Liar Dice - Diary of a Bean Counter!

This is a poker blog, not a blog about family life. But it's important for me to observe that there is a relationship between the two, now.

Last Saturday my wife gave birth to our baby daughter. She is healthy and beautiful and we're all kinds of happy. I can't do justice - here - to what it means to me to be a father, so I won't try.

Things will, naturally, never be the same again.

What does this mean for poker? Well, it would seem obvious to say that I will have less time for it now. But actually it's not quite as simple as that.

The importance of providing for my family is now - as it always has been - uppermost in my mind. But it's also important that I don't make, again, the mistakes of the past. I could look around for the highest paid job right away and aim for the biggest house and the best schools and the smartest clothes for my child. That would be one way of approaching my responsibilities. But there is another way to look at it. For I also have a responsibility to be there for my child, to spend time with her and to nurture her. To ensure that I am not the absent, stressed-out father who works all the hours of the day to buy things (mere objects) for his family. I believe that having enough time to show my love for my family is more important, both to me and to them, than driving them around town in a big, expensive car. That this time is a more important gift than any number of toys could ever be.

And so I have to see whether I can make a compromise between wealth and time in a way that keeps my family well looked-after while keeping me happy and with plenty of time for them. And it's possible - just possible, mind - that poker might hold the key to that.

If I could, with a combination of paid work - most likely part-time - and poker, make enough each month to keep my family happy and healthy then to my way of thinking that would really be something worth achieving. It would mean never having to travel round the country on business, never having to work horrendous hours and never having to come home miserable and stressed. Caveat: I still rate my chances of achieving this as less than 50%, overall. I'm a realist. But, I think the potential upside is so great that it has to be worth a shot.

So, although having a child will most probably mean less time for poker and my return to full-time work, there is a small chance that it might be the other way round: more time at home, less paid work, and... MORE POKER.

BR: $1665.79
Poker earnings (October): $672.22
Poker earnings (October) as proportion of total earnings: 36%
% increase in BR month on month: 62.19%

A big congratulations. I wish you luck with all your goals.

Good evening Tim, I just wanted to add that this is by far the best poker blog I have ever read, your way of writing and the way your mind works around poker is really inspiring and .. Great. I think a lot of readers on this forum find themselves in the same situation with the same mindset.

And also tens of thousands of millions congratulations for your new family member, if you ever bring your family to Milan(I'm a norwegian student living here). Tell me and I'll gladly show you around..

Good Luck with everything!

@RahXephon1: Thanks And I hope your downswing has come to an end. In fact, I'm off to check your blog right now to see...

@Fonyman: Well, I can't ask for a kinder endorsement than that - thanks!
My wife is very fond of Italy, so maybe we'll take you up on that offer some day.

-Tim

Many congratulations on the birth of your daughter Tim.

Best wishes to you, your wife and all the family.

Best regards,

Bart

Originally posted by Tim64
@RahXephon1: Thanks And I hope your downswing has come to an end. In fact, I'm off to check your blog right now to see...

-Tim

Rather don't do it

@EagleStar88: Thanks; I will pass them on :o)

p.s. did I mention we lived spitting distance from the Eagle Star building in Cheltenham?

Hey Tim64

Congrats on the little bundle of joy! Good luck with everything!

Thanks NickParkes, much appreciated

wish you and your new family all the best Tim.

Blatant post made to mark this blog, looks like it will be an awsome read, starting it from the beginning today.

Congradulations on your addition!!

Thanks to <3 and 8979687!

I've been avid readers of both yours for a while now

Originally posted by Tim64
Thanks to <3 and 8979687!

I've been avid readers of both yours for a while now

Thanks for reading, I made it through yours last night and you have the best mindset for this game.
Passing the Illusions of an easy life and making it rich quick and understanding truly what the game is
for you and where it fits into your life, and accepting that with open arms is way later of a stage than
most of us make it to.

Your blog is a truly inspiring read. I have marked it, and now I will follow it for good.

Congratulations on your daughter, Tim!

I am so sad, that I don't have blog in this community. The environment and the blogs of all people, that wroted on this page are just amazing At least I'll keep readin them.

After running horribly the first part of this month - probably playing horribly, too, due to a certain familial distraction of which you have already heard tell in the preceeding chapters of the present tome, I just played a luuuurvely set of SnGs to reduce the drop in my BR this month to a trifling -4.33%.

6 SnGs; placed first twice, second once, and third twice - only failing to cash in one game.

This gave a whopping $192.60 profit for the set and an equivalent hourly rate of $251.22/hr. Shame my overall hourly rate for the $22s is only $19.27... Still, that's still more than I earn in my part-time day job, so I shouldn't complain too much.

Speaking of not complaining, I have also just released $30 of the free 'Holiday Cash' $100 bonus that was placed in my unsuspecting hands the other day by the good people on Tilt. I know that some people have moaned that they didn't get as much of a Bonus as others (e.g. some people got $300 etc.), but my philosophy has always been that you shouldn't look gift-horses in their mouths, and I'm sticking to that. Be thankful for what you get - not resentful that others got more.

BR $1674.82

Hey Tim, I just read the news of your daughter! Congratulations, sir! And also it seems the Sng's are apparently treating you quite better than SSS did, right? Rahx and I have been going through some hard times lately, but nothing we can't overcome.

So, new family, new life eh. I can only imagine how everything changes once you become a father. I wish you and your family all the best.

And, of course, good luck at the tables!

@dandycal;

Thank you, my good friend. Being a father is tough and wonderful at the same time. I can't think of a better incentive to making poker work for me and the family.

SnGs certainly seem to be more my style. But still, getting through the tough times of SSS - losing flip after flip and running under EV for month after month did more for my psycological development as a player than any army interrogation endurance tests could have done...

p.s. I'm keeping an eye on your 10K challenge and hope you make it.

Tim

NickParkes recently wrote:

I remember when a $10 downswing had me wanting to punch walls

How true.

I remember playing the first few sessions of NL2 SSS with a $2.00 stack and the sessions going well and my thinking: this is a total cinch. I also recall a few days later, losing 4 or 5 buyins in a session and seeing that lost $10 as effectively the end of any aspirations to make money playing poker. I remember thinking: "If I can spend a few days earning $10 and then lose it all in one session, what possible hope is there?"

Ten months on and that feeling still tries to take hold of me when I hit a bad run. The first ten days of this month, for example, saw me drop close to $400 - about a quarter of my entire BR. I was running bad, according to HEM, and I knew it. I had reached the mindset that all long-term poker players know so well: when you enter each important all-in situation having the best hand with the honestly-held belief that you will get sucked-out on. (And indeed you do).

In my opinion, there is no cure for this - even for the best pros out there. Variance - though in its essential nature a self-imposed construct of our minds - is, nevertheless, palpable. You can feel it. You sometimes know the moment it arrives, like the first draught of winter slipping in, under the doorframe. And all you can do is wait for it to pass - like a season. Sometimes it's a tropical storm; in and out in a few hours. Other times it drags on like England's monsoon-aspiring damp, rainy autumns.

There is no cure; but there is a treatment. And that treatment is time. The more time that passes, the more downswings you experience and the more times you recover - eventually - and live to ride the updraft back to profitability.

And when your heater arrives, when you're finally sucking out on your opponents - hitting obscure 4 outers on the river to double up and make it to the money - you know it just as well. You feel the power of knowing that whatever you do, the cards will somehow fall your way. You pray it lasts another day even as you know the guilty truth: your heater is his downswing; you are the cause of his darkening mood and self-doubt. His suffering... is at your hands.

BR (courtesy of numerous 'obscure 4 outers' in last 24 hours): $1934.59
ROI $22+2 SnGs (139 games): 13.6%
$/hr: $22.46

haha very well said tim. congratulations on making some guy's last 24hrs hell!

you should be a writer Tim.