Restless Nights

It was a long, restless night for me, my laptop warming my lap as poker became my stress outlet.  It is normally a symptom of bigger issues in my psyche when we pass the 3:00AM mark, and I’ve done it two nights in a row.

The spreadsheet I open daily is called 2006 Poker Goals.  One of the worksheets contains the somewhat detailed history of my bankroll, each row a summary of the day’s results, each column showing where I stand with each account.  Some are busto (like Hollywood) while cash, PartyPoker, and PokerStars each have over $2k.  I have 540 pounds in one column, which I update occasionally the conversion rate to get me to dollars and cents (thanks Gutshot Poker Club PLHE players for generously donating that cash to my pocket, by the way).  Yesterday’s +/- for the day, $6.13 looks benign enough, but like a box score it hardly begins to tell the story of how I had to battle to turn a $450 deficit into a breakeven day.

Nothing worked for the longest yesterday, not switching sites, not the Mook, not switching games, not switching stakes.  Some highlights:

• Worst beat of the day: Not even a remotely close second.  I’m dealt As-Qc in the bb, there is a limp and a middle position raise and I three-bet it so three see the flop (including me).  It’s 2c-7c-Qd, and I bet and am called.  3s hits the river, I check and the initial limper bets with the raiser calling (now all-in); I raise and the limper calls.  5h falls on the river, I bet and the limper raises, and I call.  The all-in raiser had AK, and the limper who held on until the end had Ad-4s.
• Best flop of the day:  In the sb I’m dealt Ac-Kc, and it’s three bet to me.  I call and five of us see the flop 4c-9c-6c.  There is a bet and a raise after my check, and I call the two bets when another 4 hits the turn.  I check-raise the raiser and am called.  2h falls on the river, and the raiser with 10-10 pays me off.
• Most gracious competitor:  At a HORSE table during the Omaha orbit, a nice young man from Moscow calls my river bet.  My 3rd nut flush and 87 low is no good vs his straight flush high and 6532A low.
• Biggest consecutive pots won:  I raise in the CO with Kc-Kh and four of us see the flop of 8s-2h-7h.  bb bets, there is a call, I raise, bb 3-bets, one caller drops out.  Ks comes on the turn, and sb bets with a call and I raise and again sb 3-bets and I call.  Qc comes on the river, sb bets and I raise when he finally calls, mucking the hammer.  Next hand I limp with 22, CO raises and the button three bets.  The three of us see Kd-6d-2c, and I check/call along with the others.  Kh hits the turn, and it’s checked around.  8h falls on the river, I bet and CO raises with button folding, I make it three bets and KJ caps it.  $341 pots, netting me $200 or so.

It was great to scramble and fight to overcome my both poor play and unfortunate results throughout the night, but the bigger issue was why I was up in the first place.  Sweetie and I watched Bones (thanks for the sex in the sack and shirtless scenes of David Boreneaux, guys; not exactly the thing I need Sweetie seeing when she peers over at me playing the Mook).

It also really reinforces why bankroll management is so very, very important.  All the above was at $5/10 or $10/20 limit (with one $1/2 NLHE thrown in to try and double up to bridge the gap once I’d gone from almost getting back to breakeven to being down $250 again via HORSE).  To give you the facts again:  total bankroll is at $8,328.57 and those are the stakes I’m playing at.  Single tabling with the occasional double thrown in from time to time.  Mostly sticking to LHE and HORSE, not playing any tourneys except blogger events.  In September, biggest one-day win is $436 and loss is -$141.

I got several emails from many friends yesterday, and I wanted to address a couple of points that were made by several folks.  Most people said I didn’t have to defend myself.  I agree with that, but I felt like it was important to not ignore the diatribe especially since it was repeated and defended.  Some described slb and where he is in his progress with poker.  I don’t know anything about him but wanted to at least put facts out there to hopefully help him but also to look at myself and my play.  It was beneficial for me, not so that I could have people tell me how wonderful my play was but to publicly put most key decisions out there in plain view.  It is so easy for us to remember the bad way we got knocked out or how we doubled through someone, but what is often missed is the small decisions that are made real-time to raise or muck or call or whatever.  Sometimes I have to say I wimp out, sometimes I am bold, occasionally I’m reckless, but it was healthy for me.

The emails and comments (those diligent few who can achieve poker blog comment stardom by hacking into this site and being able to actually leave a comment) also reinforced something that I know but often don’t believe:  I have made actual friends in this virtual world.  Some (like Linda, BadBlood, Otis, and Pauly) I’ve met, others I’ve built a relationship through comments and blogger event chats and reading their site regularly (see Iak, Hoy, WillWonka, and Mook).  Still others (like Wes and Scott) have helped me for no reason nor benefit to themselves, given me insight or tough love when I needed it.

All that is pretty strange.  I’m a 41 year old father of three boys, I’ve had one sip of wine and one of champagne for toasts as the only alcohol I’ve ever drank.  In my life.  I was like the two headed snake in a carnival at my Tulane fraternity, brought out as Exhibit A during mixers as young men and women would probe and poke at me to make sure that I was indeed human.  When others do Dial-A-Shot, I resort to Dial-A-Snack.  I’m a person of faith whose relationship with God fluctuates like my bankroll.  I have a B.S. in Biology who is a 2nd tier guru in Customer Loyalty, a marketing whiz who has never had a marketing class.  Writing has come naturally for me as it is another in a long line of things that I have no training or qualifications to do yet I somehow am allowed to do.

We each turn to this mistress called poker for our own reasons, and for me it is more a symptom of broader challenges going on in my life.  In some ways, poker is a cop-out for me.  All the money is meaningless, it’s a digital scorecard for a video game that I play again and again.  It is totally discretionary, and I don’t have to worry about whether my ability to read my opponent will force me to dodge creditors or if I have the guts to make a move at a pot for my rent money.

All of this is complicated, but since I a chunk of my life is now tied up in this mistress, I need to see my way through all of it.  I don’t know what any of the above means, but if you’d like to wade in you can run the gauntlet called leaving comments on this site or email me at csquard@gmail.com.  It’s a beautiful day outside, so I think I’ll walk in the sun.

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 28th, 2006 at 9:58 am and is filed under Uncategorized.