Welcome

Welcome to ZenToad's poker blog.  I am a self-proclaimed professional-amateur poker player, and I love playing poker, talking about it, reading about it, watching it, and thinking about it.  It has been a year since online poker was shut down, and I find myself wishing it was back.

After one year hoping that online poker would come back, I am tired of waiting.  It was not a source of income for me; it was a source of fun.  I viewed online poker the same way people view other online games.  For whatever reason, when I signed up, PokerStars.com gave me $5.00.  It must have been some kind of incentive to get me hooked, or a promotion of some kind.  Back then, I had just started learning how to play, and was happy to play for free.  I was reading all kinds of poker books, watching poker on T.V., and just enjoying studying the game.

I took a leap one day, trying out a very high-stakes cash game: $0.02/$0.04 limit hold ’em.  I played for a while, but didn’t have any luck.  I was studying no-limit, and limit is played very differently.  Also, at the penny level, there didn’t seem to be much strategy.  I was over-thinking the game.

I graduated to $0.10 – 360 player tournaments, and played for quite a while, turning my $5.00 into $12.00.  I then moved my way up to the staggering $0.25 – 90 player tournaments.  With over 40 buy-ins, I played lots of tournaments, and eventually made it past $20.00.  Feeling good about myself, I decided to take the next step.

I had read a lot of books at this point, and all of them said the same thing: Tournaments are fun, but cash games are where the money is.  So once I reached $22.00, I decided to risk $2.00, which was a lot of money :-).  I got destroyed.  I would grind back to $22.00, buy in for $2.00 at the $0.01/0.02 no limit hold ‘em tables, and loose it all.  Luckily I ended up buying the following book:

Cash Games (How to Win at No-Limit Hold'em Money Games) Vol. 1 by Dan Harrington

Permalink: http://amzn.com/1880685426

That book really helped me, and I played for almost a year with the $20.00.  At one point I was up past $60.00, but a couple of weeks of serious tilt dropped me back to $30.00.  I was amazed, and still am, at how easily this game can drive a person to the brink of insanity. 

So after poker was shut down, and having never given anyone any money, I didn’t mind that the money was gone.  I missed the fun.  I check the news every few days waiting for some word about online poker coming back, but since is doesn’t look like that will happen any time soon, I have begun testing out all the online poker sites available that still allow me to play. 

So stay tuned for an account of my experiences trying to build another bankroll in these volatile times.

Ciao,

ZenToad