Sunday, February 29, 2004

A warm, sunny day in northwestern Arizona. Believe it or not, we haven't had many in the last few weeks. It is rainy and overcast, which is kind of how the winter is here (this year, anyway). At least it's not snowy! We have a day here and there of full, warm sun, then maybe a week of rain or drizzle, to remind us that even Arizona has winter.

I gave Glenn two choices. I told him that while we had a wonderful day, he could either 1) take me to one of the "local attractions," for which he would get the reward of playing poker in Laughlin a bit at the end of the trip, or 2) go food shopping, home shopping, and give the whole house a spring cleaning when we got back.

Which do you think he chose? LOL :)

We went to Lake Havasu, AZ. I had read that it is a beautiful little town on the Colorado River. Our friends, the Brits, sold us the London Bridge and shipped it over here, piece by piece, for us. They even numbered the stones, so we couldn't screw it up when making it.

There is a little English village that lines the shores under the bridge. Yeah, it's a tourist trap, but it is the closest to London I've come to thus far.

There was an English pub. We ate lunch there and had "English" food, lol. It was really neat. There was a Scottish couple there, as well as a couple from England, so that kind of made it more authentic :) I know, I'm easily entertained.

On the way back from Lake Havasu, we took the "Laughlin" route, and swung by the Belle for a couple of hours of poker. We had to play 2-5 spread limit, because although the list had only about 20 people for 4/8, there was no game offered. HELLO!

The pre-Oscar (?) show was on the TV. Since I wasn't in the mood to "kill" the poker game, I was watching the show. I guess they wait for celebs to exit their limos, then interview them when they come into the area. Some of the women were so gorgeous. The dresses were fantastic. Some were just plain ugly and gaudy, but most were tasteful and elegant. I would say I wasn't so hyped to Julia Roberts or Angelina Jolie. The other women looked great, that I saw. Julie Andrews is still very handsome. Jeez, does Michael Douglas look just like his dad now, or what? Bill Murray looked like he was 15 years older than the last time I'd see him, too.

I don't get to see stars very often, due to no TV and no magazines/newspapers, so when I do see someone, if they have aged at all, it is startling to me, I haven't been seeing it happen year by year.

Anyway, the women looked great to me, except the ones who had so much plastic surgery that they no longer looked real. Most of them looked fantastic though.

----------------------------------------------------

One of our fellow journal keepers, Poker Babe, won a 5k tourney on Stars. Go PB! It was Omaha 8. I think this might be the biggest win among the more grounded players (I'm not including multi-millionaires, etc).

----------------------------------------------------

I have noticed in the poker journal world that some journalers seem to fade away. Their entries get fewer and farther between, and then just stop. I wonder what happened. Most of the time I take an educated guess and figure that they are losing, and their obsession with poker has been replaced with something else. This doesn't just happen with the journal keepers, I see it on poker forums, too. It is just more noticeable when I go to a website which is no longer being updated.

Lots of the journalers are newbies. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. I encourage any newbie to keep a poker journal. The problem that most of them seem to have is being way too results oriented. Any given session to them is a big experience. It's a make or break session. Their moods swing depending on their outcome. Instead of thinking of poker as a lifetime session, they break it down into each playing session and let themselves get emotional over the outcome. Even some of the more experienced players think in terms of "this week" and "this month." While it is just naive to ignore an overall trend in your results, it is also a beginner's trait to base your emotions and reactions on such small samplings.

When I think of each, individual session, I never focus on the results. I focus on my, particular EV of that session. What was my EV? Was it positive for me to play in that game/tourney? How much of an advantage did I really have? What was the rake/juice? When I made this play/that play, was it the right play (regardless of outcome)?

While it may seem to readers that I will write up a story about a particular tourney, and lament over my losing hands, complete with sarcasm and cynicism, in reality, that is only to get a laugh. I never think about losing sessions individually.