Up $2670

I spend the first five hours completely even. I get up $500 or so, then make a bluff, and a couple reasonable calls that don't work out and find myself down $300. Win a couple little pots, get up. Lose a few more, go down, etc etc. I get involved in no big pots, I make no big decisions, I get a couple big pairs, raise, and everyone folds. But I find myself very very patient, and very very observant of the whole table. 7 of the 9 players are either very tight or have a little bit of skill, I can bluff them, but I'm not going to win any real money from them. I'm at the table for two players: seat 8, this middle aged dude who's a calling station with a seemingly infinite supply of money, and seat 7 is a younger very aggressive kid. I watch seat 8 suck-out on a couple hands and not bet the river when his middle or bottom pair have turned into trips, and then blow all that money making some of the worst calls I can imagine. He's completely unbluffable, and because of this I avoid playing any pots with him without a hand. Unfortunately, in the four hours it takes him to blow $6k or so, and decide he's had enough, I haven't managed to find a hand I want to play against him.

But, the Aggressive Kid is still there, and he has managed to hit a few huge hands, and has gone from like $1k on the table, to somewhere around $4k. He's not a completely bad player, but he has a nice exploitable flaw of being way too aggressive, combined with generally making over-bets. He's the exact type of player that I'm very used to playing back home. I let him bluff me out of a few pots, I play pretty passively against him for a few hours. I'll bet AK, pre flop, and when I don't hit, I'll just check and fold. I know that any bet that I put out on the flop is going to get re-raised, and I also know that if I allow him to run me over for a bunch of little pots, it will pay off well if I ever manage to make a hand.

I'm even, but I'm a little bored, and want some more firepower, so I put the whole $2500 I have with me on the table, so I have a little less than that at the start of this hand, which is 67 diamonds on the button, me and 3 others call a $100 raise from Aggressive Kid. Flop = 49X, two clubs. Checks around to aggressive kid, who surprisingly checks as well. Turn = 5 of not clubs. He bets $200, I call quickly, and I'm kind of surprised when everyone else folds. The river = 3 of not clubs, giving me the pretty well disguised nuts. He bets $400. I think and think and think, and take a nice long hesitation here. I finally raise $700 more. He goes into the tank for awhile, he asks “can you beat a set?” I say “do you really have a set?” I'm pretty sure he maybe has A9 or something retarded, I've seen him making so many calls like that the whole night, and I'm pretty confident that his hand is somewhere around there. The fact that I've been calling or checking up to this point has him confused as well, as he starts muttering to himself about how it feels like I missed a flush draw. Finally he sees the straight. “Do you have 67?” I say nothing, I do my best to give him no help at all. “67, really? Ok, show me 67.” He throws his money in, I turn the cards over, take the pot. Yay. I think maybe I could have gone all in here. I think maybe he would have called, I don't know though, I have no idea what he had. Anyway, this was a nice big pot from him, and I now have a little profit, and I have this dude on a nice tilt.

On the very next time it's my button, I know that I have his number, and I call his $80 raise with J8 of spades. Flop = 875, one spade. He bets $200, I call. I turn = 6 of spades. Not the best card for me, but, it brings the spade draw, and I'm somewhat sure I have the best hand now, or if not, I have a ton of outs. Before he does anything I decide that if he bets, I'm going to go all in. He bets $600, and as soon as the bet is out of his mouth, I insta-all-in. Which I guess I should have actually counted out and maybe thought about, because it's like a raise of $2200 (on top of his $600). A big overbet, but to take the $1k pot, it's not horrible. He goes on and on about how he flopped two pair. He says “You haven't bluffed me all night, but I think you're bluffing me now.” I say nothing, look up at him, pulse pounding in my neck, I say nothing, but just look at the pot, and him in my periphery. He's still in the tank a minute later, when he asks “do you want me to call?” I shrug and say “do what you gotta do man.” Which I think is about the best response I could give him. He's counting his money out, and I've already started praying for another spade, or an 8 (or maybe even a J would have been live), but he folds.

I'm up about $3k at this point, and I don't win another hand in the next half hour. I let him bluff me out a couple times. I make a horrible fold with 99 vs two other dudes who obviously just had a big ace. It's late, and after those two hands above, I just don't have the energy to fight with people on mediocre hands. I order some food, and when it arrives, I stop playing, eat, and go home.

Up $2980

Get there around 4 or so. The place is packed. It's always a great game there, but I think because of the big WPT thing at the Bicycle, it's even more insane. People seem to just finish their tournament there, and come here instead of playing at the Bike. There is a huge 50/100 game featuring Daniel Alehi, and maybe three 20/40 games as well. Anyway, sitting on the must move, I manage to win like $200 or so. Just a few little pots, playing pretty tight, kind of biding my time until the main game.

I wind up sitting with the dude who'd busted me with a set of 9's from my second session on this trip. He's a shorter fat middle aged dude, knows just about everyone there. He always sits down with at least $7k, looks around the table, and if anyone has him covered, he pulls another $5k brick out of his pocket. He stakes a few players in the room, said something the other day about how he's “not good enough to play in the big game, so I invest money with people who are.” Something like that. I think he puts money into this dude that I hate, for completely irrational reasons (he was the first hand during my AC disaster). I kind of hate The Staker for no rational reason either. This is the third table I've played with him, and each time he kind of stares at me when I'm in a hand. He's not a bad player, he has some problems with over betting, but besides this he has no hugely exploitable flaw that I've found, and for the most part he seems to be playing quality hands and I mostly stay away from him. Until this hand.. I'm in for $1500, and am up maybe $500 or so (so $2k in front of me). I limp with A4 of clubs. Flop = AXX one club. I'm first to act, and I bet $200, Staker nd another call. Turn = 6c. Runner runner draw! Wheee.. Staker raises to $1k (I think, it was some amount that was just slightly too big and dumb). Other dude thinks a second and folds. I know I'm folding, but I sit and think and think, and look up at him, and think, and think some more. I just want to make him either sweat that I'm going to call, or to be pissed that he bet too much when I fold. And I do fold. Anyway, my bet on the turn was horrible, because there was no way that I'd get both dudes to fold the hand, and if I'd just let one of them bet (preferably Staker, because that would put me in better position), and see if I could get the right money in the pot for me to call to river a club or 4. Anyway, whatever, bad bet, and now I'm down like $200 or so.

So, I lose a bit more after that hand above, nothing special, all reasonable calls, with little pairs, suited connectors, etc, but nothing hits, and I'm down $500 or so, with $1k or so on the table left. I get KQ. I limp in somewhat early position. Button, a young aggressive kid raises to $120. This Indian, who was a complete calling-station for absurd amounts, calls. I've been watching this kid raise most of his buttons in a limped pot, so I decide to pop him, I make it $400 total, to which he quickly folds. Indian thinks and thinks, and calls! Wow.. ok. Flop = AXX. Indian checks, and I insta-all in for maybe $600. Indian thinks and thinks, I lean back and drink the coffee behind me, which maybe I shouldn't have done, as I think people construe this as a tell for being weak, and so he calls. Turn = X, river = Q. I say “good call, ace is good.” He says “I don't have an Ace.” !!!!! So, I turn over the KQ and take the pot. As I'm stacking my chips I notice Staker is staring at me, and I look at him and shrug, to which he says something stupid that I can't quite remember.

When I'm moved to the main game a few hands later I have a little profit. The game is odd, it changes very quickly from being very tight and passive, to being very loose and passive. There are no real aggressive players at the table when I sit down. A few come in throughout the night, but for the most part this is a table of calling stations. It's a weird flaw, and one I seldom see in NY, people not raising with much of anything, but completely unable to fold anything remotely resembling a hand for anything upto $100 preflop. Anyway, this bearded dude from San Fran, who I was on the must move with, seems to be a pretty good player. He's been winning, and this is his first time at the Commerce, and he is in awe of how many games are playing, and is talking about taking a shot at the bigger games. Until.... he gets KJ which winds up being the nuts (broadway) on the turn. He makes a healthy bet at a dude, who thinks and thinks, and calls. The river is the third club, San Fran checks, dude goes all in for maybe $2k. SF insta calls, and is shown AK of clubs. And he goes on a very obvious, whiney tilt for the next half hour. “It'll take me 30 pots to win that back.” Any time the winner is in a hand he asks “Ace King of clubs?” He just can't let it go. He wins a few hands, by absurd over bets, and he's obviously frustrated and unable to fold anything. In a few previous sessions, I've actually said things to players when they were tilting, cracking jokes, talking to them about whatever, generally making them feel better. And while I actually like the dude, I think of these situations, and stupid it was of me to stopped the tilted players from throwing their money at the table. So, here, I say nothing, and just let his frustration grow into self-destruction. And I reap the benefits this time. I get 22, flop = 2J9. He bets, I raise, he calls. Turn = 7, and I'm wondering if he could have T8, his check, combined with knitted brow, leads me to know that he has either AJ or J9, I bet again. He calls. On the blanked river, I bet $600, to which he says “did you flop a set.” I say “Do I need one?” Which is just about perfect, he just needed a little bit of encouragement to make the call, and that did it. He calls and I say “yeah, I have a set.” He says he had J9, but didn't show.

Yay, nice hand now I'm up maybe $1500 or so. I start to feel good, but after raising to $100 with KQ and getting no less than four callers, I don't play too many hands after that. I pick up a nice pot though I get called down with aces up.

But, I'm finding I have a somewhat scary image, and whenever I raise, and then raise the flop, people are pretty reluctant to continue the hands with me. I exploit it the most on this hand, I think though. I have AQ diamonds. I call an $80 raise from the only active dude who's sitting on my right. Three others call. Flop = K3X, 2 diamonds. He bets, I'm the only caller. Turn = K. Check, I ask “how much do you have” he counts out $400 in bills and some change, I check. River = 3. Check. I pause for a little, and grab 5 $100 chips and throw them out. He thinks and thinks, and I'm pretty sure that we'd be chopping the pot if he calls, but who knows maybe he had 88 or something. He folds, and I win.

Near the end of my session, restaurateur sits down. His first hand he makes these insane call with A2 of hearts, into a pretty tight dude's AK (flop =AKX), and rivers a runner runner flush. He's very active and kind of spastic. On his 2nd hand, I limp in with KJ. He's the small blind, he's thinking, he's thinking. It's only fucking $10 more. I say “it's on you man.” He says that he knows, and he puts out the $10. Flop = JXX. Checks to me. I bet $100. He stares me down, weird sunburned long face, making these weird eyebrow movements, and calls, BB folds. Turn = X, check check. River = X. He bets $220. I'm just looking at him, looking at me, looking at him. And I think back to that 99 hand in my last session, what a pussy I was, and I'm pretty sure I have him, so I call. “If you're calling, I can't win.” Yay!

I quit after six hours. Which I'm starting to wonder if that should be my time limit rather than eight. I started to get a bit of headache, and so I knew it was time to go, and I did.

Ok, it's almost 7:00. I got up late this morning, which got me to the gym late, which got me to the cafe late, which got me to write this late. Hmm, I might be out until 2 tonight, kind of throws my schedule off a bit, but yeah, this is about the best time to be playing.

More tomorrow.

down $1650

Lost last session. Sunday after the mega win. I think I played pretty good, but, I keep going up and back about that. I had AA and QQ cracked early on. Although I was able to get out of both hands with only $400 - $800 damage each.

I fought back to even about midway through the session. I had AA vs this wacky asian lady who cracked my QQ earlier. I raised to $100 pre flop, she called. Flop = 432. She goes all in. I think for a little while. She's been complaining for the past hour about how she's down, how poker sucks, etc etc. She's pretty easy to read at this point, just by her talking and talking, I know that she's not feeling so good about her hand, and I know she doesn't have a set. So, I call, she has 55, she misses her set or straight, and I win a nice pot. And have like $100 profit, after being down like $1900 at one point

About an hour after this, these two insane dudes come to the table. One is wearing a "Tapout" (mma) shirt, the other seems to be his friend. Tapout, is insane, trying to bluff everyone off every hand. His friend is a bit calmer, but still pretty insane too. The rest of the table and me all sit around with helmets on, just hoping to get into hands with the live ones. I stupidly try to bluff on 22 once, and get re-raised out of the pot. Stupid. I get 99 eventually. I call the friend's raise. He'd just bluffed big at the hand right before this one, and lost a huge pot because of a dude calling him down with like a pair of T's on a TAK XX board. He'd missed his flush. Anyway, I call. Flop is like 7 high. I check, he bets $150. He turns to eat his food. I think this is suspicious, I make it $400. He looks at me, asks how much I have left, and puts me all in. Hmmm... I fold after thinking for awhile. I am feeling shitty about this now. I'm pretty sure I had him, and even if I didn't have him, this is a call I need to make. I had a good read on him, and the circumstance was pretty right, and I just pussied out for $800 bucks. He had AK at best, I think.

Anyway, I would have played past my 8 hours if Tapout had stayed at the table, but he busts out soon after. Throwing away like $1500 on a pair of Q's (top pair) vs a pretty tight dude's made straight. It was somewhat amusing.

Ok, I'm off to play now. I wrote a lot in the novel the begining of the week, sat in this coffee shop today and worked on that "on losing" essay the whole day, worked out this morning, slept well, ate well, etc etc etc. I'm feeling nervous, but, the brain is going to feel about as good as it's going to feel, and being nervous isn't the worst thing for me. I think, I hope.

l8r,
XXXXX

On losing, part 2

I went there with $16k, in three neatly rubber banded wads of 50 hundred dollar bills. At this point the safe in our room has four of these wads in it, and a couple thousand dollar chips, that I carry around and do tricks with. I'm counting out the credit cards I'm going to pay. I'm thinking about the stocks I'm going to buy. I'm deciding if I want a scooter or a real motorcycle. The next day, I get to the table, a bit hungover, a bit tired. I play poorly, get down a few thousand but eventually get a hold of myself and fight back to a $65 tie. My friend is at the final table for a satellite to the $10k main event, and so I leave the game to watch him get through a field of 300 to come in 4^th, he wins $1k, but not a seat. We have a nice steak dinner, drink some wine. I am unstoppable! Even when I play bad, I'm still better than everyone! We are both winning! We are awesome! We are in good moods.
On losing, Part 1

The the amount of to sleep I can get after a game is in pretty direct reverse correlation to the swings I've endured. This is why it's smart of me to take time off between games. But, in AC, especially in the winter, there's not much else to do but gamble. So, I get up the next day, tired, but I still manage a long hard workout, sit in the hot tub for awhile after, take a shower and then go and play. The adrenaline from the workout covered up the fatigue I was feeling, and when I sat down to play the adrenaline of the game covered it up even more.

I start playing decently enough, and am somewhere around even five or six hours in. And then, suddenly the fatigue catches up to me. It was as though I'd completely forgotten what I was doing for a few minutes... I overplay TT, AQ flopping an A, and another hand I can't quite remember. I don't remember the exact hands, I do remember the changes in the pros' faces. Their expressions and body language changed from a kind of timid wondering what I was going to do in previous hands, to a confidence knowing that they had me beat. Six months later, I'm not sure if this is a confabulation, but, either way, I had no instincts, I had no idea where I was at, I had no idea where anyone was at.

When I wake up, I notice I've lost the entire $5k I'd put on the table. I find a deep self-loathing, and tilt. I couldn't process that I'd done anything wrong, I just had the feeling I suspect my friend always has. That all the shit luck in all the world was crashing on my head. But, I found the same self destructive thing I in my brain that I imagine is similar in his. It feels like the numbness and rush of cocaine, and like cocaine it whispers “more, more, more.”

So, I get up from the table, go up to the safe in the room, and take out another $5k band. My traveling companion called sometime during this and I go and meet him for a $250 single table tournament. I'm in rare form, and just kind of pissed and willing to throw away that buyin, as I can't be bothered to fold anything. But, the funny thing about tournament poker is that the donkeys win quite a bit of the time, and I wind up knocing out like the first four dudes on some insane hands, and I roll to an easy first place $1k victory. I get no less than two dudes to curse at me, and my friend to give me the finger as I bust him, I forget the hand, I probably put him all in and hit some retarded gut shot.

Of course this win covers up any notion that the losing was my own fault, and that I needed to take a break. The numb feeling, and the idea that my money would come back to me if I kept going was there. It's somewhat late and my friend goes up to sleep, and I should be tired, but I have no desire to sleep, I only feel the desire for more more more. So I go back to the 10/25 game. They don't have a seat, and so I sit down at the 5/10 game. I lose $2300 in about an hour when I can't fold QQ vs someone's AA, and then I take a nice suckout with my TT vs K8. The act of reaching into my pocket for a rebuy in this game finally breaks my spirit, and I'm depressed enough to quit, down $7150 on the day.

It's way late now, and I can't sleep. After laying in bed for a few minutes I go to the hotel lounge and putz around on the internet. I still have like $15k left in cash in the safe. And I can't believe that after playing perfectly for so many months, that things are now going so wrong now, and how can I make things right? I need to make things right! I will make things right.

I'm only down like $1k on the trip at this point. I'm not sure why the thought of coming home with a loss chapped my ass so badly. If I were home, I would have taken a break, checked myself into the “poker hospital” for at least a week and not played until I didn't feel so bad. But, yeah, like I said, nothing else to do there. When I eventually lie down, I doze in and out for a couple hours at a time, instead of ruminating about my stupidity, my brain fixated on the monomaniacal thought of how I'm going to make it right.

When thinking about this sequence of events, it is this night I think of most. I think of how I could have taken the car we rented and driven a few hours to visit my parents, relax, and in a day or two come back to play the tournaments we'd gone down to play in the first place. But, no, I didn't do that at all...

up $5860

Hi, just finished playing. Just a quick post to say that I killed it tonight. Played great, and ran great. I think writing did the trick, I worked on that last post for like 6 straight hours before playing, and felt and played great.

Anyway, after this I'm five whole US dollars in the black. I'm feeling great. Here's my monster, $7k chip stack as I was cashing out...

On losing, part 1

The man who taught me how to play poker asked me for a loan once because couldn't pay his rent. I knew the rules and I'd played a little before, but I say that I learned to play from him, because in his apartment, at his $0.25-$3 spread bet home game, I learned about “outs,” and “pot odds.” He would eventually start dealing in and playing in some of the local card rooms, which by his invite is how I wound up getting my start playing Hold 'Em for real money. But, despite dealing cards for a living, reading tons of books, and being pretty good mathematically, he has never been a winning player. I think the fundamental problem with his game is that he's a bit of a whiner. I used to get sob stories about why he'd lost on a particular evening until I responded harshly: “Dear XXXX, Here is my secret formula for poker success. 1. Stop whining. 2. Play better. Love, Grandpa.”

Most players, most people, feel sorry for themselves when faced with adversity. Rather than really sitting down and figuring out why they lose, they find a kind of contentment in finding excuses that allow them to make the same mistakes they've always made. Specifically excuses for allowing themselves to tilt. He wrote in his own blog once about how there's no writing about losing poker. He's an aspiring writer (I think, I don't really know), and there is a certain inherent poetry in the loser. And, yeah, when losing I'll compare myself to Dostoevsky, and work long and hard on the absurdly long novel that I can't seem to finish. But he is right about the pro card player's attitude toward losing, in reading other player's blogs, their winning sessions are often hardcore play by plays of how awesome they are, while their losing sessions are “played bad. Was on tilt. Too depressing to write about.” And I'm guilty of this too. It's about hardest thing in the world to sit down and really look at your own shortcomings.

So here goes...
The story of my January through February disaster starts sometime in September. After a losing August, I decided that if I played good every session, if I never tilted, I could make a decent living. It took me a few months to get to this point, but eventually I started to do it. And, during an incredible streak from October 30, to Jan 2 I had an 83% win rate, with a little over $21k of profit. I was playing great. I had enough money that I could gamble without fear when I knew I had the best hand. I could shrug off any cold deck. I achieved a feeling of calmness that afforded me the serenity to know that despite any bad luck, the money would come to me eventually, simply because I playing better than everyone at any table I was at. And I was amazing... in tight games I played aggressive and loose, in loose games I played patient and tight. I had near perfect reads on everyone. I found a way to profit from any table I was at. No one could set me off my game plan, and nothing could make me tilt. I achieved this from an intense discipline that I found in the rest of my life. All the guidelines I mentioned in the last post I followed pretty exactly.

So, at the beginning of Jan, I got the notion that my shit didn't stink, and I got into an insanely aggressive $10/$25 game. No cap on the buy in, very rich and very bad players throwing around thousands, by far the loosest and biggest game I've played in. And in my first three sessions, I won $3k, $5k, and a two hour $10,600 win that got me kicked out of the game. This brought my total since October 30 to a little over $40k (FORTY THOUSAND US DOLLARS).

The WPT was happening the next week. Now, with the notion that my shit smelled like roses, I went with a friend to the Borgata. We get there that night pretty tired from the trip, and so I decide to just play a few hours. Within the first hour or two, I wind up hitting a straight flush, and win about $6k. We leave soon after, go out to a strip club, drink a lot, celebrate in a general merriment. I tell a stripper giving me a lap dance to come and meet me at the casino the next day, that “I'll be easy to find. I'll be the guy at the poker table with all the money!” She found this charming, but never showed.

I went there with $16k, in three neatly rubber banded wads of 50 hundred dollar bills. At this point the safe in our room has four of these wads in it, and a couple thousand dollar chips, that I carry around and do tricks with. I'm counting out the credit cards I'm going to pay. I'm thinking about the stocks I'm going to buy. I'm deciding if I want a scooter or a real motorcycle.

The next day, I get to the table, a bit hungover, a bit tired. I play poorly, get down a few thousand but eventually get a hold of myself and fight back to a $65 tie. My friend is at the final table for a satellite to the $10k main event, and so I leave the game to watch him get through a field of 300 to come in 4^th, he wins $1k, but not a seat. We have a nice steak dinner, drink some wine. I am unstoppable! Even when I play bad, I'm still better than everyone! We are both winning! We are awesome! We are in good moods.

down the rabbit hole

Hi kids. So, in the past two disastrous months since my last update, I'm down a little more than $11k. It has not been pretty. I am an idiot for not posting here. I am keeping my spreadsheet up to date, but I am not really looking at the sessions, not really thinking about what I'm doing wrong in any long analytical fashion. I am in LA now, and I am somewhat terrified at how low my levels of accessible money has become. I have this apartment booked until November, and I have no idea what I'm going to do if I can't turn things around.

I have no one to blame but myself. I have endured a few untimely bad beats, but, I have reacted to them rather poorly. They've stuck with me, not let me sleep, causing me to tilt for weeks sometimes. I brush them off in conversation, but I don't really come to terms with them. And then at the table, I will play amazing for the first part of the session, eventually count my stack, and then start drifting off to what I have in the bankroll, to what I have in the bank, to the level of money that I would have if that fucking card hadn't come. And, invariably, instead of playing 100%, I'm just trying my damnedest to get the money back, and make things right. And invariably, that is when I play dumb, and lose.

And yeah, I'm an idiot, I think for not writing in here. When I use this space, it stops the bad thoughts from perpetuating and taking root, it allows me to keep a perspective on the situation, look at it from all angels, compartmentalize it, figure it out, learn from it (or rationalize that there's nothing to be learned), and go back to playing well. Also, I've been getting a few comments from completely unexpected people asking when I'm going to go back to writing this thing, and I'm finding that having people, even if it's only ten, who have this loaded up in their news reader, and are psyched to see a new post, is really something nice. So, yeah, thanks.

Anyway, I have been breaking my cardinal rules that have kept me profitable for so long. I feel I should reiterate them here.

• 8 hours, 8 hours, 8 fucking hours. When you play more, you play bad. And if you play more than 10, you can't play the next day.

  • I need to put the dudes I see playing great for two days with no break out of my mind. It's simply not something my brain can do. I am not Phil Ivey, Gus Hansen, or David Benyamin, I need to come to terms with this, or it's going to destroy me.

• Exercise, eat well, sleep

  • I've been to the gym like twice in the past three weeks. Eating fat and sugar. Having unrestful and anxious dreams. Here's a good one... I am playing at the Commerce, and I keep forgetting what my hole cards are, and I turn them over, expecting to take the pot, and they're completely different cards.

• Write, and write and write more.

  • I get somewhat depressed from playing poker for extended periods. It's a strange heavy feeling, and when I sit down to write, even this blog, and especially the various other artistic things I'm working on, it really relaxes me and gives me this kind of deep calmness that is so good for poker, and for my brain in general. I'd like to consider myself a writer first, and when I don't write, I really feel like an asshole.

• Be honest with yourself at the table.

  • Something Greenstein's said in his book, about when you play bad, get up from the table, and ask yourself if you can play good. Sit down, and then if you don't play good, leave. It's so hard though, because I rationalize when I'm at the table... I know I'm doing stupid shit, but I put it into my head that I'm just going to stop bluffing, or that I'm going to do this or that. But, then I never stop bluffing. I just react a lot of the time to things, and before I've thought things through, I've done it.... I perceive someone to be weak, and I make a bet at them, I think I'm ahead with a marginal hand and I call. When I'm playing well, is when things are on, this is usually in the first 8 hours of play, and then after that I am completely off, I can't perceive anything, I don't have the energy to bluff back at someone, intelligently, without just throwing all my chips into the pot from frustration.

Ok, sorry to be a bit mopey. I'm feeling a bit mopey.