The last few days have been long, but a lot of fun too.  My daily schedule has been a 9:30 wake up call.  I don’t set an alarm, but that is usually when my daughter wakes up and I usually get up and pick her out of her crib and take her to my wife who then insta feeds her.  At 10AM I start the process of working on my book.  It turns out that although Scott Brown and I were going to do the book together, I decided instead to move Scott over to editor of the book and co write the book with Paul Hoppe, who recently put out a book of his own, Way of a Poker Warrior.  We usually wrap up at about 12:30 to 1.  From there I have lunch with my family and then head over to my office to play some poker until about 7-8PM and then I head to the gym, then home to spend some time with the family and get some R&R before I wake up and do it all over again.

My office is looking pretty sweet.  I recently moved in some furniture and it is a pretty sick poker office now.  I’ve got a couch, a desk by the window with a balcony that has a forest view, a big table that seats a half dozen people, a brand new baller computer that costs over $5,000 and a nice little mini fridge close to my desk for meals.  I guess truth be told, it is not an office it all hahha.  It is actually a small house I bought to play poker at.  I didn’t want to get an actual office where I pay rent because homes are absurdly cheap right now and I figured why pay rent and flush my money away?  So in case I ever go on a long online poker bender, I have all of the amenities of being at home which is nice.

The youtube poker series is going great.  I am getting quite a bit of traffic already (neraly 2,000 people watched the first video) so we decided to create our own channel which you can check out here if you are interested.
<a href=”http://www.youtube.com/user/ImagineMediaContent#p/u/4/sHMO5HpfhBQ”>You tube Poker Series</a>  Basically what I am doing is talking about some of the interesting spots I get myself in at the tables and how/why I did what I did.  It is informal and the idea is to keep it light and hopefully along the way you will improve your poker game in the process.  Anyway, check it out.

I only have two more days of grinding on the book and playing a ton of hands before my family and I head on a short vacation to the Oregon coast.  I very much have a work hard play hard mentality, so I usually try and have a lot of fun on vacations and not worry about what things cost.  I figure the reason I work hard is so that I don’t have to worry about what things cost, so we really are doing this trip right.  My wife’s mom, my wife, my daughter and I rented an ocean front suite with tons of amenities and the sand right outside our patio.  The pictures of the place online were pretty sick so we’re all really looking forward to the trip.  A lot of the reason I booked it by the water is because A. I love the water and B. it puts me in a good frame of mind for working on my book.  Each morning while my family is waking up and starting their day, I’m going to do a couple hours of work on the book while lounging at the beach which for me anyway, is where a lot of my best work gets done.

It’s funny how the little things still mean a lot to me.  I got a kick out of this line from a column put out promoting the Poker Stars golf/poker event that takes place in a month:

“Fairways and felts promotion from PokerStars at EPT
Wednesday, 4 August 2010

Poker and golf seem to go together nicely – Daniel Negreanu, Phil Ivey and Dusty Schmidt are some of the names who hit the courses after a long day at the tables. Often spiced up with juicy six-figure bets for the former two; the latter was a PGA pro before turning to poker. The last two days of the EPT Vilamoura Main Event on September 1-2 will play host to the €1,100 challenge that sees players pit themselves against each other on the – you guessed it – fairways and felt.”

Seeing my name thrown around with the likes of Phil Ivey and Daniel Negreanu is quite a thrill for a guy who used to watch them on TV as a micro limit player dreaming of one day being able to play poker for a living.  I also got really excited for the event itself, until I read further and saw it was on September 1-2.  Those are the dates I have scheduled to take my wife on a getaway for our anniversary.  On the 4th, the first game of the Oregon ducks football season is here.  So it was possibly the worst timing it could ever be.  Those are some of the only things I would ever miss something like this for.  It’s a shame really, but I am sure if the event goes well (and I am sure it will) there will be more of them in the future (hopefully on a different day!)

Here’s the latest in our series of daily hand analyses. Hope you like them.

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To get more of my instruction, please visit www.DragTheBar.com.

Here’s Hand Analysis #4, part of my new daily video series. Really having fun with these, and hope you enjoy them.

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For more of my instruction, please visit DragTheBar.com.

Here’s the latest. Still working on the graphics, but hope you can enjoy the bare bones approach for now.
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To check out more instruction from me and the other great teachers at DragTheBar.com, please click here.

Part of an ongoing series of hand analysis. Heard your comments yesterday about adding some graphics so you can follow along more easily, and we’re working on that. Hopefully this will suffice for now:

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Do get more of my instruction, please visit DragTheBar.com

I just started a new Youtube series where I will go into great detail about the more interesting hands I played for the week and release videos daily. Each week I am going to go over 5-10 interesting hands that I played that week and go into every little detail of my thought process. The video will then be chopped up into smaller videos with discussion of 1-2 hands per video being released daily. I am super excited about the series, although for now I am going to wait and see what people think. As you will notice if you watch the video, I am just on my web cam and it is not professionally done or anything. But if people are liking it and all goes well, then I will try to really make it nice and get a nice high def camera etc. For now, while it is in beta phase, I am mostly just seeking to learn what you all think of the concept and whether you find it enjoyable or not.

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If you guys dig it and want more instruction, you can watch my table play videos at Dragthebar.com

Please leave me plenty of feedback either on this site or on my Facebook Page

Man do I feel rested right now.  I went to the Dentist to have a bunch of work done on my teeth and was prescribed halcion to take right before the appointment so I the pain wouldn’t bother me.  I’ve taken that stuff before other dental appointments so I knew what I was signing up for.  Well, I took the stuff and wow did it knock me out.  I was asleep from 5:15PM yesterday and woke up at about 8AM this morning!  So now I feel great and am up a couple hours earlier than usual so I’m going to write this blog and head to the gym and watch some TV news station and get a good workout in.  Once I get back from the workout I am officially beginning work on my poker strategy book with the same co author as my last book, Treat Your Poker Like A Business, Scott Brown.  I feel like since the last book went so well, why mess with a winning formula, so I suspect Scott will be the co author of all the poker books I decide to do.  This book will have a quick turnaround too, so even though we are starting on it today, expect it to come out soon.  We grind when we do books as hard, if not harder, than I do at the poker tables.  Some writers say, “I can only write when I have inspiration” whereas Scott and I say “Inspiration is for pussies.”  No joke, that is our motto!

This weekend at the tables was as swingy as I have ever  had in my entire life.  On Saturday I was insta stuck about $10,000 at the tables (mostly 5/10nl online) and grinded it all back by the end of the day to break even on the day.  Sunday was so bad at the tables I had my laptop in my hand and it nearly went through the window about 5 different times throughout the day.  I mean, of all the poker I have played, I am almost certain I have never run worse.  I went on a 27 buy in downswing in one day, without playing one single hand in a regrettable fashion.  I was just dished out a cooler damn near every 5 minutes.  I would get kings and run into aces.  Had some clown shove 74s on me all in preflop, call with aces and watch the guy flop a flush.  Set over set, boat over boat, flush over flush, get it in with nut flush draw and a pair vs. worse flush draw no pair, and watch the guy runner runner a gutterball.  I mean it was the most incredible thing I have ever seen in my life of playing poker.

So I ended up quitting for the day after a half decent comeback and immediately went to the fridge and cracked some beers.  I needed something to stop the shakes.  Even though I was stuck a ton of money, it wasn’t a big deal really.  I don’t know why I was so upset, but it was just so surreal and nothing like I had ever seen before that my body just couldn’t handle it.

Then a funny thing happened the next day.  I woke up and decided that I was still a little fragile after yesterday’s session so I made up my mind that if I got stuck more than $3k I was done for the day.  I had lost $18,000 the day before (and that is counting the comeback I had at the end) and just felt that health wise my body couldn’t endure another bad day.  So I started winning right away and it did not stop.  I just won stack after stack after stack.  I coolered everyone and never even lost a pot in about 4,000 hands over $500.  Never got properly stacked once.  It was an amazingly good run and guess what, I won $18,000 before I quit.  I think at one point on Sunday I was stuck about $25,000 and by Monday evening I had won it all back!  That is one of my best comebacks ever, but also what is more amazing is that I had my worst day in terms of money lost of the year directly followed by my best day of the year.  What are the odds of that?

Well, I’m off to the gym.  Got some “baby fat” to lose.  I got in pretty decent shape before we had our child last fall and since then I put on about 20 with all the stress and lack of motivation to go to the gym, lack of sleep etc.  All the moms and dads out there know what I’m talking about I’m sure.  I went from 175 to 197 and after 2 solid weeks at the gym, I’m inching down to 192, but still a long way to go.  Actually that reminds me, I should clear something up.  I don’t know why, but occasionally I look at poker forums and I swear half of the time someone is comparing me to some sumo wrestler or something.  I think about half the poker population thinks I am this enormously fat guy.  Well, I am not thrilled with how I look at the moment, but for God’s sake this is the fattest I’ve ever been right now and I am still a 192 pound, 6 foot tall guy!  I mean, I want to be 165 or whatever, but I can’t imagine meeting a 192 pound, 6 foot tall guy and walk away thinking he was some insanely fat, gross guy.  Anyway, ya never know with the LOL internetz crowd what they are going to concoct in their minds and spew onto a message board.

The last few days have been a lot of fun.  Played some golf on Friday at Eugene CC and actually played half decently.  I had only hit about 30 range balls since February before playing on Friday, but managed to shoot 72 from the tips on a tough track, thanks mostly to a really sharp short game (weird, I thought after a 5 month lay off your short game was supposed to be bad?  Golf is strange.)  I played with my buddy Casey Martin and his brother.  We had a great time as always.

The day before my wife and I went to Portland’s annual Brewfest at Waterfront Park.  Brewfest in Portland is AWESOME!  In fact, I have seen it on numerous lists as being hands down the best brewfest in the US.  I have only been to the brewfest in Portland, so I have nothing to compare it to, but I can definitely say I am not sure how you could create a better brewfest.  It is right along the water, has some of the best beers in the world, and there are probably ten thousand people on the grounds, so it can get pretty lively.  Portlanders love their beer and their passion for it comes through pretty obviously at the brewfest.

Last night I was really struggling at the tables for awhile.  I was about to quit playing, but decided to tough it out because I had some pretty sick seats with direct position on some massive fish.  I am glad I maintained my composure and stuck it out because I went on a pretty good run and stacked most of the fish before quitting about 8 hours into my session.  From there the day kept getting better and better.  I decided that I wanted to go on a little trip with my family so I looked into some ocean front rooms along the Oregon coast for next week and found a really nice one.  I went to book two rooms online (one for the 3 of us and one for my mother in law who travels with us now that we have a baby) and the room types I wanted were not being listed as an option online.  So I called the hotel and spoke with a really nice woman who ultimately got us hooked up with an ocean front multiple room suite that we can all stay in, that was actually much LESS expensive than what I was trying to book online!  So here I was calling up thinking we were going to be screwed and I ended up saving $1,000 AND got the better rooms than I was even hoping for.  Score!

So with that good fortune I decided to book a 2 day anniversary trip with my wife that I am sure will score me some major points.  We ended up getting an awesome room by a winery in the Willamette Valley and got all of the fixins to go along with it (massages, champagne upon arrival, driver to take us to the wineries etc.).  What’s even better about all of this is that my wife was cool enough to let us “observe” our anniversary on a different day because if we didn’t, it would interfere with game day for Oregon football against New Mexico (the weekend after that I am going to fly to Tennessee to watch the Ducks play Tennessee on Sept 11th).  What can we say, we love our Ducks!

I will make another blog post about this, but keep your eyes peeled this week for a brand new you tube series I am starting that is essentially me recording myself talking about the most interesting hands I played for the day.  Each week I am going to pick out the 7 most interesting hands I played for the week and record myself breaking down the hands.  I will chop the recording into 7 videos and we will release 1 each day on dustyschmidt.net.  Now only 1 hand per day might not sound like a lot, but keep in mind that I am talking for 3-7 minutes per hand about every little detail of the hand.  No detail of the hand will go ignored and I will be breaking down why I did everything I did (or wish I had done differently).  I am hoping people enjoy this series and if they do, I will keep making them for an indefinite period of time.  I think the  first video will be ready to go up either Monday or Tuesday.  I will make a new blog post about it with links to the video when it goes up.  Please check it out.  If these videos get a lot of traffic, I will keep making them.

Well, I’m off for another big day on Poker Stars.  I am going to play for the next 8-12 hours on Stars in all of the high stakes cash games and tournaments.  I can’t wait.  Hopefully I get some momentum going early and am able to capitalize on the day!

This past week I have played quite a bit of poker online.  The week started off horribly with me losing 4 straight days at the tables.  I went on about a 20 buy in downer, but then I won small on Thursday and got a little momentum in the right direction.  On Friday I decided that I badly needed to get a haircut.  It was hot out, my hair was long and the woman who regularly cuts my hair was booked for awhile, so I just went into my bathroom and shaved my head!  And what do you know, I ran great on Friday, winning about $12k on the day.  So I guess the next time I need to stop a losing streak I just need to shave my head!

Other than poker, I have been watching the British Open at St. Andrews on TV. Tiger is putting SO bad.  I have never seen him struggle this much on the greens.  It is crazy what has happened to him since his scandal broke out.  He just isn’t the same, yet anyway.  When he talks about golf he even sounds more like a regular pro now.  The other day he said that he can’t put ball striking and putting together in the same round.  That is like the #1 complaint of 99% of the PGA Tour.  If they are striping it, they can’t buy a put.  If they are hitting it all over the place, they make everything.  One way or another they end up with their “usual game” which for a good pro is between 67 and 74.

But Tiger has always been the guy who has it all.  If he stripes it, he may just make everything too and win by 15 like he did at pebble.  Or 12 like he did at Augusta.  Or 8 like he did at St. Andrews.  But right now he looks like more like Sergio Garcia then he does himself.  He seems to have gotten his long game in order, but his putting is just abysmal.  I think it will be awhile before Tiger looks like Tiger again, but I suspect once he has his personal life in order (aka he’s either committed to single life, or finds another woman who he can start over with.  Man, can you imagine how insecure his future wife is going to be every time he travels?!!) we will see the old Tiger again.

I am also putting together a draft for a purely poker instructional book that I think people are REALLY going to like when I am finished.  I had no intention of doing a purely poker instructional book, but I came up with what I am hoping is a really good idea for how to present fun to read, easy to understand high level poker instruction that will be fun to write and hopefully will improve the readers’ games.  I had always intended to write a sequel to treat Your Poker Like A Business, which I will at some point probably this year, but this book is what I am most excited about right now.  I will keep you all posted on my progress in this blog.

Well, I think I am going to just play a little bit of poker and spend the rest of the day with my wife and daughter.  Tomorrow I am going to watch the final round of the British Open and play the Sunday tournaments on Poker Stars and tons of cash game hands.  I am definitely pumped to play and hopefully continue to run good.