The Market

It’s been a while since I talked about the stock market. We’ve seen a 10 -15% correction in oil & gold stocks the last couple of months. It hasn’t been a pleasant ride, but I am looking out longer term and still believe these are two good areas to invest in.

I am still holding on to my favorites:

Gold
Goldcorp
Gammon Lake Resources (silver)

Oil
Opti Canada (Alberta oil sands play)
Calvalley (Yemin oil play)

I think the housing bubble has people worried. There is a sense of nervousness in the market, and it could be a volatile next few months.

If anybody has any favorite stocks they'd like to share, please post a reply.

Sports Wagers & Poker Play

Sports
I played 6 college football games through SIA (I have to rollover $210 on a deposit bonus). I only played about $5-10/game.

I’m not a great sports picker but I picked 5 out of 6 college football games correct:
College
BYU (-28.5) vs Utah State – Win
Arizona St. (+8.5) vs California – Lose
Wake Forest (+2.5) vs Mississippi – Win
LSU (-36.5) vs Tulane – Win
Notre Dame vs Michigan (over) – Win
Louisville vs Kasas St. (under) - Win
NFL
Eagles (-6.5) vs San Fran – Win
Atlanta (-4.5) vs New Orleans - ?

Unfortunately I went 1 for 2 on my picks with Actyper on the BetWWTS $50 RAF bets.

I used this College football site to get some analysis to make my picks. Cfn.scout.com

Poker Play
I received an e-mail from VC poker about a reload bonus & entry into a freeroll, which I think they are giving away several poker chipsets. I decided to make a $50 deposit ($25 bonus) just so I could play in the Sept 30 freeroll. I cleared the bonus no problem making $66 profit; hopefully I can win a chipset now.

I also played in the PokerSavvy Mansion $10+$1 $1000 added tournament on Saturday. I think there were only about 38 people playing. I finished about 23rd. Not a good showing, but the added $ for the amount of players was worth it. I look forward to playing in more tournaments that PokerSavvy hosts.

Played a little at Pokerroom. I had 3 $5 +$.75 SNG tickets I won from the Welcome series SNG's. I busted on my first one and won the second one. ($20 plus a Stage 1 Classic ticket). I played in the stage 1 SNG and finished in fourth. Winner got Stage 2 ticket, 2 & 3 got a Stage 1 ticket back.
I still have 1 more ticket to give this a shot. I think it's four stages, so it is very tough to make the final tournament.

Pokerroom & PSO League

I played in my second Sunday Welcome weekly finals at Pokerroom. This time I finished 13th for a $150 + $12 ticket, which I can add to my $100+$8 ticket from a previous tournament. I have a couple of months to use the tickets and hopefully I’ll be able to cash in 1 or both of them.

I’m not a great tournament player but felt pretty good about how I played in both of these. In this one I was sitting in about 10/13 place when I pushed with pocket queens. 1 caller holding AK suited. He made a flush to put me out.

PSO announced a new fall league which will be twice a week for four weeks in October. The extra prizes PSO are throwing in are fantastic!

Here’s a link to the announcement.

http://www.pokersourceonline.com/pokerleague/poker-leagueFall2006.asp

$50 RAF from BetWWTS

Based on what I’ve read it doesn’t look like the Steelers bet qualifies as the 1X WR to get the $50 RAF bonus.

This is a quote from another forum

”Just got off chat with BetWWTS again and the RAF bonus will NOT be deposited if your friend bets on the Steelers promotion. Your friend will have to make a seperate 1X deposit wager for the $50 to be deposited in your account. I gave them hell, told them their T&C were misleading, I wouldn't be referring anyone else to their site, etc. etc. and they just apologized and said they would update their T&C.”

I had one friend sign up under me and I still haven’t seen any $ yet, unless they wait until after tonights game (which I doubt). I’ve offered the whole $50 RAF to my friend if he decides he wants to risk wagering $100 of his own $. I don’t think I’ll wager any more on this site (unless the Steelers cover).

Mansion Poker update & Player Points

I played again at Mansion poker last night, mainly because I am enjoying the site. To my surprise $10.29 USD was released into my account. I read a little bit more on the bonus and it does say that $10 releases for every 60 MCP’s. It’s not the best bonus, but if you’re playing NL then the points come pretty fast. At least you don’t have to clear the full deposit amount bonus, because I never would have done that.

I’ll probably play there some more and maybe even give the Poker Dome Challenge a try.

What to do with all the points?

As most of you know most poker sites have some sort of frequent player point’s scheme. I’ve got points sitting at several sites such as; Party, Paradise, Absolute, William Hill, Pokerroom, & Several VIP points from the B2B sites, to name a few.

Sometimes I feel the need to consolidate my $’s back to Neteller when it’s sitting all over the place at different sites. This is how I feel about all the points I have out there. So I ordered a track suit for my wife from Party, a coffee mug from Absolute. I guess I’ll use the other points up in some tournaments in the coming weeks. I figure I may as well use them or they’ll just go to waste anyway.

Intercasino & Mansion Poker

I received an e-mail from Intercasino offering me $10 to play at their casino. I decided to make a $50 deposit (instead of the usual $100). I received the $50 match and the free $10. I started playing blackjack and I think I went about 2 for 25.

Typical hands:
If I had 20 against the dealers stiff, he made 21
If I had 18, he’d make 19
If I doubled down with an 11 against a six – I would get a five and the dealer would make an 18.

You get the scenario

I’m not sure if it was just bad luck or what. Maybe it’s this new bonus code they make you use…

returning player = scoop his money

What I do know is I’ve busted out the last 4 or 5 months in a row, and I now vow not to go back there.

I also tried Mansion poker last night. I wasn’t very successful playing (-$30) but I do like the site. I’ll probably try it a bit more. There is no way of clearing my huge 1st deposit bonus, so I’m just playing it to try out the site and give them some business after their generous Sports book offer.

Pokerroom Update

Since clearing the Pokerroom promo through PSO last month they have had two reloads in September. I was fairly successful the first time so I decided to make a deposit on both reloads (60 days to clear) The points seem to come a little slow for clearing the bonus, but I just really like the site. I’ve even passed on a couple of other reloads, at other rooms, to concentrate on this one.

I was lucky enough to finish in 18th place in the Pokerroom Weekly new player final. I received a $100 + $8 ticket to play in one of their daily tournaments. We'll see how that goes.

What do you think of Pokerroom and the bonus clearing rates?

SIA & Mansion results

Pittsburgh pulled it off and I won my $1000 bet with Mansion! Money’s in my Mansion account, I just need to send ID to be able to cash out. Looks like others were already successful with their withdrawals.

On another note, I can’t figure out this Sportsinteraction (SIA) NFL promotion.
I put a few bucks in for the 20% deposit bonus, which I received. However, so far I am unable to make my picks for the $500 cash. I can’t see the free SNG ticket in the poker site, and the free $10 casino credit is not in my account. The biggest problem is getting a hold of someone to talk to from SIA. Live chat is down and their phone just rings busy. Not very good CS in my opinion, considering it’s the start of another NFL season and they're trying to do a big NFL promo using Jim Kelly's name.

Sportsinteraction

I received some snail mail from Sportsinteraction for their Jim Kelly NFL launch party.

It includes:
Free $500 bet (Basically you have to pick 6 selected games correct to win $500)
15% all weekend or 20% deposit bonus Thursday Sept 7 between 2-4pm EST
$5 +.50 SNG ticket to enter a 250K Poker Tournament
Free $10 Casino Bet to use playing Progressive Blackjack

Some pretty good FREE offers from them

Mansion Free Bet

I learned my first lesson in sports betting. I made the Mansion risk free $1100 bet on Friday but didn’t have my ducks in order to make my hedge bet to lock in a $400+ profit. Now that the line has moved from -4.5 to a pick it’s too late to hedge. All I can do now is hope that Batch has a career game and Pitt can cover.

Do your Homework

One important thing I’ve learned along the way is to read as much as you can when you are gambling & bonus whoring. I learn a lot by reading Blogs by Actyper, Scottwire, Riverrun, (to name a few), and of course the PSO forums. Case in point, I set up my Mansion account through PokerSavvy (an affiliate) and should at least net a $90 profit by signing up through them. These guys are an invaluable source of information, and I appreciate it very much that they share this info. I try to show my appreciation by signing up under them for whatever affiliate or site so at least they may get a bit of a kickback in return. This is no different than signing up to new poker sites through affiliates like PSO. Why wouldn’t you sign up through them and get some free gifts in return…it’s really a no brainer.