Best time of the year .... for movies

I'm a huge movie fan, I have always liked movies as far as I can remember. And for people like me December is the best month for movies, usually the best films of the year are released on these dates. Since I'm no movie critic, and live in a very underrated city like El Paso, where nobody cares to show advanced screenings, I have to wait just like everybody else to watch any movie, I'm really waiting anxiously to watch "The curious case of Benjamin Button" and "Slumdog Millionare", I think both will be nominated for oscar best picture, and even now, I still think The Dark Knight which impressed me a lot last summer, will be nominated too. I'll post my nominated predictions for the Oscars, I'm planning to deposit some money online to make some movie awards bets, since I have an excellent record in this area and of course I can use the money, lets see if I can break my betting quarentine, last time I bet (not poker of course), was last Oscar season, so most probably I'll do it again. But even if I don't, for sure I'll post my predictions to make the few people who still read this blog some money if they so want to.

"I have your AA cracked"; I insist sir, take all my stack

Sometimes you just don't lose enough with AA, even when people give you a way out, no, you must lose it all, you know you're beaten, but what the hell, you have aces !!.
Meh, I'm tired of these mistakes, when you can't let go AA. This is a hand from 5-10 NL 6 max which illustrates the point:

***** Hand History for Game 22553133501 *****
$1000.00 USD NL Texas Hold'em - Tuesday, December 02, 07:12:23 ET 2008
Table Fagnes (Real Money)
Seat 5 is the button
Seat 1: xCptMorganx ( $1705.00 USD )
Seat 2: alimali63 ( $1246.00 USD )
Seat 3: sirio11 ( $1070.00 USD )
Seat 4: Sekt1 ( $2154.25 USD )
Seat 5: Vision82 ( $1034.00 USD )
Seat 6: HT-Max ( $1452.00 USD )
HT-Max posts small blind [$5.00 USD].
xCptMorganx posts big blind [$10.00 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to sirio11 [ Ac Ad ]
alimali63 folds
sirio11 raises [$30.00 USD]
Sekt1 folds
Vision82 folds
HT-Max folds
xCptMorganx calls [$20.00 USD]
** Dealing Flop ** [ 2s, 7d, Th ]
xCptMorganx bets [$30.00 USD]
sirio11 raises [$120.00 USD]
xCptMorganx calls [$90.00 USD]
** Dealing Turn ** [ 9s ]
xCptMorganx checks
sirio11 bets [$270.00 USD]
xCptMorganx raises [$1555.00 USD]
sirio11 calls [$650.00 USD]
** Dealing River ** [ 8h ]
xCptMorganx shows [7h, 7c ]
xCptMorganx wins $2142.00 USD from main pot
sirio11 doesn't show [Ac, Ad ]
xCptMorganx wins $635.00 USD from main pot


I don't like his line much, still I should have checked the turn, and since I didn't then it was an easy fold to save my last $650, but man, being dumb is pretty expensive.

National Mathematical Olympiad

This weekend I just got back from the Mexican Mathematical Olympiad held at San Carlos, Sonora. I was there as the leader of the State of Chihuahua team and we had a terrific showing. Our best participation in more than a decade. That had been one of my goals this year and I think I succeeded, for now I'll just write about some of our most important results:

- All our students got medal, 3 gold, 2 silver and 1 bronze

Guillermo López Buenfil ORO
Manuel Dosal Bustillos ORO
Josue Isai Vazquez Garcia ORO
Karina Patricia De la Torre Saenz PLATA
Diego German Orozco Garcia PLATA
Alberto Astiazaran Tobin BRONCE

So, Guillermo ("Memo"), Manuel and Isai are preselected as part of the National team to participate in the 2009 International Math olympiad (IMO) to be held in Germany next July.

- Two of them got selected for the Centroamerican Mathematical Olympiad to be held at Republica Dominicana next June 2009; Manuel and Karina

- Out of 32 states, we got 2nd place !!!

1- MORELOS 147
2- CHIHUAHUA 145 (Arrgghhh! just 2 marks)
3- YUCATAN 115
4- NUEVO LEON 112
5- SONORA 106

- The best student in the country is from our team

Memo got the highest score of all the 200 contestants with 40 marks (out of 42), it was an incredible performance since the 2nd highest got 34

- We won the "Copa Superacion"

1- CHIHUAHUA 46.70
2- BAJA CALIFORNIA SUR 25.05 pts
3- CAMPECHE 23.65 pts

I am pretty happy with the results, the co-leaders of our team were my friends Enrique Treviño and Hector Garcia, who did a wonderful job and we just make a great team.

For sure the Olympiad took a lot of my poker playing time this year, I spent way many hours in the Olympiad rather than playing poker, and that alone cost me a lot of money, but even when there's no money to be won in the Olympiad, it's something I'm very proud of.

Society is weird, I play poker and win money doing something with almost no meaningful contribution to society, while doing the Olympiad I contribute to society and get no money, I guess it balances out.

Some tourneys and some cash

This Sunday I played 3 tourneys, the $215 and $530 at Stars and the FTOSP $322, all NL, I made the money in the $215, and if I don't lose a 3 way all in with QQ vs AK and AQ, I'd made the $ also on the FTOSP. But the thing is, I'm not enjoying much to play tourneys, probably that's a good thing, since definitely I need to play more cash.
I recovered today some of what I lost yesterday, I was really ashamed of my play yesterday and I think I played pretty solid today, but there's still a long way to know if I can beat this level.

This week I'll be coaching my math Olympiad students for the national contest which is almost here, hopefully I find time to play some cash NL.

Argh

I just played terrible today and lost around 4 buy ins playing 5-10, really, all my big hands were played pretty bad, the only good thing I did was to quit. Days like this may me wonder if I'm ready for these levels. I played 6 max cash like if I was playing a tourney, just horrible. Oh well, time to sleep a little.

5-10 NL 6 Max Session

Playing 5-10 all night, more than 1200 hands, pretty good session.

These are the hands I won and lost the most this session:

PokerStars Game #21642703777: Hold'em No Limit ($5/$10) - 2008/10/31 10:27:53 ET
Table 'Terradas' 6-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: PiS.ToTo ($1500 in chips)
Seat 2: Gomtv ($4591 in chips)
Seat 3: sirio11 ($4343 in chips)
Seat 4: sloppinu28 ($1018 in chips)
Seat 5: adtina22 ($1047 in chips)
Gomtv: posts small blind $5
sirio11: posts big blind $10
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to sirio11 [Qd Qs]
sloppinu28: raises $20 to $30
adtina22: folds
PiS.ToTo: raises $80 to $110
Gomtv: folds
sirio11: raises $300 to $410
sloppinu28: folds
PiS.ToTo: raises $1090 to $1500 and is all-in
sirio11: calls $1090
*** FLOP *** [9d Ts 2c]
*** TURN *** [9d Ts 2c] [6c]
*** RIVER *** [9d Ts 2c 6c] [Ks]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
sirio11: shows [Qd Qs] (a pair of Queens)
PiS.ToTo: shows [Ad As] (a pair of Aces)
PiS.ToTo collected $3033 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $3035 | Rake $2
Board [9d Ts 2c 6c Ks]
Seat 1: PiS.ToTo (button) showed [Ad As] and won ($3033) with a pair of Aces
Seat 2: Gomtv (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 3: sirio11 (big blind) showed [Qd Qs] and lost with a pair of Queens
Seat 4: sloppinu28 folded before Flop
Seat 5: adtina22 folded before Flop (didn't bet)

I think I played bad QQ here and it was a costly mistake.

And now the "good" hand:

PokerStars Game #21643513146: Hold'em No Limit ($5/$10) - 2008/10/31 11:14:03 ET
Table 'Terradas' 6-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: foxfox1 ($1045 in chips)
Seat 2: Gomtv ($4487 in chips)
Seat 3: sirio11 ($3180 in chips)
Seat 4: sloppinu28 ($971 in chips)
Seat 5: adtina22 ($1165 in chips)
Seat 6: Deldar182 ($2293 in chips)
Gomtv: posts small blind $5
sirio11: posts big blind $10
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to sirio11 [8s 8c]
sloppinu28: raises $20 to $30
adtina22: folds
Deldar182: raises $70 to $100
foxfox1: folds
Gomtv: folds
sirio11: calls $90
sloppinu28: calls $70
*** FLOP *** [9d 8h 4d]
sirio11: bets $120
sloppinu28: folds
Deldar182: raises $230 to $350
sirio11: raises $2730 to $3080 and is all-in
Deldar182: calls $1843 and is all-in
Uncalled bet ($887) returned to sirio11
*** TURN *** [9d 8h 4d] [Jh]
*** RIVER *** [9d 8h 4d Jh] [3h]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
sirio11: shows [8s 8c] (three of a kind, Eights)
Deldar182: mucks hand
sirio11 collected $4688 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $4691 | Rake $3
Board [9d 8h 4d Jh 3h]
Seat 1: foxfox1 (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: Gomtv (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 3: sirio11 (big blind) showed [8s 8c] and won ($4688) with three of a kind, Eights
Seat 4: sloppinu28 folded on the Flop
Seat 5: adtina22 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: Deldar182 mucked [Ah As]

Probably against another player, I play the hand differently, but against him at that moment in time, I think this was exactly the way to play it to make him commit all his stack.

I played 3 tables for about 5 hours straight. I stopped because Stars server went down.

I'm doing good playing cash games, tournaments are not fun these days, so for now I'll keep playing cash.

The election is almost here, don't forget to vote, GO OBAMA !!!!!

Long session

I'm playing more these days, and I just finished an all-nighter (and all morning). I just wanted to play, I played 10-20 NL 6-Max, 15-30 Limit, 30-60 Limit, 5-10 Razz, even 5-10 Stud Hi/low. I lost on Razz (How the hell can you lose playing that stupid game), won on stud H/L, lost playing limit and won playing 10-20 NL; it was a very nice session. I think I played well despite the long hours and this time I played a lot just because I wanted and not because I was stuck.

The hand I won the most money is the following (not necessarily the one I played the best, I think my best hands were on limit despite losing a lot there, I played nice a lot of 2nd monsters). Well, this is the hand:

PokerStars Game #21272979665: Hold'em No Limit ($10/$20) - 2008/10/17 15:55:35 ET
Table 'Dares' 6-max Seat #6 is the button
Seat 1: DeanoSupremo ($1964 in chips)
Seat 2: ADZ124 ($2000 in chips)
Seat 3: tiltphanatic ($4101 in chips)
Seat 4: sirio11 ($2631 in chips)
Seat 5: ibback ($4898 in chips)
Seat 6: Killer_ooooo ($4609 in chips)
DeanoSupremo: posts small blind $10
ADZ124: posts big blind $20
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to sirio11 [Kc Ks]
tiltphanatic: raises $40 to $60
sirio11: raises $160 to $220
ibback: calls $220
Killer_ooooo: folds
DeanoSupremo: folds
ADZ124: folds
tiltphanatic: folds
*** FLOP *** [9s 4d 4c]
sirio11: bets $460
ibback: calls $460
*** TURN *** [9s 4d 4c] [Kh]
sirio11: checks
ibback: bets $560
sirio11: raises $580 to $1140
ibback: calls $580
*** RIVER *** [9s 4d 4c Kh] [Td]
sirio11: bets $811 and is all-in
ibback: calls $811
*** SHOW DOWN ***
sirio11: shows [Kc Ks] (a full house, Kings full of Fours)
ibback: mucks hand
sirio11 collected $5349 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $5352 | Rake $3
Board [9s 4d 4c Kh Td]
Seat 1: DeanoSupremo (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 2: ADZ124 (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 3: tiltphanatic folded before Flop
Seat 4: sirio11 showed [Kc Ks] and won ($5349) with a full house, Kings full of Fours
Seat 5: ibback mucked [Kd Ac]
Seat 6: Killer_ooooo (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)

The thing I liked the most on this hand (besides winning it of course) were my timing tells, but those are not in the hand history obviously. I think I'm getting better at my timing bets, calls, checks. They are pretty important tells when you play online and you need to be difficult to read based on how many seconds you take to make a decision.

Well, now to sleep a little, I'll play some volleyball at night and tomorrow I'll coach my Olympiad Students, We already have the State Team (Chihuahua) and I feel pretty good about the team to bring some gold medals from the National Math Olympiad next November.

My first 25-50 NL session

Yes, I'm not kidding, I barely play cash or tourneys, when I play cash it's usually 3-6 or 5-10 6Max NL, I don't have a bankroll, I don't have the passion for poker I used to have, never study anymore and today I just decided to play a little 25-50 NL, ha, I'm such a strange gambler.

My session went pretty smooth, I lost about $1500 playing 5-10 earlier, so I just wanted to win some $2000, easy right?, just sit down with better players than you, more experienced than you and the money will come.

Well, for once I was pretty concentrated, these high stakes made me take things seriously and to be honest, I really enjoyed the session, at one point I was down some $3000 (total), but I ended winning $2100 in the 25-50 table, so, I won some $700 for the day and I was pretty happy my gambling didn't cost me a leg.

Probably my most interesting hand played today was the following:

PokerStars Game #20342650078: Hold'em No Limit ($25/$50) - 2008/09/12 7:34:53 ET
Table 'Sculptor' 9-max Seat #3 is the button
Seat 1: IamTazz ($850 in chips)
Seat 3: Krazyball ($1025 in chips)
Seat 4: fumbo420 ($7907 in chips)
Seat 5: sirio11 ($5424.50 in chips)
Seat 7: FUTURE102 ($3322 in chips)
Seat 8: firas71 ($5337 in chips)
Seat 9: good2cu ($5075 in chips)
fumbo420: posts small blind $25
sirio11: posts big blind $50
Bullitos: sits out
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to sirio11 [Qd Td]
FUTURE102: folds
firas71: raises $100 to $150
good2cu: calls $150
IamTazz: folds
Krazyball: folds
fumbo420: calls $125
sirio11: calls $100

*** FLOP *** [8s Jd Ts]
fumbo420: checks
sirio11: checks
firas71: bets $450
good2cu: calls $450
fumbo420: folds
sirio11: calls $450

*** TURN *** [8s Jd Ts] [Th]
sirio11: bets $650
firas71: calls $650
good2cu: raises $1750 to $2400 !!!!
sirio11: folds
firas71: raises $2337 to $4737 and is all-in
good2cu: calls $2075 and is all-in
Uncalled bet ($262) returned to firas71
*** RIVER *** [8s Jd Ts Th] [8d]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
firas71: shows [Kd Js] (two pair, Jacks and Tens)
good2cu: shows [Tc Ad] (a full house, Tens full of Eights)
good2cu collected $11547 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $11550 | Rake $3
Board [8s Jd Ts Th 8d]
Seat 1: IamTazz folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: Krazyball (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: fumbo420 (small blind) folded on the Flop
Seat 5: sirio11 (big blind) folded on the Turn
Seat 7: FUTURE102 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: firas71 showed [Kd Js] and lost with two pair, Jacks and Tens
Seat 9: good2cu showed [Tc Ad] and won ($11547) with a full house, Tens full of Eights

KJ guy was a litle on tilt, and that made me think about calling the turn raise with my set and straight draw, but I thought good2cu had 88 or ATs and decided to fold. I think it was a good fold, but of course I'm not used to this stakes, but I felt good about it, even before I knew the showdown. Good thing firas decided to call, so I could see their cards. Don't know if I'll play more 25-50 in the near future, for sure I don't have the bankroll, but I liked my overall play in the table and to be honest it's pretty nice to be able to concentrate and enjoy a poker game played at a pretty good level.

This weekend I'll be training my students for the next Mathematical National Olympiad, if I have the time, I'll probably play the WCOOP tourneys on Sunday.

Batman: The Dark Knight

Just went to the midnight opening of The Dark Knight directed by Christopher Nolan (Memento).
My first impression is I need to see this movie again, and what a fantastic movie it is. Write it down, Heath Ledger will be nominated to the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor, and not only because of his tragic death last January, it will be because his is a magnificent piece of acting, I can't believe you can't forget now about Jack's Nicholson performance of the Joker, who was pretty, pretty good, but Heath gives the character a new dimension, a new deep, man, I almost felt identified with the Joker and his vision and philosophy about how society as a whole is not worth it. Definitely a great movie and you have to see it. I liked Aaron Eckhart and Christian Bale as well and in general all the cast did a pretty good job, and the directing and editing was amazing. Thumbs up for sure.

WSOP: To go or not to go

The WSOP is running at full speed as I write this, I have been there every one of the last 4 years, but probably I'll miss this one. We already have booked some nights in Vegas (at the Rio) for the end of June and the beginning of July, but most probably I won't play any event. It's a mix of money management discipline and self-impose punishment because I haven't played the hours I should have played this year. It's a punishment because I love the WSOP, oh man do I love it, I seem to play my best there, since online I'm always distracted, and over there I'm all over the table absorbed by the action and enjoying every moment, most of my online poker players peers feel bored by the slow action, and of course it's slower compared to online, but for me it's not boring at all, and the mix of characters playing is really interesting, I have some very good memories from my playing there. I have 8 cashes there and one final table out of about 28 tourneys, but my number of cashes won't increase this year, besides I'm pretty busy with the Mathematical Olympiad, I think we have a real shot to be the #1 state ranked in the National (México) Mathematical Olympiad this year and if we do it I'll be very proud. It would be nice to go to the WSOP and win some bracelet and then go to the Olympiad and win first place, have a happy life with the family and in the meantime solve the oil crisis, but I have to accept no WSOP plans will be better this year, that's the plan as today, but I know the day I will be in Vegas at the Rio in the middle of the WSOP environment with all those strange characters who call themselves poker players from all over the world, it would be pretty hard not to play, the WSOP, such a beautiful temptation ..... and Vegas is sin city after all ......