Mini Hibernation

Profit: $24

I've managed to get in maybe 1k of hands over the last the week but, to be honest, I've really not had much time for any poker and I doubt I will over the next six weeks.

I got a teaching job in February and since starting my teaching hours have trebled so I'm now close to working full time.

Only teachers can appreciate how hard the job actually is (believe me the holidays aren't worth it) and it's even more difficult for new teachers as you have to learn everything on the job (yep, even the subject knowledge) and until you get competent it's a hard grind - just like microstakes poker.

I'll keep blogging, just don't expect much. And with this I almost feel as though I've missed my chance to really give poker a go. I haven't grown any balls to play at higher stakes and now I won't have the time or mental strength to really concentrate on my game. I guess I'll be playing to relax and chill out from now on.

My profits have come from the usual cash game grinding. I have tried a couple of satelites into the Pokerstars 100k but there are three things stopping me from making any progress:

1. I'm crap at MTTs - just get bored of muck, muck, muck, muck, muck, big hand, action decided preflop etc.

2. I find Pokerstars to be one of my boogey sites.

3. I don't run good in MTTs. Not unlucky, just rarely win crucial races and always get mullered when I have to shove with hands like A10 and KQ - example today shoving 1010 into QQ when short stacked.

In my cash room play I did have one notable hand I'd liked to run off.

I have QQ and raise about 7Xbb after three limpers. Two call and the flop is 777. I bet, one folds, the other calls (we are both +100bb stacked. I bet again on the turn 9 and he flat calls again. Pot is about 80bb now with something like a J, 8 or 10 on the river - something that brought a possible straight and flush anyway. He checks to me again and I......

Well, what would you do?....................

With him calling two bets on a very suffocated board I'm thinking there's an outside chance he has a 7. He limped called so he could have A7. Pocket pairs are possible but I don't give him a set (ie. 88877, 99977 or whatever the cards higher than the seven were). A flush and straight are out there but I just don't know how anyone can call bets on the flop and turn drawing to a hand which can quite easily be beat.

Well I checked and he tabled the last hand I expected him to have but must have subconciously factored in, he had AA - yeah, he did limp-call with it.

I'm trying to work out if I played that really well - betting the right number of times and the right amount to get the information I needed and minimise how much I lost in the hand - or really weak - just having no gambling and ramming and jamming the pot. If he'd shoved at any point I would have gone broke so his passive play obviously set off my spidey sense.

Other than that hand, all pretty standard.