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peterbirksOne of the side-effects of writing about insurance is that you keep in touch with weather events, and so it was that, this time last week, as Cat and I rushed to avoid the rain that was just beginning to lash the South Bank, I said: "there's worse to come this time next week. Saturday in London, Monday in Hamburg. You'll see".
My prognosis was based on the shit-load of snow that had the previous day dumped itself on the plains of the US "from Canada to Mexico", and which moved quickly eastwards, hitting the US East Coast with heavy rains. As a general rule, the UK has five to six days to wait before the tail-end of that kind of weather front hits. And, sure as eggs is eggs, it's pissing down today and the meteorologists are warning of several days of wind, rain, and locusts.
Hell, man, and they pay you for this?
+++++++
Apart from the fact that Pokerstars remains the kiss of death any time I sit down with any money (and why do all of the players have to be short-stacked college kids who whine like babies every time the one loose player in a million you manage to find gets a lucky outdraw?) I've been chugging slowly along at the other sites, trying to take frequent breaks, not overplaying and attempting to "pace" myself more. This will probably entail me playing fewer hands this year, but I fear that in my case more hands does not necessarily mean more money. I can only maintain focus for a set amount of time and the batteries need to recharge for longer the more I feel alienated by the game. So, short sharp bursts seem to work best. If I can force myself to pull away when I hit a bad set of hands as quickly as I leave when I run well, this should bode better for results, if only because I will be playing less often when tired.
++++++++
A few years ago the world was convinced that one bite of beef on the bone would give you CJD within a month. As a result, oxtail was, I thought, consigned to the history books of "stuff we used to eat". But, no. Yesterday I was in Tesco (which reintroduced joints of beef on the bone a couple of years ago) and, there it was, oxtail!. Yowza. It's in the slow-cooker now and I will be munching it for dinner. Last week I cooked up a couple of braised lamb shanks (Halal, I knew that Al Qaeda was good for something) which is about as close as you can get to mutton these days. 24 hours in the slow cooker and, fuckin' brilliant.
+++++++++
My prognosis was based on the shit-load of snow that had the previous day dumped itself on the plains of the US "from Canada to Mexico", and which moved quickly eastwards, hitting the US East Coast with heavy rains. As a general rule, the UK has five to six days to wait before the tail-end of that kind of weather front hits. And, sure as eggs is eggs, it's pissing down today and the meteorologists are warning of several days of wind, rain, and locusts.
Hell, man, and they pay you for this?
+++++++
Apart from the fact that Pokerstars remains the kiss of death any time I sit down with any money (and why do all of the players have to be short-stacked college kids who whine like babies every time the one loose player in a million you manage to find gets a lucky outdraw?) I've been chugging slowly along at the other sites, trying to take frequent breaks, not overplaying and attempting to "pace" myself more. This will probably entail me playing fewer hands this year, but I fear that in my case more hands does not necessarily mean more money. I can only maintain focus for a set amount of time and the batteries need to recharge for longer the more I feel alienated by the game. So, short sharp bursts seem to work best. If I can force myself to pull away when I hit a bad set of hands as quickly as I leave when I run well, this should bode better for results, if only because I will be playing less often when tired.
++++++++
A few years ago the world was convinced that one bite of beef on the bone would give you CJD within a month. As a result, oxtail was, I thought, consigned to the history books of "stuff we used to eat". But, no. Yesterday I was in Tesco (which reintroduced joints of beef on the bone a couple of years ago) and, there it was, oxtail!. Yowza. It's in the slow-cooker now and I will be munching it for dinner. Last week I cooked up a couple of braised lamb shanks (Halal, I knew that Al Qaeda was good for something) which is about as close as you can get to mutton these days. 24 hours in the slow cooker and, fuckin' brilliant.
+++++++++
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no subject
Date: 2007-01-06 09:05 pm (UTC)Hi, Peter:
Your timing with this statement is uncanny. I had three incidences where the whiners chased the only live one away from the table (all at $3/6) and each time the whiner was happy about it, much to the consternation of fellow table mates.
For the last week or so, Stars has been the kiss of death for me, also. The play has been very strange, to say the least and I have had a hard time wrapping my mind around it. I thought you may find these two hands interesting and I was hoping that you could give me some insight to why tight/semi-tight players would play their hands this way:
Hand 1: I raise from UTG with AcAd and only the BB calls (a 20% VPIP player). On a Kc-9d-7s flop, I am check-raised and only called when I 3-bet. The turn is a 7d, I'm check-raised again and only called when I 3-bet. The river is the 9h and I check behind my opponent. My opponent wins with Ts9s. Was he hoping to bloat the pot so he could chase?
Hand 2: I raise from UTG+1 with TsTc and am only called by a middle position player (18% VPIP). I bet a flop of 6s-5s-5h and get called. The turn is a 7s, I bet and get called again. River is Jh and I bet again and get called and beaten by AcJd.
I just don't get this type of play by tight players and I see it a lot at Stars, but not at other sites like Full Tilt (I have started playing there a bit). It is as if the cold callers put an UTG raiser on the widest possible range of hands, thus giving them the odds to chase. The funny thing is that if they are paying attention to me and are using HUD stats, I am a 15/10 player, which would indicate my range is smaller than most players, especially with an UTG raise. This causes me to wonder if I have a blind spot in my thinking. Am I missing something here or is just the type of player that inhabits that site?
Glad to hear you are still playing. As long as you are enjoying yourself and making a few quid, that's all that matters.
Michael
no subject
Date: 2007-01-07 08:31 am (UTC)Hand One looks a little bit like the Matt "defend any BB and check-raise any flop you kind of hit".
Opponent has check-raised the turn as a kind of two-way bet (I might have tried this, to be honest). He might be winning with his pair against your AQs, or he might elicit a fold from a pair of Queens/ pair of Jacks or even an AK from a weak-tight opponent who would be scared of a seven. He must be assuming that your three--bet on the flop is semi-automatic (say, about 70% of your initial raising range).
Your three-bet on the flop certainly makes his play atypical. If you had flat-called the cr on the flop, opponent probably leads out on the turn.
The second hand definitely has me puzzled. My experience these days is that Jacks, Queens and Kings often cold-call a raise in this position, raising your continuation if they have an overpair on the flop and folding to a bet if an Ace appears. They tend to three-bet AK and AQs. But AJo is very weak for a cold-call. In fact, a cold-call is dreadful on any count (even if he can see your cards), because it encourages BB to call for value, and AJo drops dramatically in strength in multi-wayers. And then on a flop of 655 he might as well raise if he is staying in. I'd just mark this guy down as a poor player.
On the topic of UTG raises, a few players (myself included) are marking a UTG raise as slightly weaker than a UTG+1 raise, partly because a number of players limp UTG with Aces, and a second set of players like to steal with anything UTG the hand before they leave.
If you are 15/10 you are possibly being marked as weak-tight by players with fewer than 500 hands on you. Others might have you in "bot-territory" (usually 17/11-ish). Counterplay of bots (or real players who are serious multi-tablers and who are thus "faux-bots") is different from counterplay of real players, but I'm not sure how many players at $2-$4 and $3-$6 have figured this out.
PJ
no subject
Date: 2007-01-07 06:15 pm (UTC)Thanks for the comments. I was going somewhere with this and you hit it on the head with the "bot-territory". Actually, I was going to suggest that possibly the cold-calling of early position raises with hands like AJo was the sign of a bot. I had not considered that I was possibly being viewed as a true bot or a multi-tabling HUD bit ("faux-bot").
The player in the AJo hand is one that I have faced several times. Generally plays 6-12 tables and I have never seen him "speak" in the chat box. Even as a tight player, he consistently cold calls raises with hands like that. I remember a hand recently where I won with AdKd on a final board of Kh-7d-2d-9s-3c against him where he cold called with AcQh in MP after I raised PF from UTG+1. Would you consider this to be "bot-like"? I just can't see a tight player calling a river bet with that hand on that board thinking that they have a reasonable chance of winning in order to make that call.
That is an interesting thought you have there on the difference of counterplay between bots (and faux-bots) and real players. Have you had discussions with others or read something on this differing counterplay? If so, I'd be interested.
Michael
no subject
Date: 2007-01-07 08:48 pm (UTC)This play with AJ and AQ looks like a badly scripted bot to me, definitely. The hands have a certain "rank" according to Sklansky and the script is just saying "worth calling a raise or raising a call if you are in 'x' position or later". There's no realization by the script-writer (presumably using Win Hold'em) that some hands play better heads-up and that therefore a reraise is necessary to force out the Big Blind.
I've often said that I have no worry about playing most bots, so long as they are identified as such. Once you know they are a bot, you establish their range (because you are likely to have a much larger base of hands with which to work) and adapt accordingly. Since the bot is running according to script, it will not react until the bot-runner realizes his bot is doing loads of cash. Bots also do not react "irrationally". So, if you have (say) just had AA and KK and have won two pots on the trot without a showdown, you know that a human opponent is far more likely to look you up if you raise for the third time in a row. A bot will still be running according to its own rules. They haven't yet got sophisticated enough to react to your actions the previous two hands (although some probably do react to stats generated by Pokertracker over a longer period of time).
I have read some things on bot-counterplay on 2+2, but I don't really want to go into too much detail. Just assume that it's a machine running to its own relatively simple hand-ranking tools. It looks at its own hand, looks at the board, does some calculations, and acts accordingly. Generally it takes a 4-bet to shut it up, at which point it usually goes into check-call mode.
That's a massive generalization, of course, since there are lots of scripts out there. The example that you give looks to me to be one of the weaker ones. I can't believe that it's profitable overall at $3-$6.
PJ
no subject
Date: 2007-01-08 12:35 am (UTC)I'll have to do a little reading about this on 2+2, but what you say is something that I will have to keep in mind from this point on. With Stars offering up so much financially in their VIP program for Supernovas (and the new Supernova Elite level) and the number of hands required to reach those levels, it only stands to reason that there is some incentive for people to attempt to use bots.
The AJ/AQ bot in question has been a wildly successful player, but only over 2,000 hands or so. Interestingly, I have not played against him in a couple of weeks or so. That coincides with Stars starting to use the captcha scripts, ala Party.
Michael
no subject
Date: 2007-01-08 12:34 pm (UTC)matt
no subject
Date: 2007-01-08 05:11 pm (UTC)I'm not complaining about the result, just trying to understand the type of thinking that is involved here if you are the BB. And yes, I was very surprised he did not bet the river.
Michael
no subject
Date: 2007-01-08 07:47 pm (UTC)matt
Splurge and burn
Date: 2007-01-07 10:30 am (UTC)I would have guessed a pot of £420K wouldn't last much more than 15 years. I presume the son would be expected to stump up a bit if they used all their money up, but even so, they could be looking at a poverty-sticken life by say, 80. And it's that Damaclesian sword that's being used in order to preach restraint. If your money stays locked into property, you can't splurge and have to live a more restrained life, making the money last longer.
It's an odds bet on how long you're going to live and whether a really interesting period of your life from 65-75 is worth a chance of reduced circumstances in your 80's. For me the answer is yes because you can only spend the money once and being restrained runs the risk of being a very rich 68 year old corpse. But splurge and burn isn't for everyone and there will be some people for whom the fear of future poverty would impede their ability to enjoy their current wealth. But for God's sake don't take an ERS.
Bean-counting and marrowbones
Date: 2007-01-07 12:44 pm (UTC)Challinger actually seems to be agreeing with you towards the end. In fact, the main part of his argument was based on the presumed inadvisability of equity release schemes, which I understand, but doesn't seem to be what this couple were proposing. Unless by "equity release" you mean "selling an expensive house at the top of the market and renting a cheaper property." Which makes perfect sense to me, and you don't need to fork over your 2% to a licensed ninny to make this sort of decision. I mean, it's not like they're proposing to invest in a condo in Florida (and oh, how I laughed at those poor saps).
Neil Young once sang something like "I hear that Laurel Canyon is filled with rocker stars / I hate them worse than lepers, and I'll shoot them in their cars." I feel much the same way about financial advisers. Either they tell you something obvious, and charge you through the nose for it, or they just blather as above, and still charge you through the nose for it.
---
Remember that game pie I was going to make over the New Year? It sort of foundered on the problematic detail of making a jellied stock. Apparently butchers aren't allowed to sell you marrow-bones, or anything like, over the counter any more. I tried making panting noises like a dog, but gave up when the butcher's boy started sniffing my arse.
CJD is alive and well, and living in Birmingham.
You can't even find gelatine now, except in the gourmet section, and I'm not going to pay £20 for an upmarket substitute for perfectly good animal by-product.
----
PS The flip-side of probate is just as painful as the side you're experiencing. With the added ingredient that, owing to how you got into this position, you don't give a flying fox, basically.
Re: Bean-counting and marrowbones
Date: 2007-01-07 07:35 pm (UTC)Jesus, I'd forgotten that particular scare. I think Harrington's wife still bans beef in their house.
Yesterday I explained to my 7 year-old daughter my cynical GOM view of the media when she asked me what had happened to bird flu. She listened*, then summed it up with "so they make money by making people worried". I was so proud. Then today 5 year-old Johnny sandbags me in a heads-up game of Uno. I must be doing something right.
Mike
* Unusual in itself, she normally tolerates me for a minute or so then moans "oh Dad - bo-ring"
Re: Bean-counting and marrowbones
Date: 2007-01-07 08:17 pm (UTC)Harrington is, of course, a pathetic dweeb who will never rule the universe. The rest of us still have a chance. (I'm better off than you are. You have to recognise that your daughter and son are lower down the food chain than you are. The minute they disagree with you: eat them. It's cruel, but it's fair*.)
I actually missed the most significant thing in Geoff's response, whereat he used the verb "assuage." Assuage. Assuage? (I'm beginning to sound like the start of the Soft Machine album here.) This is hardly the language of pulse enumerators. To my great disappointment, I've just looked it up (because it sounded silly), only to discover that, in fact, he has chosen a remarkably apposite word. To quote:
1. To make (something burdensome or painful) less intense or severe: assuage her grief. See Synonyms at relieve.
2. To satisfy or appease (hunger or thirst, for example).
3. To pacify or calm: assuage their chronic insecurity.
This almost sounds like the mission statement of a financial consultancy firm. (Except that almost every single mission statement I have ever heard is very silly and potentially harmful to anyone within range who has their back-brain switched on.)
Geoff, I'm sorry I doubted you.
* (Borrowed with gratitude and recommendations from Henson Jr's ABC series "Dinosaurs." Strongly recommended. Particularly the classic episode, "When food goes bad."
Re: Bean-counting and marrowbones
Date: 2007-01-07 11:05 pm (UTC)I could eat my children, true. But I think it's short-termist, in a very Oxfam way: eat a child and you have food for a week. Teach a child to get a job and it may feed you for a retirement. Something like that.
Re: Bean-counting and marrowbones
Date: 2007-01-08 07:34 am (UTC)Believe it or not, I'm a really crap accountant who's actually OK with words. So I found a niche where the numbers are relatively dull and/or easy and the words are the worthwhile commodity that I sell.
Re: Bean-counting and marrowbones
Date: 2007-01-08 10:41 am (UTC)Fair compromise?
PJ
Re: Bean-counting and marrowbones
Date: 2007-01-08 08:56 pm (UTC)And knowing what one has to offer and making a living offering it is surely a good thing, irrespective of what it actually is that people are paying for.
Re: Bean-counting and marrowbones
Date: 2007-01-07 08:38 pm (UTC)A flu pandemic will come. As will an earthquake in California. The trick, I guess, will be to get them to coincide, so that most of the people killed in the earthquake would have died from bird flu within days anyway.
That would be a real win-win situation.
Cue TV presenter, sneezing and snuffling, clearly on her last legs befor swan-like death overtakes her, standing in front of a collapsed Golden Gate Bridge, amidst rioting police officers emptying the stores of vital provisions such as 42" plasma TVs.
And I would defy daughter to call THAT "borrrrringgggg!"
(BTW, I liked the tee-shirt at the Mardi Gras emblazoned "My Ma was caught up in Hurricane Katrina and all I got from her was a 42" plasma TV".)
PJ
Re: Bean-counting and marrowbones
Date: 2007-01-07 11:13 pm (UTC)"Misalignment of objectives" is probably my main theme for the decade. I'm considering galloping paranoia for the next one.
Mike
* Or most dangerously, in the case of a pol who is preparing to stand down, to create a historical "legacy". Then we' re really in the poo.