Good Game, I Go Home Now

Didn't play any poker on Day 3 and 4. Managed to get back into +ve on Day 5. Played about 1.5hrs and finished up +$158. I'm also getting really close to achieving Platinum Star status on Poker Stars. I'd be quite disappointed if I don't get it by the end of this month.

Today = $158
Overall = -$272
I Need = $10,272

Very frustrating session. Finished overall down $291. Good news though is that I only misplayed one hand. Variance is sick...Please let me run sexy again for the rest of the week. Thanks.

Today = -$291
Overall = -$430
I Need = $10,430

Played about 2K hands and finished down $111.

Overall = $-111
I Need = $10,111

I've decided to set a goal. I've been rather lazy in the past few months in playing poker and hopefully, this goal will provide some motivation and direction for me. My goal to make $10,000 through cash games alone by July 31st. I'll need to put in somewhere in the region of 150-200hrs to achieve this goal, giving me an hourly rate of $50-$66 per hour - a rate which I strongly believe is my long term rate at my current stakes. I've got slightly more than 4 months to achieve this goal and 10-15hours per week is definitely doable.

I'll post daily updates and weekly graphs. Hope I run good.

Overall = $0
I Need = $10,000

I've got a confession to make. I'm lazy. Remarkably lazy. Last month, I put in only ~9K hands of cash game poker. I would have played more but I was only breaking even (actually lost slightly since I ran at -0.48PTBB/100) and that discouraged me from playing more. Once I played enough hands to maintain my GoldStar VIP status on PokerStars, I stopped. And for the first week of March, I've only played 800hands or so. I'm now playing at $200NL and if I want to keep moving up, I've definitely got to put in about 20K hands per month.

The grind of playing cash games is remarkably boring and I can't play MTTs anymore since I don't have the luxury of blocks of 5-6hrs of free time to commit to MTTs. So if any of you out there have any advice on how I can motivate myself to put in the requisite number of hands, please tell me. The only idea I have right now is to buy a 22inch monitor and start 12-15 tabling as opposed to the 8-10 tables that I currently do.

"Hi. My name is Jane. I'm 38 yrs old. I had a really difficult childhood. My dad abused me. He battered me. He hit my mom. He hit my sisters too. I took the brunt of it though. Once, when I was 4, he hit me so hard that I fell and hit my head against a chair and blacked out. My sisters told me that I was unconscious for a few days. They also told me that after that incident, I was never really the same again. I don't know though. I can't really remember that incident or my dad for that matter. People tell me that he died in jail and that he deserved it.

My mum sent me to a regular school but they said that I couldn't fit in. They said that I was too slow and that I needed to go to a special school. I didn't want to go since I liked my school. I made new friends and I liked wearing our navy blue uniform. Fortunately, I liked my new school. I made new friends pretty quickly and the sky blue uniform is much nicer. The teachers were nice too.

Then I turned 18 and they told me that I had graduated. And graduating means that I have to leave the school. I didn't want to graduate but my teachers and mother told me that I had to. I remembered receiving my diploma in front of my friends, teachers and family. Graduating made me happy. But sad too since I can't go to school anymore.

After graduating, they found me a job. I worked in a kitchen. I help the cook cut vegetables and meat. My supervisors have been very happy with my work. I really like it. I've never missed a day of work in 20 years. Everyone is very friendly to me and I say hello to everyone I meet. This place is like school except I get paid every month. I give my mom the money and I think it makes her happy that I had graduated and have a job now.

I hope I won't have to graduate from work."

Ok, here's a short update of what's been going on. Haven't played much poker in the past couple of weeks. Took probably about a week off. Only poker I've played then are two MTTs on Stars where I went really deep but ultimately busted out at about the final 2 or 3 tables. Also played a bunch of cash games where I ran about average, so no complaints there.

Additionally, I am also getting quite excited about the FPPs that I'm collecting on Stars. At the rate that I'm collecting the FPPs, I'll definitely get to use the e-Platinum travel vouchers for a nice vacation somewhere at the end of the year. Somewhere in the Middle East seems appealing to me though Argentina and Peru are good options too. We'll see...just hope that I won't be busto by then.

Hope to post more as I try to play more poker this week.

I've been playing more MTTs and SNGs for the past 2 days. I final tabled another Stars $22-180 yesterday and played well I think. Busted out 4th when I ran 77 into KK and QQ.

No final table today but I made it really deep in the Stars $18K Gtd. Played well and restole many times to keep my stack healthy. Then a resteal went wrong and I busted in 20th place or so. First place paid $7K. Meh...at the rate that I'm running in MTT's I'm pretty confident I'll make a sizeable cash pretty soon.

So the goal for the next few days is to make more final tables and win one. And may that one win be in a big field MTT...