2k12 finish, soon off to OZ

Finally i'm done for teh year after some massive grind in teh end.

Was like 10th of december when i realized i'm playing by far not enough to hit the 600k milestone anytime soon so that was when i finally made an excel sheet with numbers. That i still had a couple of parties lined up until my flight to OZ was not helping either but my main goal was to be done b4 i board my flight. And in fact I managed to finish around 12 hours b4 that flight so still kinda proud. Even had 2 days where i played over 13k hands which i basically did not do once teh entire year and in teh end i was playing 20-24 tables (majority shorthanded) on an 18" laptop. All this was going surprisingly well and smooth, maybe bc of christmas i would say - had to play a little tighter though once 20 tables were exceeded ofc...
Resultswise it's basically like all those other months in the end of 2012. Playing breakeven for half of teh month and making money in teh 2nd half while being significantly above EV (as usual).

Also made a little apperance at teh hyperturbos while chasing those VPPs but i assume it's pretty safe to say i will not be seen there again anytime soon.

Regarding 2012 in total i'm satisfied as well, at least about teh 2nd half of the year. While i started fairly slow and even had one of those rare losing months (b4 rakeback) in may when i returned to Malta things turned around in teh end of teh year and i believe from september on every month was 5digits b4 rakeback...

2012 BB garph

I don't want to use $ figure for whole 2012 so BB garph and WR's by months will be all i make public here. Don't wanna say too much about those garphs besides that they pretty much tell that online poker is far from being over... All in all i'm close to 30k$ above EV though which certainly helps but even without that boost i would've made some money in 2012...

2012 by month

Alot of people complain about Stars lately, that they only act in their own interest etc. I'm not one of those complaining. I was majorly pissed when they made the switch to WC and i lost 20-25k$ bc of this in 2012 but games this year were in a way way better state compared to 2010 or 2011 and games even got better during the year so i would assume they might even improve moar. In teh past years for example decembers were horrific to play bc of just too many regs while tis year december was a wet dream for any grinder out there... There are a couple moar things not 100% otpimal atm like teh russian 40BB armada, grimming, bumhunting and lately seating scripts but none of those minor issues seem to fuck up teh games as much as some people claim and like to pretend. I believe teh loudest complainers are people who not making much out of poker anymoar bc they stopped improving at a certain point of time and now their main job is to find excuses why they are not making as much money as they believe they should make. - "wer nicht mit der zeit geht, muss mit der zeit gehen...".

Anyways, i'm really really looking forward for teh grind in 2013. SNE is still not really an option but 600k VPPs or maybe even a bit moar is teh volume goal.


Besides poker teh Barracuda penthouse is finally history. If you don't know about what teh fuck i'm talking:

Had a pretty good time there but all good things come to an end sooner or later... Also kinda looking forward to having my very own place for next summer in Malta (if i return) which i haven't had in a long while. Originally we planned having a farewell bash in teh penthouse but since weather was unstable we booked a club mid december in order to celebrate teh farewell of teh penthouse and me and my roomie moving to OZ for some time. Here one of the pictures - we managed to gather 80-100 people i would say and basically had a mental open bar after everybody brought his own stuff:

christmas farewell

Another big event was Armin van Buren playing in Malta 12.12.12. and as you can see on the picture my mate managed to get a rather decent table for that night:

Armin van Buren

Exactly one week ago i arrived in germany and started by visiting some good friends in the city where i studied followed by visiting my parents over christmas and meeting up with some moar good friends from my hometown.

Weizenschein in Marburg City

After all those years it's still pretty sick how good my contacts are to very different friend circles in different cities with different backgrounds... Schoolfriends, Studyfriends, Pokerfriends, Maltafriends, etc.
Kinda proud that i still manage to see teh vast majority of those people at least once a year and def. not going to change that :)

Since my destination is summer now i also got a new summer haircut from my favorit hair dresser in Mannhighm so that i look 17 again and teh majority of that australian girls will have to watch out!

forever 17

Flight to Sydney departs 18:30 in Frankfurt so that i have to leave my parents place in around 3 hours after teh last big meal :) Flying over Seoul and will arrive in Sydney 29th in teh morning. Sharing a flat with a good poker friend of mine directly at one of teh most famous surfer and touri beaches in Sydney: Bondi Beach. Definitely looking forward after this week in germany (7 days are almost too much for me here these days). Depending on what happens in Sydney and how interesting it is i might blog a little bit moar in near future but we'll see what happens. Furthermoar that is like teh first NYE where i have absolutely nothing planned yet. Most of teh time i was disappointed anyways so i guess this time i don't put any effort in and see how it goes.... In teh end of teh day it is summer, it is OZ, it is Sydney, so what is teh worst that can happen...


peaze

Weak start, strong finish, november madness...

Another month passed and time to update this precious blog.

As teh title states i started rather weak but finished pretty strong with one of my best alltime weeks moneywise. Since i rarely include EV lines i did it tis time and yes, i can confirm, even when i run bad i really run good. After a monster session of 9k hands on last friday i was far away from having a 15k month and prolly would've instasettled for 10 if i had teh opportunity but since in tis game everything is possible every time i managed to book one of my better months tis year. Cannot remember also when i played tis volume last time - 65k VPP.

Besides that garph there is another 1.5k (including rakeback) to add from grinding a little bit Rush 200 at teh newly reopened Full Tilt Poker. In teh beginning i was planning to grind Stars and Tilt at teh same time but then decided against it which has several factors. For once stacking both sites is a pain in teh ass bc there is no proper software out yet which can handle the active table on both sites simultaneously so teh only option would be to play 2 stacks which is hard to implement if you played only one stack for ages. Furthermoar you have to reconfigure your tableninjas bc u cannot asign teh same hotkeys for both, etc. But teh main reason i did not bother to play both sites was that there is no need to do so with all teh action i get on Stars. I cannot remember any november during teh last 4 years when games came only close to teh juicyness atm. In general tis time of teh year was always horrible to play bc alot of regs going for Supernova Elite and other regs going to finish up high milestones. However i think that with teh switch to weight contributed Stars changed that pattern entirely. There are just not that many cash supergrinders out there anymoar bc SNE at NL200 is a hugh pain in teh ass and at 400+ it's very hard to play that many tables for a profit. Alot of people seem to have understood that playing less tables with a higher winrate is way moar motivating instead of grinding rakeback only. Even though regs tend to be stronger because of tis teh reg to fish ratio is alot better which results in alot better games (if you tableselect). Obviously teh 90billion hand promo did help but atm i cannot imagine games getting much worse in december compared to now which is quite awesome.
The only thing which makes me worry a little bit is that i still have 55k VPP to go and want to be finished at teh 20th of december. However I really struggle to put in any decent volume when running hot like i do atm. I would need around 6k hands every day without a break which is not possible bc there are some sweet parties lined up teh next weeks so i either have to run shit some days and play long long sessions, or force myself to play longer sessions no matter how i run or grind during christmas time. Not taking teh free money of teh 600k milestone is not really an option but i guess i will figure something out.

Goals for december are as being said to hit that last milestone and to make moar than 10k$ before rakeback - not more to add here...

Since i barely have any party pictures tis month mainly bc i only went out like once a week i post some of teh bigger hands i played instead:

standard upswing hand where everything works in my favour:
http://www.pokerhandreplays.com/view.php/id/4729791

Aces vs. teh good old limpbehindafish/raise:
http://www.pokerhandreplays.com/view.php/id/4729792

free money at 400 from a fish:
http://www.pokerhandreplays.com/view.php/id/4729793


All in all not really many interesting hands for big pots tis month. Most is teh std. AA, KK, set shit and teh really hilarious all ins are moar for smaller pots at 200 and i'm too lazy to search for them.


Lifewise is not too much to say either. As being said i went not out for party too much, still hitting teh gym pretty hard and flying to germany on teh 20th. Yesterday we had some sort of last supper with all teh pokerguys at a steakhouse. Teh majority of players is leaving now to Prague for EPT/WPT and not coming back til next year and alot of people also do go abroad like me and will not return to Malta until late spring/early summer. Today there is a nice party of teh swedish pokerchampionship which takes places in Malta, mid december Armin van Buren is playing here and on teh 14th we have our penthouse closing party before me and my roomie move on so it looks like december should be an interesting month. Probably also renting a nice car teh next days for my time in germany as long as i'm still upswinging not that i end up with a VW Polo in teh end :P
Also found out about a nice non-poker related book tis month which i'm reading atm and is def. worth a look (don't know if it is translated in english though): Florian Homm - Kopf Geld Jagd. It's teh biography of one of germanys most famous hedgefond managers and quite entertaining to read.

so far have a nice december and good luck at those tables,

peaze

2012 finish line comes closer

Another month down and teh end of teh year and my travel season comes closer.

Wasn't teh very best month at teh tables but in teh end i made 5digits b4 rakeback which is something like my minimum goal so i will not complain.
Like in september i pretty much missed teh start of teh month entirely and after 2 weeks work and 50k hands i find myself with basically zero $ tableprofit and some pocketchange out of rakeback: welcome to playing poker for a living, sometimes you work for free and sometimes u even pay for work :P
Not drinking alcohol during that time didn't seem to have teh same effect like in september profitwise... Was about mid of teh month when i was really not satisfied with my overall results and play so i decided to put in some work off teh tables and put in some new theory. Don't get me wrong, i was by far not unhappy with my game but i realized that in some spots was definitely room for improvement and i wasn't studying teh game at all during summer. Given teh nature of poker and teh rapid development of teh game you will get eaten alive sooner or later when u spent all your time at teh tables while not working to get better in teh meanwhile so it was about time.
I pretty much directly felt a good motivation push after getting to know some new concepts and ideas so that thereafter things were working out better. However games during that time were not teh very best and i had often problems to get as much action as i wanted.
So in teh night of teh 18th it finally happend that i was so tilted after waiting for 45 minutes and barely getting games at all that i decided to give ZOOM a 2nd shot. I wasn't playing ZOOM during teh last months at all, mainly bc i hate mixing ZOOM and normal tables and bc games were not too soft when i stopped playing them somewhere in may. Anyhow this was probably teh best decision i made tis month bc afterwards teh heater started that like 80% of my overall profits are from ZOOM (alot over EV though). Games seem to be way better compared to april/may but if you expect a game where u can print money i have to disappoint you. From wat i've seen alot of regs seem to be worse compared to normal games. There is a couple of guys who playing way too tight, a couple of guys 3bet and therefore 3bet/folding way too much, etc. But even if you exploit that it will not make you crazy money. And fish play tighter and therefore better as well which is probably teh biggest disadvantage. You still have teh occasional 50/25 drooler but by far not as often as on normal tables and i don't have position on him everytime. Furthermoar i only played 200 6max so far so cannot really judge how tough/soft 500 really is but swings are definitely way bigger compared too normal games so if you tend to tilt teh slightest bit after losing 3 stacks in 5 minutes ZOOM might be difficult. I believe teh biggest advantages are that you get close to 1000 hands an hour while 4tabling from teh moment you sit down so you don't need to waste time to open and close a session and therefore you can play with a very high focus and alot of breaks to keep your mind sharp and you have a way better overview tiling 4 tables compared to stacking 16-18 which also helps to make better decisions. But enough about advantages and disadvantages of it. For now i'm quite sure i will play decent amount of it in november as well but also will play normal tables when games are good. Sooner or later i might shot 500 but given what i've seen swing-wise at 200 (even while running like god) i'm not sure if i will be shotting very soon...
Here teh garph which illustrates teh good and bad phases of teh month:

October garph

If you cut out teh first 50k hands it looks rather decent... On a sidenote besides that money i made teh usual rakeback and another 1k$ out of a ZOOM promotion where you had to win with very specific hands at showdown while receiving 100BBs for free if you do, Obviously was running hot here as well.
Goal for november is to make way moar but since profitgoals are nonsense anyways i will rather focus on staying motivated and making good decisions.


Non-pokerwise i'm back to partying every now and then again but in general that is limited to teh weekends and i try to only do one day bc of hangoverpurposes and teh general state of games (especially on friday i prolly have double teh EV compared to any other weekday...)
Malta got alot quieter now but especially on teh weekends there are still plenty of options to go out and meet people that it doesn't get too boring.
Bodywise i'm around 82kg now and quite satisfied with teh results. I feel way better overall compared to summer where i only had 71-72 and alot of people told me that it looks better as it is atm. 6pack is gone unfortunately but since it's autumn/winter now anyways that is not my biggest problem. I'm even considering gaining further mass and then invade Australia with around 85kg - we'll see wat happens.

TimStone wit around 81kg at teh gym

In case of Australia all my accomodation for teh time is sorted and most of it already paid. As being mentioned i'm in Sydney and Melbourne in january and at Gold Coast (Broad Beach) in february in march. For february and march i still have two bedrooms available in a massive supermodern villa very close to beach and nightlife so if you are interested in moving in keep me posted.

I also started watching Dexter lately which is definitely one of teh best series i ever watched and only can recommend to anybody who is searching for something good.

Need to go for a sleep so that's it for now, HOLLA!

Sunglasses at night at Aria very late...

Murcielago in teh garage of my car dealer in Malta

maltese weather has changed

Sunglasses at night again

Part of teh group of our big pub crawl to Kings Club

Summer is over, back to Business, Bitches!

Already been moar than 1 month since my last post so i guess it's time even though i don't feel too much like writing.

Pokerwise September was a good although not perfect month but i'm still satisfied overall. I even managed to run about 250$ beyond EV which is strange bc my account is not made for running beyond in general. Winrate is over 2.5PTBB as well which is pretty topnotch in todays games i think.

You basically can split teh month in 3 parts. First is a slight downswing over teh first 2 weeks while running up to 20stacks below EV as well, followed by one of my (if not teh best) weeks (and sickest heaters) i ever experienced since i started playing. 3rd part is fairly std and a little swingy but nothing too special.
Especially the massive heater was interesting where i was basically not losing any flips for like 15k hands while having a WSD of well over 60% (other players will know what a sick number that is...)
Nevertheless i'm still running meh at teh higher limits where i'm staked for and am still a bunch in make-up there but hope it will turn around eventually.

September garph

Non-pokerwise there was not too much happening. After making alotta party all summer my plan was to slowly finish it off with some closing parties which worked out well.
At teh moment i'm not going out at all, i haven't been drinking since teh 17th of september and i drastically reduced my smoking habit. Sounds a bit boring, yes, but after that intense summer i figured my body wouldn't mind a break.
In teh meanwhile i'm hitting teh gym pretty hard like 5 times a week and started doing creatine for 6 weeks. I'm eating alot as well and goal is to gain a decent amount of weight until mid november when i will start to define for Australia again. I'm pretty satisfied with my results so far - when i started in teh 2nd september week i had around 71kg and now i'm around 80kg so things seem to work out. Not looking too different though, 6er is gone and arms and chest are a little bigger but no major transformation. Goal is to have 85kg++ mid november but that's pretty ambitious bc it's kinda hard for me to gain moar weight once i hit 80kg - damn you, body type...
Pokerwise goal for teh month is to play decent volume and ofc decent poker. Having around 430k VPP atm and goal for teh year is 600k which should be fairly easy to reach. Could push for 700k as well but then i would be forced to play some sessions when i'm tired or just don't really feel like playing so if nothing major happens i think i will stop at 600k. Not drinking helps alot in case of volume bc you are able to actually play every day and especially a-game everyday while when drinking you were forced to take days off bc of hangovers and bullshit.
Furthermoar i realized lately that i'm craving to get a new car sooner or later which might be a pretty good motivation to increase volume and focus a little bit. I remember that i had my best time pokerwise directly after ordering teh Vette in beginning 2010 where i made way over 60k teh first 3 months. I originally planned to get a Murcielago in 2014 but might postpone this for 2 moar years and get teh 2013 Shelby GT instead next year which is way cheaper, has moar horsepowers (660) and 4 seats as well so that i can actually could take some people with me to teh beach and stuff. But in teh end i haven't decided anything yet and it will be highly dependant on how good teh next 3 months (where my main focus is poker) will be and how much money i'm going to spend in Australia once i'm there.

Here as usual some last shots of summer:

Ingram game over in Malta

late in Nordic

Maltese Falcon in front of my terrace

Proud profile picture

No clouds end of september

Day at Golden Bay end september

Lovesexy end of summer

Travelbuddies for Australia 2013 wanted!

Hi there,

I just opened a facebook book regarding this but cross-post it here to maybe create moar interest. If you are interested just hook me up on facebook and I'll invite you to teh fb-group! cheers


Sup foos!

European summer comes slowly to an end and as some might know my plan this winter is to escape to Australia and co. from januar 2013 ongoing for 4-5 months. Last year I had a blast in South America but I decided to not go back there until I at least speak semi-fluently spanish and this will not happen in teh next few months. 
So my main issues in searching for a place to go were good weather (so obv i have to go south) and english language. After all I decided to roll with Australia for next year and see how I like it.

If I have to go alone I will do so but if I find somebody who is keen on travelling a little bit with me even better. If you have already plans for january++, cannot move bc no money, gf that stresses, whatever it is just snapleave teh group in order to keep it clean.

Optimal scenario for me would be 2 or 3 people who would be interested to go to OZ in teh aforementioned timeframe. If there is moar interest we can obv. go in different groups but living together only makes sense up to 4 people imo and even that will get pretty messy concerning we are all poker players...


General Plan:
- Sydney for NYE and staying there for 2-3 weeks til mid end january
- flying to Auckland and staying there for 2-3 weeks again til beginning/mid feb
- flying to Gold Coast and staying directly at Surfers Paradise for appr. 2 months - depending how much I like it maybe a little shorter or longer
- on teh way back to Europe spending a month in Bali or something similar (like Thailand, Philipines, Malaysia, watever)

= total time 4-5months

That being said this is my general plan which I will be doing if I'm on my own - i'm pretty much open for every suggestion there is and nothing is set in stone especially when travelling in a group...


Budget:
From what I've seen so far the downside is that OZ and NZL are not very cheap, especially when it comes to short-term renting. I don't really plan to stay in hotels there (bc this gonna be ridic expensive) but even apts tend to be on teh pricier side...
I only looked into Gold Coast accomodation so far but would expect Sydney and Auckland to be similar if not moar expensive.
If you search a nice 1br place for yourself and you want to have it semiballer you have to expect to spent between 2-2.5k$ a month. If you are a group of 3 or 4 I would expect to get this down to 1.5-1.75k$ a month per person.
That being said living in a nice place is pretty important for me bc teh better i live teh better i feel teh better i play teh moar money i make etc. So saving here it's not really an option for me.

I cannot say much regarding other costs like food, party, beach, sightseeing, etc. but assume renting will be teh biggest share. You also have to consider that flying to Australia is not cheap and will cost around 1keuro (atm) from central europe one way.

All in all I expect to spent something around 5k$ a month for everything but you probably can also go a little bit cheaper (i spent alot on food...)


Timemanagement:
I plan not to play to much poker during teh time in Sydney and Auckland and visit teh cities, make some trips, sightseeing, party, etc.
Once I'm in Gold Coast I plan to increase volume again to at least 100 hours a month, go back to a good workout routine, party, beach, etc. - same for Bali.
Since I'm quite flexible with my time I'm always keen to do something different like a couple of days road trip in teh outback etc...



As being stated in teh beginning if you have already plans just quit teh group directly in order to make it easier for me to see who is really interested in Down Under.
For those interested just leave a post here for now or drop a private message - I know it's still along time until january but you cannot plan this things early enough from my experience...

Eurosummer comes to an end...

After not updating for over a month now i guess it's about time...

During the last 6 weeks i wasn't doing much else besides party, party, party. So my pokervolume was probably the lowest i played teh since i started to grind for a living but fortunately i ran good for the most part and was at least able to cover my expenses and a bit moar...

In the end i was calculating from teh beginning of teh year that i will not work too much in july and august given to different factors. For once during this time it is just way too hot in Malta too work your ass off. Point 2 is that there are way too many parties to attend and another issue is that i got alot of people visiting me over the last 5 weeks and i cannot tell my good friends coming down to Malta "listen, i have to work, i cannot go out with you guys". So given all these factors i'm still kind of proud that i managed to play 150.000 hands during the last 2 months.

Regarding teh parties i don't really know much what i should write. It was definitely a blast but especially during teh last 2 weeks i realized that it maybe even was a little too much. I mean i'm 28 now and if you go out 4-5times a week you get to a point where you are not 100% motivated anymoar and sometimes i found myself standing in front of a bar and basically didn't know what to order anymoar bc i was fed up with everything. But i guess that's teh price you have to pay for maltese summer haha. Anyways, there will be another couple of very nice events in september and from october on it's going to be alot moar quiet in my opinion that i can increase my pokervolume again, getting a better gym/running schedule while only going out once or twice a week and making some money for my time in Australia beginning next year. In case of Australia i'm searching for 1 or 2 travelbuddies so if you are interested you might get back to me. Plan is Sydney, Auckland, Gold Coast, Bali - nothing set in stone yet but that's teh general schedule.

Even teh legend himself Joe Ingram made it to Malta teh last month and even though he was faster gone then he was here i assume he had a good time and i can say that he's one of teh first persons i met where teh online impression 100% matched teh real-life impression (if that's good or no is another thing lol)...

Here are some of teh party shots occured over teh last weeks:

doing nonsense at a wedding of a friend

pool party at aria club

wit marica at marakesh

with a bunch of friend at entrance of bet and win bar

GTL

ez monday in surfside

hard wednesday in vox ultra loung

bet and win bar at late hour

farsons beer fest 2012

sunglasses at night party at gianpula

surfside pt 2

view over st. julians and sliema

sunday chill at xara lodge

day at teh beach in paceville

bining at medasia playa

And these are only pictures of like 30% of teh parties i attended lately.

Last thursday i made another huge discovery in malta. I managed to go to teh local drag race court. Even though i still don't know if it is good that i got aware of this i had a blast over there and if i have a picture of paradise in my mind this thing comes pretty close to it. Lotta people will not understand it but whoever loved teh first 2 fast 2 furious will know what i'm talking about. Basically all you have to do is to take you car up there, pay 6euros entrance and then you can race against other cars at a str8 track of like 3-4kms. It's loud, it's dirty, there are cars everywhere, girls wearing belts instead of trousers and so on. The only problem is if i go there too often i might need a new set of tires pretty soonish...

To go a little bit moar into detail wit poker here is teh monthly graph so far:

Started pretty hot, then a little downer but i'm back on track for now. Also teh usual 3k above EV but since that is pretty std with my account i don't want to go too much into detail here.

Since this month there is one major change i want to adress. Since I'm hating variance and swings i wasn't playing 600 6max and above anymoar but since i got offered a stake here i got it back in my schedule at least til end of teh year. For teh non-pokerplayers this means that i don't play teh highest stakes i'm playing with my money but with teh money of somebody else which means if i'm losing i don't lose my own money but when i'm winning i have to give a large share of my winnings to my so called backer (who is a good friend anyways). I'm convinced for me it is better that way bc there's nothing which tilts me moar than having a good day at 200 and then losing it all in 2 hands at NL1k. However so far this staking deal is not working out too well for my backer so that i'm down a decent chunk in money at the stakes i'm staked for (this is not included in teh graph for obv. reasons).
So i managed to play (and lose) my biggest pot since i play for a living so far vs. a massive fish a 2k deep. While i'm convinced my play is good pre and on flop and turn i'm very much convinced that river should be a fold but i was skyping with my sponsor at teh moment and he tended moar towards a call and since i'm not that much of a highstakes expert and in teh end it was his money i pressed teh call button and got owned... shit happens i assume. Here teh hand for u to see:


PokerStars - $20 NL (6 max) - Holdem - 6 players

SB: $3,104.23
BB: $5,535.15
UTG: $7,734.46
Hero (MP): $9,093.28
CO: $19,481.07
BTN: $4,173.63

SB posts SB $10.00, BB posts BB $20.00, SB posts ante $4.00, BB posts ante $4.00, UTG posts ante $4.00, Hero posts ante $4.00, CO posts ante $4.00, BTN posts ante $4.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $54.00) Hero has Th Ad

UTG raises to $40.00, Hero raises to $160.00, fold, fold, fold, fold, UTG raises to $460.00, Hero calls $300.00

Flop: ($974.00, 2 players) Ks Tc 3c
UTG bets $660.00, Hero calls $660.00

Turn: ($2294.00, 2 players) 3h
UTG bets $1,260.00, Hero calls $1,260.00

River: ($4814.00, 2 players) 3d
UTG bets $5,350.46 and is all-in, Hero calls $5,350.46

UTG shows 4s 3s (Four of a Kind, Threes) (Pre 40%, Flop 23%, Turn 95%)
Hero shows Th Ad (Full House, Threes full of Tens) (Pre 60%, Flop 77%, Turn 5%)
UTG wins $15,511.92

allrighty, that's all for now, gl next month and see u around or at teh tables...

One week in Sweden - Visby, Gotland Update

Allrighty, sitting here in Visby in my hotel room and since it's teh first day this week where I'm taking a break from teh party and teh alcohol I guess I can give my impression so far.

First off I was expecting way moar of this week. In teh end we running pretty bad weatherwise and I assume that is prolly teh main reason why nobody of us is satisfied.

I arrived on tuesday with 5 other pokerplayers for teh Stockholm week in Gotland (small island in Sweden for those who don't know. But yeah, the main problem is probably teh sick amount of rain and it is insanely cold for july even for Sweden (around 16°C during daytime). The other probably even bigger problem is that everything is closing at point 2am in teh night which is tilting teh shit out of all of us. We prolly wouldn't have even bothered coming here if we would've known that from teh very beginning, but somehow teh clubs screwed up their licenses to open longer during this week and so the law forces them to close at 2. I would even be fine with that if parties would just start earlier but clubs don't get packed b4 0:30am which leave you a timewindow of 1.5hours to finish between 7.5 and 10liters for champagne - you not allowed to order any other bottles like vodka or whiskey either, again thanks to teh law. That all this is not going too well is prolly obv. and especially for me who I would consider as a late clubber this is just horrible. I could not recall a single night out in my life where I had my peak b4 2am and could not even tell a single night in teh last 5 years when I went home this early. You would think now that there should be an intense amount of private afterparties going on but from what i've seen even that is just not happening - seems like the people just accept their destiny but maybe i don't know teh right people though.

The only thing I really enjoyed so far are teh dayparties at Kallis which was voted as teh best beachclub in europe. As soon as there is some sun this place is just awesome, packed with beautiful people, good music, good vibes and alot of alcohol. But still this is just nothing compared to something like P12 in Brasil with 35°C and everybody in swimmingpants or bikinis. I will not complain too much here though bc I might be a little spoiled and obv. I cannot expect 30°C in Sweden all of a sudden bc teh TimStone shows off.

What's also weird is that teh city is not even that busy, I was expecting way moar people but prolly alot canceled bc of teh mix of poor weather and these ridiculous opening hours - i mean no real clubber will even bother to come if he knows he has to go home at 2 i assume.

On teh brightside I'm really satisfied with teh people i'm here - even though we running bad in basically every aspect we have a shitton of fun, laughin our asses off all day, never having any serious arguments and just trying to enjoy it teh most we can and in teh end that's what it all about i guess. And obviously girls are stunning but that's prolly not even worth a mention bc that was clear from teh very beginning... But still, we prolly would've had moar fun if I just would've invited my friends to Malta while saving a shitload of money in teh meanwhile bc if Visby is one thing for sure not then it's cheap :P

Since it is almost rock bottom teh positive thing is that it cannot really get any worse and we still have lined up some sweet parties teh next days and maybe things finally turn around.

You see alot of frustration in this post but life not always goes your week and in teh end all this are ridic luxury problems anyways.

After all I heard I def. wanted to see and experience Gotland - mission accomplished I guess. Chance that I do it again is rather small though. Staying here until monday, then another night in Stockholm and tuesday back on teh rock, definitely looking forward :)


Don't want to write too much about poker here but month is going pretty decent so far. Obviously I'm not grinding while here but I'm up around 7k with rakeback,
while only having one losing day so far and very low variance. Only thing which sucks is teh volume i put in so far which is mainly due to teh sick heatwave in Malta
with basically every day over 35°C until mid july. Hope to go out somewhere between 10 and 15k this month and once i'm back in Malta it's def. time to grind.