A few more details

I know, I know. I never post anymore. I could give you the standard excuses, but I won't. I'm just busy and not quite as into it as I have been in the past. But I did buy a new camera, and I have been blown away at how good the picture quality is. I picked up the Canon Rebel Xsi, which is a little better than an entry-level SLR, and I got the Canon 70-300 lens with built-in image stabilization, so the lens ended up costing about when the camera did, but as you can see from the pics on the last post, it's worth it. Special K and Dr. K came up to Merlefest for Saturday, and he showed me a few tricks to make my shots better. I took over 60 photos over the course of two days, and culled that down to 100 or so that I liked. My plan for the week is to cull even further and then do a little iMovie thing to show off some more pics. If that ever happens, I'll let you know.

Update from the land of dead blogs

I bought a new camera.


I took it to MerleFest.



I saw some killer boogie.




You should all go with me next year.

Riding Coattails

If you wanted any more proof that he's one of the very best in this business, go to PokerNews and follow Pauly's live updates from the LAPT final. With Pauly, Change, Mean Gene and Otis all at one non-WSOP event, the A-Team is definitely in Argentina this week.

Back in the saddle

Poker content - Lost my ass in Tunica. Lost my ass again at BadBlood's. Shoved into the nuts and lost my ass at my home game. And I still love the game. We did wonder what type of thread we could get started of jealous bitches on the forums if we posted that Lee Jones made a McDonald's run at Blood's home game, though. That dude is great fun, but I hate getting in big hands with him. You'd think he'd played the game once or twice.

Today was first tech for the Avett Brothers, and it was a trip to be back in the saddle. This was the first show I'd really done since Godspell in September. I did a little one-weekend thing in December, but it was super-simple and nothing near as complex as this. I picked up a dozen used LED color-changing fixtures online (go here if interested) and bought a pair of small moving lights. I also got a lighting board that is PC-based, so the whole control rig runs out of a backpack, and a bunch of cable and big hampers to move everything with. So today was all about loading it in, putting it together for the first time and beginning to teach their road guys how to run it all. Once I figured it out, that is.

The Avett boys are really loyal, and their road crew (the parts that don't play in the band, that is) are all people that they've known for a long time. This doesn't necessarily mean that they know a ton about lighting, so I'm learning how to run a new console while I try to figure out how to teach their lighting guy how to be a lighting guy. It's a challenge, but he's really bright and was like a sponge today soaking everything up, so I'm pretty sure it will work out okay. These guys are getting bigger and bigger and I think they might be ready to make the next step. If you're going to see Dave Matthews over the next 5 weeks or so, get there early enough for the opener, because they're worth it.

They're also all about the art, which is very cool. So today we got the rig put together, and everything actually worked the first time we turned it on, which NEVER happens. We actually got done early enough to cut a chunk of the crew early and I got a couple hours of dark time in the theatre to program. That's something that I almost never get, and I've yet to be on any show where I have enough time, so to grab an extra two hours today was a luxury like getting to sleep in when the time changes. I think we've put together a good rig, and the ColorBlast TR fixtures (the LEDs) have a ton more output than I expected. We're flying them at about 20-22', and I didn't think they'd give me any punch at all over 16-18', so I was very pleasantly surprised.

And the console that I'm learning has turned out to be very intuitive, and I think it will be good for their guy, since he doesn't have any experience on lighting boards and thus doesn't have any bad habits. It's a Jands Vista PC, which uses a much more visual system of running and programming lights than any other lighting console on the market. When it came out, it was a total reimagining of lighting control, the kind of thing that comes along once every couple of decades. And since it's PC-based, it doesn't have a big piece of furniture, so it's way less expensive. It's available in a big desk-type light board as well, and I've sold one of those to a big church that I worked on a few years ago, but the PC version is ridiculously inexpensive and powerful.

So all my gear worked and I got out of the theatre by 8, so that was a good day. And it was a good thing, since I've got another 8AM call tomorrow. I'm still debating with myself whether or not to talk to Scott about running a couple of their shows later in the summer. They've got two shows in Myrtle Beach, which is an easy drive and I'd only have to burn one vacation day, but if anybody knows the boys are coming close to them and wanted to party, I might be persuaded to range a little farther afield.

Flooding New Orleans

With my chips, that is. Two buy-ins in two hours was enough to get me out of the casino and onto Bourbon Street for the night, not that my nights run all that long anymore. Anyway, I've got a teleconference at 9 tomorrow, so turning in early was ok. I set myself a 2 buyin stop loss for the night, and rapidly went past that dumping another hundred at the blackjack table. But on the to my tales of woe and mediocre play.

First bu-in was easy - I lost about $50 playing 4/8 Omaha Hi before I got called to my $1/2 seat. All that came in a hand where I flopped the open-ender, got there on the turn, and got out for only one bet on the river when the board paired. My nut straight no good to her boat, but at least it wasn't PLO. Meh. Then about three hands into my $1/2 session at what might be the most passive table I've ever seen, I flopped the K-high straight on a board of K-J-10 with two hearts. I held Q-9 off suit, and led out. Guy immediately to my left called, and the short stack at the end of the table raised my $6 bet to $20. I raised enough to put him all in, and the guy to my left moved all in over the top of me. I hadn't been at the table long enough to have much of a read, but I thought he was a pretty sharp player, solid, but capable of making a move. I put the short stack on a King or maybe two pair, and the guy to my left on hearts, so I made the call with the baby end of the straight, saying to the guy on my left "If I'm coolered, I'm coolered."

I was coolered. He turned over A-Q off, having limped into a 7-way pot with AQ and flopped Broadway. Shorty at the end showed another Q-9 off, and when the board didn't bring an ace, I lost my first buy-in. I didn't sweat that too much, since it's pretty rare that someone limps with AQ at the $1/2 table, so I reloaded. A big chunk of my second buyin went away when I flopped a flush draw, bet out, got one caller. Turned the open-ender to go with it, bet out, got called, and when the river missed me I had to fold to his shove. Then I made my last poker mistake of the night. Old nit had raised his button to $12 every orbit. He was a local, and old fuck, and a table captain besides. Add that to his habit of hiding his green chips behind all his other chips, and I kinda didn't like him. So the third time he raised his button, which put me having limped in under the gun with Qh-7h, I called out of spite, figuring he was raising with position. The only times he raised preflop was from the button and cutoff, and he limped every other hand. His pattern was to raise preflop and overbet the flop if it checked to him. This flop came down A-7-x, and I checked, planning to go to war with 2nd pair if he did his standard overbet. He did, pushing $50 into the $30 pot, and I moved all in over the top. He had A-K, I didn't improve, and I went to wander Bourbon Street.

Neither of those hands turned out the way I wanted them to, and maybe with more information on the old fuck I don't make that move. It could be that he had the goods every time he had the button, but I don't buy it. I just ran into him the time he did. Meh. Tomorrow will see me heading to Biloxi to check out the casinos there after I wander the Quarter a little during the daytime, take some pics and snag some souveniers for my sis and Suzy. Then hopefully I can rebound in Mississippi from the drubbing I took in NOLA.

Heads Up Continued

So I mentioned that I'd been playing a bunch of these heads up SNGs on Full Tilt, with good results. So I thought I'd put down a few thoughts on how I play them to see what people thought about the strategy that I've developed, and to give me something to look back on in a few years and think "what a moron!"

1) I don't open-fold my button. Hardly ever will I toss away my hand from the button. It doesn't matter how bad the starting hand is, on the button I'm getting 3-1 on my money to call, and against a random hand, I could very well be good. I see my opponents throw away their button hands a lot, and I can't help but think that it's a mistake. And one reason I think it's a mistake is

2) I raise a LOT from the button. With any two cards. ANY two cards. Let's start with the fact that if I don't bet or raise, my opponent doesn't have the chance to fold. So by not betting or raising, I'm removing one of the ways I can win the hand. And since I'm going to have position on every other street, increasing the size of the pot when I'm in position versus the hands that I'm out of position is +EV. If you don't believe me, think about it this way - if we played 1,000 hands together heads up, and on 500 of them I had position and the pot was $120, and on 500 of them the pot was $40 and I was out of position, how much do you think I would make against an opponent of relatively equal skill over those 1,000 hands? Yeah, I don't know either, but having position is a huge advantage, and if I can play for more money when I have an edge, I'm gonna.

3) Bottom pair is huge heads up. Most flops miss most hands, so bottom pair is quite likely going to be good. And I'm certainly going to bet it like it's good, once again giving my opponent that opportunity to fold.

4) Your opponent is going to overvalue their draws. Not every opponent, and not every draw, but I've found a TON of opponents on these low-stakes SNGs pushing with flush draws and straight draws and nothing else. So if you value small pairs more than they value draws, then you'll be willing to call their shove with middle pair and let them stack off with a naked draw. Now sometimes they'll get there, but less often that they hope.

That's just a few things I've observed over the past couple of weeks. I'm sure I'll come up with more drivel as I play more of these things. So far I've run my last $80 into $200, jumped up to the $21 SNGs, hit a bad patch of variance (lost 3 in a row at 80% favorite) and dropped back to the $10.50 SNGs. I'll probably hang out at the $10 level until I get to three or four hundred in the bankroll, then move back up. I'll take occassional shots at higher levels now and then, but I don't plan on playing constantly higher than $10 until I have at least 20 buyins for the next level. That said, my bankroll management is usually for shit, so don't hold your breat for me to wait at $10 until I get to $400.

The Hero Call Revsited

So there were a couple of hero call moments at last night's home game that I was involved in. You can call them pressure points or whatever, but there were two moments that stick out in my memory as opportunities for someone to make a big call for a sizable pot, one time the call was made, the other time the fold was made.

The first situation was between me and Hot Brian the Red. It was pretty early in the evening, so neither of us had a real feel for how we were going to run yet. I had gotten off to a rough start, donking off about 1/3 of my starting stack, so I was sitting on about $30-35. Brian was ahead of me in chips, but I had position. I don't remember the board, but what it boiled down to on the river was I had called on every street with A-10 off suit, and the river put a flush or straight out there. Brian checked to me, and I moved all in. It was only about 1/4 the pot, but after a long think, he said "I just don't think I can be good here," and folded. He was good, but the line I took in the hand made him think that he couldn't be good. I played it like I was chasing, then played it like I hit. Brian decided not to make the hero call, and we went on with the evening. Part of my shove was an awfukkit move, where I found myself short and looking to rebuy, but the pot came close to doubling me up so I was back in decent shape.

The other hero call moment for me was against Nate. I was in the big blind, and Nate was under the gun. Not that position matters to Nate, but it frequently matters to his opponents. I hate playing Nate out of position, but have learned the tricks of it after years of practice. I'm pretty sure Jim the Knife raised, because it was his button, it was late, he had a bunch of chips and he'd played well all night. At one point he even commented that he was playing "sterling poker," and I gave him shit that after the 2-outer he caught on me, it was more like electro-plated. But I reciprocated by catching a 2-outer on Special K, so it was all good (at least to me, I don't think Special K caught a 2-outer on anyone, but that was his problem, not mine. If he'd play worse hands, he'd be able to suck out more :)). So I called the preflop raise with Ks-3s, because Brian called it and I figured if I called there would be a cascade of callers behind me, giving me odds with my shit hand. And in one of those patterns that makes people love my home game, it sparked exactly that cascade of callers.

So the flop came down 3-3-x with two diamonds, and I'm loving life. I check, Nate leads for $4, Jim calls, there might have been one more caller, and I raise to $10. Nate calls and Jim got out of the way. Turn is the Jd, and I lead for $10. Nate calls, and the river brings an off-suit duece. I fire another $15, and Nate moves all in over the top for another $52 or so. I go deeeeep into the tank, because while I have trips with a big kicker, the flush is out there. It's also not a bit beyond reason for Nate to have been calling me down with 2-3 or pocket twos and have filled up on the river. So I'm thinking. And thinking. And I think long enough to feel like I should apologize to the table, so I do. Then I ask Nate if he has the flush. He doesn't look at me. Then he looks at me like "what, I'm really gonna tell you?" Then I resume my think. Then I look at my stack. If I call and lose, I'm up $50 for the night. Then I look at the pot. There's well over $100 in the middle, so if I win, it's a gooood night for the home game. Then I think that thinking about booking a win is the wrong way to think, and I'm getting 3-1 on my $50 and if I can't call getting 3-1 on trips, king kicker. then maybe I shouldn't play poker.

Then I hit the thought that makes me call. Nate fired the river. Nate only raises when he thinks he has the best hand. He'll lead out at a pot to make people fold, and it's usually an overbet. But when he raises, he thinks he has the winner. And he doesn't wait to pull the trigger. So if he's raising the river, then that's the point where he thinks he has the winner. So either he thinks he's been ahead the whole time, or he thinks he got there right then. That takes the flush off the table, because if he'd hit the flush, he'd have raised the turn. So he's got a limited number of hands - A-3, 2-3,J-3, 2-2 and the like. Or he has the case three and a worse kicker. Or he has two pair and is absolutely crushed, which is not as unlikely a possibility as you would think, because Nate routinely overvalues two pair to his wallet's detriment.

So finally I decide to make the call, and he shows 9-3. I table my K-3 and rake a massive pot, bringing my win for the night to around $250 and putting my slightly back into the black for the year. I couldn't make that call in a casino. I couldn't make that call against many folks in our home game. But against that player, in that spot, with those relative positions, I can make that call. After a lengthy think.

Overall I played fairly well last night, with the exception of getting my money in as a 95% dog to Special K and getting there on the turn. I sucked out a few times, including flushing out Brian on the river, but I'd flopped the open-end straight flush draw, so I wasn't going anywhere at any point. It might not be mathematically correct, but I'm probably going to get my money in most of the time when I flop 15 outs twice. So I called him down, and when he asked me if I rivered the flush I told him and saved him the call. He said he didn't think he had that call in him, but I'm slightly looser a player than Brian. Slightly. There might be a comment or two coming on the use of the word slightly in that sentence. Let it be known that there is a variant definition of slightly that loosely translates from ancient Swahili into "astronomically." Then decide which definition I was using. So while I wouldn't say I played "sterling poker," I felt like I did a good job of picking my spots and capitalizing on my opponent's weaknesses. Like a weakness for playing good starting hands, leaving the crap flops to hit only me and Nate :).

It's all fun and games...

Until somebody loses their job. No, not me. I'm still in good shape, and they show no signs of not wanting to continue to put up with me for a lot longer. But my company did become the latest to lay some people off today, and it kinda sucked. It really hit home to me what the leadership and population of our country did to our economy when friends of mine lost their jobs. Up until now, even when real-life friends lost or were afraid of losing their jobs, it didn't seem real. For the first time in a long time today, I was worried about my job. And that's not a good place to be in a single-income family.

Now, really, my job is as secure as anyone in the company, and the company is in no way close to folding. But we saw cuts in almost every office today, and that made some harsh realities come into focus for me. My offices were spared any layoffs, but the time may come when I am the person who has to make the decision of who stays and who goes, and I don't look forward to that day. I don't think it will come to that, I really don't. Our company operates with very little debt, and is very cash and inventory-heavy. But in a sales organization, when people aren't buying, it's hard to support a large sales force. So cuts were made today. And good people lost their jobs. I know, it's a reality that a lot of you have been seeing for months, and some of you have experienced firsthand, and for that I'm really sorry.

I hope that when we come out on the other side of this mess, and I have faith that we will, and in an America that is not terribly different than the one of a couple years ago when we went into this mess. I hope that when we come out of it everyone's opinions of money and the people that handle it are a little different. And I mea everyone - individuals, corporations and government. I hope that people in our country wake up an accept responsibility for their spending. I hope that corporations stop trying to cheat every nickel out of the system and just make and honest profit. I hope that our government finds a balance between oversight and free market that we can all accept and that will benefit everyone relatively equally. I don't really believe that all those things will happen, but I can hope. Right?

Sorry to sound so morose, I'm just a little shaken this evening. I've given my entire adult life to this company, and while I still have a job, and all my people are still employed, it still shakes one of the foundations of my life and livelihood to hear the word layoff associated with my company. So I'm a little scared. I'm a lot sad for the people that no longer work for our company. I hope that in a few months this will start to turn around and we can hire them back, and if not, that they'll find even better gigs somewhere else. And I hope all of you guys are ok.

Srsly? That's just cute!

Cutest. Computer. Ever.

9" screen, 120 GB Hard drive. 1GB RAM. Windows XP Home. 3 USB ports. Media Card slot. Wi-fi.

Just precious.

By the way, when I install the Jands Vista software on this computer, and add the M1 control surface (below), this little laptop becomes the light board for the Avett Brothers tour. The tour lighting tech will walk into a theatre with the laptop and M1 fader wing in a backpack, unpack the bag and plug into the house system. For less than 8 lbs, I can control over 500 lights!

Heads Up

So while I've been setting up computers and transferring files, I find myself with a pile of free time sitting at my desk in the home office. I can't really watch a movie or anything, because I only have so much processing power, and most of that is being used to move gig after gig of music and movies from one place to another. So every night I find myself firing up Full Tilt for a little pokery goodness.

And for a change, it actually has been good. I've been focusing on the Heads-Up SNGs, of the $10 variety, and have been pretty successful so far. I think I've run my $100 into about $170 so far, so I'm winning more than I'm losing. I don't track each SNG anymore, and frankly barely keep up with my progress in online poker, because most of the time I just don't care. But there have been some observations that I've made that I thought I'd share here. Please note that this is not a statistically relevant sample size, nor is there any real research put into this - it's just what I've seen. If you want well-written, thoroughly researched writing, check out Shamus. 'Cause it ain't gonna happen here.

1) The majority of the players at this level seem timid. I raise my button probably 90% of the time, regardless of what I'm holding. I want to put more money in the pot when I have position, and less when I don't. So I raise less when I'm out of position, and almost every hand on the button. My opponents don't seem interested in raising that often with the button, and not terribly interested in defending their big blinds, so I'm picking up a ton of orphaned big blinds.

2) There seems to be a lot of desire to get money in behind at this level. I value small pairs very highly at this level, as it's infrequent that both players actually hit a flop. I have seen several instances where an opponent will call me down on every street with no pair, and have picked up a few pots when my opponent got all their money in on a small flush draw with no pair. I tend to play pretty hard in these due to the passive nature of my opponents, but I'm also waiting until I pick up a pair at least to go to way. The number of people willing to go to war with nothing but a naked draw is pretty impressive.

3) It's easy to play these things one at a time, but I can't multi-table heads-up. I do much better when I can pick up betting patterns on my opponent, and I can't do that with multiple tables going. I'm pretty sure there's a simple mathematical formula that would make these profitable with less focus, but that's not what I'm interested in. I'm just killing a little time and trying to pad my roll a little.