. Followed up with a phone call in the evening to let us know he had checked the Auckland University website and he has been accepted into the Engineering degree course. So well done him. 
After his midday phone call, the ex got on to #2 son, and pushed him to check his results. (#2 son is in 3rd year of High School - first level NCEA). He ducked and dived, claiming he didn't know how to log on. The ex sensed a snow job and laid into him. At which point he logged on and shared his mixed bag of results.
He pretty much managed to gather every possible result - From Excellence (think A) to Not Achieved (think fail). I like simple systems....And NCEA is not one of them. For each subject you get assessment in subtopics within the subject. So, for a subject like Drama, he got two Excellences (associated with internally assessed performance) and two Not Achieveds (associated with externally assessed written components.
Ditto for English and Japanese
Physics, Chemistry and Maths were ok.
This is from a lad who has appalling hand writing, uses a computer / keyboard for his class work, was offered a reader/writer for exams, and declined the reader/writer......
#2 son promptly scarpered to a friends place, and, when he returned home in the evening suggested a swim. Purely designed to butter up his old man... Part of my parenting for #2 son is to try to get him to do some physical exercise and push him to go swimming a couple of times a week. This was probably the second time a swim had been initiated by him. The buttering up sort of worked... even though it was so transparent
Discussed the results with the ex and tore some more of our hair out re #2 son. Happy for #1 son. Then we reviewed #2 son's behavior and realized he has matured quite a bit over the course of the year. And maybe this will be a nudge in the right direction (As in - don't be so proud. Use the Reader-Writer!!!!)
Tried to satellite into this coming weekend's main event at Auckland's Casino. Busto in 6th which was 2 places away from getting some cash and 3 from a ticket.
Sat at the Cash tables and got moved to a table where there was:
- a guy from moscow
- a guy from holland
- A guy from Queensland, Australia
- A guy from Sydney, Australia
- A bunch of locals
One of the benefits of playing live poker is that you get to sit with such a diverse range of people.
The guy from Sydney was over from Sydney following the Indian cricket team's tour of New Zealand and will be watching them in Auckland on Saturday.
He had a big stack when I joined the table. He was fearless and knew how to put pressure on... However, he soon lost his stack and another couple of buyins. One of the best local cash regs had wanted to join the table as he perceived this guy as a huge whale. But, as the local reg had already run up a stack he wasn't allowed to leave the table he was on. After the guy from Sydney had left, a local reg who plays the Asia Pacific Poker Tour, said that this guy, who was now perceived as a whale, had finished 4th in the Aussie Millions a couple of years ago....
After a little googling.... I found Rajkumar Ramakrishnan had finished 4th in 2009 for a AUD$400,000 cash... 
The guy from Queensland was heavily tattooed and had large, stretched earlobes. When I asked him what he did for a living he replied "Retail...pretty boring really".... I dug a little deeper and it came out that he did about 5 body piercings on a slow day... Not really what I had envisaged when he claimed to work in retail... This was one of those conversations where you just wished you had a little more time to come up with some better questions.
Last night got to sit at the same table as someone who was a dead ringer for Antonio Esfandiari
There was a local reg who was ranting at another guy during much of the time the Antonio look alike was at the table and I was thinking "Gee, you are sitting at a table with probably the best poker player you are ever going to sit down with and you are having a prolonged mega dummy spit...."
Spoiler
For non-antipodean types, a dummy is the antipodean term given to a baby pacifier. So when the baby has a tantrun, they have to spit the dummy out so they can raise a ruckus. A counter-measure to an adult dummy spit is to cup your hands and move them around as though you are trying to catch a flying object. Then when they ask you what you are doing say "Well you are having a dummy spit and I'm just trying to catch the dummy..."
I'm also 99.99% convinced it was Antonio Esfandiari. Another player at the table made a comment after he had taken a pot down with some good play "Nice to see a professional at the table." The doppleganger winced. He was sitting in Seat 2 and I was in seat 4. After a little while I asked whether he was here to play at the Auckland poker Tournament. "no". Then asked "what about the Aussie Millions". He said "I'm not very good at Tournament poker so No I won't be.".... Yeah......Right. I said nothing further as it seemed he probably didn't want the fuss.
The prolonged ranting was a little unpleasant and I requested a table move (edit: after Antonio or his Doppelgänger had left the table) . The table I sat at for the remainder of the night had one hand worthyof comment. It was a hand that I was not involved in.
It was pretty late, with about 10 minutes to go before they shut the poker room, and I didn't really take full notice of the betting action until the river. (Poker room shuts at 3:30 am on Friday / Saturday nights as there isn't the volume to sustain having poker tables open after that)
Board had run out something like
K :diamond:7 :club:J :spade:10 :heart:4
The OOP player had run up a stack of about 1800 during the night from his 300 buyin.
The IP player had started the hand with about 1500
Come the river and the OOP player bet around 200.
The IP player then shoved, requiring the OOP player to call off the bulk of his stack.....
After about 3 minutes tanking the OOP player called
Spoiler
The IP player showed A♠Q♠ The OOP player showed pocket 10s
OOP player
The IP player had shown 2 or 3 bluffs for fairly chunky raises or check raises during the relatively short time I had been at the table.... But he had never shoved with a bluff that he had then shown.
You mean you left a table with Antonio Esfandiari on it to go to another table?
You have got to be kidding.
I would have put up with the ranting just to watch the guy in action.
Originally posted by tightfish19
You mean you left a table with Antonio Esfandiari on it to go to another table?You have got to be kidding.
I would have put up with the ranting just to watch the guy in action.
Nope.
I left the table maybe 30 minutes or so after Antonio (or his Doppelgänger) left the table. I'll edit the original post to make that clear.
Ventured out for some live play last night and had to cope with some stack envy with respect to the guy to my right on the Cash table I found myself at.
He flopped 3 straights in about 90 minutes and got paid off for stacks on a couple of them. Plus he was hitting pretty much every flop he saw. And he was seeing a few. Mind you, he confided that he only plays poker for fun and, after a 16K downswing last year, it was nice to run up a big stack. By the end of the night I estimate he would have been up around 7+ Buy ins
I started off my night playing in a tournament and went busto fairly quickly. Getting good, but 2nd best hands, three times in a row. Such is live turbo tournament life.
The first hand I lost to a buxom lady in her 30's who had a low cut, off the shoulder dress. After she had won the hand, whilst holding the cards just in front of her cleavage, she asked the table, in a girlish, coquettish voice, "Would you like to see my big pair?".
Spoiler
She then revealed AA, holding the cards just in front of each breast..
She went on to the final table and ended up chopping the prize pool..
After busting out of the tournament, prior to getting a seat at a cash table, another guy who had busted out of the tournament was questioning a scenario he had been involved in.
In the scenario he was questioning, he was involved in a hand where:
a) Two players already in a pot
b) one all-in
c) Player to his right looking like he will make the call.
d) He says "I think I've got a better hand than you"
e) Player to his right folds and he makes the call with AK
f) Cards run out and, as it turns out, player to his right, with A7, would have won.
h) Post hand he was chastised for talking to the player to try to talk him out of folding.
i) He believed he should be able to do so.
My limited understanding of etiquette is that talking might be ok Heads Up, but in a Multi-way pot as per above, he shouldn't have spoken.
The other point of etiquette was at the live table.
A regular local Asian lady in seat 8 had just lost a big pot. I suspect she made a flush on the turn, only to be beaten by a full house on the river. After the hand, a young German male tourist asked her if she had a flush. She said "No English".
The German guy looked a little confused and muttered "Flush is international" and let it slide at that point.
Very shortly after the Asian dealer joked that the lady in seat 8 was racist (may have been related to the "No English" statement as all the regs at the table knew she had English as a first language). At which point, she gave the dealer a serve in very clear, well articulated English. The German guy then questions why she didn't answer his flush question and somehow manages to get a serve from another reg down the far end of the table and, in a fairly grumpy manner tells the German "You don't ask people what they had, especially if they have just lost a big pot...Its just rude.."
Which leads me to question... Just what is the protocol at live Cash after someone loses a big hand.? Is it really that rude to ask?