JC missed this week.

   This week  Cumulative  Average 
CR    -$0.50      +$4.55    +$0.30 
EM    -$4.55     -$21.40    -$1.26 
ER    +$5.30     +$11.65    +$0.83 
JB    +$3.45      -$2.75    -$0.17 
Me    -$3.70      -$1.00    -$0.06

We mixed things up by making it dealer’s choice a la Maudie’s home game. Surprisingly enough, we did not play any Hold ‘Em. Instead we played Heinz 57, the Jake (5 draw with Deuces wild), Chicago, Follow the Queen, Omaha 8, and Baseball.

It was a tough night for me. I’m not a stud player, and the wild cards make it particularly tough to figure out whether to pursue my draw or just fold my hand at the earliest opportunity. The wild cards also have the effect of making more people go to showdown more often. It’s tough to bet someone out if their two wild cards give them 3-4 different draws. Found myself with the second best hand a few times–forcing me to re-buy halfway through and try to make back some of my losses.

Omaha 8 was a painful experience–not because it’s a complex game, which it is, but because everyone was bitching and moaning about how much they hated it, didn’t understand it, or whatever. Which doesn’t make sense in light of the craziness of wild card games, but I guess those games appeal to their inner gambler.

ER and JB made out like bandits, catching lots of wilds and hole cards. Another session like this, and JB will be in positive territory for the first time since I started keeping track four months ago.

Found my friend’s copy of Winning Low-Limit Hold’em last night under a pile of stuff and flipped through a few pages. It’s embarrassing how little of it I’ve actually absorbed. The first time I read the book I thought, “Yeah, this stuff all makes sense,” but I was probably on a rush at the time, so I just barreled through it without really incorporating it into my game. I think a lot of my impatience with, and lackluster results in, limit owes a lot to my not playing it as aggressively as I should. I’m letting my favorite offsuit one-gappers and suited two-gappers (Q9s anyone?) erode my stack, and I’m not pumping the pot enough when my cards and position give me an advantage. I’m going to have to reread this one and see if I can stick to his guidelines for a thousand hands or so. I’ll let you all know what happens.

On that note, I’ve decided to put together a reading list using some of my profits. What would you recommend? for low stakes limit? for pot/no limit? for tournament play? for poker in general? Small Stakes Hold ’em is on the list. Should I read The Theory of Poker, or will it give this English major an aneurysm?

Just finished clearing the bonus at Paradise and ended up with 2.5 times my buy-in. So now I’m faced with a choice, do I keep playing at Paradise or move the bankroll over to Party? Here are my stats at different levels:

Paradise 1/2: 1021 hands, VP$IP 23.02, 7.95BB/100 hands

Party 1/2 (since June): 5601 hands, VP$IP 21.32, 1.08BB/100 hands

Party $25PL (since June): 3900 hands, VP$IP 33.56, 5.84BB/100 hands

Party $25NL (since June): 1455 hands, VP$IP 28.45, 9.15BB/100 hands

Since late August I’ve mostly played PL and NL at Party. Not really sure why I played 1/2 at Paradise, but that’s just how it turned out. Anyway, if you have any thoughts on what the best course of action is, let me know (email or comments). Personally I like putting in short hit and run NL sessions and then going off and bragging about it to anyone who’ll listen. The brag/play time ratio is very high.

And just for kicks, here are my stats since I started using PT back in March:

All levels/sites: 24773 hands, VP$IP 22.73, 1.97BB/100 hands

Yep. That’s what happens to your win rate when you bust out twice. Each time I kept back a little profit, so it wasn’t completely devastating to bust out, but it still sucks.

With a name like Diary of a Poker Slut, Ms. Amandalicious is sure to get lots of hits from the Y-dominated poker blog community, no matter how small her bankroll, or the limits she plays. Now the smart money would do what she’s doing–playing nickel/dime limit and penny no limit–but I never claimed to be smart money. I’ve only recently gotten the bankroll in a position to handle the swings of 1/2, and I’ve been known to risk my $10 Empire bonus at $25 PL (running that up a couple hundred dollars, I might add). But enough about me; check out the poker slut for writing that makes you want more.

Great. Another blog to waste away my day.

Eighty: Percentage of bonus I’ve cleared.

Two point twenty-five: The number of times I’ve increased my initial buy-in, including bonuses. Just under two without the bonuses.

Seven: The number of days I’ve played.

It’s really hard to believe. I don’t feel like I’m playing great, winning poker, and my time constraints relegate me to playing only an hour here and there. So a lot of this is just making out like a bandit on two or three hands and folding the rest. So I’m left to wonder if I’m just on a good run or if something about Paradise players makes them give it up when I’ve got the dominant hand. Obviously if it’s the latter, I should keep playing there. It’s still too early to say for sure (936 hands–mostly at 1/2), but I’m liking the 9.96BB/100 hands.

Here’s another number:

Thirteen: the number of days before I hit the tables in Fabulous Las Vegas! Hopefully I’ll keep up this current run and have enough in the bankroll to fund the entire trip.

So here’s a question for you Vegas gamboolers out there: you should sit down at a table with 20BB according to Love and Casino War (and have an extra 20BB to rebuy if you feel you can beat the table) and your bankroll should have 300BB to play at a particular limit according to The Cards Speak (and others as well, but that’s where I recall first seeing the number). How many big bets should you take with you for a Friday – Sunday Vegas trip? I think you can safely assume that I’ll be at the tables at least an average of eight hours a day.