IO, Swongs, Life, Work, Skiing

So I haven't posted in an age so I said I'd stick an update up anyways.

Haven't been playing a hell of a lot. Started work experience in January, so thats been taking up a lot of my time, between work itself, being tired from work, and learning stuff related to my work. Basically been thrown relatively in at the deep end, and am still a little weak at a lot of the stuff I'm expected to do, but I'm enjoying it anyways. In the final stages of implementing a programme I wrote for a branch of the place I work in, and the girl that manages that department said she was "delighted with it." Really makes a difference in terms of happiness levels! Compared to some of the other people in my course, I'm pretty lucky in terms of the work I do. Two of the smartest people in my course (imo) have ended up doing shitty stuff like photocopying, and one of them didn't even have a computer for the first 5 weeks of his job, so they're getting done pretty hard. Might be harsh but it makes me feel happier where I am!

Enjoying it anyways, bit of a sense of achievement, and gives you the idea that you're heading in the right direction. I feel that I can actually make a positive contribution in relation to my wages, even though I'm relatively new at this, so thats pretty cool I suppose. I really would not like to do anything poker related with my life anyways, but it still takes up a huge portion of my interest, so it is most definitely remaining as somethign important in my life.

Having the real monies makes a huge difference too. I'm so used to being cash busto through being way too lazy to withdraw and being left scrounging for a few days at a time.

Went skiing with the lads in France at the beginning of Jan too. That was a week of mayhem for sure. I've always had problems with my achilles, and they started to play up again over there, resulting in me being in extreme pain for a few days, so missed a bit of skiing which was hugely gay, but I just ended up drinking all day, and getting even messier at night with the lads so it was all good. Something about the air up there keeps you hangover free so it was just days on end of the stuff. BTW, if you're ever offered Chartreuse say no. That stuff is nasty. Nothing monumentous happened over there that I recall, lots of messiness, but the only bits of interest are banned from being told by the lads! No mentions here then obv! Didn't do anything that I mind being said though so I'm guilt free!

Pub crawl one of the first nights. We assumed that everyone would be a bit tipsy before they headed out, so we lashed into the beers the second we got off the slopes in preparation for heading out.... It appears English people don't really do this. First pub was an Irish bar, and we obv just headed straight for the Guinness. Look around at all the English people on the crawl getting stuck into their half-pints and shandies. Pretty bad condemnation of their nation imo. Just spurred us on to greater heights to show them how to do it. Converted a few properly, but we bumped into a few Cork lads on the trip from the first bar to the second, when we were trying to figure out a good place to piss that the gendarmes couldn't see us. You'd be surprised at the spirit of cameraderie that imbues lol. Obv we gave up on the conversions and just stayed with them for a few pubs and that was the beginning of the end. Competitions in each pub, one of the lads won a competition involving his arse being slapped. Not really sure of how it worked though. Put us in good spirits and when one of the lads in the next bar entered a drinking one we lifted the roof off the place chanting Irish stuff to the stage where first the barmaid had to come over and tell us that the people a few doors down were complaining about the noise. This being a nightclub type place just made us proud. They couldn't even get the competition started for ages cos they couldn't explain the rules cos nobody could hear them. We were just giving good support imo. When my mate took it down we just went nuts. The english people started giving us weird looks after a bit of this, especially after the Cork lads started singing IRA songs. Not really sure how well that went down. Next pub was some sort of karaoke thing, so after a couple of girls sang some pop song we went up and said we'd sing Bryan Adams. They kick in the music and we just belt into The Fields of Athenry. They immediately switched off the music, took away the mic and try to get us to stop but we actually persuade one of the English reps to join in, so there was no stopping us. 12 of us end up dancing on a rickitty table still going with Irish songs, while all the English guys are still on their half pints lol. We got some weird looks but there was a good bit of banter so it was all good. Any of the english guys and gals we got talking to seemed pretty sound and they were all taking it as banter so it was all good. The reps loved us as well for some reason despite the mayhem. Antics just got worse the more pubs we went to, but everyone loved us for some reason! Ended up staying in some disco place till we were kicked out. Half the lads had gone home at that stage. Weak imo. One of the lads had an absolute fail with some really hot French bird coming on to him really strong in the last place at around 3 in the morning and him doing nothing bout it, so we were giving him fair stick for it. Absolute mayhem and everyone loved us for the rest of the week. Not really sure why. I just thought we were causing mayhem, but all the reps and the people there loved us. Really not sure how that happened though. Lots of hazy stuff!

Poker is going mediocrely. Went through a 10 bi downswing over the course of about 5k hands where nothing went right, and I spewed a couple bi as well. Recovered from that by playing pretty well and getting back even pretty fast, but then lost 7 bi to the same guy in 3 hours. He was ridiculously bad, and insanely spewy even though he was playing something like 27/23. Had 99 vs J8 in with him pf, AA vs 55, a few other big hands vs draws on the flop, got QJ in vs A8 on a Q83r board. Just a crazy session.... Should have ended up a good bit up but lost a lot in spots where I got it in ahead. Love to play the guy some more but haven't seen him since. He was just insanely badly spewy. I had pretty much no history of bluffing the guy cos he loved to stick it in so much, but he still was. Sigh, wish all the regs would be like him.

Have been grinding it out though between .50/1 and 1/2 and I'm up a good bit since the last post. Still recovering from decimating my roll while skiing though lol.

Took down an IO package which I'm pretty delighted with as well. Played a 5er rebuy one night when I was feeling sick cos I wasn't gonna play my normal games, and ended up getting a ticket from that for $10 for a $40r which I was probably gonna play anyways. Played really well, got pretty much everything in ahead and stayed ahead so I guess I ran good in terms of that. Built up a pretty huge stack straight after the first break. Was chip leader of the tourney from about 10 mins after the 1st break till the end of the tourney really. Pretty big chip lead for most of it too IIRC. Was playing really well, and ran really well in terms of getting to SD when I did have good hands, and my hands holding up when I get them in. Won a few 65/35s or so to give me a huge one, and I was stealing a good bit in good spots as well cos there was a lot of guys being ridiculously weak. Once I picked up the stack I bullied my way through most of it. Just stealing constantly. I think I judged the amount I stole quite well though. Only hands I got it in behind with during the whole tourney were for 0.4BB more with 54 from the BB which I won, and with bottom set vs top set on the FT which I obv lost. Was for a smallish pot relative to my stack though cos I had a pretty big one. Just stole through the FT as well into a ticket. A couple of boards guys railed it and commented on my aggressiveness. Kinda true though. I was stealing like a madman cos people were being pussies. Only one guy I thought was good throughout the whole tourney, and he ended up bubbling the package. Girlfriend decided to watch me play the sat and she nearly had a heart attack so many times cos she couldn't believe I was raising when I didn't have the nuts. She got really mad at me for being too aggressive and went off to sleep in a huff. Shows her.

Pretty stoked with the whole thing. It'd be pretty cool to cash the IO, and I'm definitely aiming for it. I've no qualms going up against the field. I'm sure I will be in the top half in terms of ability anyways, as would anyone semi-competent, and with a bit of luck, hopefully I can take down something. It'll be a great experience anyways.

Gonna room with my brother for it anyways. He's taught me pretty much all the poker I know, so maybe he'll be a good influence on me, but somehow I doubt he will, the degen! He's making vids for pokerswat now, so any of ye that have access should check out VanDice on it. Shameless plug, but his thought process is really clear and concise, and I would well reccommend anything he churns out.

Anyways, I'll try keep this updated, but I don't have much time for pokers these days, so there may be a lot of life crap posted here. Hopefully some poker though, and roll on the IO!



EDIT: I'd reccommend reading Holllllaments blog, its quality stuff!