I spent a week relaxing at home, getting my sleeping patterns back, spending time with the wife and dogs and generally re-establishing some normality. Although I tried to go online for a few sessions I was generally not motivated by online poker. I had played so much live poker that sitting in front of the PC for hours just seemed boring. I therefore was impatient and generally donked off my chips after an hour or two of each session. Strangely enough this did not upset me.
Another side effect of the Vegas trip was my chronic back-pain was gone. I guess I walked a lot in Vegas and slept in many different hotel beds. Maybe the poker chairs are more comfortable than my office setup. Something obviously had helped my back-pain and I played one of my most enjoyable games of soccer in the last couple of years - not because of how well the team played but just because I had full movement on the ball without the pain I have suffered for years.
Anyhow week 2 after I got back I was sleeping reasonable hours and still not very motivated to play online. The few sessions I did have seemed to all go bad.
Week 3 was much the same. I started going back to kicking off 4 or 5 tournaments at the start of the day and trying to grind but my enthusiasm was just not there. When I got knocked out I did not start any more tournies - just watched tv and read some books. I realised I was running bad and started re-reading some of my poker books and watching poker videos at some training sites but I could not even be motivated to finish these activities. Also my back pains came back and I resumed playing soccer at 60% movement and killer-pain (relieved on the day by excessive Advil and then post-game suffering for a few days!!).
So now I am in week 4. I have tried varying the games I am playing mixing in some heads-up, some Omaha H/L and some small SnGs. Just to get some motivation. Yesterday evening I kicked off 3 decent sized tournies and bubbled 2 of them and cashed in the 3rd. This is the best result I have had in weeks and makes me feel like maybe I am on the way back. I also cashed in a couple of small one table SnGs so that has cheered me up a little.
Vegas is such a dilemma for me. I think I was a net winner at cash games, a slight loser at tournaments although I cashed in 3 out of 13 winning two of them (one chop). I could spend hours grinding the poker tables to win a few hundred dollars and then minutes playing craps and lose that and much more. I struggled on Friday and Saturday nights walking through the casino where everyone was chugging free drinks, playing table games, having mega-fun and partying whereas I was dead sober heading for the grind in the poker room. Yes it would be profitable taking money off the drunks but they were having fun and I was working. I cannot imagine how tough if must be doing that full-time although I think if you do not stay in the casino-hotel that may help keep your sanity. If you live there and drive in specifically to go to the poker room and then drive home again maybe its like any other job. But staying in the casino hotel, walking past the fun loving people to get to the poker room, eating in the restaurants, watching the bands perform in the lounge, the dancers all over the place, the tourists in their skimpy outfits falling around drunk, the dropouts, hustlers and hookers when walking from casino to casino (especially at night with thousands of dollars in your pocket) etc. - its very tough.
As I write this I think anyone who reads it would say what a great life - how can you think that stuff is tough. But it is tough if you are trying to stay sober and focus on getting to a card table to win a bunch of money off people you are clearly trying to exploit. For me , my inner self was telling me Fri and Sat nights were party nights - have a beer or six and join in the fun. Play some craps, blackjack, slots, roulette and enjoy Vegas like everyone else. And as soon as I let my guard down - there went all the poker winnings.
So in conclusion, I dunno!!
I do know that I still love Vegas. I still would love to live there for 6 months to grind the games and see how I do. But I am sure I would degenerate and become a sad human being. Fortunately my wife keeps me sane and would not allow me to go for so long in the first place. I recognize my own flaws could break me if I stayed there too long.
