An example of +EV online blackjack

So, playing regular blackjack perfectly according to basic strategy is a no-brainer. As with all regular casino games it has a negative expectation, i.e the game has a return of less than 100%. In the long run you will lose, the house edge is inescapable.

In the case of blackjack the game has a return of anywhere from 98% to 99.9% depending on rule variations, number of decks etc.

Online casinos are fairly cool because their running costs are a fraction of bricks and mortar operations. Fewer staff wages to pay, no utility bills to pay etc etc, plus a busy online casino can accomodate tens of thousands of paying customers at any one time. All this is good news for the cunning punter: the online casino can afford to offer the occasional positive expectation promotion in hope to gain your future loyalty.

For example, Red Lounge casino offered a nice blackjack promotion this weekend:

Dear Red Lounge Casino Member,

This Friday the 13th does not need to be unlucky for you.

No matter what your hand looks like, every time the dealer has a Blackjack, you will get half of your wager back.

Expert players will note that this extremely favourable bonus rule in addition to the existing very favourable blackjack rules gives players a fantastic opportunity to win.

A quick evaluation of this offer goes as follows....

House edge of blackjack at Red Lounge: 0.3%

Frequency of dealer blackjack: 2 x (probability of 10)x(probability of ace).
(There are two ways to order the two cards; either the ace or 10 can come first. The probability that the first card will be a 10 is always 4/13, regardless of the number of decks, because there are 16 out of 52 tens in the deck and 16/52 = 4/13. The probability of an ace, given that a 10 has already been removed from the deck is the number of aces divided by the number of cards left. Let n be the number of decks. There are 4*n aces and 52*n-1 cards left. So for n decks the probability is 2*(4/13)*(4*n/(52*n-1)), which is conveniently about 1 in 21. For example for 6 decks the answer is 2*(4/13)*((4*6)/(52*6-1)) = 192/4043 = 0.047489).

So for every 21 hands we play we get half our stake back. This gives us 0.5/21 back = +2.38%

The game now has a return of 99.7 + 2.38 = 102.8%. It has become a positive expectation game.

Lovely jubbly.

Done with Stars

Finally reached my 20000 FPPs target at Stars, and have ordered my 30GB Video Ipod, it takes 4-6 weeks to arrive apparently. I'll be in the UK by then so it'll be interesting to see how long it actually takes.

Rather costly experiment in that I ended up winning only $190 after approx 25000 hands. I'd expect to have gained at least $1200 in bonuses and rakeback for that sort of action if I'd played at my regular site. Not to mention expected winnings from more numerous donks. I'd originally hoped to win around $1K and an Ipod by playing at Stars.

Maybe I just ran cold (plenty of wicked suckouts for sure) but the excellent customer support they provide and their ultra-reliability doesn't make up for the overwhelming number of TAGGY players that frequent the site IMO (I practiced good table selection religiously). It's no fun logging in and seeing an array of tables at 15-20% seeing the flop.

Back to Towergaming I go.

Finally a win at Stars

It's taken approx 25000 hands, and numerous long sessions but I am finally a winning player at Stars. I booked two winning sessions last weekend for $450, meaning I am $420 in the black.

Interestingly, the very early hours local time (around 9am GMT) seemed to be particularly juicy. There are bad players to be found at Stars.

1500 more frequent player points and I've gained my video Ipod, after that I'm off to more fertile grounds (read: rakeback and bonuses!).

Interviewed by Sebastian Hacher

Wednesday was a fairly atypical day for me, I was interviewed by the Argentine journalist Sebastian Hacher (google the dude to see some of his works) about the life of an online poker professional. I gave the interview in my finest Spang-lish, so wasn't able to express myself as fully as I'd liked.

I think Sebastian was more interested in the travelling aspect of my chosen career, but I'm keen to see the final version of our discussion (should be YouTubed initially) and if any of it makes it to the press (Clarin are interested...if I understood him correctly).

Anyway, Sebastian was a great guy....if you read this, it was a pleasure to meet you and good luck with this project and with future works.

Some good news from Neteller?

As a cardholder of the original NETELLER Card, you will be amongst the first to receive the new Altair Prepaid MasterCard® card, brought to you in partnership with Altair Financial Services.* This new card will replace the original Cirrus network NETELLER Card, which was retired on May 3rd, 2007.

Your new Altair Prepaid MasterCard card will arrive soon

We will start our new Prepaid Card distribution in a few days. You can expect your card to arrive in your mailbox in the coming weeks, followed by a Personal Identification Number (PIN) a few days later. This card will carry the “Altair Financial Services” brand on it as they are our card services partner.

Once you receive your card and PIN, follow the simple activation steps provided in your card envelope. Also, as a valued member, we have pre-loaded your card with £5/€7.50/$10 USD to cover the activation fee.

To learn more about the new Altair Prepaid MasterCard card from Altair Financial Services, including pricing, visit our website.

Should you have any questions or require assistance, please contact our Customer Service Team, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Thank you for choosing NETELLER.

NETELLER Communications

* The Altair Prepaid MasterCard is issued byNewcastle Building Society pursuant to licence from MasterCard International Incorporated. Newcastle Building Society is authorised and regulated by the Financial Services Authority, and can be found in the FSA Register ( www.fsa.gov.uk/register) under Registration No. 156058. Contact cardsolutions@newcastle.co.uk for information.

Here's a table of fees associated with use of the card (certainly an improvement on the previous version).

Frustration at Stars

I can only conclude that I am not good enough to beat the combination of decent players and 5% rake at Stars. After 20K hands I have fought my way back to -$30. LOL.

It doesn't help when your very first orbit of the day goes like this:

$3/$6 Texas Hold'em Full Ring (first orbit so no reads...bar 3 regulars at the table).

I'm in middle position with pocket Queens, and it's folded to me. I raise, everyone folds, button re-raises, blinds fold....

I just call here, I'm out of position and I've never played this guy before, if no A or K flops I'm going to war.

Flop: T clubs, 5 spades, 2 hearts. Eureka.

I check, viallin bets, I raise, villain makes it 3 (He has AA, KK?) I cap, he calls. I decide I'm check/calling him down now....probably incorrectly.

Turn: 8 clubs.
I check, villain bets, I call.

River: J spades.
I check, villain bets, I call.

Villain show's down 88 for turned trips, I muck with a sigh, and note villains poor play.

THE VERY NEXT HAND.

Dealt to me: pocket aces.

Early position player (EPP) raises, I re-raise, villain cold calls (WTF??!...now I'm convinced he's a clown) everyone else folds, EPP calls.

Flop: Kspades, 2spades, 7hearts.
EPP bets.....I figure a raise here isn't pushing a flush draw off the hand so I just call (with the intention of going to war if the turn doesn't bring a spade), villain calls.

Turn: 9diamonds.
EPP bets, I RAISE, villain cold calls (WTF??!), EPP just calls (EPP does not have KK, nor does villain).

Turn: 2spades, ffffff, the scare card for me.
EPP checks, I check, villain immeadiately bets, EPP calls, I make the crying call.

EPP turns over QQ, villain flips 22 for rivered trips. Outrageously bad play.

3 hands later, dealt to me UTG: KK, christ, more money down the drain I think.

I raise, everyone folds (including villain.....gutted) bar the button who reraises, I make it 4.

Flop is Q high and rainbow.

I bet, button calls.

Turn is a blank 5.

I bet, button raises, I re-raise, button caps.....oh fuck, I'm beaten here and I know it, probably by QQ I think...I call hoping that the button has fallen in love with AQs.

River: Blank Ten.
I check, button bets, I call.
Button shows pocket Aces.

First orbit and I'm $106 in the hole.

Meanwhile, I played the Gold Star $100K donkament on Saturday, managed to get myself to 2400 chips from a start of 1500 when my re-raise all-in against the table bully was cold called by the button (bully then folded). I had pocket 88's coldcaller flipped Ace-5 offsuit. Obviously he flopped his ace. Still, I got my chips in as 70/30 favourite so can't complain....also I'm no donkament player.

Turning the corner

At last the cards are beginning to fall kindly, I've been managing to book some decent wins this week.

Poker Stars
I played a sporadic 10K hands or so at Stars during the last 2-3 weeks, $3/6 mostly with some $2/4, at times playing up to 6 tables, mainly to take advantage of the double points promo period, and reload bonus. The standard of play is significantly better at Stars, and as I'm still playing without poker tracker (3 months now) I think it's wise to stick to other networks. I practiced good table selection but still I managed to grind out a steady -1BB/hrs. Very frustrating when the 1 or 2 clowns at the table seem to suckout against me only, then have to sit back and watch as they spunk away my chips to the other TAGs. A particularly enjoyable hour where my flopped set of Kings lost to rivered quads TWICE.
Result: -$250, so by no means disastorous, I'm Gold Star Status this month and have 12000FPPs, so one eye on the Video Ipod. Might as well play the $100K freeroll donkament at the end of June too.

Ongame (Tower)
Another 7000 hands I guesstimate, in 2 weeks. $2/$4 full ring and some $1/2 shorthanded. Never more than 4 tables. Solid losses until this weekend, where all came good. The full ring games are super soft during the week (European evenings), which helps. Sadly not much $3/6 going on, I should grow a pair and play more $5/$10 but want to wait until I have PT again.
Result: +$800 including bonuses.

Party
I don't usually play here much, but with the new points system in place and the fact that I'm sending and receiving P2P transfers for significant $$ every month I figured I'd give them some action again. Glad I did, as I'm running hot at the $2/$4 tables and am up around $350 in just 2K hands.

Finally, +EV blackjack has been OK, nothing spectacular (I´m actually a little below EV) but +$400 for about 10hrs play this week is plenty for me.

A very brief update

I wish I could post more regularly but I'm not in the best of moods.

Argentina is cold now, typically just a couple above freezing at night, maybe 15 degrees celsius in the afternoons. I really should switch hemispheres but my private life is hampering my travel plans.

I've also been getting a severe spanking at the poker tables this week. Poker can bore me at the best of times, but it's mind-numbing when you can't win a pot.

It's a holiday weekend here (May 25th = Revolucion de Mayo). The history of this relatively young country makes quite interesting reading (naturally it's littered with examples of Politicians screwing it's people left, right and centre), maybe I should summarize it one day.

Chau for now.

April stats

Quick reveiew of Aprils financial performance, more for my benefit than yours:

Poker: +$250
+EV Blackjack: +$1180
Websites: +$1700

Total: +$3130

I barely managed 20hrs of table time during the entire month: lack of a reliable net connection and lack of desire on my part are to blame. Must knuckle down in May, and I think it's time to learn how play No-limit cash properly.

On the blackjack front positive EV opportunities have really shrunk this year, my EV was actually a paltry $800 for April (last years average was around $1500/month), so I owe the math gods $380 somewhere along the line.

I have a few websites that have eventually started to show some life. It's all about niche finding and I believe that after 12 months of trial and error I am beginning to find my own niche. This blog has helped by chipping in nearly $400 (I have over $6000 in rakeback to ship for April).

All in all not fantastic numbers, but a small fortune by Argentine standards. I'm living on less than $1000/month right now and to be honest I really have done fuck all work! ;-)

Good luck Rob

Just a quick shout to one of my favourite poker bloggers Rob Sherwood, over at sherwoodpoker.blogspot.com. Rob's recently won his way through to a shot at $1million....he has a seat at the 6-player final table of the Mansion Poker Dome Challenge

Rob qualified for his seat at the final table by first winning a seat to the semi-final via online qualification, then winning the semi-final heat in Vegas (and $50K) in Jan 07.

It's a winner-takes-all final table, so good luck mate.

UPDATE: Rob finished 3rd, hardlines mate, but still an excellent overall performance.

Poor blackjack play

I had forgotten about a $100 reload bonus that had been sitting in my Ladbrokes live casino account for a few weeks now, until I received a reminder via e-mail from them on Friday night. It's always nice to find money I'd forgotten I had, kinda like find a cash in an old pair of jeans.


Ladbrokes live is one of those casinos that uses webcams to allow players to experience real-time play of blackjack, roulette, sic bo and baccarat.

Anyways, I logged in at around 2am local time, found an empty table and started to play ($400 total wagering requirement with an EV of +$98). I chatted with the croupier briefly, she was from the Dominican Republic and just happened to be very attractive (see photo).

Within a few minutes the table started to fill up, here's a selection of some of the classy comments from other players:

"Great rack Cindy"
"Massive Titz, I like big titz"
"Can you lean forward some more?"

Why she didn't call the pitboss over is beyond me.

I don't get to play blackjack with other players very often. I can't card-count, so live casino blackjack is -EV for me. Why would I make a habit of that? I play at private tables online because other players just slow the action down so much. Time is money after all.

Some of the strategy from the other players at ladbrokes was just pure comedy (for a geek like me). Within 10mins I had seen the full array of common mistakes.....refusing to hit on 12-16 when the dealer shows 7-10, splitting tens, doubling down on ten when the dealer shows an ace, not doubling down on 9,10,11 etc etc.

I know for majority of these guys playing cards is purely entertainment, but I don't get why they wouldn't want to learn to play blackjack properly. They turn a 99.5% return game into a 95% return game, which from my point of view (and the casinos) is fantastic of course, so I'm not complaining.

After completing my requirements I ended up +$155, apologised to Cindy on behalf of the other players, and hit the cashout button. The funds hit my neteller account 6hrs later.

Congrats Tufat

Well done to Andy (aka Tufat23 at 2+2) over at tufat.blogspot.com for recording an excellent $12K month in February.

I've been following his blog for nearly a year now. If you can get passed his terrible spelling (more accurately: his lack of proof-reading) and the frequent "ship it", "hollas" and "yo's" his blog makes an interesting read. ;-)

Tufat started blogging as a micro No-Limit player (NL25, NL50) and has built his bankroll (currently at $32K) grinding the 6-max tables. I like his no-bullshit approach (very little off-topic stuff) and the fact that he posts a lot of his pokertracker stats/graphs. He's currently multitabling at the NL200 and NL400 levels.

Well done mate, awesome month....but just a pointer: you´ve got some tilt issues dude. Stop placing $1000 blackjack bets, and stop taking shots at the NL2000 tables after a bad session!

The Joy of Poker [/sarcasm]

Warning: The following is a fairly long poker-realted post, if you're looking for anything Perpetual Travel related this is what I first had to say about it last year, and if you're planning to become a Perpetual Traveller then maybe Nabombs progress towards becoming a PT might interest you. (He's gunning for 75-large (USD) in the bank, on top of other investments. A recent 5-figure bonus from his employer has surely helped him on his way, though Uncle Sam took a nice taste......poor bastard! :-)

There's no glamour in playing poker in a Ciber Cafe, at 3a.m, on a Sat morning in Buenos Aires I can tell you. Grind, grind, grind. It will be a couple of weeks before my deceased laptop will be replaced.

The one $3/$6 Full-Ring Limit Hold Em table really was much easier than the two short-handed $1/$2 LHE tables I had going. There are no $2/$4 or $3/$6 short handed tables at all, Bodog just don't provide the option. In theory this is where I'd like to be playing, and the few remaining LHE fish on USA-friendly sites like to play short-handed too.

I'd put one last $3000 into BoDog for the final 10% reload bonus probably just over 2 weeks ago. Too bad this little 10% deal on all deposits came to end. This was only my second session since depositing.

I lost $110 2-tabling the short handed games for my 4hours. I gained $90 at the FR $3/$6 and cleared just $80 of the reload. $15/hr....$20 if I was a break even player. Shitty rate for a post-grad who is 30 (Christ, I nearly put "in his 30's"!!). $100 of the reload left to clear and I am -$50. Therefore, if I break even tomorrow I will cashout +$250.

Mid-limit Full Ring is the way forward, $3/$6 x 2 and a $5/$10 maybe. Yawn. Fold, fold, fold....ABC poker.

Hopefully I can also win just 1BB/hr, which should see me hit the $35/hr mark. Adding the 30% taxes I'd pay if I was working a regular job in the UK gives me an equivalent of approx $45/hr. I prefer thinking in those terms. ;-)

Interesting hands? Not really. I found the grind particularly uninspiring. I definitely called too many post flop bets to the better players at the short-handed tables. I didn't particularly play my blinds well either (so important at 6=max), and on occassions I failed to maximize profits from my good hands against the maniacs.

I fired up Towergaming for a final 30mins and netted $80 playig $2/$4 and a $1-$1 NL table. 1000 points and I've cleared another $200 free-load there. ($700 total, potentially $1800 more available).

Total for the night was +$160, so shouldn't grumble.

An antidote to degeneracy

After losing enough money to house and feed your average immigrant family in Argentina for at least 6 weeks in one sitting yesterday, I felt the need to promote Kiva.org to combat my feelings of degeneracy.

Kiva (meaning "agreement" or "unity" in Swahili), is a brilliant website that enables the relative wealthy of the world to lend money to the poorest entrepeneurs in the developing world. When (and if) the loan is repaid you can hit the cashout button, or reinvest in another entrepeuner.

Kiva have a repaymemnt rate of 100% thus far. Such microfinance loans have a global return rate of 97% according to the United Nations Capital Development Fund.

What is fantastic about Kiva is that 100% of your money reaches the entrepeneur....
and it's beauty is that you can lend as little as $25 completely free of fees via Paypal.

So fellow degenerates, here's my strategy to at a least feeling a little shred of decency:

Initial $200 investment (at -3% remember, and bear in mind that the entrepeneurs will pay much more in interest rates) from me, spread $25 amongst 8 entrepeuners.

100% of blog revenue upto $200 will also be invested (scheduled for 2009 at current rate).

;-)

Running Good

Much better run of cards so far this week.....thankfully.

Clearing the Poker Stars reload by 3-tabling $2/4 Full Ring Limit Holdem: yesterday I ran at +8BBs/100 hands for 1000 hands....approx 4hrs. (clearing $70 of the bonus).




I'm also currently clearing a $200 sign-up at Trident Poker on the Prima Network. Because of the rake structure it's actually worth more $/hr in terms of bonus clearance to play $1/$2 than $2/$4. 4-5 tabling I've just played 1200 hands @ 5.5BBs/100 (clearing $75 of the bonus).




I promise I'll post something interesting eventually later this week.

Me no good

A lovely graph of my poker performance over the last 6000 poker hands of December:



75% of that action was at $2/$4 full ring LHE. A pretty tasty -175BB (-$700) swing. I don't ever recall slumping so badly. Most of it was down to sheer bad luck, I probably threw 25BBs (poss more?) away tilting.

Add this to the fact that I was spewing cash at the blackjack tables (-$2500 chasing just +$300 in EV at one point) and December was a pretty crappy month.

Thankfully I recovered approx $1500 of the blackjack losses finishing wagering requirements for a +EV promotion at one casino. I also received $900 in bonuses and rakeback for my poker action.

December 2006 was a losing month.....my last losing month was December 2005.

As my attempts to be financially productive were costing me money in December I decided it was +EV to be non-productive. Consequently I've managed to watch entire series' of my favourite TV shows on the internet AND sleep for incredibly long stretches (totalling 42hrs in 3 nights!!).

A huge downer

I'm on a pretty nasty downer right now, I've managed to spunk away $3000 in under a week. It's all part of a correction that I knew would have to come eventually, I was way over expectations during Sep-Nov ($7K over) but it's still a bitter pill to swallow.

My neteller roll now sits at $15000, and my GBP roll at £5500 so I'm in no danger of going busto just yet. But as my roll also covers my living expenses (I'd rather my savings went untouched) an element of doubt occassionally creeps in.

There seem to be two approaches to tackling these swings:

1) Sit it out for a while, take a break from the grind, actually get out of the apartment for a decent length of time, see some new places, interact with new people....generally live like any 'normal' person does.

or

2) Work even harder to recover the losses, spend even more hours in solitary confinement thinking that the good times are just around the corner.

In the past I've always taken option 2) but the weather in Buenos Aires is awesome right now so I'm really leaning towards option 1).

If I don't post for a while you know why.

A good example of bad bankroll management

A friend alerted me to a recent program on Internet gambling aired by the BBC over the weekend. Thanks to the joys of t'internet I was able to watch it yesterday. (You can also read a summary here). No great surprise that the Beeb focused on the negative.

In a nutshell: reporter Declan Lawn gave current Internet pro, Matthew Hopkins, $2000US and asked him to double it in a month playing poker online. Matthew duely doubled it in 48hrs (he makes upto $30K/month by all accounts).

Obviously this doesnt make for good viewing so the reporter changed the rules and asked him to continue playing....at higher and higher stakes. Eventually they're sat at a $1000 buy-in No Limit table and lose the entire $6K bankroll Matthew had won.

This is a good example of bad bankroll management.

Funnily enough this quote by the reporter was not included in the TV show:

What if we upped the stakes, I reasoned? What if we played for $500 dollars a hand? Or $1000?

Matthew said it was idiocy and that I was just being greedy. He said we didn't have a big enough bank roll and that playing such high stakes could mean we would lose everything in just a few hands.

I made him do it anyway.

I like Matthews story though:

20-year-old Matthew Hopkins gave up his job in a fish and chip shop and earns up to $30,000 a month gambling online.

When I started poker I was doing a course to become an accountant and worked in a fish and chip shop.

I was told about the game by a friend who I used to play online computer games with.

I was attracted by the apparent skill edge in the game and the fact that the game was played with money.

Friends told me that it was easily possible to make a week's wage in just an hour.

In the beginning I was quite ignorant and naive when playing and like most other players I thought very highly of myself. At that time, I was losing.

But I devoted myself to the study of poker, and the probability of poker, in the way university students might devote themselves to their subjects.

When I'm not actually playing, I'm continuously reading all the books I can get my hands on in case I come across a piece of advice I haven't heard of yet.

I'm now playing quite high stakes and am earning between $20,000 and $30,000 per month.

I would much rather do this than work nine to five.

By playing poker I work my own hours, play wherever I want and don't have to worry about a boss breathing down my neck.

Also, I earn money that I could never earn in most other jobs.

http://www.news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/panorama/6177046.stm

Playing Online Poker for a Living

Forgive the shameless self-promotion, but I wrote this piece a while back for ThePokerProf.com, my website that aims to help you profit from playing poker online.

In many ways playing poker online for a living really is one of the best jobs going:

1. I have no Boss.
No one to tell me what to do, no one to increase my workload because others are incompetent, no one to suck up to just because they've been at the company longer than me so they're 'in charge'. As you can probably tell, I don't like bosses. Never have, never will.

2. I work when I want.
No getting up at 6.30am to make it to the office on time. If I want a day off I take a day off; if I want a week off I take a week off. I have no boss, I can do what the hell I like.

3. I don't pay tax on my winnings.
I'm from the UK, this means my income from playing poker is tax-free. Up-Yours Gordon Brown! (He's the money-man in the UK, Tony Blair's right hand man for those who don't know). For many of you outside the UK this isn't the case, your profits are fully taxable by law. Make sure you are fully informed about your tax obligations with regards to professional gambling*.

4. I can work anywhere in the world.
Have laptop: will travel! Good invention this internet thing isn't it?! I have travelled a lot over the past two and half years, lucky me gets to go to South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, USA and Canada to name but a few. At the time of writing I'm in Buenos Aires. If you have the desire to see the world, playing poker online really does fit the lifestyle like a glove. An added bonus here is that you'll be earning in US dollars (GBPs or Euros too) if you choose to live anywhere where this currency is stronger than the local currency you'll feel that much richer!

5. I enjoy what I do.
Hold 'Em is a great game, it's always throwing up new situations, a new set of challenges to overcome and new opportunities to learn. Even after over five years of playing I still enjoy sitting at a poker table. More so now than ever in fact. Sure, there are times when I don't enjoy playing, I'd rather be out socialising with the 'regular 9-5ers' but I can honestly say that after all this time I still have a passion for the game. It's not such a bad way to meet people too. I've forged several strong links with fellow online players from all over the world. We have a common interest, we're bound to get along!

Convinced? Thinking of how you'll be telling your boss what you really think of him, or her, as you hand over your letter of resignation? Wait just a minute, life as a full-time poker player isn't all a bed of roses I'm afraid, playing for a living isn't for everyone. Read on and I'll tell you why.

1. Say goodbye to most weekends and evenings.
In fact, if you're in the UK you might as well become nocturnal. The truth is it's much easier to find profitable games during the night and at weekends. This is when a lot of casual players will sit down for an hour or two, many seem to just hate their money and are eager to give it away. Even the biggest poker room online has far fewer, and far tighter, tables during the US day time than during the evenings.

2. Your income is unstable.
Even the best players experience long losing streaks, it's unavoidable. These streaks can last weeks, or even over a month in extreme cases. It's entirely possible you'll play near-perfect poker for a week yet still end up losing money. Not only do you need the bankroll to withstand this you also need the temperament to cope with these swings of fortune, they do happen and it's not fun when they do. It's important therefore to keep your living expenses separate from your bankroll, this helps ease the pressure when the fish are feeding on you. Stick to your solid game and you will experience the correction in fortune. Poker is a game of skill, in the long-term luck plays no part in your profits. Providing you are adequately bankrolled you will win back any loses, in fact you'll win even more.

3. Dear Mr Bank Manager, I would like a loan to buy my dream house/car/holiday/bride. I am a professional poker player and my annual income is $(insert crazy figure here!).
See how your lender reacts to that! You won't convince too many people to lend you any money if they find out what you do. If you'll be needing to borrow money to make a significant purchase in the near future think long and hard. Personally this is no problem for me. I don't believe in debt. If/when I chose to buy a house I will be paying cash. For advice on securing loans for pro-gamblers seek a qualified Independent Financial Advisor.

There's a lot to consider if you're thinking of relying on poker for your source of income. Without doubt the wisest way to proceed is to keep your steady job; play poker as your hobby at first, it's probably best if you give it at least one year. I played for 4yrs part-time before quitting the day job. Perhaps you can only manage 10hrs play a week? Over the weeks and months you will learn advanced skills that will increase your profits significantly. At the same time you'll still have the security of a regular salary.

*US residents read http://www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc419.html for information on declaring gambling income.

Hours of fun

I haven't had a great deal to post about really. Poker had been boring me to death for the last 2-3 weeks. I've put plenty of hours in but was running very cold for maybe 8000hands. I've been reading a few blogs, and like a couple of other players self-doubt had started to creep in. Add to this that several of the rooms on my favourite networks have tightened up significantly since the US legislation passed and I was pretty disillusioned with the game.......but then along came Bodog.

This place had been on my 'to do' list for months, and I wished I'd played there before. The site isn't poker-tracker compliant, they only allow a max of 3 tables at any one time, and the software is prone to crashes (I've experienced 2 in about 20hrs of play, so not too bad. Not great if you're an MTT'er, but I was able to login straight away with no problems). All of this means that the sharks have stayed away. Consequently this place is full of clowns!

They haven't banned the Yanks either, so the table chat alone is worth the entrance fee. I know I should really ignore that chat but I just can't help it. It's really helped me enjoy the game again. I love the donks moaning when they get rivered by another donk (after they themselves have caught some crazy cards only a few short hands previously), and I love the advice I'm given when I'm told how bad my calling their river bluff check/raise with a 2 pair board (I'm holding KK)....etc etc.

I've just finished at a 2/4 FR session where the guy immeadiately to my left raised 90% of hands preflop for over 2hrs. A sheer delight to play against. Sadly the night ended on a sour note when I had KK cracked by a rivered 2 pair (J4o, another donk called 3 bets cold pre-flop with this monster!) and my AA cracked by said Maniac who capped preflop, flop and turn with KTo. Flop TJ3 rainbow, turn 6 completes the rainbow....bastard rivered a ten to make trips. The 3/6 tables are just the same.

This standard of play reminded me of the good-old days 6 or 7yrs ago, when I first started playing £1/2 limit at the cryptos. 70-80% seeing the flops, all rounds capped, 4 to the river and you're holding the flopped nut flush etc etc.

I do know I've been lazy and haven't sharpened my game for a long time. I've torrented some well known books to read, and I know I need to improve my play of the blinds (amongst other things). Maybe some reflection on that in a week or two.

+EV blackjack and +EV videopoker has been delightfully profitable for the last 6 weeks or so. Long may it continue, but I'm due a down turn eventually.

Travel-wise, exactly zero to report. Thailand has to happen for me, but I don't know when. I have 3 weeks on my Argy visa so I do at least have to head for Uruguay or something, if only for at least 24hrs!

Hopefully something actually interesting to post later this week.....