Harrier's Blog - Mixed Games & Mixed Drinks

Originally posted by VorpalF2F
This stuff makes a kick-ass Piña Colada
https://www.maliburumdrinks.com/en-ca/

Yeah, I still have a bottle of Malibu at home. Some people like to use it in Piña Coladas as well, but the standard version uses cream of coconut.

There are some drinks that specifically call for a coconut rum like Malibu. Off the top of my head, I can only think of the Bahamas Rum Punch, which I once posted about here in my pre-blogging days, when my cocktails landed in the IDC-thread instead.

I also once tried to use it for a drink that was mentioned on the packaging of some hurricane glasses I once got, called Poison. I have yet to perfect that one. The instructions were very vague, and I only made this one attempt at it so far.

Originally posted by Harrier88
I also once tried to use it for a drink that was mentioned on the packaging of some hurricane glasses I once got, called Poison. I have yet to perfect that one. The instructions were very vague, and I only made this one attempt at it so far.

It once was common for bartenders to ask, "what's your poison?" when a customer comes up to the bar.
I can't imagine the reaction a bartender might have if someone came up and asked, "Please make me a Poison".

Originally posted by VorpalF2F
It once was common for bartenders to ask, "what's your poison?" when a customer comes up to the bar.
I can't imagine the reaction a bartender might have if someone came up and asked, "Please make me a Poison".

That's some Abbott and Costello stuff right there.

Prim and I had enough fun with the Orgasm already, especially the Screaming Orgasm version.

Originally posted by Harrier88

Originally posted by Harrier88
Harrier has a screaming orgasm while Prim is enjoying her wieners.

There hasn't been any poker in the last few days - we'll be back at the tables soon.

In fact, how about we make a goal for the month? Let's make at least ₮100 at OFC in March. We briefly passed this mark last month and finished at ₮94.63, which relied on some outstanding sessions at very fishy tables that we may not get anymore. However, most of it was done at ₮0.02 tables, and by now, I've mostly moved on to ₮0.05, hoping to get back to ₮0.10 soon.

If we do even half as well as last month, making ₮100 should be an attainable goal at these stakes. If I fall significantly short of it, OFC may not be a very good choice for the grind after all, because I might have to rely too much on fishy opponents and favorable variance to do well. But I will look at more factors than just the results.

Meanwhile, let's have one new cocktail already, using some of the stuff I got the other day. This one was served to Primrose yesterday:

It's called a Casino. It involves 40 ml of gin (ideally Old Tom, which is hard to get), 10 ml of Maraschino Luxardo, 10 ml of lemon juice and two dashes of orange bitters. Shake 'em up and pour it over ice in a rocks glass. If you are going to add any garnish, a maraschino cherry and some lemon zest will do well.

I was nearly out of gin, it was barely enough for this drink. Luckily, decent gin is easy to get even in my home town.

Prim liked it. I had a sip, it was all right, but not really my kind of drink. Still a worthy addition to the menu, many drinks I serve are intended for guests only.

Lemon juice and Maraschino together?
Sounds odd.

Originally posted by VorpalF2F
Lemon juice and Maraschino together?
Sounds odd.

Well, they're both only minor ingredients, used in small parts. The gin is the main feature.

I repeat: The booze was great!

First OFC session after the short break. For some reason, Saturdays often don't go well for me at the tables, and tonight was no exception.

I only got a few very brief games in at CoinPoker, against two opponents who would leave immediately after winning. They still left me 31 points in the red. I found a nano stakes table at SwC instead, where I was at least able to play for a while, but it didn't go any better, leaving me with a 60 points loss.

Perhaps I got a little rusty at OFC, but it is hard to tell after this one session, of course. Maybe I will actually find some opponents tomorrow so I can find out.

Originally posted by Harrier88
First OFC session after the short break. For some reason, Saturdays often don't go well for me at the tables, and tonight was no exception.

I used to notice the same thing about Saturdays. So much so that for a long while I took Saturdays off.
What is different about Saturdays?

I came to the conclusion that people were not playing "predictably" — in other words, not playing using common sense.
This showed up in three ways:
 Playing too many hands
 Betting too large
 Bluffing too much
 All of the above.
The trick (for me, playing mostly 5-Card Draw at the time I did this) was to both tighten up and attack far more strongly with what good hands I had.
It seemed to work — well except for those time when they actually had good hands 🤮😭

I've no way of knowing how (or even if) this applies to OFC, just an observation from a few years ago.

Originally posted by VorpalF2F
What is different about Saturdays?

I came to the conclusion that people were not playing "predictably" — in other words, not playing using common sense.
This showed up in three ways:
 Playing too many hands
 Betting too large
 Bluffing too much
 All of the above.

I don't think that other players playing more poorly in any way whatsoever can be considered a good reason for worse results in the long run, no matter how we justify it. I'm not even sure if the bad recs flocking to the tables on weekends are still a thing, because in my experience, it almost seems like in recent years, traffic is worse on weekends, not better.

In my case, it seems much more likely that the problem lies with me, not my opponents. Saturdays are my designated rest days where I don't even turn on my computer until some time in the early evening. I may just not be in the best mindset for a good poker grind coming out of that. In fact, with me not being that pressed for free time on my regular weekdays anymore, taking Saturdays off from poker entirely might be a good idea.

I haven't played any OFC in almost a week before tonight, so it is also possible that I just wasn't in the zone anymore. But maybe I just got some bad cards this time. Also, I find bad traffic a little tilting in general, which may have been a factor. We'll see how things play out in the next few days.

Originally posted by Harrier88
I don't think that other players playing more poorly in any way whatsoever can be considered a good reason for worse results in the long run, no matter how we justify it. I'm not even sure if the bad recs flocking to the tables on weekends are still a thing, because in my experience, it almost seems like in recent years, traffic is worse on weekends, not better.

In my case, it seems much more likely that the problem lies with me, not my opponents. Saturdays are my designated rest days where I don't even turn on my computer until some time in the early evening. I may just not be in the best mindset for a good poker grind coming out of that. In fact, with me not being that pressed for free time on my regular weekdays anymore, taking Saturdays off from poker entirely might be a good idea.

Agreed. The problem lay with me as well.
I failed to adjust properly to their poor play, and as a consequence my results suffered.
Sometimes I over-compensated, and just assumed that because they were playing poorly, I could widen my range, and up my aggression. Not always the case.

That went a lot better today, I started with a good 190 points session at ₮0.05. One highlight (which happened at ₮0.02 later on) included trip aces on top in one hand, which is the best possible hand you can get there, and almost as valuable as a Royal Flush in the back:

A later ₮0.05 session didn't go so well, losing me 38 points again, but we still made a nice profit of almost ₮10 today, and briefly passed 4K points in profit for the year. We're still very close to it.

Badugi had an early cooler which crippled my stack, from which we made a great recovery. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough to earn us any cashes or bounties after all. This isn't too bad, though, as we had an unlikely session saver in the HORSE Race tonight. I'm usually just playing this as a fun little challenge with Prim without expecting any noteworthy results, but tonight was different.

I didn't play very well in my two Five Card Draw SNGs, but managed to get my crap together eventually in the second one, so I could secure a 1st place in there after all. Altogether, it was a profitable day.

I would have played some more OFC after my tourneys, but not after that deep run. Time to grab a small bottle of beer and hit the bed, it will be back to work tomorrow.

.

Again?

Wow, you're right. Almost makes one wonder why I even bother with poker.

Thank you. And thank you very much, Pokerstrategy.

$200 in a fortnight - that post EV is working out well my friend. Congratulations!

Oh boy, didn´t write "congratulations" here, only over there (in the comment section of the article). Super cool.

Congratulations!

Thank you very much! I already considered counting those $150 OFC as OFC winnings and declaring my monthly goal to be met.

After this afternoon's session, it seems like this would be the only possible way. Yesterday's good winnings are gone again. My graph for the year still looks good overall, but no progress has been made since game 77, which occurred two weeks ago.

My points graph looks less swingy because it doesn't take stakes into account. This one shows some very modest gains during this time.

This is exactly what I mentioned before, that I'm concerned that my good results earlier on may rely too much on bad opponents at really low stakes, as well as good variance, and that I may not have a significant edge otherwise. I guess we'll see by the end of the month if this game turns out to be worth playing.

In the meantime, I think I should get back to Badugi, Five Card Draw, Stud Hi-Lo and maybe 8-Game or possibly something new entirely on Stars - without giving up on the OFC experiment, of course, because I'm genuinely curious.

Oh well, at least I solved my gin problem today:

I intended to get some Bombay Sapphire to begin with, but I was surprised that their regular London dry gin wasn't available today - just some lemon-infused stuff. I guess Finsbury will do fine for now.

I'm far from being a Gin expert but I would have to say Bombay Sapphire is up there on the list.

It was one of our most popular sellers in my retail job - definitely a refreshing choice.

Curious as to your top 3 here? Can go top 5 if you wish ♦

Originally posted by UPAY4DINNER
I'm far from being a Gin expert

So am I, honestly. I rarely drink gin straight, but it is a very versatile ingredient in cocktails that finds many uses.

Mind you, I didn't even go for quality drinks until a few years ago, when I took mixing cocktails more seriously and got into a more stable financial situation.

From what I can tell, though, Bombay Sapphire really is up there. I had it once at a relative's wedding.

Can you give me some recommendations on good Irish whiskey, while we're at it? The local stores carry Tullamore Dew, which seems good enough, but maybe there are some better ones out there that I might find on my next trip to the bigger store.