Charles Town Session 14 (May 26, 2012):
Given a 3 day Memorial Day Weekend, I decided to play a lot of poker, partly to prepare myself for my Vegas trip next month. I decided to spend a longer session at Charles Town on Saturday, and arrived at 11:00. Neither the 1-2 nor the 2-5 list was long yet, so I decided to play 1-2 to start, with the hope that I could feast on the holiday weekend fish.
Honestly, I don't remember much of what happened in the first couple of hours. There weren't many interesting hands, as I was largely card dead, both in terms of hole cards and in terms of flops. Regardless, I built my stack to around 500 after buying in for 260. I'd already been leaking chips away for a while given the cold deck, but I'd actively been trying to stay patient. It was all downhill from then.
-Hand #1-
I'm dealt 74o in the big blind. Villain sits two seats to my left with about 250 and limps early position. Someone raises to 7 and about 5 of us see the flop.
Flop comes K74 with a flush draw. I check, villain leads out with 15 and everyone folds to me. I call. Villain has been an extremely loose player, and not the effective kind of loose. However, with bottom two and large effective stacks, I can't raise OOP. I'm putting villain on K with a T+ kicker, so I'm watching out for high cards.
Turn comes a non-flush card Q. This is a pretty significant scare card, and while villain has been loose, he's been pretty passive with marginal hands. I check, and he bets 35, which concerns me. Had the turn been a blank, I'd be looking to check raise the turn. However, I can only call given that KQ is entirely within villain's range.
River is a non-flush card 7. Now, I have 7's full. I don't think the 7 is that scary, so I can realistically get a call from a pretty large value bet. I think villain has around 130 behind (he actually has almost 200, which would have increased my bet in hindsight but it doesn't actually affect the results of the hand), so I bet 85. Villain makes some long elaborate speech about how he thinks I must have 74 (which from hindsight I can imagine might cause someone to jump him in a home game, because he has 74 beat, and is slow rolling me since I'm calling regardless), and then shoves. Thinking he has around 50 behind even though he has significantly more, I call and he shows Q7o. WTF? Q7? He played this hand so horribly and ended up lucking out with the perfect sequence of board cards. In hindsight, while a 100+ raise would make me think a little longer about calling, I'd probably be forced to call anyways. Given the way he played the hand, he would have done the exact same thing with any other hand (especially any other non-boat 7). I'm frustrated with the outcome of the hand (he happened to have the case 7 and hit a runner runner against me), but not necessarily with the way I played. After that cooler, I'm actively trying to stay patient, which is obviously a good sign.
About 5 hands later comes the next cooler.
-Hand #2-
I'm dealt AA in late position. I make it 16 after a couple of limps. Only the small blind calls, with about 200-250.
Flop comes K33. Villain leads out for 25, and he's one of the easiest players to read I've played with, and I'm 100% sure he has a K (the kicker doesn't matter whatsoever, given that the paired board makes it so that I don't have to worry about him hitting his kicker). I call, fully expecting him to continue betting.
Turn is a T. As expected, villain bets 45. I call again.
River is a fucking K. Villain bets 75, and I fold face-up, visibly frustrated. Villain shows the K sheepishly.
Normally, one of these hands doesn't rattle me, but collectively (and along with the overall lack of cards and flops), I start going on tilt a little. The plus side is that I notice this, and only donate about 50-100 more than I otherwise would have (while I did lose more chips, a lot of that was unavoidable). As I continue to be card dead, I start loosening up (and still don't hit anything), and after losing another 100 or so, I decide to sign up for 2-5 with the hope that the discomfort with the game can tighten up my game. Unfortunately, the list is much longer than hoped, and I end up playing an extra 30 minutes or so at the 1-2 (even going as far as to sit out a number of hands to keep myself from leaking away even more chips).
Anyways, I finally sit down at my 2-5 table and notice one thing: everyone is big stacked (there was maybe one player with below 400) and a number of players are enormous stacked (1000+). Given that everyone is so big stacked (as opposed to just one or two players), that suggests that most of the players are 2-5 regs, as opposed to some of the weaker players I'd played with in my previous 2-5 sessions. My plan coming in given the field is to play extremely nitty poker.
I buy-in for 300, partly to limit my swings and partly because being the only short stack at a table of big stacks lets me take advantage of small stack poker (since everyone is both big stacked and LAG, I can wait for premium hands and reraise preflop). I fold about 2 full rounds preflop before I even see my first flop. I build an extreme rep at the table for being really tight, and I use that to my advantage. I win a couple of pots preflop just by 3-betting (albeit with actually good hands, like QQ) and from showing down a hand with a turned straight on a board of 4578, but without betting/raising once during the hand (part of it was because I didn't want to get reraised on the river, and part of it was that I wanted to reraise the river). Instead, the river gets checked around, and I'm sure how I played this hand influenced a couple of hands later on. I eventually build my stack to around 500 before the first interesting hand at 2-5.
-Hand #3-
I'm dealt AA in the big blind. Villain is UTG and raises to 35. There's only one call to me and I repop to 105. Only villain calls.
Flop is T94 rainbow. I c-bet 125, villain folds his JJ faceup and I show my AA. (I've realized that I want to reaffirm my image as an extremely tight player, as having an extreme image one way or another makes it easy to take advantage of one's image).
After about 10-20 minutes, I'm again dealt a big hand in a blind.
-Hand #4-
I have AKo in the small blind. Cutoff raises to 25, I repop to 75, and he calls.
Flop comes Jxx rainbow. I c-bet 105, and villain calls.
Turn is a blank. I decide to shut down given that villain both called my preflop raise and my flop c-bet, which suggests to me that he has AJ (slightly unlikely), 99, TT, JJ, QQ, KK, or AA. 99/TT is the only hand I can realistically expect to fold to a second barrel, AJ/QQ might fold, and KK/AA/JJ don't. I don't think KK/AA is as unlikely as it might seem, since I can definitely vouch for trapping with KK/AA in position preflop. Anyways, villain bets, and I fold. I ask him after the hand if he had QQ and he says he did not have QQ.
About 30 minutes later, I play another big hand OOP.
-Hand #5-
I have AJ in middle position, and open for 25. Villain is the same guy from the previous hand and he sits to my left. He and another play call.
Flop comes KQT rainbow. Given my tight image, people can fully expect me to have hit this flop (and if not, i.e. if I have 88, I still should be expected to c-bet). As a result, I c-bet 35, and only villain calls.
Turn is a blank club (which puts two clubs on the board). I fire away again with a 50 bet, "repping" AK/KQ/KJ/etc, and again villain calls.
River is a non-club J, which sucks because it's either a huge action killer or I'm chopping. I continue with a bet of 75 (trying to make it seem like I'm blocker-betting), and villain raises to 225. Sure that we're chopping (and consequently, pissed off), I call. Villain shows 69 of clubs for the lower straight. A guy to my right asks me why I just called and I said that I was sure villain had an Ace, and that if he didn't, he wouldn't be calling anyways. Granted, it would have been a downside-less raise, and villain had been extremely loose (sometimes bordering on maniacal), so there was maybe a 5% chance he didn't even realize an Ace would be a higher straight and I could have won an additional couple hundred. This was definitely a byproduct of my previous hands, both the boat over boat and the AA that got rivered by a two outer.
-Hand #6-
I have ATs in middle position and open for 25. I get 2 calls, including villain on the button and one of the blinds.
Flop comes AJx with a flush draw. Villain is enormous stacked (probably almost 2000), and at this point, I have around 800 so we're very deep. Villain is also extremely aggressive, somewhat loose but very effective. As a result, I decide to play this hand passively, especially given my image. I check, villain bets 35, the blind folds, and I call.
Turn is a blank. I check, villain bets 55, I call.
River is a J that misses the flush draw. I check again, and villain thinks a really long time, before shaking his head and checking back. He shows A8, and my T kicker plays. I'm sure part of the reason he didn't bet the river is because he thought I wasn't that great of a player (which isn't unfounded, because I bought in short stacked and played like a tight beginner); the other part was that I'd checked the early hand with my straight, planning to reraise the river, and he suspected I may have a J (or better). Given that he thinks his hand has showdown value, I could easily repop a river bet, and he just overall has no idea what I have, he checks behind. I also may have had to fold a river bet, because my T kicker is pretty bad, so I was definitely happy to see it checked back.
The past hand also demonstrated how well I was running. I was primarily playing only pocket pairs and AK/AQ/AJs/ATs/suited connectors, and outside of the AK hand that I folded on the turn, I literally hit an A every time I had one. This includes a couple of times I was dealt A-rag on a blind and still hit an A and won. Anyways, the last interesting hand of the night:
-Hand #7
I have 55 in late position. Villain is the same guy from the previous hand (one of two players at the table I would consider demonstratively better at 2-5 than me; the other would be the guy I lost AK to). He raises UTG to 30. About 4 of us see the flop.
Flop comes 752 with two hearts. Villain c-bets 45, and only I call.
Turn is a blank. Villain bets 75, and I call.
River is a heart. Villain beats 85, at which point I feel very good about my set even though the flush hit, as I expect super LAG players to be betting big on this river if they hit the flush. Still, with a stack of almost 1000 behind, I can't afford to raise and get reraised so I call. Villain says you're good (assuming I have a flush) and I flip over my set. I have a feeling he had either A7, two pair, or an overpair, and was blocker betting the river, so I'm pretty sure he wouldn't have called a raise anyways.
Anyways, I leave soon afterwards at 12:30, as I was starting to get tired, and I didn't want to play too long with a huge stack, given that the way I was playing was more conducive to short stack play. I ended up 821 at 2-5, down 465 at 1-2, and overall up only 356 over 12 hours. However, my 1-2 losses were primarily a result of shitty luck, and while I didn't necessarily optimize my 2-5 winnings, I did find somewhat of a comfort zone against deep-stacked, LAG 2-5 regs by playing tight poker. I definitely feel like my "ideal" stakes right now are somewhere between 2-5 and 1-2, but that I'm definitely comfortable enough to hang at the adults table now. (I am somewhat apprehensive about how I'll do once my 2-5 luck runs out though).
Home Game Session 2 (May 27, 2012):
Not much really to say here. After claiming last time that I feared rake might be higher, I then realized that the host simply has more money to give back since at the casinos, both the house and the dealers take a portion, which means even with 10% rake up to 6 dollars (which is what Charles Town charges), that can add up to 100+ in rake/hour (20-30 hands/hour * $50/hand * 10% rake). Given that the nights usually go at least 10 hours long (which is long after I leave), they can rake in over $1000, which means they can give back around 300 per night. This is especially true, since the flips/freerolls they have entice people to come, and their main goal is to simply get a game going.
Anyways, they held a super turbo freeroll at the start of the night, and I maintain that super turbo tournies are extremely exploitable against bad players. By about the 20th hand, everyone is already short-stacked, but people don't understand short-stack play. That of course means too much calling preflop with the hopes of post-flop play, too little calling based on pot odds (when you're big blind with 5BB in chips, you should be calling all shoves), and way too little shipping as a result (given how often players fold to ships, you should be even further enticed to ship more often). Anyways, long story short: won a flip with 88 against 2 overs, won a 60-40 against 2 unders, lost a 60-40 in the same situation, and then chopped $150 each when the other 2 players at 3-handed went all-in against each other and one player ended up with pretty much the same stack as me.
Then, I played 1-2 for about 2-3 more hours, and ended up another 115. All in all, a +$265 night.
Overall, this was a moderately successful weekend in terms of results, but an even more positive one given the fact that I feel that I've become more comfortable playing 2-5. I definitely plan on playing more of that in the upcoming weeks (and in Vegas).
-Summary-
Time at 1-2 cash tables: 11.5 hours
1-2 Cash: -$200
Time at 2-5 cash tables: 4 hours
2-5 Cash: +$821
Poker total: +$620
Gas and food: -$30
Net:+$590
-On record career to date-
Time at 1-2 cash tables: 101 hours
1-2 Cash: +$3005
Time at 2-5 cash tables: 17.5 hours
2-5 Cash: +$1530
Total time at cash tables: 118.5 hours
Cash games: +$4535
Time at tournies: 12 hours
Tournies: -$570
Poker total: +$3965
Net: +$3350
Brags: The fact that I routinely leak away chips at 1-2 due to boredom isn't necessarily a good or bad sign. I can probably only limit my impatience to a certain level, after which I'll always need to account for some leakage. The fact that it's happening so often in 1-2 suggests that my comfort with those stakes has increased dramatically, and I can start moving on to playing 2-5 more routinely.
Beats: My emotions still are affecting my play, i.e. the donating of probably 100 more than necessary after the AA hand at 1-2, and the failure to raise on the river in a weekly dominant scenario because a J "killed" my action (in reality, that was the only card I was going to win money on...).
Variance: Even while I'm going through some bad luck at the 1-2 tables, I have run insanely hot at 2-5. I would venture a guess that the 18 hours of 2-5 I've played has to be at least in the 95th percentile in terms of how good someone can run in any 18 hour session.
Given a 3 day Memorial Day Weekend, I decided to play a lot of poker, partly to prepare myself for my Vegas trip next month. I decided to spend a longer session at Charles Town on Saturday, and arrived at 11:00. Neither the 1-2 nor the 2-5 list was long yet, so I decided to play 1-2 to start, with the hope that I could feast on the holiday weekend fish.
Honestly, I don't remember much of what happened in the first couple of hours. There weren't many interesting hands, as I was largely card dead, both in terms of hole cards and in terms of flops. Regardless, I built my stack to around 500 after buying in for 260. I'd already been leaking chips away for a while given the cold deck, but I'd actively been trying to stay patient. It was all downhill from then.
-Hand #1-
I'm dealt 74o in the big blind. Villain sits two seats to my left with about 250 and limps early position. Someone raises to 7 and about 5 of us see the flop.
Flop comes K74 with a flush draw. I check, villain leads out with 15 and everyone folds to me. I call. Villain has been an extremely loose player, and not the effective kind of loose. However, with bottom two and large effective stacks, I can't raise OOP. I'm putting villain on K with a T+ kicker, so I'm watching out for high cards.
Turn comes a non-flush card Q. This is a pretty significant scare card, and while villain has been loose, he's been pretty passive with marginal hands. I check, and he bets 35, which concerns me. Had the turn been a blank, I'd be looking to check raise the turn. However, I can only call given that KQ is entirely within villain's range.
River is a non-flush card 7. Now, I have 7's full. I don't think the 7 is that scary, so I can realistically get a call from a pretty large value bet. I think villain has around 130 behind (he actually has almost 200, which would have increased my bet in hindsight but it doesn't actually affect the results of the hand), so I bet 85. Villain makes some long elaborate speech about how he thinks I must have 74 (which from hindsight I can imagine might cause someone to jump him in a home game, because he has 74 beat, and is slow rolling me since I'm calling regardless), and then shoves. Thinking he has around 50 behind even though he has significantly more, I call and he shows Q7o. WTF? Q7? He played this hand so horribly and ended up lucking out with the perfect sequence of board cards. In hindsight, while a 100+ raise would make me think a little longer about calling, I'd probably be forced to call anyways. Given the way he played the hand, he would have done the exact same thing with any other hand (especially any other non-boat 7). I'm frustrated with the outcome of the hand (he happened to have the case 7 and hit a runner runner against me), but not necessarily with the way I played. After that cooler, I'm actively trying to stay patient, which is obviously a good sign.
About 5 hands later comes the next cooler.
-Hand #2-
I'm dealt AA in late position. I make it 16 after a couple of limps. Only the small blind calls, with about 200-250.
Flop comes K33. Villain leads out for 25, and he's one of the easiest players to read I've played with, and I'm 100% sure he has a K (the kicker doesn't matter whatsoever, given that the paired board makes it so that I don't have to worry about him hitting his kicker). I call, fully expecting him to continue betting.
Turn is a T. As expected, villain bets 45. I call again.
River is a fucking K. Villain bets 75, and I fold face-up, visibly frustrated. Villain shows the K sheepishly.
Normally, one of these hands doesn't rattle me, but collectively (and along with the overall lack of cards and flops), I start going on tilt a little. The plus side is that I notice this, and only donate about 50-100 more than I otherwise would have (while I did lose more chips, a lot of that was unavoidable). As I continue to be card dead, I start loosening up (and still don't hit anything), and after losing another 100 or so, I decide to sign up for 2-5 with the hope that the discomfort with the game can tighten up my game. Unfortunately, the list is much longer than hoped, and I end up playing an extra 30 minutes or so at the 1-2 (even going as far as to sit out a number of hands to keep myself from leaking away even more chips).
Anyways, I finally sit down at my 2-5 table and notice one thing: everyone is big stacked (there was maybe one player with below 400) and a number of players are enormous stacked (1000+). Given that everyone is so big stacked (as opposed to just one or two players), that suggests that most of the players are 2-5 regs, as opposed to some of the weaker players I'd played with in my previous 2-5 sessions. My plan coming in given the field is to play extremely nitty poker.
I buy-in for 300, partly to limit my swings and partly because being the only short stack at a table of big stacks lets me take advantage of small stack poker (since everyone is both big stacked and LAG, I can wait for premium hands and reraise preflop). I fold about 2 full rounds preflop before I even see my first flop. I build an extreme rep at the table for being really tight, and I use that to my advantage. I win a couple of pots preflop just by 3-betting (albeit with actually good hands, like QQ) and from showing down a hand with a turned straight on a board of 4578, but without betting/raising once during the hand (part of it was because I didn't want to get reraised on the river, and part of it was that I wanted to reraise the river). Instead, the river gets checked around, and I'm sure how I played this hand influenced a couple of hands later on. I eventually build my stack to around 500 before the first interesting hand at 2-5.
-Hand #3-
I'm dealt AA in the big blind. Villain is UTG and raises to 35. There's only one call to me and I repop to 105. Only villain calls.
Flop is T94 rainbow. I c-bet 125, villain folds his JJ faceup and I show my AA. (I've realized that I want to reaffirm my image as an extremely tight player, as having an extreme image one way or another makes it easy to take advantage of one's image).
After about 10-20 minutes, I'm again dealt a big hand in a blind.
-Hand #4-
I have AKo in the small blind. Cutoff raises to 25, I repop to 75, and he calls.
Flop comes Jxx rainbow. I c-bet 105, and villain calls.
Turn is a blank. I decide to shut down given that villain both called my preflop raise and my flop c-bet, which suggests to me that he has AJ (slightly unlikely), 99, TT, JJ, QQ, KK, or AA. 99/TT is the only hand I can realistically expect to fold to a second barrel, AJ/QQ might fold, and KK/AA/JJ don't. I don't think KK/AA is as unlikely as it might seem, since I can definitely vouch for trapping with KK/AA in position preflop. Anyways, villain bets, and I fold. I ask him after the hand if he had QQ and he says he did not have QQ.
About 30 minutes later, I play another big hand OOP.
-Hand #5-
I have AJ in middle position, and open for 25. Villain is the same guy from the previous hand and he sits to my left. He and another play call.
Flop comes KQT rainbow. Given my tight image, people can fully expect me to have hit this flop (and if not, i.e. if I have 88, I still should be expected to c-bet). As a result, I c-bet 35, and only villain calls.
Turn is a blank club (which puts two clubs on the board). I fire away again with a 50 bet, "repping" AK/KQ/KJ/etc, and again villain calls.
River is a non-club J, which sucks because it's either a huge action killer or I'm chopping. I continue with a bet of 75 (trying to make it seem like I'm blocker-betting), and villain raises to 225. Sure that we're chopping (and consequently, pissed off), I call. Villain shows 69 of clubs for the lower straight. A guy to my right asks me why I just called and I said that I was sure villain had an Ace, and that if he didn't, he wouldn't be calling anyways. Granted, it would have been a downside-less raise, and villain had been extremely loose (sometimes bordering on maniacal), so there was maybe a 5% chance he didn't even realize an Ace would be a higher straight and I could have won an additional couple hundred. This was definitely a byproduct of my previous hands, both the boat over boat and the AA that got rivered by a two outer.
-Hand #6-
I have ATs in middle position and open for 25. I get 2 calls, including villain on the button and one of the blinds.
Flop comes AJx with a flush draw. Villain is enormous stacked (probably almost 2000), and at this point, I have around 800 so we're very deep. Villain is also extremely aggressive, somewhat loose but very effective. As a result, I decide to play this hand passively, especially given my image. I check, villain bets 35, the blind folds, and I call.
Turn is a blank. I check, villain bets 55, I call.
River is a J that misses the flush draw. I check again, and villain thinks a really long time, before shaking his head and checking back. He shows A8, and my T kicker plays. I'm sure part of the reason he didn't bet the river is because he thought I wasn't that great of a player (which isn't unfounded, because I bought in short stacked and played like a tight beginner); the other part was that I'd checked the early hand with my straight, planning to reraise the river, and he suspected I may have a J (or better). Given that he thinks his hand has showdown value, I could easily repop a river bet, and he just overall has no idea what I have, he checks behind. I also may have had to fold a river bet, because my T kicker is pretty bad, so I was definitely happy to see it checked back.
The past hand also demonstrated how well I was running. I was primarily playing only pocket pairs and AK/AQ/AJs/ATs/suited connectors, and outside of the AK hand that I folded on the turn, I literally hit an A every time I had one. This includes a couple of times I was dealt A-rag on a blind and still hit an A and won. Anyways, the last interesting hand of the night:
-Hand #7
I have 55 in late position. Villain is the same guy from the previous hand (one of two players at the table I would consider demonstratively better at 2-5 than me; the other would be the guy I lost AK to). He raises UTG to 30. About 4 of us see the flop.
Flop comes 752 with two hearts. Villain c-bets 45, and only I call.
Turn is a blank. Villain bets 75, and I call.
River is a heart. Villain beats 85, at which point I feel very good about my set even though the flush hit, as I expect super LAG players to be betting big on this river if they hit the flush. Still, with a stack of almost 1000 behind, I can't afford to raise and get reraised so I call. Villain says you're good (assuming I have a flush) and I flip over my set. I have a feeling he had either A7, two pair, or an overpair, and was blocker betting the river, so I'm pretty sure he wouldn't have called a raise anyways.
Anyways, I leave soon afterwards at 12:30, as I was starting to get tired, and I didn't want to play too long with a huge stack, given that the way I was playing was more conducive to short stack play. I ended up 821 at 2-5, down 465 at 1-2, and overall up only 356 over 12 hours. However, my 1-2 losses were primarily a result of shitty luck, and while I didn't necessarily optimize my 2-5 winnings, I did find somewhat of a comfort zone against deep-stacked, LAG 2-5 regs by playing tight poker. I definitely feel like my "ideal" stakes right now are somewhere between 2-5 and 1-2, but that I'm definitely comfortable enough to hang at the adults table now. (I am somewhat apprehensive about how I'll do once my 2-5 luck runs out though).
Home Game Session 2 (May 27, 2012):
Not much really to say here. After claiming last time that I feared rake might be higher, I then realized that the host simply has more money to give back since at the casinos, both the house and the dealers take a portion, which means even with 10% rake up to 6 dollars (which is what Charles Town charges), that can add up to 100+ in rake/hour (20-30 hands/hour * $50/hand * 10% rake). Given that the nights usually go at least 10 hours long (which is long after I leave), they can rake in over $1000, which means they can give back around 300 per night. This is especially true, since the flips/freerolls they have entice people to come, and their main goal is to simply get a game going.
Anyways, they held a super turbo freeroll at the start of the night, and I maintain that super turbo tournies are extremely exploitable against bad players. By about the 20th hand, everyone is already short-stacked, but people don't understand short-stack play. That of course means too much calling preflop with the hopes of post-flop play, too little calling based on pot odds (when you're big blind with 5BB in chips, you should be calling all shoves), and way too little shipping as a result (given how often players fold to ships, you should be even further enticed to ship more often). Anyways, long story short: won a flip with 88 against 2 overs, won a 60-40 against 2 unders, lost a 60-40 in the same situation, and then chopped $150 each when the other 2 players at 3-handed went all-in against each other and one player ended up with pretty much the same stack as me.
Then, I played 1-2 for about 2-3 more hours, and ended up another 115. All in all, a +$265 night.
Overall, this was a moderately successful weekend in terms of results, but an even more positive one given the fact that I feel that I've become more comfortable playing 2-5. I definitely plan on playing more of that in the upcoming weeks (and in Vegas).
-Summary-
Time at 1-2 cash tables: 11.5 hours
1-2 Cash: -$200
Time at 2-5 cash tables: 4 hours
2-5 Cash: +$821
Poker total: +$620
Gas and food: -$30
Net:+$590
-On record career to date-
Time at 1-2 cash tables: 101 hours
1-2 Cash: +$3005
Time at 2-5 cash tables: 17.5 hours
2-5 Cash: +$1530
Total time at cash tables: 118.5 hours
Cash games: +$4535
Time at tournies: 12 hours
Tournies: -$570
Poker total: +$3965
Net: +$3350
Brags: The fact that I routinely leak away chips at 1-2 due to boredom isn't necessarily a good or bad sign. I can probably only limit my impatience to a certain level, after which I'll always need to account for some leakage. The fact that it's happening so often in 1-2 suggests that my comfort with those stakes has increased dramatically, and I can start moving on to playing 2-5 more routinely.
Beats: My emotions still are affecting my play, i.e. the donating of probably 100 more than necessary after the AA hand at 1-2, and the failure to raise on the river in a weekly dominant scenario because a J "killed" my action (in reality, that was the only card I was going to win money on...).
Variance: Even while I'm going through some bad luck at the 1-2 tables, I have run insanely hot at 2-5. I would venture a guess that the 18 hours of 2-5 I've played has to be at least in the 95th percentile in terms of how good someone can run in any 18 hour session.
