August Review - Procrastination

August was a strange month. I slacked off big time, and played far less volume than I should have. I've talked about why in earlier posts, and while there is no excuse I'm having a tough time feeling too badly about it.

I ran terribly for the first half of the month, close to as poorly as I have in any point in my career. Fortunately for me, I ran well enough during the latter half of the month and perhaps more importantly my run bad seemed to be isolated to 100NL, I had a great deal of success at 200NL this month.

A winnings graph is below. More interesting is the table below it, which shows where the money came from. Note the lackluster 100NL winrate (not as bad as it looks when you factor in the 100PL hands), but exceptional 200NL results. 600NL 6max, 400NL, and 50NL HU hands also contributed positively this month.



Given that I had been playing 275k+ hands during previous 31 day months this year, I cannot be disappointed taking $8.7k off the tables in 178k hands, despite the volume number being unacceptable. I failed to reach the 800k yearly VPP mark, so no milestone bonus this month. I'll have a nice $7.2k in free money waiting for me in early September.

The bottom line:
$8691.10 winnings
+$3714.70 FPP value (66334 VPPs * 3.5 FPPs/VPP * 1.6c/FPP)
+$300 reload bonus
+$204.51 staking profit (same student, he is once again playing on his own roll)
--------------------------------------------------------------
$12910.21 USD total profit. At current exchange rate, this equates to roughly ~$14109 CDN.

Considering I slacked off mightily and had no milestone bonus to help, I really can't complain about the results. If you had told me the month would end this way on August 15th, I'd have been absolutely thrilled. Here's looking forward to sucking it up and playing more in September, while also spending more time studying to improve my game. Who am I kidding, I'll probably just keep on slacking off because I know in the back of my mind I can coast and still make SNE easily enough.

Furniture and More Run Good

-- Status Update --
2009 VPPs:	781,551
SNE Pace:	123,951 AHEAD
Currently Playing:	Dissidia: Final Fantasy (PSP)

On Thursday I spent part of the day shopping for a new couch (ended up spending ~$1k on a very nice black leather 3 seater) and kitchen set (w/6 chairs, setting me back another $1k). The main floor of my house should be in very good shape with these furniture upgrades. Getting the old couch/kitchen set taken away will be a bit of a pain.

With regard to poker, I put two good sessions together back to back on Wednesday and Friday. I didn't play any on Thursday. I'm definitely having issues staying motivated to put in long sessions (or on some weekdays, play at all) because I see no need to get SNE early. I'm a procrastinator at heart as my parents will attest to. It is something I've accepted about myself, and as such I will be surprised if I get SNE before the end of November. I should also mention my Friday session maintained the trend this month of me making the majority of my profit at 200nl, despite it accounting for like ~15% of my hands. I'm at around 6.90ptBB/100 over the 15k hands at 200nl I've put in so far this month. Graph of Wednesday + Friday below:


On the gaming front, Dissidia is a very good game. However, every time I play through a great game on the PSP or the DS , I'm always left to wonder how amazing it could have been on a major console (in Dissidia's case, the PS3). Oh well, beggars can't be choosers.

45 Mins of HU While Waiting For My PSP To Charge

-- Status Update --
2009 VPPs:	775,046
SNE Pace:	125,666 AHEAD
Currently Playing:	Dissidia: Final Fantasy (PSP)

So after running some errands and having dinner with my Mom today, I returned home eager to play Dissidia for the PSP which I had picked up. Unfortunately for me, my PSP wasn't charged. This normally wouldn't be a problem, but the device required a firmware update to play the game, and it won't let you update the firmware unless the battery is near fully charged (regardless if it is plugged into the wall). This is a good safety feature I suppose, as a power off mid update would brick the system. I am still waiting for it to charge as I write this post.

Anyway, I decided I'd play a quick session while I waited, but the games looked really, really bad. Instead of grinding, I instead booted a 50NL HU table, and played 1-2 tables of 50NL HU for around 45 mins. Results below:


I ran really well (my 55 versus fish's K4 on 544 flop 171bb deep didn't hurt), and made sure I was up against bad players before sitting. Ship the 103.56ptBB/100 at 50nl, hah. I still run as bad as ever at my normal limits of full ring though, rest assured.

A Little Run Good

-- Status Update --
2009 VPPs:	763,598
SNE Pace:	127,918 AHEAD
Currently Playing:	Secret of Mana (Wii VC) + other stuff

I was a major slacker early this week, neglecting to play at all on Tuesday and Wednesday and very little on Monday. I finally put in some decent volume on Thursday with the following result:


I've added some traffic analysis/logging to the blog, and I'm always surprised how many people find it, given it is basically only referenced in the SSNL Regulars Blog List over at 2p2.

Hopefully I get in good volume this weekend and slack less on the remaining weekdays of August. Dissidia for the PSP should be released on Tuesday, and should be lots of fun - looking forward to it. I think I'll also finally get off my ass and do some of the furniture shopping I've been talking about for the past month during the coming week. A new leather couch and kitchen set is what I'll be looking for.

Reload Bonuses, Warped, Permanent Doomswitch, 75% mark, and more

-- Status Update --
2009 VPPs:	754,438
SNE Pace:	135,198 AHEAD
Currently Playing:	Secret of Mana (Wii VC) + other stuff

August has been a shit month poker wise. I really don't know how anyone can run this bad. Being an underdog when you're supposed to be a 19:1 favorite isn't much fun. Today was my first real solid day of the month, and I believe the first day where I didn't run under expected AIEV. Instead, I ran less than a BI above and made $1.5k + FPPs. I'm also starting to feel comfortable at 400nl, and feel I'm game selecting well enough to be very +EV there on the tables I play. I think I've played around 1% of my volume there so far this month, which isn't terribly significant but it is still nice. I believe around 10-15% has been at 200nl.

Two days ago my tenant/roommate/poker student and I went to Warped Tour. Saw some good bands including Hit the Lights, Valencia, All Time Low, Silverstein, We the Kings, and There For Tomorrow. It was a good time, though there's a good chance it will be my last Warped. Getting too old for this stuff.

Earlier this month Stars put in a $300 reload bonus, which is a good chunk of free money. The reload and first deposit bonuses have really brought in the fish, and game quality has definitely improved. Of course, since the fish are favorites with two outs and one card to come, it doesn't translate into more money.

You may also have noticed that I've crossed the 75% barrier on my journey to Supernova Elite. It is somewhat difficult to motivate myself to play long sessions these days because I'm so far ahead of pace, but at the same time I know I'll appreciate some time off late in the year. Hopefully I reach SNE in November. It would take nothing short of a cataclysmic event to prevent my reaching the goal at this point.

Oh, I've also entered ChicagoJoey's Fantasy Football League this year, and I'm looking forward the season. I'm a FFB fiend, and while the $200 BI was more than leagues I've played in the past it'll just motivate me to do my homework and draft well.

Sorry for not updating the blog more often. I know it's been awhile, but pretty much all I would have posted in the last couple weeks would have been ranting about how poorly I've been running, so it's probably for the best.