What Am I Doing?

I am starting to get the distinct feeling that the poker Gods are done with me. I'm not much for posting whiny "woe is me" posts, but after a solid month of losing, one has to wonder whether this is just running bad or if I'm just cosmically fucked.

Went to Vegas for a week in the middle of May. Thankfully, I didn't spend much time at the tables. Of my 5 days there, the only ray of light was a 6th place money finish at the afternoon NLHE tourney at the Planet Hollywood. I have to say I did play some solid poker that day, but with the amount of chips at the table, by the time we got to the final table the blinds were so high it turned into roulette with cards. At one point, I was down to my final T100 chip and managed to hail-mary a couple of double-ups and a triple-up to get back into the game. 6th place basically paid 2 to 1 on your buyin, so for 3 hours of work it's sort of crappy earnings, but I had fun and learned, so that's important.

The rest of the trip gambling wise was a sea of red. I sat down at a $1/$2 NLHE table and got my ass handed to me thanks to a couple of crushing beats. Nothing suckout-ish, just good hands running into better hands. For some reason, I just simply cannot make money playing B&M ring games. I think it has something to do with the donk level at the tables.

I got talked into playing Craps with a friend which cost me a bundle, and there's no such thing as a cheap table of blackjack on the strip, though I did do decent playing 21, in spite of my abandoning attempts to count. I'm not quite there yet to try it in live games without making it obvious I'm doing it. I can't carry on a conversation with people and remember the count.

It was a good time though. I went with a friend of mine and his girlfriend, both of whom I barely get to see, so it was a good trip. Next time I'll have to plan a little more ahead and try to play some more poker tournaments. It's hard to convince your travel companions who don't want to play a tournament to be okay with your disappearing for hours.

Anyway, it appears it's only a matter of time before I'm done with online poker... again... It's just not fun. Losing seldom is, but it's usually followed by a decent winning streak, so I am content to ride it out and wait for my luck to change, but that doesn't seem to be happening. I opened an account on Absolute Poker, put in $50 and never saw a profit there. Just crushing losses and suckouts. Ironically, they keep sending me notices telling me about the $50 bonus I have yet to unlock. Thanks, assholes. I guess it's my fault. To get "points" to unlock their bonus, you have to be involved in a hand, and my involved, they mean seeing the flop, and the rake has to be at least $0.50. So, if you're gonna play tight/aggressive poker, it'll take forever. And, if you deposited $50 and play the $.25/$.50 tables, you are NEVER going to see a $.50 rake, so you're basically, well, fucked. Thanks for the deposit! The final blow about this is, the whole reason why I deposited money at Absolute to begin with didn't pan out, because I crapped out so fast.

Good times.

I was thinking about throwing some cashish at Bodog and see what happens there. Word has it it's a fish farm the likes of Party Poker of olden days, but when you can't hit a hand if you picked it out of the deck, it doesn't matter the skill of the opponent.

So, I dunno. My bankroll at Pokerstars stands at around $20. I've been trying to gain traction playing $3.25 6-handed turbo NLHE games. I was doing very well, but not lately. The latest blow that put me out before this post... I was the dominant chip leader when I get KK. 4 people left in the game, I'm the SB. I raise 3XBB, called by BB, the second largest stack, which is about 3/4 mine. Flop comes something like J66, I put out a good bet, he raises, I shove, he insta-calls and turns over...

66, for the quads.

This is my world for the last 45 days.

So, I don't know.. Maybe if I can find someone to sponsor me I can play poker at a level that doesn't equate to roulette with cards, though with my current luck, I wouldn't put money on me.

But it's gotta turn around eventually, right?! In the mean time, I'll continue to play my ass off for $1 profits at a time. My definition of fun times, to be sure!