A Poker Post and Some F1

I'm excited. I've got a pokery post....

....deep breath...

...After a horrible Betfair session I tried some PLO on Poker Heaven. Naturally I was shafted more times than Ferndando Torres on a sexual offenders wing. So after a reload I moved to €2/€4 NLHE. After being in for £450 I managed to get out £900 to leave me slightly ahead on the day and easily ahead on the session. It's been a while since I played 2/4 NL and it's reassuring to find that nothing changes! The scandies are still way too aggressive and easily tilted.

I caught a lot of the F1 today, in between being abused by Irish racing on Betfair. Hamilton looks really good for the title this year and I hope he does it. He is clearly the best driver out there. On the flip side of the coin Glock MUST be the worst! I haven't seen an F1 driver bin his car as often as Glock. The man drives like my wife.

The New Job

I'm really enjoying my new job at The Poker Channel. The work is enjoyable and challenging and exactly what I needed. Call me a sadist, if you will, but I'm actually enjoying the commute as well. Alright, I admit, getting out of bed when there is a 6 at the start of the alarm clock isn't great but it goes some way to experiencing the sleep loss the wife is suffering due to the baby.

The train to Euston takes just under an hour. The tube (with one change) takes roughly 45 minutes. Factor in a drive to the station/back home and a 5 minute walk to the office and each trip is around 2 hours. One way! How can I possibly be enjoying that? Maybe the novelty will wear off. Then again I enjoy the peace on the train to Euston (it hasn't ever really been busy). I enjoy seeing the city gents running for tubes. A man in a bowler hat with an umbrella, running at full sprint, is just hilarious to me. I'm enjoying the exercise too. Working at home means walking from bed to a computer with the occasional business trip to the toilet. So getting to walk a few miles each day has me feeling good inside. Maybe a little knackering on the legs, though!

The work itself is great. I enjoy creating and building things from scratch. With the new site there is a blank canvas to work from. While UK PokerNews was a success is was very limited in how far I could take it. I'll be very susprised is the Poker Channel Europe isn't a market leader in the next 3 or 4 years. I'm hugely confident about the whole project.

As you can probably imagine with so much working and commuting and baby stuff going on there is little chance to do anything else. Playing poker has taken a back step. I think I'll get back into the game in a month or two as the baby settles into longer sleep patterns. I am desperate for a live game however :-)

That's all for now. Apologies for the lack of pokery content.

Frosty PokerRoom

The last game I played was two days ago on PokerRoom. It was the third event of the UK PokerNews league. The league is a tasty looking promotion with $10k up for grabs, spread over the top three places.

I've given up.

I'm down in 8th or 9th and, although that might not seem far off 3rd, I'm a million miles behind in terms of points. I would have to go on an amazing run in the next six games to trouble 3rd place. Tonight's game was cancelled and I'm sure that will be very much appreciated by the top three players!

I'm not usually one for throwing in the towel but, I'm running so cold, that I swear if I went to Vegas tomorrow it'd snow on the strip!

In other news....

....Baby Sandells was born on June 18th. Little Isabel is very sweet but very tiring. Her pictures are on my Facebook pages.

It's not long until I start work for The Poker Channel and I can't wait to get started.

Good luck to Damo with his move to Manila.

That's all. Carry on.

A quickie with Tila Tequila

At times she was good. At other times she hurt me. In the end we parted company richer for the experience.

Yes, I've withdrawn from Tila Poker! (what else were you thinking?)

Finally they delivered on the $50 freebie promise and that pushed my total to almost $420. From a $60 deposit and 9 days play I'm pretty happy with the total. So, after my sordid fling with Tila, where next?

UK PokerNews have just launched a great looking league with PokerRoom. I don't have a PokerRoom account and I've heard good things about it from Kev Stevens (RIP). That site will be the next download solely for the reason of the UKPN league which has a $5k first prize alongside $3k for 2nd and $2k for 3rd.

The first game is on June 17th. The second on June 19th. This represents a small problem. Child #2 is due on June 19th and I have a funny feeling Leicester Royal Infirmary won't allow me to take a laptop into the delivery suite. Of course baby could be a day late and all will be well at Chateau Sandells.

A girl is due. Maybe I'll call her Tila.

Yeah Yeah... where's my f'ing money!?

I know the graph pic in the last post was crap, but as Bender might say, whatcha gonna do?

How annoyed am I that I'm STILL waiting for Tila Poker to cough up my $50 bonus? Quite. I mean, I'm not sending death threats yet but then it is Sunday, I am hungover and I had about 3 hours sleep last night. Maybe tomorrow.

I played a huge 100 hands yesterday! I can tell you're already impressed. I didn't play at all on Friday. The $60 challenge total is almost at $300. Fascinating. So, what am I going to write in a poker blog?

Ummm..

...I did my nuts on the Derby. I backed Ronaldo's goal minutes on the spread in the Portugal v Turkey game (he didn't score).

Hey! Everybody likes reading about a loss. Don't they?

I see Kev Stevens has hung up his mouse ( http://flipyouforit.blogspot.com/ ) after coming to the conclusion that online poker is disrupting his family life. So be it. I have some understanding of his situation as I spend far too long at the computer myself. It's easy to get engrossed and, before you know it, 4 hours have gone by.

I've been thinking about why online poker is so addicting. I think it boils down to getting (possible) great rewards for little effort. You can sit in your armchair and make thousands in a few hours. If you win a big MTT you feel you've won a war, single handedly, and been paid a wedge of cash for your efforts. Your efforts of clicking a mouse and scratching your balls for a few hours. Beautiful. Then there is the pain of losing. The bad beats. They suck. Like a nagging toothache. But, when the toothache is cured you feel great, alive, refreshed. Just like after a good win on the virtual felt?

Anyway, online poker is here to stay. It's just a shame when the nice guys fall by the wayside while the arseholes keep playing.

New Challenges

It's been a strange 7 days for me.
Last week I started a "$60 challenge". Why $60? I've no idea to be honest. The amount was suggested to me by Kev Stevens after I was seeking answers to why I'm so crap at tournament poker recently. The idea is to play patient poker at both cash and STTs. To ignore the small stakes / buy-ins and just play my absolute bollocks off. I've passed 1000 hands and things are going pretty well. Note the Matusow blow up around 800 - 900 hands :-) - Hey, I'm not perfect!




So, I've gone back to playing poker levels circa 2003/04. Strangely I'm really enjoying it. I've no idea where the $60 is going. My heart still thumps when I'm all-in for $7! I think I'm rediscovering my love for playing online.

In other news....

....I have quit my job! I've been working for PokerNews for 4 years now and, to be honest, I've had enough. I'm not going into reasons right here, right now, as that would be wrong. Suffice to say, just like boggle eyed Ben from LOST, "I always have a plan".

I will begin a new job in July. It represents plenty of exciting challenges. One of which is a 3 day a week commute to London and back!

Resigning is a strange feeling. I've only done it once before and the whole thing left me feeling awkward and a little guilty. This time I did it by email and things were much easier!

The WSOP is underway and I really don't care. Why? because I'm here in the UK while everyone else, it seems, is lapping up the atmosphere or taking a shot at some of the events in Vegas. Bah! I'm not bitter, honest!

Home from Vegas. What now?

Vegas was superb (again) for me for the third year in a row. I brought home far more dollars than I left the UK with thanks to a lucky spin on a slot machine and a little poker positive.

I arrived home just under two weeks ago to the cold and the rain of Gatwick airport. The previous 9 - 10 days was spent in the company of my old mate Danny McCarthy and the balding alcohol sponge that is Gaz Bouch. Danny is not great about flying anywhere thanks to a scary experience in bad weather a few years ago. Although he was nervous and pretty much EATING his calming medication I thought he dealt with the long flight to Vegas really well. I think the combined 22hr+ flying may have eased his flying nerves a little.

This trip was a boys holiday really. I played very little poker apart from two tournaments at Caesars and the odd cash session.

We met a lot of characters in sin city. I visited a few establishments which I had avoided in the past and really enjoyed myself when I did. The boys were wide eyed at the whole place and I always enjoy seeing the expression on the faces of Vegas virgins. Despite the fun and excess it was good to get home. I think around 8 - 10 days in Vegas is plenty long enough to enjoy yourself and not become bored. I may have discovered the perfect length of time to stay in Vegas! Of course now I'm home I want to go back again. Maybe I will in 2009 if I can keep the cold sweats at bay for another year.

So, what now? My daughter is due to be born in June. That should be an exciting and tiring time.

Currently I'm not playing poker tournaments and I'm only occasionally dipping my toe into any cash games. Playing poker has taken a back step this year. I do love the game and I always will. It's been very good to me financially and socially as I've found many new friends from playing. I'm shocked to see quite a lot of "poker players" expressing why they now dislike poker and why they don't play or rarely play these days. I think some people have short memories and are quick to slag off poker simply because their recent results have dipped. I will never be negative towards the game as I have a lot to thank it for.

If you can write a big list of why poker is crap and you're still playing it then you clearly have huge problems.

2008 is looking like a very busy year for me, work wise. I think I will start playing tournaments again at some point. Qualifiers for the Aussie Millions at the end of the year may be the point at which I get involved again.