Mid April Update

Long time since my last post, I apologize to those who have been asking me to update. I really want to make this something interesting to read so that people will come back, but I have a hard time finding anything I write about interesting. However, the purpose of the blog is also to allow myself to manifest my thoughts clearly into words for my own benefit. We often make plans for our lives (daily or otherwise) based on the thoughts in our heads, but there's something to be said about ideas and plans that are transcribed into written or typed words. I think it enables us to focus on those things more-so, to make them more "real". Anyways, on to the goods.

Poker has been a mixed bag. I blocked my stats on sharkscope and I haven't really looked at my results over the last month. I've definitely profited, but until recently I haven't felt like I was crushing the games. The beginning of April was really poor, then about a week and a half ago I mysteriously receive an install queue from my Account Control in Windows7 whilst im mid-session. Setup321xxxxx.exe would like to run? Odd. I've spent the majority of my life working on computers and to me this was clearly some sort of malware since I didn't run any programs to prompt the install. I clicked no, but it kept popping back up. Of course I had pocket aces on one of my tables and someone had gone all in (how cliche) so rather than risk losing my $13 buy-in I decided to just click "Yes" on the install prompt because, hey, how bad could it be? Literally 3 seconds later before I could even see the flop come out my computer instantly shuts down. Wow. I'm thinking at this point, "Okay, this is bad. But it can't be THAT bad." Oh boy, was I wrong. Upon trying to reboot the computer "blue screened" everytime it tried to load windows, even in safe mode. Meanwhile my games were running and popping off (registering 16 ahead is convenient for grinding, not so much for this). It took me about 20 minutes to surmise that fixing my PC right now was out of the question, so I went for my backup laptop. I tried to turn it on and nothing. WTF? But just a few seconds later I realized what was wrong. I had forgotten that just days earlier I had nearly tripped and fell over this laptops charger because it was plugged in a weird area and in my raging hatred for aforementioned laptop I may have thrown it on the ground and punched it. In hindsight, this was a poor decision (lol) because now I was without a backup laptop in my most dire moment of need. I spent some few minutes sulking about how unfair life was and pitying myself until I mustered up the intelligence to remember the other 3 laptops in the house. Luckily for me my mother in law was out doing errands and not using hers, so I was able to log-in, finish up the games that were up, and unregister from the others. I still lost about 10+ buyins out of the whole fiasco though.

So thankfully like I mentioned previously I've worked with computers my entire life and spent a few years doing PC repairs for various companies. I figured this would be an easy fix, just need to format the computer. Unfortunately for me I needed to backup the data from my hard-drive before formatting. I could either take it to a PC place that would charge me out of the ass, or order a part from Newegg and overnight it. I chose the latter of the two options, and even though the overnight order came two days later instead of one, I'm happy with my decision. I spent basically 4 entire days away from poker, one of which was my scheduled day off. I was worried about whether or not formatting my PC would even work, since I'd never encountered a virus quite like this before, but ultimately the time off was well spent and much needed. I feel like I came back to the game without any expectations as to how I should run and just felt all around better. I've still been reviewing my own hand histories every morning and every day I find multiple things to correct. I read somewhere before someone refer to their game as a rock that they polish up just a little bit every day, until one day they'll have a diamond or some shit. Well that's how I feel about my game as well. I learned a long time ago that I can't polish my rock into a diamond in one day and by trying to do so you'll miss a lot of things along the way. Just work on the little things you can fix, every day, and eventually you'll end up with that diamond.

Other than poker, life has been absolutely great. I had some sort of epiphany after catching a glimpse of myself in the mirror about the same time the virus happened. I am just generally unhappy with how I look. I think I've spent a lot of time justifying to myself why I am overweight but at the end of the day it's my own laziness and lackadaisical attitude towards my health that causes it. I have a gym membership, but until recently the most I've been able to go is twice a week. I wasn't really eating fast food or drink sodas anymore, but I was drinking a few beers almost every night (not light ones either) and would eat whatever I wanted portion-wise. So I decided to quit drinking and go on a diet. I also started running outside on the days that I couldn't make it to the gym. The results have been fantastic. In 1.5 weeks I'm down about 10lbs (little drastic, I know). Last gym visit instead of doing my usual 30-45 minutes of cardio I just did 10 and worked in some heavy lifting, so hopefully introducing that into my workout regimen will balance the weight loss. I should've been lifting more weights before, but I felt like I wanted to establish a good cardio base before I started trying to work out too hard. Excuses, really. But now I'm extremely happy with my progress and exercise feels like a want rather than a have-to. The extra energy you have after working out regularly is also amazing. I definitely don't feel myself wanting caffeine while playing poker anymore.

My fiancée has also been dieting and exercising more often and experiencing the same success. I'm really happy for the both of us. Our engagement party is coming up this Sunday. We should have about 80-100 people show up and I'll be grilling for everyone. It'll be the first Sunday grind that I've missed in probably a year but it's definitely a worthwhile reason. I couldn't think of my life without this girl, she's everything to me :)

I hope everyone reading this is doing well, in poker and life, and if not and I may be of service to you some how, please do not hesitate to ask. Until next time friends.

March on

So February was a pretty shitty month for me as far as poker goes. I think a big part of becoming a great winning player is consistency and this month I definitely fell off. I could go on about extinuating circumstances that affected my play, but ultimately as poker players we need to work towards ignoring all outside factors and playing our A-game day in and day out; hand after hand.

I'm also still learning, despite my current skill level, and some of the adjustments I make turn out to be poor ones. For example, I purposely played more tables than I thought was optimal this month just to see if I could handle it, or if it'd be profitable. Towards then end of the month I geared back down towards a more 'normal' load and noticed immediate improvement. Couple that with the undoubted runbad I was due and it's easy for me to understand a subpar month.

Outside of poker, life has been as great as ever. Every day I wake up I feel immensely blessed to be alive, as should we all. I work hard at constantly appreciating the small things; waking up, showering, eating breakfast, spending time with my fiancée, because I know that it's all of these little daily things we take for granted that are the real gifts we receive.

This month my mother and I got the chance to finally lay my Father's ashes to rest next to his Mom (and eventually Dad) and his sister. We had no idea the plot was already there and paid for (poor relations with the surviving members of his family) but I'm very happy that a mutual friend of the family took the time out of his life to call us and help us get all of this organized. It's not a very huge deal to me that someone's remains be 'laid to rest' per se, but if the rest of his family is to have the same arrangements then it only makes sense to keep them together.

I thought the whole situation would be sort of weird, it's been about 6 years since he's passed, and sometimes I still tear up randomly when I think about it. But it was really nice, and even though religious practice in regards to remains isn't something I place precedence upon, I think it gave me some more closure which is always a good thing. Also, as always, a constant reminder to me to enjoy the life that I have EVERY day and always let the ones close to me know how much I love them. We are all so blessed to live in this very moment and I know we all forget it, but if you work hard to recognize what you've been given you'll never resent another day or event in your life.


Anyways, enough random rambling/life advice, it's time to study a bit and grind. I know I said I was looking forward to good things in Feb, but loljksrslyguysthistime.

Looking forward to good things

Woke up this morning and went for a jog. I've been going to the gym off and on for the past six months (obviously more off than on, most recently due to injuries and illness) but this morning I decided even if I couldn't get to the gym I should at least make some effort to exercise. It was definitely less pleasant than the air conditioned cardio I usually enjoy at the gym, but that's the point. I'm actually excited to work this into my routine more often and see some improvement. The hills around here should whip me into shape in no time.

Yesterday was my day off and I spent it mostly reviewing and studying, as well as the greater part of this morning. I won't lie; I found time to sneak in some Black Ops and BC: Vietnam yesterday. Speaking, does anyone that reads my blog play either of those games on Xbox Live? Hit me up and we play sometime, my gamertag is bearNP.

So no complaints or great stories to share this time; but I would love to hear more feedback from those of you reading. Suggestions, shouts, insults, leave a message ;)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qx-S83J_9yc

Super Sunday

Quick update for those interested before I begin my Sunday; I went with my fiancée and her friend to Disney World on Friday. We had a really great time, which was surprising  since I've always considered Disney World to be "children's parks". I guess I've finally grown up to the point where being hurdled through the air by tons of steel doesn't seem as appealing as it once was. Epcot is definitely my favorite park, I love the different countries and the architecture seems really authentic compared to pictures and movies I've seen. It's like a mini-vacation to Europe (and a few others) within my own backyard. It should also come as no surprise that Germany was by far my favorite country, and dinner there was awesome. The community style bier hall buffet was a nice change of pace from conventional dining settings. After dinner we stayed and watched their fireworks presentation which was by far one of the best if not THE BEST I've ever seen! I highly recommend this experience to anyone who hasn't been. Here's a few of my favorite photos from the afternoon; I hope everyone has an awesome Sunday grind! Ship somethin'~

P.S. If you are reading this and not following my blog, please sign in and take the time. It would encourage others to do the same and eventually I'm going to do some giveaways (Free Tilt money, private tournaments, coaching) to my Followers, so I want everyone to qualify for those promotions. Thanks guys I appreciate your support!!!

So I decided to start a blog...

All of these other cool kids have blogs so I figured that I may as well start my own. I'm not huge on being public about seemingly trivial shit, however, it's has occurred to me that it would be unwise to not take advantage of such a great way to network with other players and market myself as at the same time. So here I am. I guess a little intro would be in order; my name is Brad, I play online poker full time at Full Tilt Poker. My player-name there is gbb187, but if you've made it this far I'm sure you already knew that. I started playing at Full Tilt in October of 2009, depositing ~$100 with the intentions of grinding single table tourneys or microcash to buy myself a new laptop.

My experience with poker prior to this included some limit cash on PartyPoker (before I turned 18 I found 2+2 and bought a few books, SSHE being the one I read the most. I was sure that I could make a fortune playing Limit Hold Em online). Shortly after I turned 18 I registered to PartyPoker and ran $50 up to 300ish in a few days and thought I was rich. I immediately cashed out most of the money and went to Spring Break with a few friends. Other activities were on my mind at that young age, and for some reason I just never really grasped how important it should have been to pursue poker. I got offered what was basically my dream job at that age (working the desk at an online gaming center) and the events that followed in the subsequent years kept me from ever exploring poker more than the occasional bar league game, home cash, or odd $50 donking online. UIGEA also had me thinking poker was illegal for a while so I just let go of the idea entirely (lol).

So here I am fresh into poker again in 2009 after a long hiatus and a friend had told me how well he was doing playing cash so I thought, hell, if this guy can do it, I'll have no problem! After I blew my first two 30$ buy-ins playing cash I reconsidered my plan heavily. I wasn't going to give up but I definitely needed to re-evaluate how good I was. I decided tournaments would be less variance for my BR (lol) and started playing $3 9 mans. Thankfully for me those players just happened to somehow be worse than I was and I showed a very slight profit, which coupled with the little bonus money I was earning, was enough to keep me afloat until one night in Novemeber when something special happened. With the help of  Kyle "I GRIND THIS" O'neill I managed to take down 2nd in the Daily Dollar for 1k. Now I was rolled, and I vowed to myself that I wouldn't leave the 3's until I knew for sure I could beat the 6s. Kyle, being a 180man grinder on stars, suggested I play the 90man kos as they were similar payout structure. He armed me with some basic advice and there I was, off on my own to start carving out a destiny. Progress was slow. I was a winner, but not by too much. I posted on 2p2 fairly often, but found myself frustrated with how little I seemed to know compared to the rest of the posters, and also by the fact that I had to post so many hands because I had so many questions it made me seem lazy I guess. I knew my approach to getting better had to change.

I knew 2p2 had a coaching section, though I had never looked in it, and had no idea what to expect. I knew some players were "backed" and coached, so i thought to myself maybe I should look into this and see what my best options would be. I found a post by none other than BIGNATE904 himself, advertising cheap coaching for 90man KOs. It was like destiny, a winning player offering affordable coaching in the tournaments I was already playing. Nate and I worked out an agreement where we traded services and I began to see immediate results.

At this point, I had a daytime job that I was beginning to resent slightly, not only because I was now a hot-shot micro-grinder raking in ~$50 a day PLAYING A GAME, but because the management of this said establishment was less than rewarding to the few employees who actually tried to make it work. I guess subconsciously this lead to me making a moral (albeit stupid if I wanted to keep my job) decision to inform the owner about some of the shady going-ons at the establishment. People were unhappy once they learned about that and it lead to the manager firing me for reasons that she herself could not even come up with. At the time I was a bit devastated, as I was not quite ready to put all of my financial dependence into online poker, however, in hindsight it is these moments in where life thrusts you into the river, truly sink or swim, that creates who you really are, I suppose. At least it sounds good anyways :)

I once again had to tell myself that no matter what I could not screw this up. Since then I've made a few more friends in the community, moved up stakes, worked in some more MTTs, and have enjoyed more success doing this than I could have ever dreamed of. And yet still, my success pales in comparison to most of well known grinders. I have a lot of work to do, but I love it, and I'm excited to see what the future brings and now also excited to be able to share it here! If you made it this far, thanks for reading :)