Home working

[peterbirks]

Because my US freelance is on holiday, I have more to do this week, so I am saving commuting time by working from home today and Thursday. There are various things you have to do when working from home (well, you don't HAVE to do them, but it is advisable). One is to prepare for the day normally. This consists of shaving, showering, and dressing reasonably correctly. Just getting a cup of coffee and sitting down at the keyboard in your dressing gown is not good enough. Some people advocate that you go for a half-hour walk, imitating the "journey to work". But since I'm doing this to save the time on that journey to work, this seems a bit pointless. But I can see the reasoning behind it.

When you work at home you work a lot quicker. This is because offices are mainly occupied by people chatting rather than working. Marketing people spend about 1/50th of their time marketing, one-fifth of their time in meetings, maybe a quarter of their time staring at spreadsheets and databases in a manner which makes it look as if they are working, but they are not, and the rest of their time chatting. Journalists spend no time in meetings (if they can help it), but do spend a lot of their time chatting. So, when you are at home, you are already 100% more efficient than you were, because there is no-one to chat to.

And with that, I note that my work day is about to begin, so I shall disappear for a while.

I'm going to try to cure my currently awful poker play by making a list of errors. My failure to bet on the river is coming back. It's a function of a couple of bad sessions and a feeling that all is wrong with the world. I must overcome it. And I must also avoid this bet on the river with an ace-high. It's terrible. I know it's terrible, even at the time, but I still do it. And, finally, I must find out why I do things which even at the time I know are wrong. This is the toughest one of all. If I can just stop that flaw, I think my win rate would increase by at least 1BB an hour.

Comments

Yes

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

Yes. I know that. That's what I was writing. You have to be there. This betting at the end with the Ace-high is a really common mistake. Jennifer Harman mentions it in SS2. I've mainly got rid of it, but sometimes it creeps back in. The checking at the end with less than a monster is also a common mistake, frequently seen in pot limit and no limit players venturing into the limit arena.

The psychology behind the two actions are that, with the overpair or the top pair, you "aren't quite sure", so you check. Whereas with the Ace, you are fairly sure that you are losing (but are not absolutely certain), so it's one last throw of the dice. I know that this psychology is flawed (if you are going to win with the ace, then you might as well check and call a bluff) -- but at least I see it for what it is. Defeating it is harder. Try telling an obsessive-compulsive handwasher that what they do isn't necessary, and they will look at you despairingly and say "I know!" It really is something hard to explain.

By way of catharsis, I looked to see how the 15-30 games were going at 8.30am UK time, and they seemed a bit looser. As luck would have it, within 20 minutes I twice found myself in a position with top pair at the end, and both times I bet it, and both times I was called, and both times I won. But getting yourself to press that "bet" button requires an act of will, it really does. So, another $172 back and, this time it was as much as I reckon I could have won. Now that is pleasing.