"Wherever we look upon this earth, the opportunities take shape within the problems."-Nelson D. Rockefeller

As I stated in my last blog two huge outcomes were to come. The first has come and past with disappointment. I still await the second.

At work I am still! waiting for word on whether I will be accepted into a new position or laid off. The length of time it has taken for this decision is mind boggling. I am really questioning whether this company is worth working for at all. The compensation is quite good considering but the games being played are really saddening.

On the poker front I continue to try new ways of increasing my take per hour. I have been experimenting with a new way to multi-table. My normal way of organizing tables has been to tile as many as I can across my monitor in a tiled floor type pattern. This way I could see and scan all tables at once. That was the pros, but the cons were that the number of tables was limited to the amount of space available and the screen resolution, ie how small I could make the tables which would mean how many I could fit on the screen without overlap. Having read some message board posts from some 24 table multi-tablers I have decided to try stacking my tables on top of each other. The con is I cannot scan ahead and pre-fold hands. I also cannot see the outcome of hands played (not necessarily a bad thing). The pros are the number of tables is only limited by my ability to make decisions and make the play without timing out and I no longer have to move the cursor around the screen which allows for faster plays. If I add in hot keys which make certain plays for me without having to input bet amounts etc than I should be able to reach 24 tables at some point. So far I have experimented with up to 17 tables with some success. I do find that being tired makes it quite difficult but that is really no different than when I was tiling 9 tables. I have already noticed the jump in fpps per hour and as the table number goes up I'm sure the change will be dramatic! As for missing some table action I have come to realize the only action I am missing is that of hands where I have already folded. If I am still in a hand, when the table pops up the previous action is right there for me to see anyways and I am less distracted by what else is going on at other tables where I have folded etc. It so far has helped with tilt problems caused by seeing outcomes of hands where someone has hit a rediculous 1 outer or something. Off to music class.....

"The mind that is anxious about future events is miserable."- Seneca

I am not miserable but the wait to see what my fate is has been nothing short of torture. My future at the mill has literally been up in the air for over a month now. I will find out later this week if I actually have a job in the chem lab or not. At home, we await confirmation of epic proportions that will literally shake our world. We are stressed!

Today I was pretty tired and to be honest I am pretty brain-dead too. That adds to the stress factor. Being at work today was awful. There is so much anxst and alot of animosity and bullshit galore. The last part isn't new but it is getting a bit much now that I know I will no longer be working in the department I am in right now. What's making it worse is that because I still do not know if I have a job or not I am unable to speak my mind without potentially really looking like an asshole. How can I make any speeches when I have no idea what side of the fence I am going to end up on. Not only that but I might stay over senior guys many of whom I have worked very closely with for over 5 years. Then again, I very well might not. I am in a very crappy position of having to pretty much keep my mouth shut and be vague. I really am ok with losing my job but if I don't I will come off looking like a real jerk if I've been going on about the guys should just suck it up and move on. Then I stay and they go. Yeah, asshole much! But if I end up going I hope I have time to say my peace. Like I say the past couple weeks have been the shits on the work front.

At home the potential for excitement or disappointment is even greater if that is possible.

Two huge outcomes are about to be revealed in our lives that are going to impact everything and the wait is brutal. Today was a fairly bad day as I felt the weight getting to me somewhat. My hope is tomorrow, feeling rested, I will be able to face the challenge of keeping my mind straight and focused on the opportunites of whatever comes.

"Do not anticipate trouble, or worry about what may never happen. Keep in the sunlight."-Benjamin Franklin

The big wait is on for the next few weeks. It is so hard not to think of what may or may not be but really there is not much that can be done until the cards fall as they may. My work and life is one big guessing game as to what will happen. At the best of times we don't know what could happen day to day but right now life is really up in the air! Job, children, family illness. Wow. A lot of what ifs going on!

About the only thing I know for sure is that coming soon shift work for me will be a thing of the past at least for the near future! So there is definately one thing we can put in the win department! If I continue on at the mill it will be Monday to Friday. If I am laid off then it will be onto EI and most likely a combination of trade school, EI and poker to make ends meet.

On the poker front there will be some significant changes coming in the way I will be organizing my schedule. Obviously with the change from 4 on 4 off shift work to Monday to Friday work or school my poker schedule will change as well. As my body and mind readjusts to a much more normal circadian rhythm I expect that the extreme exhaustion I have been working around for the past couple of years should hopefully fade somewhat. Yes, I am one tired dude most of the time!

What does my new schedule mean? On the poker front it means I can experiment with different ways to put in table hours and still get in sleep and exercise and spend time with my family and get work done around the house. Going to work at 8 am means that I have an opportunity to change the way I spend my time. Instead of going to bed late and getting up at at 6 am for work I can go to bed at around 9 pm and get up at 4 Am getting 7 hours sleep. That is more than I am used to on a dayshift. 8 hours would be best but we shall see. I will always have to option of sleeping until 6AM. Getting up at 4 Am means I can get in a 10 minute bike ride, shower, eat and be playing poker by 5AM. Playing 18 tables for 2 hours undisturbed in the morning would mean a vpp output of over 1000 a day during the period of Monday to Friday while still getting to bed by 9pm every night. Saturday and Sunday I could probably fit in 3 to 4 hours of play. (LOL yeah right!, but sometimes yeah I will). Over the course of a month instead of doubling my vpp output when I go from one to two monitors because of my new schedule I will actually be close to tripling it. Now I am not saying that it is a sure thing but I can hypothesize that I will be close to 45000vpps/month in the second half of 2008 when taking into account mill curtailments and such giving me even more days off than normal. Plus vacation time etc. That would comfortably allow me to reach 300000vpps for the year. That means bonuses on top of the worth of the fpps of about $3500. Not bad right. Well, it gets alot better in 2009....Let's look ahead to a couple of the possibilites shall we....

In a perfect world I could play enough to earn Supernova Elite status in 2009. I think I am about a 1% chance of this happening. I will simply be too busy with other things to have the time. Work school family etc. To do that would take about 6 hours of 24 tabling 100NL a day or about 5 hours at 200NL. Its possible but highly unlikely for someone in my position without big sacrifice. The payoff is big though. A Supernova Elite earns over $100000 in year one with just a net zero winrate!That goes up to about 130K in year two as more bonuses kick in. If you can hit further bonuses for 1.25 million vpps it goes up from there....The bonuses are pretty enticing!! That is the carrot that is out there. To read more on Supernova Elite status go here http://www.pokerstars.com/vip/supernova/elite/ . For information on Supernova status which I am currently go here http://www.pokerstars.com/vip/supernova/ .

Now as a Supernova there are bonuses setup every 100k vpps that go up the higher you go. At 200K vpps the bonus is $2000,at 300K it is $3000 and so on up to 600K where it is $6000.

As I said before I believe that I can conceivably hit 45000vpps every month in 2009. That would give me 540K vpps for the year. Half way to Elite. In fact I believe at this time, looking way in the future that 500K vpps is a goal that I can reach in 2009. I give myself a 75% chance of making it to 500K in '09. 600K would be a great achievement and I set the chances at about 25% for that. That final 100K would be worth nearly $10000 in fpps and the bonus. Let's run the numbers for 400K, 500K and 600K, the three most likely totals for 2009! Yeah I am looking ahead because in 08 I don't believe 400K is all that realistic at this point. 300K should be almost a lock as long as I go to two monitors fairly soon and play a reasonable amount of hours.

Ok, what does 400K vpps earn me....First off that is 33333vpps/month.
400Kvpps x 3.5 = 1.4 millon fpps.
That is 14 x $1500 bonus which is now my preferred way of cashing fpps = $21000.
There are 3 milestone bonuses at 2,3 and 4ooK equalling $9000 but we must deduct a cost of 150K fpps or $2250. So the actual bonus is just $6750.
So just totalling the fpps worth and the bonuses gives me...... $27750 or $2312/month.
My equity in Saturday freeroll tourneys is about $300/month. So at 400K and an even winrate at 100NL my earnings expectation is about $2600/mth.

Ok how about 500Kvpps which is my goal for 2009.
500K x 3.5 = 1.75 millonfpp
17.5x $1500 = $26250
Bonuses $6750 + $4250= $11000
Freeroll equity=300x 12=$3600
Total=$40850 or $3404/mth.
This is my poker goal looking ahead at 2009 and where I most likely expect to be earnings wise in 2009.

Ok what if, if I were able to make 600Kvpps in 2009. With curtailments, possible paternity time off from work, holidays.. this is why I give myself a 25% chance at 600K...
600K x 3.5 =2.1 mill fpp
21 x $1500 = $31000
bonuses $11000 + $5250= $16250
Freeroll equity= $3600
Total = $50850 or $4237/mth

That would be ok......

"All misfortune is but a stepping stone to fortune"-Henry D. Thoreau

The hammer came down on Tuesday. 83 jobs lost at the mill. I have yet to go into work since the announcement. My job is gone, but not is all lost. To my great astonishment I was told I was the only qualified candidate among those affected to bump into a chem lab job onsite that is currently held by a junior worker. It is not a slam dunk I am told. But it would appear that I have luckboxed into a better job if that is possible. The pay scale is lower but my schedule would change from 12 hour shiftwork to 8 hour dayshifts Monday to Friday. This is both good and bad but as far as how it will affect my poker it cannot be anything but positive. For now I have to leave this scenario alone and not speculate on how it can affect the rest of my life. As I stated this in not a sure thing yet. I believe I am in this job from what I have been told so far, but strange things can happen in the next few weeks that could change everything. You never know. If it does not work out than I will be applying for EI and then work on getting into trade school to be an electrician.

It has been a stressful few weeks and the news of a different job left me stunned. I had assumed I was out the door. There will be many senior workers out of their jobs and I will still be there. All the schooling that I had thought was in the end a waste from a job point of view turns out to be my saviour? The conversation I had with my boss was in retrospect kind of amusing as I cut him off with some angry comments before he was able to tell me the good news! Lesson...don't shoot the messenger...until he's told you everything! Ces't la vie....

Oh and is winter over now or what?? Geesh.