A CR member PM'd me today to ask my advice regarding some upcoming life decisions he faces.  I gave him a fair but brief response with some perspective, but then I thought it might be helpful to expand on it and share it in the blog.  He is about to graduate with a respected degree and is considering playing poker and traveling.  He asked "how did/do you decide when to move on and when to push harder?

My succinct reply was..."As for your questions, there is no really easy answer. I am a firm believer that loving what you do is more important than doing what makes you money. I have on multiple occasions chosen a more humble less profitable path because I would be doing something I enjoy and find meaning in, rather than chase a higher paycheck or prestige. That isn't always an easy decision, especially when you have debt, expectations, and an investment in your education.

I know of several people in law school, business school and good jobs who quit those to play poker. But poker isn't for everyone. The swings are brutal and the lifestyle isn't for everyone.

The key is to apply yourself in whatever you do. Don't pursue poker because it is easier, pursue it because you love the game, its challenges and feel you can prosper. Many poker players realize they will only last for a while in the game, and look at it as a stepping stone to something else. This can also be a wise choice for many, if you plan accordingly and invest your winnings well."

Thinking about the subject more, for me, it comes down to passion. There are many paths one can take in life and each person has a different set of goals, wants and needs.  Mine weren't always clear as a teen or young adult, but they started to coalesce in my 20's.  I sensed that material and prestige were traps and not things I wanted to pursue.  I preferred to try to find meaning and a humble value in what I did.  I'm not saying I was an overly motivated or a particularly charitable person, but I identified that I wanted quality of interactions over quantity.  I would rather have a few friends than a lot.  I would rather focus on my wife and kids than some social network.  I would rather keep my life simple, than have it become more grandiose and complex.  Most of all, I wanted to discover areas of my life that I could be passionate about.

When I graduated from college, I didn't know what I wanted to do.  I had an International Relations degree with minors in Philosophy and Psychology.  What do you do with that? I drove around the US with a couple friends for several weeks that summer visiting National Parks and various sites.  I lived at home and volunteered at my old Middle School to see what teaching was like in a special alternative classroom setting.  I took off for 9 months to travel around Africa with my best friend from my junior year exchange trip to Kenya. I went back to take classes to become a secondary social studies teacher.  I helped start and develop a small business in my home town with my best friend from high school's father.

I knew the wealthy and conservative community I was living in was stifling me, so my then girlfriend and now wife and I moved across country on a whim to Portland, Oregon to begin a new life.  It was a great decision, despite how unplanned it was.  You can't always know where your decisions will lead you, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't take them.  Life can't always be planned out.  One decision leads to another.  Each choice opens up new considerations.  Encounter a roadblock, then find a new path around or blast your way through.  When teaching opportunities didn't work out in Portland, I joined and grew a small African art gallery into a respected sculpture garden and gallery over 12 years.  During the later years, I discovered poker and eventually ended up at CardRunners, helping grow it into the biggest training site out there.  When that opportunity ended, I began Poker Curious to continue my interests in the poker world.  Who knows where it will lead, but I'm already discussing mergers and the future of where it can take me. 

I couldn't have planned my life.  It just happened as I went along.  Growing up I was always a procrastinator in everything I did.  Only by fostering my passions did I learn to really apply myself starting in my later 30's.  I work harder now than I ever have, not because I'm getting rich, but because I enjoy it.  When I got married, I didn't fully understand what for better or for worse meant.  Now as the years come and go, I begin to realize what that meant.  I have to work hard to overcome my faults and hers.  I always thought I would be a great father, but I find my impact is limited.  In the end it comes down to your passion.  If you follow your passion and fully apply yourself, it will work out for the best.  Not always in the direction you planned, but in a direction you can live with.  I can't tell you what career to pursue, but I will encourage you to pursue your passion and life will work itself out along the way.

It's been a while since I shared any high stakes hands.  Last night I had a couple 300/600 ante PLO tables open while I was doing other things.  I selected and captured five all-in hands that I thought were interesting - two between Cole South and Ziigmund and three between Patrik Antonius and Brian Townsend. 

Instead of the usual hand retelling and analysis, I decided to try a different format.  I am going to show you the screen capture of the final pot with both hands and community cards shown.  The challenge is for you to predict how the action went.  For the sake of simplicity, don't worry about bet sizing as almost every bet involved was pot sized.   I thought about offering a prize, but it could be tainted by someone having also witnessed or captured the hand results last night as well.  So are you up to the challenge? 

#1 - Cole South and Ziigmund

#2 - Cole South and Ziigmund

#3 - Brian Townsend and Patrik Antonius

#4 - Brian Townsend and Patrik Antonius

#5 - Brian Townsend and Patrik Antonius

Good luck...I'll check in periodically to identify the first person to get any of the individual answers correct.  I doubt anyone could get them all correct.

A line from a movie I was watching online last night caught my eye. "Only the dead have seen the end of war"  Interestingly enough, it made me think of poker.

Lately, I've been going through a lot of variance in my play.  Everywhere I turn I read of various poker bloggers struggling to deal with their swings.  Brian Townsend was mentioning how he's down $2.75 million lately in his best game PLO.  He has worked the hardest on that game the last couple years and his results have been terrible of late. The past few days I also watched Patrik Antonius play a few hours online.  He's obviously one of the best players in the world with tremendous results, but he couldn't win.  He would get it in as a 60-40 favorite, a flip, top set on the turn against naked FD and lose them repeatedly. Over and over the odds broke against him.  He was dropping buy ins like it was going out of style.

The association with the initial quote is this...poker is war.  Anyone who chooses to play will face variance.  Assuming that they work hard to learn the better EV+ lines to take, they will still regularly win when behind and lose when ahead.  The odds will go against you for extended periods of time.  Only those who quit the game, those that are dead, will see an end to variance.  Anyone who remains in the game will have to battle on.  Manage your battles well and live to fight another day.  Plan well and you can win the war.  History tells me so.

Back in mid November, I posted a humorous blog about the local community college's student newspaper word find.  I'm not sure if they bowed to public pressure or just felt it was fair game to give equal time, but here is this week's "all the girly bits"

bazooms
bearded oyster
beaver
bird
bonbons box
cat
chichis
crumpet
cupcakes
ginny*
honeypot
hooters
jugs
mouse*
muff
rodeo*
rose
sugar scoop
tatas
toyshop
twins
vahjayjay
warheads
ying yang*
yoni*

I'm not sure if I should be depressed or elated that I had never heard of the * (starred) words in that context before.

J.D. Salinger, the iconoclast and recluse writer, world famous for his 1951 novel "The Catcher in the Rye" just passed away at 91.  I don't know if most American schools still have it as part of their high school curriculum, but growing up everyone I knew had to read "The Catcher in the Rye".  It was a seminal novel that accurately captured the mind-set of a sensitive 16 year old and his disdain for all the "phonies" in his world.  It was one of the first and best novels of its time to capture the disaffected youth that rejected all the values of their parent's generation.

One of the most fascinating aspects of J.D. Salinger's life was his choice to go into seclusion and shun all public life after the fame and success of "The Catcher in the Rye."  He said that he only wanted to "write for myself."  That got me to thinking about what motivates most writers and artists?.  Do they create for themselves?  Do they create to connect to others?  Do they seek feedback or acclaim?  Do they create to earn a living?  Obviously it is a different combination for each person.

Comparing the different poker bloggers out there, you see different motivations as well.  Some write a sort of personal diary to capture the happenings and thoughts of their lives.  Some write to gain feedback and input from their audience.  Some write sensationally to entertain and grow an audience.  Some write to educate, inform, and stimulate their audience.  When I examine my motivations, I can see every one of those motivations entering my considerations.  But maybe I'm not a true writer, like J.D. Salinger, because I don't think I would blog if no one ever read it.  I spend plenty of time alone in my own head, that I enjoy the occasional opportunity to connect to something outside of myself.  If J.D. Salinger had grown up in the age of blogging, I wonder if he might have found a more comfortable balance between anonymity, seclusion and the desire to write for an audience other than himself.

My last blog got me thinking about chips.  I don't play live regularly, and certainly not much in casinos, but I've always liked the variety of different types of poker chips you encounter when playing.  When I was out last summer during the WSOP Main Event, I stayed with a friend who had a small chip collection.  If I played more often live, I think I would start a chip collection.

I did some image digging today and thought I would share some of the various casino and custom poker chips that you can find out there.  Just about any theme you can think of has been done at one time or another.

and the most valuable of them all...lol

The guy who invented poker was bright, but the guy who invented the chip was a genius - Author Unknown

We post a poker related Thought of the Day on Poker Curious, presently located on our The Community page, but hopefully soon on our redone home page.  So I'm always looking around for more quotes (250 quotes already posted). I stumbled across this above quote recently, and while I didn't put it up on the site, I thought it would make for a decent little blog topic.

Poker is a card game where money, or chips, keep the score.  It is only when you can track results with some universal currency or rating that the game takes on a new competitive and comparative level.  Tournament players love their rankings.  Cash game players love their bb/100.  SNG players love their ROI.  Online players obsess about their all-in equity graphs. People crave parameters of comparison.  It isn't only a competition against who you play at the table, but who also plays your game or level.

It is basic human nature to compare results  We do it in all areas of our lives.  You look at someone's wife or girlfriend and compare to your own.  While in society we don't typically announce our earnings or salary, we compare our car, house or extravagant possessions.  We want to know where we stand.  

Personally, I'm not one to do as much of that.  I can notice differences, but they don't matter as much to me.  As long as I can manage my expectations, I can live with that.  My wife joked the other day that I wasn't ambitious enough, but I prefer to look at it as not caring as much about material and comparative elements in my life.  Maybe I simply have a different currency that I judge my chip stack with?

I was surprised Tuesday, like everyone else, by the launch of Rush poker on Full Tilt.  I don't play NLHE these days, except for Poker Curious freerolls and tournaments which I host.  But then on Wednesday, they opened the first 'table' of Rush PLO (.10-.25 9 man).  I've been intrigued ever since I watched ChicagoJoey break the world record for hands played in a day.  He had an app that brought all his 24 table action onto one virtual table.  I've always had a challenge focusing on more than a couple tables, jumping my attention and mouse from multiple parts of a screen.  With Rush poker, there is an economy of motion and action that I can appreciate.  If you utilize the quick fold option regularly, the hands come flying at you at light speed.  It is never more than a few seconds until you have your next playable hand.  It accelerates all your important decisions.

I have chosen to play only short sessions so far, typically lasting 20-30 minutes each.  After a while, my mind dulls a little from the constant speed and intensity of action.  If you aren't sharp, you can make mistakes and lose quickly.  The first two days, I have played 12 of these mini sessions - having won money in 9 and lost in 3.  Averaging out the sessions, it's been about a buyin difference each mini session.  My bb/100 has shot up dramatically.  I'm sure players will be making quick adjustments to compensate for the different dynamics, but so far I have found it considerably easier to profit compared to my micro 6 max PLO tables.  That may not last long, as I noticed some different strategies and moves today, compared to yesterday.

I've heard various serious and casual players decry Rush poker as not pure poker, but all poker is adjustment.  The key to any poker game or format is to adjust to the changing dynamics and opponents.  That will never change.  Certainly for the professional grinders that were used to utilizing stats, HUD, careful table and seat selection, and established player reads this form of poker negates most of their prior advantages.  But the paramount skills of utilizing position, quick hand and stack reading, and bet sizing are front and center.

I will share some helpful suggestions that have helped me.  If you want to see a hand play out, but you intend to fold, click the 'sit out the next hand' option and you remain at the table until the conclusion of the hand.  That is helpful to gain some history and tendencies on players you are bound to run into again.  The other option I recommend is that if you don't remain at the table or missed the action, you can call up the hand history and it will tell you the cards they had whether you witnessed it or not.  Using the color dot option on players is also very helpful to type them and make quick future reads, but it's challenging to do it in real time as each time you fold you instantly move on to a new set of players. 

The only two times I've been full buyin stacked so far have been all in pre with AAxx vs. AAxx vs rundown hands that hit straights.  Try to avoid those...LOL

Some differences I've noticed from the NLHE Rush 'tables' compared to the PLO version:

- NLHE averages 250-280 hands an hour, PLO  only 175.  The action in hands is slower due to more considerations.
- Average pot size is 40% larger on PLO tables than NLHE, and 10-20% larger on 9 max vs. 6 max tables of each.
- There seems to be much more 3 and 4 betting preflop in NLHE, whereas the preflop aggression has been less at PLO.

I also learned from a friend that Rush poker is not a new idea.  It was conceived in Europe over 3 years ago.  It was originally intended for the Entraction network, but never saw the light of day for various reasons.  Thankfully, the creator/inventor persisted.  Full Tilt has now embraced it and I'm sure is working feverishly to establish its patent pending to maintain its competitive advantage.

Like any new form of poker, time will tell if it's here for the long haul.  It has been a breath of fresh air to my game.  In the end the casual and recreational players will determine its fate.  Will they value the increased speed of action, their anonymity, and the leveling of the playing field with the pros not having their usual tools at their disposal, or will their likely faster rate of potential losses ultimately deter them?  I'm in no hurry to pass judgment.

This morning I heard some challenging news for my son.  The last several indoor soccer seasons, his team has gone undefeated.  You get used to winning and the confidence that brings.  But it also often causes you to relax.  He can relax no longer.  This winter indoor season, they have lost their first two games 6-2 and 3-2, against better teams.  Now I hear that their next match is against an older select team that beat those first two teams a combined 19-2.  They have their work cut out for them.  They are playing against older, stronger, faster and more skilled opponents.  It is in these moments of adversity that your character is tested.  Do you push yourself to improve, striving to be better, or do you accept your fate and complain of your misfortune. 

The very same dynamics shadow any poker player, as well.  Some days you can't win, no matter what you do.  You will have to face losing on a regular basis.  Your ego and sanity are constantly tested as you deal with variance and your own inadequacies.  The question is how do you respond to that adversity.

While my son only just turned 11 and this wouldn't be considered serious adversity, no one goes through life without facing significant adversity.  My hope for him is that he faces his challenges head on with no complaints.  Managing yourself in the face of adversity defines you.  Every challenge is an opportunity.  I thought I would share some related inspirational and thought provoking quotes on the subject....

Adversity is like a strong wind.  It tears away from us all but the things that cannot be torn, so that we see ourselves as we really are.  ~Arthur Golden, Memoirs of a Geisha

The robbed that smiles, steals something from the thief.  ~William Shakespeare, Othello

We have no right to ask when sorrow comes, "Why did this happen to me?" unless we ask the same question for every moment of happiness that comes our way.  ~Author Unknown

Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.  ~Truman Capote

In this world there are only two tragedies.  One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.  ~Oscar Wilde, Lady Windemere's Fan, 1896

If you don't like something change it; if you can't change it, change the way you think about it.  ~Mary Engelbreit

My son turned 11 this past week.  On Sunday, we invited another family that has two boys around his age to join us for some Laser Tag, then pizza and cake back at our house.  I've played maybe 6 sessions before, but I rocked it out, crushing all the grandpas, new moms, and over stimulated teens.  It's pretty difficult to come out on top out of 36 and 34 players back to back, though, because it's such a frenetic, haphazard setting.  There are supposed to be 3 distinct teams, but many people wander aimlessly with no team concept.  It's not something I do regularly, but it was good family fun for all ages.