Danger zone

Felt full of optimism last night. Sat at work looking forward to a night of poker, I thought to myself ‘I am intelligent and motivated, I can win money consistently at poker’.

Somehow I got home and played badly and lost just over a hundred dollars, and I didn’t care enough (at the time, I sure as hell care this morning) or focus enough.

It went wrong from the word go, when I started with some $1/$2 five card stud. I managed to ship $40 at that, in an hour. Must be my worst session ever in that game. I probably played a tad too many hands. I certainly called down a couple of times when I shouldn’t have. I certainly suffered with the cards too – a chap called me on every street with Queen high when I was showing a King, and he caught a pair on fifth. That is 25% of the hour’s loss right there I suppose.

Then a break to eat, while my ears steamed somewhat.

Back into the fray, with a multi-table tourney. Played a few too many speculative hands early, failed to make a couple of bold bluffs when I knew they were called for, became fairly short-stacked. Cracked up and made an all-in move with 9Td trying to nick the blinds. Got called (badly I think, not that it matters) by KQ and went out.

No limit hold ‘em cash game. Nothing much happens for a while, as is the nature of NLHE. I get a cheap flop with TJ. Flop comes TJ2 with two diamonds (which I don’t have). I bet, get raised, decide he might be on the draw and raise all-in, and he has a set of tens. I recovered some of my buy-in but realised I was too impatient to ‘get even’ and quit that game.

I figured some PLO would be a good move; I’ve just started re-reading Ciaffone’s book which had resided with a friend for about eighteen months, and also figured when I needed a fillip I should play my most familiar game (not to mention one where a very juicy pot can be won). I played okay there, but did – and here’s a familiar phrase – play a few too many hands and could never get ahead.

Meanwhile I also managed to lose two of three heads-up matches. I won the first on the second hand, holding KK on a Kxx99 board where my opponent had a 9 in his hand. The other two were surprisingly tough, although I made a very borderline all-in call in one which I don’t feel I would usually make.

And there’s the rub – last night I was, for some reason, Mr Action. I couldn’t make good folds, couldn’t accept I was beaten, couldn’t stop throwing a few chips in with weak hands. I simply played badly – the complete opposite to how I had intended to play when I looked forward to my session. I cannot explain it.

Now my bankroll is back into the real danger zone – if it were a car’s petrol tank then the warning light would be on. So I’m in the same dilemma I discussed a few entries ago; whether to try to eke my way back into safety, or take a Mike Caro-endorsed risk with my pathetic, shrivelled ‘roll.

Me and The Girl Etc argued again last night, both by phone and text message. Perhaps I can blame her for putting me off my game. I am getting increasingly fed up with the constant arguing and constant demands upon my time. When me and my ex split up I anticipated being single for rather more than two weeks. Instead, I have been in this half-single, weekend-relationship middle ground ever since, and it is getting wearing.

Finally, I downloaded that bloggar thing at home, so links and italics and suchlike will be returning to my posts. I am not yet sure if I can use it to edit the existing posts that have suffered from blogger’s crappy recent changes.