Well, another week in the books and a few things to catch up on, so here goes …

• Finally managed to end my latest downswing of 160 BB with a positive session last night, up 56 BB. So overall my BR is at is at $336, down a bit from my last up date due to the downswing. Hopefully I’m on my way up again, we’ll see.

• As mentioned, I moved my money back to Party last week to take part in their reload bonus. Within a few days I was able to get the first 2 phase of the bonus but didn’t think I could manage the third (827 raked hands in 3 days). That being said, Quadman let us know that even though Party documents three days to clear the bonus, you actually get 7 days to clear. I put in a good session last night and I figure I need about 3 more table hours before Sunday night to clear another $43.59 – might get it after all.

• Obviously I’m still at Party and haven’t moved to River Belle. I was actually getting ready to move last night until I found some fine print that suggested I wasn’t eligible for the sign-up bonus because I already have a Prima Poker account. Not wanting to move there for no bonus I decided to send them an email to confirm – as it turns out they did confirm I am eligible for the bonus and once I clear at Party I think it will in fact be my next stop.

• I finally spent the money on Poker Tracker this week. Wow, what a piece of software. All the data is out there for the taking and these guys have done a great job putting it into a DB and presenting all the mounds of info. That being said, I have lots to learn about it and hopefully as time goes by it will help the game a bit.

• Once you have Poker Tracker, you need to download Poker Patterns. Poker Patterns is an add on to Poker Tracker that allows you to create all kinds a graphs based on the data in Poker Tracker … more cool stuff that will hopefully someday help me get better.

• And the final piece of the Poker Tracker software is something called Game Time Plus. This is really cool, basically you setup Poker Tracker to auto load you hand histories into the DB and Game Time Plus overlays your poker screen with real time stats on all the players at the table. Instantly you know who the fish are and who the good players are. The key here is to know how to play against the variety of players!!! I’m working on this part of it now, lol.

• For the record, Poker Tracker has rated me a Neutral Passive player … not exactly what I aspire to be. The neutral part describes your game before the flop and I’m OK with that, I like to see flops and will make a few loose calls from mid and late position. The passive element describes your play after the flop and this is where I need to work on my game. I’m aiming to be more of an aggressive player after the flop and need to work on getting my ‘aggression’ factor a bit higher in those instances. At this point this is the way I understand it – when checked to I need to bet and when bet to I need to raise -- in a nut shell that would increase the aggression factor. Easier said then done, if I’m playing post flop with rags I can’t just throw money in for nothing.
  Anyway, I’ve rambled on enough, back at it and will be back this week with a review of Poker Rewards and a revelation I’ve had this past week.

See ya next time, AA up

As promised, here an update on my bankroll…

Total Bankroll: $352.80

Bonuses: $307.18
$75.00 – Instant Bankroll
$25.00 – Party Poker Sign-up Bonus
$50.00 – Golden Riviera Sign-up Bonus
$70.00 – Poker Rewards Sign-up Bonus
$43.59 – Party Poker Reload Bonus
$43.59 – Party Poker Reload Bonus

Limit Ring Games: $49.91
$10.29 – Party Poker
-$43.17 – Golden Riviera
$82.79 – Poker Rewards

NL Ring Games: -$1.79
-$1.79 – Poker Rewards (had that much left in my account when I left and just donked it off!!)

Tournament: -$2.50
-$5.50 – Party Poker *
$3.00 – Golden Riviera **

* played in a few freerolls and finished in the money in the money in two of them and also played 2 SNG and finished out of the money
** played a couple of freeroll and managed to finish in the money in one of them

A few thoughts …

• My BR is growing as I expected at this point … mostly via bonus chasing
• I’m playing a profitable game at the moment, maybe a bit less than I expected but profitable non the less
• My winrate at the moment is about 1.25 BB / hour … OK, not great

The bottom line is I’m growing my BR and learning the on-line game. I still believe my initial goal of settling in at the $3/$6 and / or $5/$10 limit games is achievable, the more important question is how long will it take to get there. I’ll leave that for another post.

As for what’s next, well I’ve managed to clear 2 of the 3 bonuses at Party and will work on the third between now and Wednesday (not sure I will be able to clear the 3rd bonus but we’ll see). The Geek has found and suggested we head off to River Belle next with a 100% sign-up bonus up to $200 and only requires a 7x to clear. This is another Prima site and I’ve had mixed results there but the bonus looks reasonably easy to clear.

We’ll see, after Wednesday I’ll make my decision and go from there.

Till then, AA up

It has been an interesting few days, so let’s catch up…

Wednesday night I wasn’t going play but ended up with what I thought would be a few mins so I decided to see if I could continue the run I’ve been on the last few days. As a foot note, I needed about another 100 hands to clear my bonus at Poker Rewards but wasn’t even thinking about clearing tonight. After about an hour I was way up again and was able to keep playing and managed a total of 2 hours for the night. In the end I was $48 … not bad even if I do say so myself. And also, the games seemed to be fairly loose and in 2 hours I was able to clear the 100 hands I needed to release my bonus … bonus!!!

So, I withdrew my money from PR with the plan to move it to Party. With my recent win streak my BR was now at $220 (not including my $70 bonus that should appear on Thursday).

After checking my PR account on Thursday morning my bonus was there and I decided to withdraw it as well to give me a total of $290 to deposit at Party – giving me the following reload bonus

1st bonus = $43 for playing 435 raked hands
2nd bonus = $43 for playing and additional 654 raked hands
3rd bonus = $43 for playing a further 870 raked hands

The key was to get the money deposited into Party by midnight Thursday in order to qualify for the bonus. With that in mind I kept an eye on my Neteller account for the PR money to arrive. As the day continued and I didn’t see the money I started to worry just a bit. It was time to check in with the Geek to see if his money has arrived yet (the Geek is also planning to follow the money at Party!!!). After chatting with the Geek and finding out his money wasn’t there yet we started to talk about alternatives.

After much research and a couple of calls to Poker Rewards to find out when our money would be available we knew we had to come up with a new plan – the money wasn’t going to get out in time for our deposit into Party. Well, now it boiled down to where the ‘line in the sand’ is for me in terms of adding my own money to the mix which would technically go against my objective. I decided that the only reason I didn’t have my $290 available was because of the poor quality of Poker Reward’s withdraw process (more on this later) and that shouldn’t stop my from playing (I know, maybe a slippery slop).

In the end I decided to use my own money to and deposited $290 into Party in order to qualify for the bonus program. Now, the minute my withdrawal from PR appears in Neteller you can bet I’m going to withdraw that money. (as of now Saturday mid day the money is still not out … very troubling that it takes that long)

So it’s on to Party Thursday night to try and play the 270 raked hands. I two tables for a while and at the suggestion of the Geek, I started three tabling in order to get the bonus on Thursday night. Yes, should have learnt this lesson already but it was obviously time for a refresher. In the end I lost $30 and got my $43 bonus … so, net $13. Not ideal and as I said, a good reminder for me.

I’ve not got 3 days to clear the next bonus in order to qualify for the last part of the bonus … so I need to play 645 hands before Sunday night. I had a good session last night and managed to not fall any deeper into the hole! The only thing with the second and third bonus is Party doesn’t give you a raked hand count and therefore you don’t know how far along you are. Therefore, based on the raked hand definition at Party we figure that 50 hands / table are raked each hour. So, based on the need to play 645 hand I need about 13 table hours to get the bonus – after Friday night I have about 9 hours logged and so I figure I need another 4 or 5 hours between now and Sunday … we’ll see.

That’s it for now, next time I’ll get a full BR update as well as my thoughts / review of Poker Rewards I’m also thinking about buying Poker Tracker, if I do I’ll let you know what it tells me about my game.

Until next time, AA up! (and I’ve had a few of these lately )

What a difference a few days make. After a weekend away and a few days of not playing any poker I was ready for another 'kick at the can'.

I only managed about 40 mins on Monday but did pick-up $7 ... a small victory but nothing to write home about. Then, the big day, Tuesday I managed to play for a few hours and well let's just say ... wow. As with any good day, my good hands held up and I managed to hit a few draws and was up $57.

Now, to put this in perspective, I was down approx 180 BB (or $90) during my downswing and in the last few days have managed an upswing of 128 BB (or $64). Not all the way back just yet but I certainly feel as though I may have turned the corner.

As for what is next, well I have 601 of my required 695 raked hands for my bonus at Poker Rewards and I think it may take about 3 more hours of play to get there. However, as mentioned in my previous post, Party is currently offering a reload bonus of 15% up to $75 which is pretty attractive as it will be an easy bonus to clear.

So, I think the plan is to withdraw as much as I can tonight from PR and move it to Party tomorrow and take advantage of the bonus there. The Party bonus is a progressive bonus and I think I may be able to get through the first two stages of the bonus and make about $50 in bonus money. After the weekend it will be out of Party and back to PR to finish up that bonus.

I know, I know, sounds like bonus whoring ... but as I said, I may do a bit of this in the short term to build up the BR.

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Speaking of BR, it now stands at $189. This puts me back on the positive side of the house (thanks to the last couple of days!!!). Once I'm through this weekend and hopefully cashed in both the Party and PR bonus I'll provide a more details BR update.

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And again on the topic of BR, now that I've turned the corner and am back on track (I hope!!), it is worth noting and re-enforcing one of my earlier posts about BR. The slide that I just went on only confirms the need to ensure a proper BR when playing poker. Even with on a 300 BB BR I still managed to go on a slide that took more than half of my BR. If I only had a BR of 200 BB I would have been left with only $10 ... hardly enough money to play at any level - even the smallest games (0.05 /0.10). If I wasn't convinced before I sure am now, before I move to the next level of play (and for me that would be 0.50/1.00) I will need to have at least $300.

If you are interested in more detailed and geeky discussions about BR and the swings including some funky talk about standard deviation - you need to visit the geek’s blog. Here is the link – thepokergeek.blogspot.com

Till next time, AA up

I’m back, I think, I thought, maybe not … ahhhhhhhhhhh

After suffering a 90 BB downswing at GR before taking my bonus and walking away and taking a bit of a break ... actually I was blowing off steam at Party Poker with my $3.75. And believe it or not I’m actually doing well with this as I’ve previously mentioned.

As reported in my last blog, I finally signed up at Poker Rewards for a 50% bonus. My initial deposit was $140 and therefore a bonus of $70.

Now as for the ‘I’m back, I think’, first night out of the gate at PR I manage to pick up about $17 in 3 hours and thought, I’m back. Overall I think I played solid poker and my good hands tended to hold up. I’m a bit tentative in saying I’m back as I need more than one good night, so we’ll see.

As for the ‘I’m back, I thought’, second night out it starts to go away. I register a lose of $36, yes, $36. Nothing is holding up and whenever I’ve got the best hand someone spikes a 2 outer on the river to beat me. (a few examples below)

As for the ‘I’m back, maybe not’, the third day at PR pretty much seals the deal. Another $13 down and now I’m convinced the deck is working against me.

So after three days and about 425 of my 700 raked hands needed for my bonus I’m on a 94 BB downswing and it hurts. If you count my 90 BB downswing at GR I’m on a pretty big / bad streak.

I’m still convinced I’m playing good poker but the deck is just working against me. I know that of late I may be pushing some hands (read: chasing) a bit more that I should only because of my frustrations. Here are a few examples of hands that just aren’t holding up …

I’ve got K9s in late position and call the BB … the guy in the BB raises and the 4 others including me call.

The flop comes T73s and I flop the 2nd nut flush and the SB bets, BB raises, and I reraise and the BB caps … I’m liking this as there is only one card that beats me and it needs to have a heart with it. The turn comes 3 and I’m worried about the boat, maybe the BB had a pair of TT and now has a boat. SB bets, BB raises and I just call as does the button. River is a blank, SB checks, BB bets, I call and he turns over 73o.

Can you believe it, takes down a pot worth 21BB … oh my. He raised in the BB with 73o and 5 others in the pot. Unreal. I know, I want these people in the pots because in the long run I’ll take all their money. Sometimes I need to keep telling myself this.

While two tabling I’m dealt pocket TT at both tables, yes within seconds of each other I’m sitting there looking at TT. I raise with both hands, one of the in mid and the other in late position. I flop top set on both tables and by the end I get rivered on both tables … a straight beats me out of nearly 40BB.

This has to be just a cold deck right? I’ve got monster hands in all of the above examples and bang, they get crushed. In these three hands alone I can account for more than half my slide at PR. I don’t know, maybe I’ve got it all wrong.

As an FYI … PR and GR are both part of Prima, maybe this is my problem!! :)

Clearly I’m struggling and the only place that I’ve won money is Party so, I think I’m going to go back there when I’m done at PR. I logged on the other night and they have just posted a reload bonus there so maybe that is what I’ll do. The reload bonus is small but maybe it will give me some confidence and then I can get back at it.

Until next time, AA up (I think!!!)

I know, I’ve been slow to post my update from the weekend home game, family has been a bit ill over the last few days so haven’t had much of a chance to spend time in front of the computer.

But, before I give the update on the night that was I want to introduce a few friends. Yes, I have friends and my life isn’t all about poker!!! (although the friends are poker related!!!)

A couple of buddies have joined me in the pursuit for on-line poker $$$ … Poker Geek and Quadman. Poker Geek and I have been playing home games for about 18 months and talk regularly about poker … all aspects of it. The Geek truly is a geek, he’s got the books and the head for it. Check out his blog and you’ll get the flavour of it. Quadman is the Geek’s brother and I think we sucked him in a bit. I think he may have had some interest in poker but after a recent visit to the Geek’s place for one of our home poker nights he may have gotten hooked. Quadman doesn’t yet have a blog but if one does surface I’ll put a link to it from here.

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On to the to the poker night, what a night, lots of fun and lots of poker as there was some new blood that joined the game which changed the dynamic a bit. For the last year or so we’ve had more or less the same 5 or 6 guys with the odd extra in there to make it a game. The games were generally fun, a good night out with the guys but lacked a bit of ‘something’ that would satisfy my craving to play. But last night, with the new blood, we had 11 guys. How fun, and some of these guys really like to play poker which means we would be in for a long night.

We ended up playing 5 NLHE tourneys, the first was a $10 buy-in and the rest $20. The night started out slow for me and the first game ended very early (actually I was the first one to bust out) when I ended up all-in with my pocket 88 vs. pocket QQ (that were slow played pre and post flop – a key point to remember for a later hand).

The second game was a bit better as I wasn’t the first to bust out. Maybe mid way through the game I had doubled up once and was in decent shape when … AJo on the button with maybe 5 limpers, I raised and got one caller. The flop comes AKJr, top and bottom pair and it is checked to me – I bet maybe half the pot only to re-raised all-in. Now, this bet is a bit suspicious based on how this ‘fish’ had been playing and I certainly didn’t but him on AK, KK, or JJ but thought maybe he at QT and that would put me behind. Without much thought I decided to call and he turns over K7 for second pair and no kicker. I’ve got him dominated, and make my boat on the turn when a J comes … but get bit by a K on the river. And just like that, I’m done. Live and learn, make some mental notes for the next games.

The next game was a good one as I was able to slowly grind away at the small pots and eventually went heads-up with a solid player. We traded chips for a while until my cards heated up and I was able to finish it off. No major hands really, just a solid game, never really putting my stack at risk … it was as good a tourney as I had played.

The forth game was a repeat of the second game, just grinding away and slowly building my stack until … I have AKo in the BB with a 3 or 4 limpers and I raise and get called by the button. The flop comes KXX with 2 spades giving me TPTK and I bet out and get called. The flop comes blank and I bet out again and get re-raised all in. Wow, what could they have, could they have stayed with a small pair and hit trips, or are they on a draw. After thinking about if for a while I decide to call the all-in bet only to find out they are on a draw, wow, a bold move. And you guessed, the river is a spade and I’m crippled.

The last game I was pretty much card dead and actually was on the brink of busting out when I couldn’t even post a complete BB but managed to double up a few times and finish 4th. A key hand that took place late in the game, I’m in the BB and I’ve got maybe another 2 BB left and I’m dealt 52o and the SB limps and I check. The flop comes 234r giving me bottom pair and an OESD … and the SB goes all-in hmm, remember the guy that busted me earlier while slow playing his QQ, well this is the same guy and after thinking about calling I mucked and decided to wait for maybe a better opportunity … he turns over AA. Not that I had lots to play for at this point only having a few chips left, but it was more about reading that my opponent had a big hand … that is what I was more pleased about. The proper play was likely to make the call based on my chip stack and the outs I had.

All in all, a good night was had by all and I finished +$30. I was please with my play and I think that I’ve come a long way at our home games over the last year or so. Although I only won one game, thinking back, almost every time I put all my chips at risk I went in with the best hand which is about all I can ask for. I’m not gonna talk about the bad beats that I took but in the long run those guys won’t make their hands and in both cases, if I double up, who knows what I could have done. I’ll play with those guys anytime!!!

As we were leaving about 2 AM our host suggested he may be working on a NLHE tourney with about 30 people and a buy-in somewhere in the neighborhood of $50 in the comings weeks … cool, especially if some of the same fish, I mean guys are there!!! J

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As for my on-line poker playing, not much of it the last few days – as I mentioned earlier, the family has been ill and thus has curbed my play (which maybe isn’t a bad thing). I’ll likely be back at it tonight when I sign-up at Poker Rewards and see what I can do.

As a side note, I did manage about 45 mins last night at Party with small BR there and managed to move it from $10.03 to $16. Remember, this was $3.75 about a week ago. Who know, maybe I can get this to $50 + so that I can actually withdraw it from Party, we’ll see.

Till next time, AA up

A quick blog update … LOLOLOL. As mentioned last night, I transferred out all money from Party except $3.75. Well, last night I didn’t feel like playing much and really didn’t feel like going through the setup process at another site. So, using the $3.75 left at Party I decided to site down at the 0.05/0.10 tables … as that is about all my BR could handle. After an hour I nearly double my money, how fun.

Now, where was this run of cards the last few days? Anyway, it was a bit of careless fun and now my Party BR is at $7.26. Maybe a small challenge over the next few days will be see if I can turn this into anything!!!

Off to the boys poker night tonight and I’ll report back on that tomorrow.

AA up

So took a much needed night off last night. The GR experience really soured me and as I said before, need to get my head screwed back on properly. That being said, it is a new day and what better to do then get back at it!!!

As I haven’t moved my money out of Party yet and haven’t confirmed my next stop I decided to try something different. I decided to play a couple of Sit & Go tourney for a couple of reasons, first, something different and second, I have a poker night with the boys tomorrow night. When the boys get together we generally play NL Hold’em tourneys for a $20 buy-in.

Beings I haven’t played many tourneys of late I figured I could use some practice. Here is a short recap of each …

First tourney I didn’t get any cards, really, nothing. I was getting blinded away and was able to steal of few hands only because I didn’t play any hands. I ended up finishing 5th (only because the blinds hadn’t caught up with me yet). I didn’t really get to try any moves, so no much to report.

Second tourney was even shorter and really hurt. I picked the first pot, not a big one but a good start. Didn’t see much else for the next round or two, a few limp-ins with a fold after the flop. With the blinds at 30/60 in CO position I pickup AKs with one limper, I raise to 220 and the button folds. The SB goes all-in and the BB and limper fold. Wow, what to do, gotta call as the only hands that have me really in bad shape are AA or KK. Anything else I’m more or less in good shape. I call and SB turns over ATs. Perfect, I’ve got him dominated … until he spikes a T on the river. I’m essentially crippled, 280 chips left. Two hands later I pick up Q9s in mid position so I go all in and steal the blinds. Now up to 370 when I pick up A3s in early position and go all in. The SB calls with ATs, trouble. Flop comes 3d 6c Qs pairing my 3 and giving me a backdoor flush draw. The turn is a Js helping my flush draw. At this point I’m feeling OK, until the river, Th. Rivered again … argh.

That’s it, I’m moving on. I think it is off to Poker Rewards. I can get a bit bigger bonus, 50% rather than 25% (and now that my BR has taken a bit of hit with two S&G I need the money) and I can clear the bonus at 0.25/0.50 rather than 0.50/1.00 at Paradise. Based on the release requirements I can clear my bonus in approx 750 hands (not that I’m counting or even thinking about it!!!). I’m going to sign-up through Poker Source Online to also take advantage of their promotion and eventually get closer to getting poker tracker. The only catch with PSO is I need to play 750 raked hands at 0.50/1.00 – so once I clear my money bonus I can move up to 0.50/1.00.

So that is the plan. My mindset is to play at Poker Rewards for a couple of weeks minimum and not be in any hurry to leave.

Just for the record, (and so you don’t have to try and follow the math) my BR currently sits at $143.

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And to conclude my comments on GR from my last blog, as it turns out their withdrawal isn’t too bad. I got my money out in 24hrs without any problems. So, overall I would still rate them as average or maybe a bit below.

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Like I said early, tomorrow night is poker night the boys and I will report back on that. I’m looking forward to it as I haven’t played any live poker for some time now as I’ve missed that last two monthly poker nights. Nor have I been to the casino … should be a fun night.

That’s it, AA up

Disappointing is about the only way to put it. I’ve now completed my required hands at Golden Riviera and have received my $50 bonus – but it came a cost. Here is a summary of the last couple of days…

As mentioned in my previous blog, I stated playing on Tuesday night and lost $22. Not the result I was looking for but figured I would right the ship and come back the next day with my head in the game and at least not lose anymore.

Well that didn’t happen, on Wednesday I logged in to play and hopefully get through to 250 raked hands to complete my bonus requirements. I did manage to make it through the 250 hands but it cost me even more money. In the end I lost approx $43.

After this debacle I reflected on the experience and came up with the following ‘reasons’ for the big loss …

• I didn’t play very good poker
• I was too focused on clearing my bonus rather than enjoying play [and this is a big one for me]
• I did get beat quite a few times by people sticking around without much and hitting the ‘only’ card they could on the river to make their hands. I know, these are the people you want to play against because more often then not they won’t hit the card. But still frustrating non the less

With my BR at GR sitting at $7 (still waiting for the $50 bonus to be put into my account) I decided to play a freeroll at GR last night. The qualifications to get in to the tourney is playing 100 raked hands in the last 24hrs – got that!!! In the end I was on auto fold for half the tourney but managed to get online and play the last little bit. I finished in 75th place which was good enough for a $3 payout.

I got up this morning and had a look at my GR account and sure enough my $50 bonus was in my account along with my tourney winnings … so BR is at $60. The next step is to cash-out, which I did this morning. The process at GR seems a bit more drawn out then at Party so we’ll see how long it takes to get my money – they suggest 5 working days. Which if this is true is way too long. (more comments on GR below)

I know, in the end I’m up $10 so shouldn’t be too disappointed. But I am because I found that I didn’t enjoy the experience and was not playing for the right reasons. So, with that leaning experience behind me - next up will likely be Paradise Poker with a 25% match bonus and by signing up through Poker Source Online I will also get enough PSO points to buy Poker Tracker. All good news, my challenge now is to go to Paradise with my head in the right place and enjoy the game.

It may take a few days to get my money from GR so I’ll have a few days to wait for my full BR and I’ll likely keep busy by playing a bit more at Party.

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Now that I’m starting to move around to other sites, I though I would provide a review of the sites.

Party Poker

This was the first site real site I went to (not including my free play at ESPN, although the expectations I have from playing there did take a while to overcome) and took a bit of getting used to. Although, after a few hours and a bit of customization of the interface it became easy to use and I felt pretty comfortable. There didn’t seem to be too many bugs with the software and it was reasonably easy to navigate.

The deposit and cash out process was easy and quick. The deposit although done through PSO was very quick (as you would expect) and when I cashed out my $50 it was in my Neteller account in 12 hours or less. Both I think are good benchmarks for the future.

While I was playing at Party they released a major upgrade. Aside from the initial attempt to install / upgrade (I seem to have problems with this and had to reboot my computer for the install to work properly), the new version seems to work fine. A key new feature is the ability to resize the poker room windows so you can view more than one on your screen at once – nice for multi-tabling.

So, overall I would rate Party Poker as very good (this rating may change once I get to more sites!!!)

Golden Riviera

The setup and install seemed to be OK but it did take me a few hours before I could actually logon – which puzzled me. Once logged in I poked around and it took me a bit of time to figure out the interface … it didn’t have the straightforward feel I would like. (now this could just be me!!!) My first deposit was quick and smooth, as you would expect.

The poker room interface seems a bit busy and the placement of the action buttons leaves a bit to be desired. One of the features is the colour changing when a player is out of hand … makes it nice and easy to see who is left. Overall it was OK but not as good as Party.

Now that I’ve cashed out and the guideline suggests 5 working days I’m a bit soured. If this is in fact how long it takes I would rate the site poorly just for that. One of the apparent reasons for this is that they hold your withdrawal for 48 hours in case you want to reverse it … what is up with that, if I want to reverse I will just redeposit the money – that’s instantaneous. Give me a break, 5 working days.

I’ll come back and update this review once the withdrawal is complete and let you know really how long it took.

So, overall I would rate this site as average or even below average – mostly for the withdrawal process.

Well, my head still hurts!!!

Lets see, where did I leave off, it was Monday and I was going to play one more night before moving to a new poker room. Well, Monday night was a good night, I was up $20 for the night. That put the BR at $145 … not bad.

At the end of the night I transferred $50 to Neteller as that would be all that was needed to take full advantage of the next poker room’s bonus. And the next poker room is Golden Riviera. It is not one of the most popular but they have a deposit $50 and get $50 promotion. And the release requirements are easy to meet, only have to play 250 raked hands.

On Tuesday I signed up at GR and deposited my $50 and started playing (this is where my head started to hurt!!!). I’m not sure what got into me but I was playing the 0.25/0.50 tables which is what I’ve been playing for the last few weeks and felt I wasn’t progressing to the magic number (250 raked hands) fast enough … so I started to triple table. Yes, you guessed it, I started losing and losing and losing!!! I ended the night losing about $22 – but I had 199 raked hands! lol, how bad is that. It seemed like I started to chase hands and in the end was only thinking about the bonus, which is definitely not what I want.

Well, all I can do with this now is learn from it and move on. The plan is to clear the bonus today and move on. Where to next, I’m not sure. I will have a look today at what options are out there and go into it with a better frame of mind.

Until next time, AA up