It may be just an amazing coincidence, but upon accepting a bonus earning option from Full tilt, I experienced quite the negative poker variation. It seemed like I was card dead for longer periods of time than usual, that I was hitting second best hand to often, and every time I picked up aces no one else was picking up a playable starting hand. I play at the micro stakes, so not many would notice I was playing only a little tighter, so why no action on aces? I was playing some of these garbage hands preflop, to make sure people wouldn't think I was a nit.

This also caused me to realize that the other time I lost my bankroll was after taking a bonus. I'm a pretty open minded guy and I don't want to instanly believe that the company (FT) actual would bother causing things like this to happen in their software. I realize I may be playing a little different, but really, would I be playing that much differently. We are creatures of habit, and I've learned to play a certain way in general and don't believe I was playing that much outside of my standard game.

So, when I got back down to almost my original deposit amount, I was seriously considering cashing out and opening up something new at party poker, cake poker, or where ever. I ended up changing my mind, and played some more, and lost some more....hmmm well this is great.( I thought to myself).

Fed up I did something crazy, I took 70% of my bankroll and hit 1 higher stakes (by my standards) table. I realize this is totally not reccommended by any serious poker player, but I've always wanted to know what it was like to play in a higher buy in game on Full tilt. Luckily, I picked up some strong starting hands early and was able to get in there and mix it up without having to bluff. Although, I didn't need to go to showdown, I would have done it with the hands I had.

So now I'm back to within pennies of my original deposit amount, I guess I should be glad I bounced back. So the plan is to go back to square 1, at my usual limits and take this to be another real life lesson in poker. I'm really getting to understand why they call it "the grind", it seems you get ahead a bit and then poker variation kicks you back down.

DWT