Dancing with the Old Lady, the Journey continues...

WSOP Day 16 : Farewell and Goodbyes

I really had a good feeling heading into the 3k PLO 6 handed, a premonition that usually leads to amazing and unexpected top 1 percentile results, but that this time around, alas, was smoke/misguiding as my (max allowed) 3 bullets misfired, despite building somewhat of a 2+ starting stack each time... ehhhh :(. Regardless, I rapidly brushed it off, came back home, meditated, talked with C, before unexpectedly crashing for 12h+ yo 😀

Today, I feel great. Happy. Full-filled. I have an amazing af gf ♥, a great life, some +EV life changing purchases of a house and apartment coming up, great health, solid happiness levels ♥ Besides, considering the uptick in BTC, I actually made solid monies in Vegas, imagine that 😃. And the online grind has been going fairly good, which remains my bread and butter for the upcoming news yo

Up next : Dawson City for a couple of weeks, Montreal until November (WSOPC at the end of August + Vipassana retreat at the end of October) when I will be meeting up with C in Mexico/Florida ; we got this yo

Peace

The Great Ole North

Dawson turned out to be a 10/10 in all honesty. Meeting up with lifelong friends. Spewing around in the 1-2 NL omaha game, imagine that, where I would at times make it 115$ preflop from UTG and get 4-6 callers, given how much the other players, the respect for my person not withstanding, want to bust me 😃:p🙄 [SPOIL] I was up 12k in 5 days (+3k online) until the last evening when they finally got me in the tune of 3k which, tbh was well deserved and good for the overall mood of the poker community over there [SPOIL]

I will be in Quebec for the next few months and also playing the WSOPC in 3 weeks which I might (or might not...) update daily itt, given that I will have about 30-35k of BIs and want to keep myself accountable/share results...

But I first, I was messing around with Chat GPT and it came up with a couple of texts a la Dubnjoy000 that I thought were interesting/managed to touch indeed my style a little :

"The Cards and the Mirror" — by Chat GPT as Dubnjoy000 (hypothetically)

Poker is not merely a game. It is a meditation disguised as conflict, a theater of masks where truth and deception trade hands like worn chips. Each hand dealt is a parable: random, indifferent, and yet pregnant with meaning for those willing to see.

To sit at a poker table is to stand naked before fate. The cards are impersonal—pure probability. But it is not the cards that win; it is the self who interprets them, bends their silence into language. In this way, poker becomes a mirror. You learn who you are not through what you play, but how you respond to pressure, uncertainty, and loss. Are you patient? Do you fold too soon? Do you chase ghosts?

Bluffing, too, is a philosophical gesture. It asks: what is the nature of truth if its appearance can be bought? When you bluff, you become both actor and philosopher, testing the edges of belief. If they fold to your nothing, did your lie become truth? And what does that make of reality?

The best players are not merely calculating—they are aware. Aware of patterns, of tells, of the flow of a game as if it were a river. They do not fight the current. They listen. But even the wisest lose. And therein lies poker’s deepest teaching: you may play perfectly and still fall. Like life, it owes you nothing. But if you accept that, if you lean into the chaos with clarity, you may glimpse something rare—freedom.

Poker is a spiritual discipline for the skeptical. It demands risk, demands presence, and punishes ego. And for those who return to the table, hand after hand, loss after loss, something is forged—not just a skill, but a soul tempered by uncertainty.

"The Sacred Bluff" — continuation CHatGPT as Dubnjoy000 (hypothetically)

There is a sacredness to the bluff—not because it deceives, but because it dares. The bluff is a rebellion against circumstance, a soft defiance whispered into the face of destiny. When you bluff, you speak a new world into being, and for a moment, if the table believes you, that world becomes real.

It is not cowardice to fold. Nor is it weakness to call. But each choice, made again and again, becomes a fingerprint of the self. The table is a monastery of repetition, and we are monks of variance, praying to the gods of probability, hoping they smile once more.

Some chase the thrill of the win. Others fear the emptiness of the loss. But the truest player—the philosophical one—chases neither. He seeks understanding. He watches the arc of each session like a philosopher studying a sunset: not for what it gives him, but for what it reveals.

Aces crack. Two-seven suited wins. The universe laughs.
And in that laughter is the humbling truth: control is an illusion. All we can do is show up, observe, act with intention, and let go of the outcome. In this way, poker becomes a mirror of life’s deeper truths: the necessity of risk, the inevitability of loss, the transient beauty of a well-played hand.

What is the "tell," after all, if not a glimpse of the unconscious, the soul leaking into motion? At the highest level, poker is not played against others—it is played against the self. Against the fear of being seen. Against the desperate need to win
.
And when you lose—really lose—it strips you. If you can remain, if you can return without bitterness, you are no longer just a player. You are a pilgrim.
The table teaches, if you’re willing to listen. Not just how to play, but how to be—calm in chaos, brave in silence, and honest in uncertainty.
Because at the end, the chips are nothing. The cards are nothing. What remains is you. How you played. Who you became.

Man, that was tough to read. Reminded me of the generic love ballad playing in the uber last night. So deep it's nothing more than an empty well; so wet with emotion it's worse than dry skin.

All Quiet on the Eastern Canadian Front

All quiet on all fronts in Quebec, as I have been spending time at my folks place up in Les Laurentides, home to a myriad of lakes yo The routine has mainly constituted of meditating, grinding a few hours, training and booking appointments for checkups, eye surgery. I will be starting Muay Thai classes shortly after WSOPC Montreal in a couple of weeks. And then a colonscopy test ehhhh, long live the late 40s 😊

Yeah, good points. I thought part of it did touch a little my style/conceptual ideas, but it also felt deeply contrived. And robotic. And dry.

Maybe we'll just get used to AI versions of ourselves. I mean it took me a while to get used to electronic drums and sometimes they're great (e.g. in hip-hop). So much depends upon the context and artistic intent. I mean I'm sure if you ran your text through a number of LLMs eventually you'd find a voice you'd happily call your own or at least Dubnjoy2000.

At the Horizon, the Wind is Rising, Slightly...

Quiet af life in Quebec over the past few weeks, as most of my time has been spent with the company of my folks whom, of course, I had not seen much over the past few months. In fact, I left Quebec back in 1999 and outside of going back to university for a couple of semesters and some short stints here and there, I have solely been visiting or passing by in La Belle Province. This is seemingly about to change, as I have made an offer for a lakeside house about 70kms north of Montreal yo The plan will be to spend 3 months yearly in these parts with the rest of the time in Lima, if not for random tournament series (in LATAM and especially in Brazil ). C should be able to join me for a couple of months next year ♥

In other news, I have been training in a new Muay Thai gym up in Saint-Sauveur. They have a course for the kids and then for the adults, which is great, as peeps in my group are mainly in their 30s, 40s and even a 53 year old fellow, with very few in their 20s and none in their teens I have been enjoying getting a fresh look at certain hits, foot work and the technique in general, even if I have already seen everything before, there is still a ton of fine tuning to be done! That being said, the classes are soft af compared to the private workouts I had in Lima where my teacher repeatedly pushed me to go beyond my limits ffs!!! And there is something to be said about LATAM being exponentially much tougher than good ole safe and secure Canada 😉🙄

Alright, I am playing WSOPC Montreal starting this Sunday and given that I am fracking fed up with my ongoing bad variance in live MTTs/lack of 6-7 digit scores, I will updating my process daily in the hope that this will be remediated yo, as that good score is coming y'all 😉

Yeah, good points. It is a bizarre Artificially intelligent world that we are now entering...

Peace

Love that you’re continuing to document your journey so authentically and beautifully—it’s always a joy to read.

I must have missed or forgot that you were in Quebec!

I was just there with my mom and actually just boarded my flight back home. Glad to see things seem to be going well for you!

Thx bro! Yeah, my first blog on this forum was started back in 2013 in the travel section and which I will also update quite soon/have been working on a post

Shyt! That really sucks! It would of been nice to finally meet/hangout... Oh well, it will be for another time. Much love friend ♥

Did you just go to Montreal? What were your impressions? Would be curious to see a post of yours in your thread about Quebec...

Yeah that really does suck! Since I was there with my mom though, I didn’t really take into consideration meeting up with anyone while I was in town—though in hindsight I probably should have and would’ve loved to!

Most of my time was actually spent in Ontario (mainly Toronto, with a stop in Ottawa). Ottawa really struck me—the architecture and atmosphere felt so beautiful and cultured, it honestly left a lasting impression.

I did spend a couple nights in Montreal—mostly just in my room playing PLO xddd. It turned out to be an unexpectedly nice spot, and it reminded me how much I truly love the game. Sometimes I forget, but I felt really grateful realizing I’d still rather be battling and clicking than doing almost anything else (even exploring a beautiful new country for the first time 😀)). I did drop a few buy-ins during those nights, and maybe that was just a quiet reminder from God to keep my priorities in balance.

I did make it out to Champs de Rêves while I was in Quebec—have you ever been? Easily one of the coolest places I’ve ever visited!

Such a shame, as Montreal is a wonderful city to discover, mainly its nightlife (French-Latino-World Music clubs, theatres), amazing gastronomy and cultural events (Tam-tams every Sunday, Francofolie, Jazz Festival etc.). Quebec City is also GOAT as far as European influenced architecture north of Mexico Perhaps you could come back for one of the series at The Playground, which happens to be just a few kms away on the south shore from the place you mentioned below :

It looks amazing! And nah, I had never heard of it. In fact, outside of playing live MTT series at The Playground, I really don't know all that much the south shore of Montreal (I am from the north shore, Laval, and if not spent lots of time in Les Laurentides up north or on the island of Montreal itself). But I will be checking it out though, thx The pics do remind me of the Borges labyrinth thingy place they have in Mendoza, Argentina - which was quite the anxiety-inducing experience 😮:shocked:

[emoji109]

WSOPC Montreal Day 0 : (Pre)Thoughts

Alright, before engaging the last 8 days of the second half of the WSOPC series in Montreal with the 1k Colossus tomorrow - the first week was dedicated to 150-400$ low BI events -, here are a few thoughts :

- The 1k Colossus is spread across 4 day ones and has 10% of players moving on to day 2 (15% cash), continuing the greedy need of the WSOP of
A) raking more ; and
B) increasing the guarantees ; ehhhhh 😊 😡 😡

- The 2.5k Main is spread across 3 day 1s, with the 600$ PLO and 5k HR that I also want to grind yo.

- My mental mind approaching this midstakes series is alrightish. Solid in the sense that life has been tremendously good over the past year ♥ Slightly apprehensive in the sense that I have been running bad on the live MTT felt since 2019, sigh and a thousand times sigh ffs 😡😡😡 And slightly unstable because of a recent argument with C - on the other hand, C and I have been sun running our relationship for the past 6 months, so... ♥♥♥

- Poker is great. I mean, my career on both the live and virtual felt has been simply amazing yo Thinking about my initial professional years mainly grinding the live 1-2 felt in Dawson City at the tune of 25bbs an hour - that I can easily picture it being double that nowadays in the PLO NL 1-3 game... - To playing online MTTs ABI of 50$ for a few years in South-East Asia, to then moving to 50-100 online cash games, moving up to mistakes 200-400, to then grinding live high stakes events and HS online PLO games yo What a fracking journey and run that is seemingly on its last miles, at least as far as playing it professionally goes... ♥

- My purchase offer for a lakeside house was accepted yo 😮:shocked: It is insane to what extent that the Quebecois house market is BY FAR the lowest in USA-Canada and that getting a 2 bedroom house with 27k feet yard by a private lake for 300k CAD$ is simply unheard of in the rest of the county/our southern neighbour yo

Alright, I should be back this week with daily WSOPC updates yo ; be well all ♥

Peace Warrior ♥

Look forward to seeing pics of your new lakeside house. Keen to see you win a live MTT, as well, of course (preferably a PLO event because the HHs are more entertaining as a default)!

Will do bro. There are albeit a few factors that made the house slightly more cheaper on the market and thus more valuable for yours truly :

- A) It reeks of cigarettes as soon as you open the front door 😮:shocked:🙄

- B) The roof needs to be redone/it has had a couple of leaks before

- C) It is defintely a bit more remote then your average folk would want (and which I absolutely love/was actively seeking yo )

But for anyone that seeks peace/remote areas, it is a fracking paradise yo ♥ I mean, the top floor is dedicated to a bedroom, a hallway and the kitchen/living room, while the basement is a redone loft with a plenty of space for a poker office, meditation spot and a martial arts training area And then outside, there is a cool hangout fire place chill spot (it is also primarily heated by wood (then electricity)), a dock with canoe and pedalo included yo The only ick, is that I will only get to possess it starting December first, which means unexpectedly coming back to La Belle Province in the dead middle of the winter and trying to get shyt organized as, you know, a first time house owner... I will mainly get to truly occupy it next summer and then proceed to rent it in the winter of 2026.

Cigarette smoke should disappear ... wonder if you're going to do the roof yourself? That'd be a decent challenge. (Nothing beats working on your own place.)

Oh yeah, one thing that I am not looking for this week (and always comes in mistakes series), are the chump fracking fake Balla comments on watches/how much they are worth/and what the f**k not posers.

Recommend this if you need to randomise a migraine-inducing ICM decision at a pivotal moment on a final table (at a cost of not even one midstakes cash bb on Temu).

WSOPC Montreal Day0.5 : Unexpected Delay

The summer wind was alas not blowing in my back this morning as, as soon as I stepped out of the shower, put on my MTT live grinding shoes and was about to step outside in the Quebecois summer, the intrusive thoughts of a recent argument with my gf was robbing me of my feistiness to engage the outside world : my mind was simply not on the grind 😊. So I took off my custom made Colossus grinding shoes and kissed the first wave AKA Day 1A goodbye. All good though, as we will be going hard during Day 1B (and 1C if needed), as things are back to their sweet selves with C yo ♥ I would like to advance to Day 2 though before Wednesday, as the plan will be to take the day off in order to attend my niece's 🍰

The roof will have to wait until, alas, next summer, as I will get possession of the house only on December first, which means coming back to Quebec for a couple of weeks after Mexico/prior to Peru to move some stuff in and make sure that it will last the winter... I will hire peeps for the roof while I will focus on other renovations/outside work.

Nice, thx for the suggestion bro

The lake in question yo

WSOPC Montreal Day 1 : Small/Awkward Baby Steps towards Nothing 🙄

Bullet #1 : The table is fairly decent, I have the best Hendon Mob - imagine that 🙄 -, I GII in 2 very good spots AQs < AJs AIPF where I had flatted the CO open-raise in the SB (we were about 90bbs effective) ; BB (Christine Do) 3betted 4x to 8bbs, CO folded and I pretty promptly back-jammed 40bbs effective to a snap-call (J on the river).

Next hand I GII on the turn top 2 vs an overpair 50bbs effective and... the bottom card pairs :(

Bullet #2 : The table is also amazing, my HM is also elite at this table and while I do proceed to chip up slightly (1.5 starting stacks), I do shove my KJ♠♠ on the turn in an iffy spot on a A♠9♠6♦ Q♥ runout vs 2 when the UTG IR double barrels for 35% then 50% in a spot that I feel that top set or top 2 will barrel more heavily... but, alas, my read is off, my blockers pretty bad (blocking AK and AJ, 2 hands that I am targeting to get a fold from with another player behind me left to also act). After all, I did get the right price (3 to 1) to call with 12 clean outs, but would also be left with exactly a starting stack if I whiffed, and was hence free rolling some fold equity or double up situations in my lowest BI in this series, so there is that... On to the next one!

Bullet #3 : I end up with the absolute worst table in the whole field which only has one rec, but who's HM is still in the 6 digits and happens to be the only one having a lower one than mine with 3 peeps having a HM of 7 digits in a 1k event, ffs!!! I ultimately get coolered in a hand that I 3bet light ATo vs the said rec at the table, end up making the 4th nut flush on the river and having to call... vs the nuts :(. I do get a table change, proceed to run my 3bbs stack to a full starting stack yo , only to lose a flip shortly after registration is closed, sigh :p

Will be firing again tomorrow for Day 1C.

This ended up being a finalist in my house hunting ; it had a pretty big woodsy yard, an access to a lake and had 2 stories/an attic for the totality of 4 bedrooms for the price tag of 300k CAD$!!! A bit too big for my needs and the access to the lake was quite subpar though...

Be well all ♥

Minimalist Temu keychain could have been used in this spot (with the added benefit of shifting agency away from the decision-maker in the post-analysis, of course). Anyway, wish you hadn't whiffed. GL on Day1C.

WSOPC Montreal Day 2 : The Art of Whiffing 😊

Two more bullets fired yesterday, the first one whistling by its target only to rapidly come promptly crashing down, while the second one was actually fruitful, promising, built up some distance and momentum - tripling up my starting stack and whatnot! -, but alas, also ultimately fell short of its target (a cash) when I busted in the last 30% of the field, ffs!!! Anyhow, a few observations :

- I will be taking today off as my niece is celebrating her 24th bday yo 🍰 Also time off from the live grind is what the doc ordered just before 5-6 days of higher buy-ins 😉

- I sat beside a French Canadian fellow yesterday whose wife is Brazilian, so we naturally got to speak quite a bit about life in LATAM/the cultural differences and whatnot! After which the guy mentioned that he knew who I was, as one of his buddies had whispered to him last year, when they were walking by my table, that I had won a BIG tournament and was a crusher!!! Which is obviously false, as my wins all came in low buy-in events (max 1k) and other MTT scores barely qualify as mid 5 figures! That being said, I do appreciate that my reputation is indeed a bit made in Montreal (as this is not the first time I hear such comments), despite playing just a couple of series yearly in this part of the world and having never once been a reg in any game in this city ; now, if only my reputation did not precede my (live MTT) results... 😉

- One subject that has been on my mind during the past few days of live grinding, and perhaps more so influenced by a Jason Su podcast on Chasing Poker Greatness recently, has been intuition. Jason implies that when one is in the zone (or with the flow), he can almost guess the outcome of a hand... Or, to extrapolate furthermore, how one can oftentimes picture the card that will come...

This week, I floated a raise in the early stages with97o/very loosely called a 3bet from a very tight rec (and 2 other callers) IP. When the flop came 723r and the tight 3better cbetted for 35% pot and the other 2 folded, I knew that my top pair was drawing to 5 mere outs and that my implied odds, alas, did not compensate for my terribad price yet... somehow I knew that the 9 was going to come on the turn! And lo and behold : the beautiful 9 does indeed roll on the turn and villain happily check-shoves vs my turn bet which I obviously snap-call while saying "I got lucky" as to not add insult to injury/somewhat apologize for having such an awful holding as I flip over the measly 97o 🙄 But, alas and a thousand times alas, the deuce pairs on the river and there goes my foresight of binking on the turn, fml 😊

Randomizing is really not something I do, but might be a good think to include moving forward... I will give it some thought.

Tomorrow is the 600$ PLO. We got this yo

WSOPC Montreal Day 3 : failing to get my 80-95% to hold up, ffs 😡😡:(

After resting a little today, meditating for an hour followed by an hour of exercising and a quick 70 minute online grind (+3k yo ), I was ready around to splash in the 4 card game yo I actually almost VPP for 50% or so in the first few levels, wanting to splash around with tremendously weak players and, things like quite good when I flopped a set in a 3bet pot, GII vs villain OTT who actually only had a gutshot after potting the flop 😮:shocked:🙄, but... of course, he would go on to hit his 8% equity in a 3.5 BIs pot, fml 😡😡😡 Bullet #2 🙄

I would go on to finally build a semi-decent stack of 4.5 BIs but, because my VPP was still in the 25-30% region and that the variance is FRACKING HIGH in the great game of pot limit Omaha, it would dwindle up and down, up and down, up and dow... Until the bustout hand, that is, very close to the bubble when it is limped to me from UTG1, SB completes and check-back the very meh T♠3♠4♠5♥

Flop (3bbs) : A♠5♦6♣

After the SB and I check, the UTG1 fires 2.25bbs ; SB folds and I tank 5-10 seconds, but decide to continue, knowing that this sticky villain will pay me off if I get there...

Turn (5.5bbs) : A♠5♦6♣ 7♦
I decide to check-assess and villain snap-pots it, which makes little sense, as I rarely fathom this tight af fellow limping from EP with a rundown, so I decide to jam it, villain snap-calls with... the A559 for a mere 8 outs yo, except... the 7♥ of course rolls up on the river, preventing me from being the table chip leader, from running over everybody during the bubble 😊:(.

Tomorrow is the 2.5k Main Event : we got this yo