I had a few bad sessions in a row the last couple of days-- nothing crushing, but enough to make me pause and rethink what I was doing. The loss could be attributed to a number of things-- sloppy, unfocused play; complacency; losing 3 different pots for stacks where I had >90% equity when the money was committed; any resultant tilt from trying to win back those pots; poor physical and mental maintenance. Whatever the case, I decided to review my play a little and see what I thought the best option for retooling my leaks would be.

And that's when I realized, in my review, that I'd played for twenty-four days in a row.

You think it might be time for a break?

I decide to make myself not play poker today. I realized I'd been holed up in here, occasionally taking breaks to stretch or watch something, but still hardly leaving my room. I needed to get out.

I didn't do anything fancy. I went for a little jog in the late afternoon. I cooked myself a nice little dinner. I went out for a couple of beers with some friends I hadn't seen in a while. It was a nice reminder that there's more to life than poker, than my goals I'm working for. A reminder that life is happening right now, and it's good to just stop and experience it every once in a while. A reminder that, most of all, I really do enjoy a wide variety of experiences and need them all to feel happy and fulfilled in my life.

I'll probably get back to playing as soon as tomorrow-- I couldn't totally get away from the game, as evidenced by this blog entry-- but I want to have a clear head and a proper frame of mind first. I've been happy with my progress in those 24 days, but it's showed signs of slowing (and even reversing course), and I don't want to wait any longer to address that.

I've been playing a lot more over the holidays and I feel like I've finally turned the corner. I went on a tremendous winning streak starting about ten days ago and I've been doing everything I can to keep putting in the time and work to keep building the bankroll. I've been able to move back up to NL100 and if this keeps sailing relatively smoothly I'll be at NL200 again before too long.

Patience is key in HU. If you lose a pot, don't act like you have to get it back immediately. Wait it out; if you've done a good job of game selection, your opponent will afford you an opportunity to win it back from some major mistake of his. Don't try to force him to bend to your will; manipulate him into doing what you want without him realizing it. You really have to go with the flow, more so than any other form of poker; if you try to swim against it, you'll dash yourself against the rocks.

I am by nature an impatient person, because I'm used to getting the hang of things quickly, so this has been both a valuable and a hard lesson to learn. But it's the only way to win, and no matter how much I want it to be otherwise, it doesn't work that way.

So now, with a lot of free time and not much else to do, I'm going to ring in 2010 by continuing the pursuit of heads-up excellence. I'll move back into tournaments gradually, once I have a bankroll I'm comfortable with. I'll look to travel more to play live again, too, but my immediate goal is to continue pounding out dollars mano y mano.

Well, 2009 is about to come to a close, and with it, I'm wrapping up my time in Houston, at least temporarily, and setting forth on the poker trail once more.

I'm still trying to build that online bankroll through heads-up play. I feel like I've turned a corner; I tinkered with my approach until I settled on one that worked. It's still early, though. Over the holidays I should have more free time.

At the end of the year, I'm moving out of here and I'm going to visit family and friends for a few weeks. I plan to spend much of my time then playing online, and hopefully I'll have a decent bankroll stacked by then. Then, I hope to travel west for some live tournaments, starting at the LA Poker Classic. I'm going to have to sell shares and such to raise the money, unless something absurd hits before then, but I don't mind. I've been able to do it before, so I hope I'll be able to again, especially if I've been playing a lot lately and putting up good results.

Not much exciting to talk about. I've put in about 11k hands since I got my laptop back, and the first half was roughly breakeven, but the second trends significantly upward, and while I'm aware of the role luck may have in that, I'm certainly playing better than I was at the start. It takes time to shake off the rust.

Well, I'm gonna keep at it and try to report back periodically as my plans solidify. One more thing: Would there be any interest in some reduced-rate tournament coaching as I get back underway, say, $50 an hour? Feel free to send me a PM or e-mail requesting any details.

Hola, amigos. Been a long time since I rapped at ya. (Great, I'm ripping off Jim Anchower .) Anyway, for those of you who were wondering what I've been up to and what I'll be up to, I'll run it down as quickly as I can:

I've been on the online grind the last couple months, but I've hit a downswing. I've been pressuring myself too win too much, and as a result I've been stressed and tilt-prone and not playing well.

I haven't been playing with enough of a cushion to live behind me, and my monthly nut was unnecessarily high, especially in a city as cheap as Houston. As a result.

I've decided the only solution is to take a more proactive effort in curbing expenses. I haven't put nearly the serious effort I should have into this endeavor, because I'd convinced myself that grinding out volume would just cover for it. But I realized that I wasn't giving myself enough of a safety net, hence the earlier pressure. I plan to shed some unnecessary possessions and move somewhere that cuts my rent and bills severely. (I have plenty of options in both regards.) I'm aiming to stock up 6 months' work of living expenses-- whatever that means; it'll be a product of how much I sell and how much I cut my monthly nut-- and ideally more. With living expenses covered, I am free to gamble with my bankroll, relax and take chances, and more importantly, I'm not forced to play outside it.

I don't have to win now. I don't have to chase scores. I don't have to play out of my bankroll. I can take a much more tried and true approach. And if the score comes, it comes. Meanwhile, I'm setting myself up to succeed no matter what the circumstances.

As poker players, our role in the game is to minimize luck. We want to master the game to maximize our success under any circumstances-- to win even when the breaks don't all go our way, and to win the most when they do. By not accounting for my expenses up front, I was unnecessarily, opening myself up to luck, simply because I didn't want to do the work necessary to maximize success-- I thought I was doing "just good enough".

I owe it to myself-- we all owe it to ourselves-- to be more than "just good enough". We deserve to be great. We push ourselves to be great. We must stretch our comfort zone. We must be willing to accept success. We must be willing to not be Just Another Guy. (Honestly, I loathe fame-- I much prefer anonymity, though I do enjoy the spotlight from time to time under the right circumstances and for the right reasons-- but I have to accept that if I succeed, I might become famous. I shouldn't, consciously or subconsciously, sabotage my success because it potentially brings an uncomfortable level of fame.)

Anyway, just some quick thoughts. I've been recovering from a tonsillar abscess that I had drained on Tuesday, so I won't play until Sunday. I won't play if I'm not ready to then, but I feel like I'm recovering on schedule. I have a lot to do before the end of the month, though. We'll see.

Good luck out there.

This day gave me a hard reminder of why I don't like this city: Everyone is always trying to take your money.

It started with a simple taxi ride from Bill's Gamblin' Hall & Saloon to the Palms. My shaved-head (and possibly bald) driver started telling me I looked like a guy who could use a topless massage and a handjob, or some such.

Well, despite my ignominious exit from the Main Event, I did manage to both get a massage and find time to jerk off the day before, so he was obviously clueless about me and just trying to rack up a sale. Even though I had no interest, he kept persisting, and I knew I had to put up with this for the duration of the cab ride, so I started laughing it off and thinking about it, before finally asking him, "So how much do they pay you for bringing me there?"

"Twenty bucks."

Not bad, I suppose, but I know the game... it's not my thing.

Later that day I went for a walk down the Miracle Mile Shops at Planet Hollywood Casino-- just a chance to browse windows, see what was around, see what people were like. Some guy at a kiosk sees me on my iPhone and calls after me. "Sir!"

I should just keep walking, but I decide to stop and indulge him. He asks me if that's an iPhone, yeah obviously it is, and he wants to show me this gadget-- a mobile charger or some such. I'm not buying, and he's painfully obviously sticking to script. "Look, you can see it charges--" he says, pointing to the battery icon, except that I've jailbroken my phone, so the battery is a number, and not an icon, and he doesn't know what to say to that. So I get to the point:

"How much is it?"

He comes back with "Do you trust me?"

Do I trust you? You hassled me in a mall to sell me something. Our relationship is based on the opposite of trust. Are you kidding? Are you for real here?

Instead, I come back with, "I trust you to tell me how much money you want for that."

"Well, it's normally $60, but I work commission and get off at 7--" oh, save it-- "And I can give it to you for $39.99."

"Nope." And I start walking again, knowing this was the ending all along, but still finding satisfaction in making it so. I mean, I'm exact with my money and my business dealings when I'm with friends-- I'm not gonna start throwing it away on any random yahoo who sees fit to accost me.

It doesn't stop when you make more money or become famous, either. The hustlers just try to get a bigger piece of it. They just become craftier. You've got to be sharp to stay on top of your money-- and that's one skill that just plain comes from experience with people. A friend gave me a valuable piece of advice around the new year: "Most people are friendly, but most people aren't trustworthy." Knowing how to separate the two and evaluate them independently is valuable indeed.

On that note, I'm getting out of here soon. Back home, back to my friends there. I love my friends here, too, but I haven't gotten to see much of them, I'm out of the main event, and every minute I'm in this city, I'm burning money.