Category: General

As per my last post, it’s been a rough 2026 so far. Today, however, I was able to get back to therapy (my therapist had taken a few weeks off for a personal matter) and talk about the when-it-rains-it-pours last two weeks, I was feeling a lot better, and I decided, after doing some of my physical therapy exercises¹, to go ahead and put in a session today. And I was even doing much better at keeping my emotions under control while I played.

And then I had the worst full session I can remember. I ended up calling it early, but I’d already played 19 tournaments… and finished with a -97% ROI. That’s pretty damn hard to do!

I don’t think I played badly, although I’m sure I made some mistakes, and my first hour or two I was much better focused than the latter half. I usually measure when I have my A-game going by three little things that show up: Finding more bluffs (and more 3-bets preflop), sniffing out bluffs, and finding extra value bets or unexpected lines to make more than expectation. I had some of that going in the early going, but I may have been settling into a more default mode after all that losing (which might have been another good reason to bow out). “Default mode” is my B-game; it’s standard and can win marginally, but it means I’m not listening to my instincts and intuition when it comes to spots where I can win more chips with hands or bluffs, or save chips when I’m beat.

The biggest spots, though, were just bad luck. Losing 90BB flips AKo CO vs. QQ SB. Jamming 99 over an MP raise, getting called by 77, losing. 3-betting AQo from the SB vs. a 20BB CO open, calling the shove, being against KcQc, the flop is king-high two clubs, the turn is a club (and then the river is an ace, just to rub it in my face)— losing 3/4 of my stack in that hand and the rest K7s < K5s. Making big hands (two pair, sets) and getting outdrawn or coolered. Shoving AQo and 66 on 10BB and running into AKs and 77 respectively. Just one of those days where, if it could go wrong for me in a big pot or all-in, it did.

Anyway, worst day of the year so far. The year got off to a good start for… I dunno, two weeks? But it’s been kinda crummy since. Still… I’m looking at my long-term ROI and my average buyin, and I’m trying to remind myself that, as long as I put in the volume and play well, the results will come.

On the bright side, I did a good job recording hands for review later, and I’m gonna do that with some people I know at some point. One of the odd things for me is that there’s a lot of fishy play where I play, and so there are a lot of times where I’m playing exploitatively instead of theoretically optimal, and it can be tough to measure when that’s the right line. I guess that’s something else to consider for study.

Most fun hand I had today was with 5s3s in the big blind facing a limper, where I flopped an open-ended straight flush draw, turned a flush, and rivered a straight flush, and bet/bet/shoved. I got called by two pair (with one of them being a board pair— IIRC the runout was Ad4s6s As 7s and I got called by I think K4.)

I’m trying to remember spots like that, not just focus on the beats, but remember the good hands, the thrilling victories, the elements that make poker fun to play.

‘Til next time.

1. Yes, I’m in both kinds of therapy. Everything is broken. At this rate, spiritual therapy may be coming soon as well. ↩︎

I have been delayed again for the last couple of weeks by some unplanned issues in my home life – a health issue I was dealing with and some repairs that needed to be made. So I haven’t gotten to play poker much or write much or work on this website much.

So I’m behind schedule, not least in part because I’m nervous about the time/effort commitment and whether this will come together the way I want it to. But you never know until you try, right?

So I plan to start reaching out to guests soon and start setting up the early episodes of the podcast. Also part of this plan: Actually designing this website to look more like I want it to and less like the default.

And I gotta get back on the poker grind because I gotta make a living, too. Maybe if this takes off I can spend more time on it, but we’re certainly not there yet.

Don’t forget to sign up for the Patreon if you want some say in what I’m doing here or just want to support it. The more support I get, the more content I can make.

I’ll start writing some posts about what’s going on once I finish setting up the site. Hopefully I’ll be able to report regularly on what’s going on with me, where I feel like my game is, and any interesting hands or other happenings.