Number Crunchin'

The only bright spot about Monday morning and returning to the day job grind is that I have plenty of time to catch up on poker blog reading, as well as ruminate and postulate on my own degenerate gambling.

Lots of introspective posts in the poker blog universe right now. I think that's cool, as far as seeing the moments where we all stop and say "No, really, why the hell am I doing this?" And the "this" is obviously open-ended, whether it's starting a blog, playing poker itself, whatever. I think it gets a bit dodgy when you extend that line of thinking to "No, really, why are you doing this?" but that's just my own two cents. I'm obviously partial to teh poker to begin with, but I think the whole poker blog phenomenon in itself is pretty interesting, as it's simultaneously a solitary/communal game, and provides all sorts of good blog fodder.

Officially closed the gambling books on January 2005. Maybe it's my contrarian nature but I somehow managed to dodge the -EV mojo that seems to be making the rounds. Dodged it in a big way.

I hesitate a bit from posting results, as it's pretty crass. But one of my resolutions for the new poker year was to do exactly that, on a monthly basis, good or bad. I do think there's some value in sharing that, though, as far as showing real-world results for someone chasing bonuses and grinding away at lower limits. It also helps tighten my play a bit when I know I'll be broadcasting the ultimate results.

I'm including poker profits, casino profits, and gambling-related affiliate profits in the total number. I averaged about 20 hours of play a week (21.7 to be exact), with most of the poker play at 1/2, £1/2, and 2/4 limit tables, with a few experimental hours a week at £5/10. I usually played a minimum of 4 tables at a time, and on occasion 6 or 7. On the casino side, I mostly did sticky bonuses, with a few monthly and reload bonuses thrown in.

Total profit for January: $10,570

So, umm, yeah. Big number. I honestly didn't even realize it was that big, until I toted everything up this morning. Breaking it down a bit, I made $2,117 from poker, $4,817 from casino bonuses, and $3,636 from affiliate revenues.

To be fair, that number is not sustainable. No how, no way. I ran really well on the casino side (even with occasional donkey behavior thrown in) and I got some unexpected linkage from a couple of prominent blogs and other sites to my casino bonus strategy guide, which caused the affiliate revenues to rocket upwards.

On the flip side, I didn't run particularly well at the poker tables, so that number definitely has some upside potential. For the most part, I played with a bonus overlay the entire month. It was a busy month as far as reload bonuses, though, which may or may not continue in the future. I also was getting used to playing 6 tables at a time, which takes some getting used to. While I'm rocking the dual monitor setup now, I need to upgrade both monitors so that I can fit four tables to a monitor with no overlap, as my current old-school wee monitors make the process more hectic than it needs to be.

What to make of all of this, then, in summary fashion?

You can make good coin chasing poker bonuses at lower limits. Quantity seems to be winning out over quality (in my personal results at least), as simply adding more tables has increased my overall profit much more in recent months than focusing on strategy, etc. This is the golden age of poker bonuses. If you're not always playing with a bonus overlay, you're smoking crack.

Casino bonuses are really profitable. They just are. They're not -EV when you play with a large enough bonus overlay. They're not guaranteed money but if you start small and play smart, it becomes an exercise in profitable math more than gambling. That's not to say that you can't lose money, even when playing optimal strategy. You can. They do, however, have enormous upside potential.

But that's enough grubby money talk for one day.

Be interesting to see if Party does indeed float an IPO this year. I'd take some of that action, even if it meant buying in during a crazy run-up the first day it trades. I'm still kicking myself for not buying some Neteller stock back in December when it was around 300p per share, as it's been going absolutely nuts lately, running all the way up to 506.

Oh wait. That is grubby money talk. Shutting uo now and getting back to work.