What's next?

The action of the US Department on Justice has had a profound affect on the lives of many poker players, as I and many have discussed many times since April 15th. At this point all that can be said, thought, speculated and surmised has already been repeated in many a blog. Myself and others have written about using this time to take our game to the next level by study and review. Many have written about having to move out of the country to continue playing online.

Online pros have lost their lucrative contracts with the three poker sites involved in the indictment and they are either having to leave the country or figure out how to continue to make a living doing what they love. Others still have large sums of money tied up on the two sites that haven't paid out yet. All this said, yet again, it's time to figure out what we do now.

I recently purchased The Poker Mindset by Ian Taylor and Matthew Hilger. I'm now three chapters in and I really wish I had purchased this book two years ago. Since April 15th my mindset has been anything but productive for my game. I'm so pissed off and feel so cheated that I tilt over the least little thing. Why, because I don't want to be playing on Carbon Poker or Bodog or any other site except PokerStars. PokerStars was my constant companion for the last two years. When I was down or upset PokerStars was there with thousands of players and hundreds of games to play to keep my mind off of all the things that were bothering me. I totally enjoyed playing there, well except maybe during the worst of my downswings but even then I still didn't want to play anywhere else. Poker seems to have lost so much of it's allure for me right now.

So to the title of this blog, nope I don't have an answer but I wish I did. I have no idea what's next. At this point I trudge on and study and work on my game. I try out the others sites in hopes of finding one I enjoy half as much as I enjoyed PokerStars. I study and read and review (if I could just find a site with a decent method of saving hand histories so I can review my games). I hope the DOJ doesn't decide to shut down the remaining sites but that is a possibility that we all have to be aware of. Most of all I stop and I realize this is yet one more bump in the road of life. I realize how many other things I have to be thankful for and most importantly I work on my mindset. I do my best to stop being pissed off and accept what has happened and do what I can to improve the situation while accepting that what I can do is minimal.

I've been asked quite a bit about other sites and depositing and rakeback and all the general questions. While I'm no expert in online poker sites I do know quite a bit about how to find a new site and deposit and get rakeback and all those things so my next blog will be a review of each site still available in the U.S. (based solely on my experience and opinion) along with how you sign up, get rakeback and deposit. Until that update if you are interested in Cake or any of the sites on the Merge network please go through Rake the Rate using my referral code (a girl's gotta make money where a girl can) here. Click on the tab that says Rakeback Offers and choose the site you're interested in and follow the instructions. Merge pays 35% rakeback and Cake 33% (I will tell you now I'm a bit leery of Cake) by using my link you get 35% (on Merge) of your rake and I get 4%. You can refer people using your referral link after you sign up and you will get 4% referral rakeback on any of your referrals and I will get 1% from everyone you refer, certainly a win/win situation for us all.

Let us trudge on and hopefully prosper.