Some interesting facts

Today I read in Discovery that statistically speaking, beautiful couples have daughters as their first child while engineers, mathematicians, violent & big people have sons. Since I am big, and an engineer I am assuming I am going to have a son.

Also, the other day I read in a book that left handed people get 15% higher salaries than a right handed person. No explanation was provided because they did not have one to offer. This explains a lot, since medieval ages, righties have been punishing lefties; I even remember a senior back home telling me how the nuns at school used to hit lefties with a ruler until they stopped using it. We lefties have been the envy of righties for centuries because we are smarter, why else would we get paid more for the same job 

I wonder if lefty poker players are more successful…

Superpowers

Yesterday night I was watching a show called ‘Heroes’. In this show a group of people discover they have unusual powers such as painting the future, immortality, flying, bending time in space and mind reading.

My question to you…as a poker player, what superpower would you chose?

I can confidently guess most of you would choose the power of mind reading. Indeed this is the power that would make you a great poker player, even maybe the greatest. As David Slansky wrote in his book ‘The Theory of Poker’:

Every time you play your hand different than if you could see their hands; they gain.
Every time you play your hand exactly the same as if you could see their hands; they loose.
Every time your opponent plays different than if they could see your hand; they loose.
Every time your opponent plays exactly the same as if they could see your hand; they win.

How a perferct play can be no good enough

Both players played the hand perfectly, but sometimes stuff like that happens in poker. Well i guess 10 grands well spend Hudson.

Listen to the dealer!!!

Everyone has a poker moment that he will remember forever. My first Kodak moment was my first winning at casino Niagara with a KJo against a QQ. I cashed out $1,200 that night.

Another moment was on Poker Extravaganza week. I was getting very bad hands, I think I got faces cards less than a dozen times in 3 hours. Then one hand came A6s, I was in the small blind, everyone limped in so I decided to bluff (I was getting really bored and I need to change my table image quick.). The blinds were 1-2. The pot had $19, so I raised it to $7; big blind folded, one guy reraised to $15, three other guys called so it was to me. So my pot odds were ~ 11-1, I thought that even if the odds where there, that I was beaten by a big pocket since there was a reraise and 3 calls, so I was going to fold when Gary – the dealer – said “Come on, you gotta play that hand look at the odds.”

I was surprised that a dealer would say that, I thought they were not allowed to give advice in the table. So I said to myself what the heck, just for Gary, so I called…. Guess what the flop came….

6 6 6

I flopped quads! I couldn’t believe it, I admit I got lucky but if I did not play that hand I would be on a tilt right then. So now the question was hiow do I get the most money out of them?
Since I was first to act, I called $5, my explanation was that if I checked and then called or raised they would know I have a hand but by calling with a small bet like that they would think I want to steal. So someone raised to $10 and everyone called, of course I called; the pot was up to $134. the turn came a brick, I bet $10, one guy calls, and everyone else folds, my mistake L - the pot became $154, the river came a J and when I checked the guy it looked like he liked that river so i knew he had a jack. He had $80 left but I was afraid if I go all-in he wouldn’t call so I just bet $45 assuming he would go all in since he would be pot committed. To my surprise he just calls – as I expected he had a full house 6s full of jacks. I made $244 in that hand which is not a lot compared to other hands but I liked the fact that I got lucky thanks to the dealer…hahaha
p.s. I tipped him $10.

Poker Extravaganza Week

Here is a summary of my Poker Extravaganza week. I don't talk about plays and hands, I MAY in a later post.


Day 1 & 2: -$170 ; was doing pretty good but t someone got really lucky and rivered my all-in full boat – the pot was $1200

Day 3: +$1,380 ; I got some marginal hands that I played to perfection and got me a lot of money. I lost a lot playing qualifiers for the WPT Canadian Open.

Day 4: - $290 ; after I made close to $800 in cash games in less than 3 hours, I went and played $330 qualifiers for the WPT Canadian Open

Day 5: No poker today – had an appointment with citizenship.

Day 6: +$850 ; pure solid poker

Days 7, 8 & 9: I dedicated these days for the tournament, after losing $500, I finally made it to the main event….I am going to the WPT Canadian Open J

Day 10: Today I wake up exhausted,I didn’t really know why but I was really exhausted. I checked my PDA and I had a tournament in the Nuttz poker club at U of T. It is an easy tournament; 50 people, buy-in 50 bucks and a lot of novice people. Then I looked myself in the mirror and I knew I was done poker for that week. My face was terrible; red puffy eyes, pale face as white as snow and my shirt was up side down.

So I decided not to play and give a call to Sophia. We agreed to go for Sushi. She got sushi and I got my favorite plate; sushi and lots of sashimi. After food we walked around and talked, later I met Mika and went to the mall.

Very unproductive day…poker-wise.

15 Signs You Play Too Much Poker

This was in the Full Contact Poker newsletter, i wanted to share it with you guys, enjoy. According to this, I AM playing too much poker.

1. You start classifying people on your life as "weak-tight" or "loose-passive," even when they've never set foot in a poker room.

2. You use the phrase "bad beat" when lending a sympathetic ear to a friend.

3. The guy on TV didn't win the lottery, he had the "nut ticket."

4. It's been more than 24 hours since the first time you told yourself "Just one more round and then I'll get some sleep."

5. Your two ATM cards and five credit cards have all reached their maximum cash advance for the day.

6. You figure if your family leaves you that will give you more time and money and you can move up to a bigger limit.

7. You have 12 games on your computer, solitaire, minesweeper, and 10 poker games.(that's me...hahaha)

8. Your kids are named Check and Raise.

9. Your bathroom library consists of Card Player and Poker Digest.

10. The only reason you go to your in-law's for Thanksgiving is for the nickel, dime, quarter game after dinner.

11. Or because they live closer to Oceans 11.

12. You are having such a bad day at hold 'em that you decide to take a break...and play Omaha.

13. Your sweetie gets a certain look in her eye and you think it means that she want to go to the cardroom.

14. You have nightmares about your cards changing during the hand.(that happened to me too...weird)

15. You have a poker chip in your pocket right now.

Poker Extravaganza Week, Oct 6th to Oct 15th

I was thinking of what to do for this vacation. I was planning to travel to Chile visit my bro or go to Europe but my current situation doesn’t allow me to go anywhere outside Canada. So I came up with the best holyday idea – POKER EXTRAVAGANZA WEEK.

What is poker extravaganza week? I will be taking my vacation from Oct 6th to Oct 15th, in those 10 days all I will be doing is play poker but not online, I will go back to play real games. For these 10 days I will go to Casino Niagara, Fallsview casino and an underground spot here in Toronto. In those days I will go to any games I can hear about and if I do well enough, I will fly to the some casinos in Alberta and visit some of my friends. Also, if my game is tight I will try some of the satellite tournaments they have in Casino Niagara for the WPT Canadian Open.

I am getting ready for Poker Extravaganza week doing the following:
1. Bankroll: I will shorten my bankroll for that week to JUST $1,000. I play better with a small bankroll, I don’t bluff that much J

2. Preparation: I am going to finish 2 books I have been reading:
Killer Poker
Hold’em Poker for Advanced Player

3. Practice: I WILL NOT play poker from now till OCT 6th, I want my head to be fresh to play for 10 days straight so all I will be doing in the meanwhile is practice. I will practice on free-rolls, play money games and simulating hard situations I encountered before using Hold’em Calculatem.

So people be ready to the best 10 posts you are ever goping to read about poker. They will be full of games, excitement, girls (I love girls that play poker at casinos), lust and bluffs.

A day in the poker life of EVH (that's me)

I came back from work tired and smelling like burnt plastic. I ate a delicious salad, watched some TV and then jumped on my leather chair, grabbed my wireless keyboard and logged in at Full Contact Poker. I entered a low stake Pot limit ring game (0.25+0.25 PL), the table was full of lose aggressive players, it took me 30 bucks to find that out but I decided to stay at that table because I knew how to get my money back. I switched my game from passive to aggressive almost every 5 minutes, I was calling pockets and raising with suited connectors and my raising was inconsistent so they were lost. Of course I was playing regular poker with absolutely no bluff with the couple of amateurs at the table.

After 30 minutes I knocked out 3 guys and crippled the ex-chip leader with quads I got at the flop. I just let them raise and re-raise into themselves while I was partying it on my chair and seen that pot getting bigger and bigger. At the river one guy went all in and then the other two followed suit. There was 2 full houses, one Ace high flush and my dear quads. I made enough money to enter the high stake tournament I wanted to play.

After 7 minutes in the game, I was short stacked, i went all in with pocket tens and someone rivered me L , I finished 7^th (it was a single table tournament). With the left over from my previous winning I went to some ring games, after 20 minutes I made a fat profit. When I decided to leave, I saw these entire 2-people table, so I entered one just to watch. Before I entered I was expecting to watch professionals playing for that much money (2,000+) but I was surprised that they had no clue how to play.

So I decided to try it out. I entered a table where my opponent had five folds my stack but I was confident I would get the money. I start using my strategy for showdowns in tournaments which is ALWAYS RAISE NO MATTER WHAT YOU HAVE AND LET THEM FOLD LIKE LITTLE GIRLS. When he noticed what I was doing it was too late, we were almost equal in chips. I was temped to leave with the profit but I knew so much about his game that I wanted to stick around a bit.

I was fishing a lot…I mean I was fishing every single hand. My opponent had no clue what were hand and pot odds; he wasn’t betting enough and he would fold whenever I show I have even a pair. Finally he took his money back with a K high straight while I had the 10 high straight L . But I was confident I would get it back. I forgot about the lose and I went back to my game but this time he believed I was on a tilt so he was calling more of my raises. Thanks to that and a pocket 8s I made a nice profit before he left the table. Too bad.

I was ready to leave the table when a guy came in with 60 bucks (i had 500+). I said to myself ‘ok one more hand.’ – I got a pocket jacks…NICE :) the flop was A 7 9[all hearts], he was first, he bet $1, I raised to $5 and he calls, the turn was a 5, he checks and I bet $5 and he calls. By this time I put him on a straight draw. Next card is a J, he goes all-in and I sit there for a second analyzing the game. I had a feeling he had nothing, he was on a draw and he didn’t make it.

Let’s analyse this

Common card were A795J

He could beat me with KQ, AA, KK & 87 however, I WASN’T FEELING IT, so I called and it turned out he had QT, what a moron :)

Understanding your limits

Yesterday I had a great start, I won 2 ring games, then I won a high stakes tournament. I made a decent profit for one day [it took me almost 3 hours]. Later that night, I was tired but decided to play a bit – BAD DECISION. After I lost the first time, I was on a tilt. At the end I lost everything I made that day [I made a $3 profit J ]. This lead me to today’s topic. How do you know when it is enough?

As you all already know, I am a reliability engineer. Part of what I do is to record work done on equipment and from those records I analyze the history of the equipment so I can come up with the best action [rebuilding, replacing or performing a preventative maintenance] on the equipment. I have been able to increase the production and the uptime of most of our manufacturing lines thanks to that history that I created. This is a good illustration on the importance of building a history with useful data.

Most poker players keep a record of their winnings that’s why I started recording my poker winnings since i was 18. I have been developing what I record and I believe I finally came up with the ideal spreadsheet.

Following is what I record in my spreadsheet for each entry:
Date
Profit/lose [if it was either from ring games or tournaments, and what was the entry fee]
Time
Profit per hour
Location where I played [house game, casino or online (for online I specify the site)]

Also I record the frequency of winning and losing in tournaments (single tables and multiple tables in different indicators), see previous post to see what’s the benefit of this metric.

From this data I can conclude what method is the most profitable for me (so far it has been house games with online at Full Contact Poker a close second). Also, I can conclude my overall profit and my profit per month.

Now back to the first question, How do you know when it is enough?

Using this database and performing some statistical tools, it came up that my optimum profit was at 3.25 hours (3 hours and 15 minutes). And going back to yesterday it makes perfect sense. I made the peak at 2.8 hours, then I lost everything from then to hour six.

So my recommendation is to record the location and the time you spend everyday playing and what is your profit for that day and from that come up with your poker strategy.
If you have more metrics in your records I would love to hear what they are and discuss their benefits.

Delicious chinese food.

You may be wondering why i haven't posted anything in 25 days? the answer is really simple - i have been too busy. I have been fine tuning my online game and i have been studying players' behaviours very carefully. First i started keeping a record of my % of tournament winnings, i already have a poker record but it doesn't specify tournaments. So i found out that my tournamnet winning rate is 27% [sample population was 55 tournaments] which is close to 1 out of every 4 tournaments.

Since January, August has been the first month with a steady profit. The reason for the change is my new method of playing. Here is my game plan. I already got people laughing at it, but it works for me:

Statistically, i win 1 game of every 4 i play. Therefore, i start the day with a $20+2 tournament,and i will continue to play 20+2 games till i loose 3 times, then i will play 50+5. Regardless of the outcome of the last tournament i will return to 20+2 games till i lose 3 times.

What is my phylosophy behind that tactic?

A lot of players they start the day with high stake tournaments and when their bankroll is low they will switch to low stake games. The following example illustrates my point.

(Some of you were getting confused about this, so i made the math clearer)
Regular player
lose 50+5 = -55
lose 50+5 = -55
lose 50+5 = -55
win 20+2 = +88
-----------------
net profit = -77

Me
lose 20+2 = -22
lose 20+2 = -22
lose 20+2 = -22
win 50+5 = 195
------------------
net profit = 129

You may say my method is flawed since you cannot predict that you will always lose the first 3 times and win the 4th game - think about it by answering the following 3 questions.

What is the probability you will fip tails one time? 50%
What is the probability you will fip tails two times in a row? 50% x 50% = 25%
What is the probability you will fip tails three times in a row? 50% x 50% x 50% = 12.5%

According to your history you know your winning rate is 25% so you know you will win one game out of approximetely four [assuming that losing three times in a row doesn't affect your game]. So each time you lose, your winning chances increase [ as illustrated below]. It is the same principle like betting double the last bet on the same color in the roullette.

The odds of losing on time = 77%
The odds of losing 2 times in a row = 77% x 77% = 59%
The odds of losing 3 times in a row = 77% x 77% x 77% = 45%
and for the 4th, 5th and 6th time the probability of losing are 35% , 27% & 20%

If you have any comments i really would like to hear them, good or bad.

As for the picture at the top of this post, I went for chinese today, it was delicious.
Hahaha

Tournaments vs. Ring games.

Every serious poker player keeps a record of his loss/winnings. Every month I take a look at it to see how good I am doing. This month I saw a pattern that I never realized before; I am a better tournament player than a ring player. Combining my house games, online and live tournaments, I win 3 times as often as regular ring games in the casino or online.

As a matter of fact, my records show that I haven’t lost a single house game since April 2004. That may be because I usually play with the same people and friends (it is so easy to learn your friends tells J). But the same is true for ring games at the casino; almost always I end up playing with a table were 70% of the players I played against before but I still don’t win 100% of the time as in house games.

When I start thinking about it, it all make sense. In a tournament you will play the same players for an extended period of time, meanwhile in a ring game I’ve seen people changing tables in less than 30 minutes!!!! Therefore, it is harder to build a reliable history on players betting habits and tells.

In addition, I believe that tournaments are mercier on you than a ring games. I have dozens of examples where I did several mistakes and was the lowest stack in the table and I end up wining the tournament. However, a bad decision in a ring game tend to cost you all your stack.

Tournaments change gears all the time, making the table more dynamic. In a ring game you play virtually 8-10 people all the time which may lead to boredom or playing crappy/marginal hands. However, in tournaments, the number of players keeps going down changing the value of hands, betting amounts and the odds leading you to stay alert in the action all the time. Also, don’t forget the blinds which keep increasing with time!

Finally, I noticed it is easier to be patient in tournaments because as long as you are in the table you are winning. However, in ring games, chip stack is the winning indicator and as a lot of players had found out over centuries, it can be very volatile. This change in chip stack will affect your winning state of mind leading you to play more hands trying get your stack back.

One last word, when I mention tournaments in this post, I refer to single-table tournaments. I consider multi-table tournaments a hybrid between single-table tournaments and ring games. The speed of the game keeps changing because the blinds keep going up. And watching more and more tables being merged gives you a winning feeling. Once, you get to the last table, it becomes a single-table tournament and you should change your tactics accordingly.

BEST street festival ever.

On July 9th I went to the Street Festivasl here in Toronto. It was great, great singers, great talents and great music. It was an enriching experience.

When I went to listen to some beirut tunes in one of the stages, old ladies were dancing and trying to bellydance which i found really cute, then this skinny white dude jumps in attemping to arab dance, i never saw arab dancing being so enjoyable to watch so I taped it and uploaded it on YouTube.com, I linked it here. SO ENJOY and leave me a comment.

What to do when you hit the plateau?

Yesterday I was watching UFC 61 the first couple of fights were neat, however, the last fights were horrible; since both fighters were so good the fight became a boxing match, no one was on the ground, there were no good combos and nothing exciting.

This got me thinking. This years World Cup was not that exciting to watch as well. Why? Because of the lack of goals. Every team is using the same advanced defense techniques that makes it really hard to score. That’s why now the soccer community is thinking of new ways of making this sport exciting again since it hit the plateau.

There is plateau in anything you do; when you are on a diet, you hit a plateau, when you work out, again, there will be a plateau. And of course, there is a plateau in poker.

Lately, I was analyzing the players on my table at Casino Niagara. Disregarding he drunk college boy, every one on my table was playing exactly the same way. They tried to be random, being unpredictable, forgetting the odds and the stats…etc. At this level poker becomes a game of pure luck. As a beginner, poker (specially Texas Hold’em) is a lot about luck. As you advance in the game and adapt new techniques, the game becomes more predictable and more skill-oriented. However, as the poker community gains these skills, these new techniques are not as effective leading to the creation of new more advanced techniques.

Nowadays, I personally believe we reached a level were the game of Texas Hold’em has developed too much neutralizing the skill part of it and increasing the luck factor.

I believe that the new techniques that will rejuvenate poker are in NLP (neuro-linguistic programming). I am saying this because I have used it for years in poker and it works wonders.

For example, you flop a monster hand, but when you bet everyone folds so you end up winning a small pot. How can you maximize your winnings? By making your opponents bet. You can try making your opponents bet by commanding them to bet which I don’t see woking or you can persuade them to bet by using neuro-linguistic programming. Also, if you bluffed a pot ad would like your opponent to fold. You may attempt to tell him not to play it, or you can persuade him using NLP.

Finally, NLP will elevate poker to the next level. I don’t know what will be the next step after everyone uses NLP. Maybe a modified version of the currently game theory. We just have to wait and see.

Would you gamble 1 million?

Let’s imagine you won a million dollars in the lottery. Now assume that Donald Trump comes to you and challenges you to flip a coin, heads you win, tails he wins. If you win, he will give you 10 million dollar; however, if you loose you give him your one million dollar. Would you accept this challenge?

From a probabilities point of view you should accept the challenge since you get a 10:1 for the money with a 50% success, that is, you get 10 times the money you bet for a challenge that you would win half the time.

However, from a psychological point of view, should you accept it? It depends on the person. How many million dollars you have? How long does it take you to make one million? Are you willing to lose your one million? Everyone has a different perspective of life therefore we would see some people accepting the challenge (Type A), and some won’t (Type B).

In poker, we run into both types of people, from my personal experience, I never seen successful type B poker players. There is a saying, it takes money to make money and I completely believe it is true in poker. Saving your chips and never risking it is just going to shrink your stack by the hour. However, type A players are the players that you see having a huge stack in front of them or stands up and leaves the game very early. One good example of a type A poker player is Phil Ivey; in tournaments you either see him with a huge stack early in the tournament or you see him out the game in a couple of hours or even minutes!

Even though, type A is the way to go in poker. Sometimes, players (especially me) become type B for a moment. A good example was summer 2005 where an old experiences player went all-in(~$1,000), I knew he had pocket jacks or lower (I had a tell on him therefore I knew he didn’t have anything bigger), I had AKs, so if my assumption was correct it was a coin flip. The pot had $500 before he went all-in; therefore I was getting 1.5:1 for a 50% success. Probabilities-wise, I should have played, but emotional-wise I was too attached to my winnings.

p.s. He showed pocket tens.

A word about online poker

(This article was adopted from http://www.GambleWIKI.com.)

Since early February I had no time to go to Casino Niagara, therefore I've been playing online at PokerRoom.com and PartyPoker.com. So far this year I am in the negative -thanks to online poker. Actually if it wasn't for my casino winnings earlier this year; I would have been in the big negative.

So the question is; Is online poker for me?
I think I could be a good online player since I always make a profit in the first hour I play, then it goes downhill. What is it? maybe I have no patience, maybe I get tired after that or I just get bored.

Consider these points before playing online poker:

1. '''It can be very very addictive.''' Online gambling is more dangerous than live gambling because you tend to play more often (the computer is right in your house) and you can play whenever you want. Also, people tend to forget that the numbers in the screen is ACTUAL money so they tend to play loose.

2. '''Cheating is wide spread in online gambling.''' It is easier for more than one individual to play on the sae table and help each other through the phone or instant messeger. My recommendation to avoid such a situation is to play big tables, that is, 10 people in the table. Also,those tables are EASY to identify when you recognize check re-raise a lot among certain players.

3. '''Online poker can mke you or break you very easy.''' If you don't have patience, discipline and a solid strategy then it would be hard in online poker to make a steady cash flow, same goes for live games to a certain extent.

4. '''Get a CHEAP and FAST method to get money IN & OUT of the net.''' If you are not wise with your transactions you can lose a big portion of your winnings to admistritative and processing fees. Study each deposit site carefully, I personally use NETELLER.

GambleWiki - the ultimate gambling portal

Two days ago, Moneer and I decided that there was not a good gambling poker on the net. Our decision? create one. GambleWIKI.com is the ultime gambling portal on the net.

If you are curious about the history of gambling....GambleWIKI.com
If your friends use poker lingo and you feel like a bum...GambleWIKI.com
If you want to make some coin...GambleWIKI.com
If you want to donate some of that coin...GambleWIKI.com
If you want to share some strategies...GambleWIKI.com
If you would like to arrange house games...GambleWIKI.com

I would like to take the opportunity to metion that GambleWIKI.com does not encourage gambling in any way.GambleWIKI.com will help you be more educated in your gambling and know more about the history of gambling.

I hope that some of my beloved readers will become contributors at the gambling portal; GambleWIKI.com

Business talk

So I am into entrepeneur mode right now. And luckily they got this guy who started 4 businesses that is an alumni from my Uni to give a speach at some class of mine. There is one thing that he said that really got my attention,'If you have an idea just execute it. And just care about doing the first little transaction, do not care about later. If you do that first transaction then that would mean that you just opened your first business. Afterwards, everything gets easier.' So right now, I am trying to do that first transaction. Things are going slow since I need to go to a lot of places and try to make deals with people about something that I have no idea about. I have a friend that knows a lot about that, he is going to help me; actually his father is in that line of business. We'll see how things turn out.

Proyecto Uno

I have been considering this for a while, do my MBA and get a strategic management consulting job for 150k a year or open my own business. Long time ago I realized that I am a lousy worker; I don't let anyone boss my around even the biggest boss, I believe that's why I have so much respect in the company.

When people ask me 'where you see yourself in 5 years?' I give some diplomatic ansdwer that they all like, but later when I am thining about the question, I see myself owing my own company where the longer I work the more money I make, contrary to being employeed. I see myself having 100 employees working fr me, having a great company that provides a great service to the customers, my employees and the comunity.

I have tons of ideas but most of them need capital. Finally, last week I decided that I needed an action plan, so I picked one idea from my ideas vault (yes i have my brainstormed ideas with detailed business plans saved somewhere just in case) i do that because when the opportunity comes along there is no time for preparation; and that opportunity came earlier this week.

I was playing poker at PokerRoom, I was up by $300 in a 2-5NL game when I got a call from my friend. She called me because i asked her for help finding a place to lease in Bay St., the conversation went something like this,

(M=me, F= friend)
F= May I speak to EvolvedHomoSapien.
M=Speaking
F=Hi I am from Colliers, I am calling regarding your request for 4,000 sqt. office space for lease in Bay St.
M= Oh, it is you, how are you?
F=Nothing much. So why do you want that space?
M=I am planning to open a restaurant there.
F=Oh dear, i wouldn't do that, restaurants have the biggest turn over. But listen come tonight to this concert I am going with my boyfriend, you can talk to him about that, he knows a lot about that.
M=Alright, see you there.

That night i went to that concert, it was pretty awesome, good music, nice people and a vibe that filled the air with pure energy. One of the guys singing was her ex-boss, he was a pretty good singer. Well we stayed there listening to music, drinking domestic beer and singing along with the musicians, it was a good time.

In the break, her boyfriend and I started talking about business stuff and he told me about his 2 companies, how he started and all the details. After I pitched my ideas he offered to help me with my credit history through his contacts since he believed I had some good ideas for a business.

Later we went for dinner to the MarketPlace, such a nice place. I got a personalized made deluxe pizza, so delicious. We spend 2 more hours talking, it was such a nice night full of controversial topics, food and alcohol.

I went back home knowing that if I start one of this ideas I wouldn't need the MBA anymore. I emailed my brother and told him about the details and he started to work from his end of the rope. Our project was on its way...Proyecto Uno had been borned.

TTC = Take That Cock!

Woke up early, was sleepy, was hungry and was thirsty. After 30 minutes I was out the door and heading to work. I was pulling the station's door but it wouldn't, i tried pushing and again didn't open. I was still sleepy so I didn't know what was going on; for a second I thought it was Sunday and not monday, I was confused. Then i noticed all the people outside, I realized the operator or collect guy might have forgotten to open the door, so I called the TTC and a surprising message went like this "Welcome to the TTC customer service. All TTC services are closed due to a Union strike". I was pissed big time...it wasn't just for the fact that now it would be a dilemna to get to work but in addition that I hated the TTC union- here is the story:

Fresh from university I joined the TTC as a senior technical assistant in the maintenance departmet. At first I was so happy; good company, excellent pay, health benefits, pension and the whole nine yards. It didn't take me more than a couple of months to realize what a mess it was in there. There were a lot of contributing factors but the big factor was the union. The union at the TTC is really strong. Just as an ilustration, they don't care about anything-it is virtually impossible to fire a union guy. Therefore they would spent a great portion of their time taking a nap at trains scheduled for maintenance and cleaning. In a nutshell, they are the laziest workers I have ever seen in my experience.

Surely, the union was a big factor for me to quit that slow-pace job but there were many more important factors I may discuss in a later post. Going back to the topic of why i dislike that union is that they dare to strike AGAIN after just one year. However, i shouldn't blame them, it is the fault of management, a wiseman once told me 'management gets the union they deserve'. One big fault I noticed in TTC management is that they allow being tosed around by the union, that fact by itself is the mere reason why the union has been able to get away with what it had so far.

Well anyways, once I realized there was no TTC to work I started evaluating options, first I thought of taking a cab but after 5 minutes of waiting I noticed all the cabs were already taken and it was uncertain how long it would take me before getting one. So I tried the Mississauga transit. At first, I spent 10 minutes planning my route to work; I had to take the 11A to Derry Rd. and Rexwood then I would take another bus, the 12E to work. Well that trip took me more than an hour; not because of the route, it was due to the service, there was a 30 minute gap between busses!

As for coming back from work, it was the peak of this experience. First, I thought that TTC was back since I saw some TTC buses on the street. After 45 minutes of waiting I called TTC info and the message said the service will resume the next day at 6am. I was surprised and curious what all those TTC buses where doing then.

Well then I walk for 20 minutes to a Missisauga transit bus, waited there for 25 minutes, got in the bus, got off at Derry Rd. and Rexwood, waited 30 minutes, missed my bus (was seating in the wrong stop!) so I decided to go to Wendy's get some fuel. Got a Single Classic with large fries and a large sprite. Finally I got home at 8pm. What a day.

Begginer's luck or psychic skills.

Today I met the worst luckiest player ever.
At the poker table I was completely dominating the table...I had tells, I played any two cards making profit, I bluffed on and off position.

Then, a skinny little blondie came sat beside me-she had no clue how to bet and to play. I knew she wasn't acting, she was a complete disaster. After a couple of hands I noticed that she called every hand and hoped to get lucky, I was so happy-it was gonna be like stealing candy from a baby.

I had the dealer button and I had pocket 5s. Everyone called and when it came to her she raised it to $12 (the big blind was $2) I was right after her, I called since I just wanted to sneak with it and make a lot of money if I get a set. Everyone else folded, it was the two of us.

The flop was 9 5 6 rainbow. At first I thought it was a bad flop since She could have a straight, BUT then I realized she raised to $12 before the flop- she HAD to have pocket kings, pocket aces, big slick or any other big cards; so I wasn't really concerned. She bet $15, I raised to $45, she called. A BIG tell when she called was her hand shaking-an alarm started beeping in my head.

The turn was a 10. After seeing her shaky hand while betting I realised that she had the straight, damn me, how could I get in that trap, and HOW could she have a straight if she raised before the flop? She bet $15, I called because I could still make the nuts, I had 8 outs so i had a 18% of making the nuts and I had good pot odds. The river was king, I didn't make it, she showed an 8 7 OFF-SUITED. I was so surprised and dissapointed. I motivated myself by realizing that she just got lucky and I played my hand the proper day.

After that hand I left with a $10 profit for the day :(