This week has been pretty hectic. We had birthing classes on Tues and Wednesday evenings, and some family favors to take care of (had to get a lawnmower fixed).

On a total tangent, do you have that one vocal friend who isn't shy about asking for stuff? "I like that painting, can I have it?" My good friend... we'll call him "Mike"... is the king of this. He is quite blunt, and almost makes it a game sometimes to see what he can get from you because he realizes it's not exactly standard in America. He's from Eastern Europe and in general, it's really a sign of closeness if you treat others like they're family, and possessions as if they are familial possessions. Your friend's PS3 game is almost as good as it being your PS3 game. On the reverse side, he invites me over to his brother's house all the time for ridiculous BBQ's of whole lamb, delicious sides and all kinds of stuff. Bringing anything to the BBQ is considered kinda rude, because you are basically saying "you aren't a good enough host". We went over there on Saturday and only the younger guys were drinking, neither the brother nor the parents drink either, but the second we ran out of beer the mom was out the door before anyone could object, only to come back with a case of beer. My fiance's family are also Eastern European, and it's exactly the same.

Anyway, as a born and bred American, it takes a while to get used to and lately Mike has been borrowing a ton of my PS3 games. Definitely not at all a big deal, I consider myself a generous person... but yesterday I finally got him back! Not only was yesterday his birthday, it was his 30th. We were chatting on Gmail about a game that I have that I never play (requires login info). He's been asking for a while if he could have this info, and I just kept forgetting. Of course if it's a game I'm not going to play, I'd be happy to give it to a friend. Yesterday he reminds me, and I ship him the info. Then finally, I take a play out of Mike's playbook and say "you know, you probably should just buy me a game". To my surprise he says "yeah, you're probably right, what do you want?" After a quick browse of Amazon, we settled on Dungeon Siege III pre-order, and he immediately shipped it.... on his birthday!!! Don't ask, don't get, I suppose. Shipppp!

It's hard to imagine I'm going to have a little baby in just a month! I was only 19 when my son was born and I didn't do any of the birthing classes. At 19, you're pretty retarded, no matter how "smart" you think you are.

Last night in the infant CPR/baby safety class they were showing slides of staircases and I couldn't help but get a little angry as it reminded me exactly of a house we had put an offer in on (and a winning one, come to find out later) just before Black Friday. It really sucks that if I found a new profession today, I'd still be 2+ years away from home ownership (self-employed home loans require 2+ years in same occupation in most cases)... but in any case I need to manage my money in ther interim. I am certainly thankful that Black Friday happened well before we got into the house, as it leaves our options wide open.

But c'est la vie. Black Friday made me really think about the downsides of self-employment, regardless of what it is... I'll never feel all that great planting my roots in my city, as I have very little chance to find employment in a programmer capacity if all other avenues fail.

I've been studying a bit on trading this week, although not consistently. I made a few realizations about my personality and how it relates to the type of trading I should be doing. In this respect, trading is exactly analogous to poker... you should play what style suits you best. Don't force a nitty style if you're an action junky... Don't force a laggy style if you are risk averse. Often times the WORST line is to fire 2 barrels as a bluff, and give up on the river (very very very very general statement, I know... but hopefully the point is clear). In the same line of thought, scalping is truly for me, and I've been reading the Your Trading Coach - Scalper, and it's helped me a lot. While you never can throw out fundamentals of price reading, there are a few simplifications for entry/exit that goes well with my style.

Some of you have been following my blog for a while, and probably have noticed that I've reviewed a few products over time... last being Slow Habit's book. I don't use this blog for anything other than connecting with my friends, CardRunners members, and as a way to keep a log on what's going on... I was given a copy of Slow Habit's book in exchange for the review.

I have been following www.yourtradingcoach.com for the last year and a half. In my opinion, it's one of the best free resources out there for trading material. Some that followed my blog during early 2010 when I was exclusively trading might remember that I linked to articles from that site. The reason I love the site so much is that it teaches how to be a good reader of market sentiment. 90%+ of online resources for trading teach very generic setups. What I mean by that is stupid stuff like "when the 15 MA crosses below the 30 MA, short". There is no strategy that robotic that will ever lead to profits. It doesn't incorporate the objective data such as... which direction is the market going? Is it trending up, trending down, or in a range? What does the market structure look like? Where is the resistance, where is the support? What is the market sentiment? Who is winning the price wars, the bulls or the bears? What are my expectations when price interacts with this next level of support/resistance?

These are the important questions, and quite frankly, all you need to know to trade profitably. Don't take that statement lightly though... by "all you need to know" I really mean "what you should be focusing on for the next 1-3 years to even begin to trade profitably, and you will probably spend your lifetime enhancing". Again, it's perfectly analogous to poker... you can work hard at it for a lifetime and only approach mastery.

All that said this is sort of a preliminary announcement that I've decided to be an affiliate for the YTC - Price Action Trader and YTC - Scalper. I paid full price for both, sought them out as a resource on my own, and found them both to be absolutely helpful. I realize that Black Friday may have sparked some trading passion in some American poker players, and really think this is a great resource. As I said, this is a preliminary announcement and there will be more on this in the coming weeks... I'll share my trading struggles more frequently... but before you consider buying the ebooks you really should know who it is and isn't for:

- It is NOT for brand new traders. While it explains some fundamental concepts, just as I would never attempt to charge someone for poker coaching who has never played a hand, you need to have struggled with some of the core concepts of Technical Analysis and really be ready to accept the reality of markets as changing bullish/bearish sentiment within a framework of support and resistance. That is to say, it is NOT about systems, or indicators. If you are intellectually aware of this, but still find your charts absolutely littered with indicators, and entering trades solely because an indicator "tells you to", you are probably not ready.

- If you feel comfortable reading a naked chart, with only your markings of support/resistance, and maybe 1 MA (which isn't necessary really, it just helps read the market bias a little more quickly), and have a reasonable idea of how and why price moves, then you are most likely ready.

- Finally, while I think it's a steal for the information given, the YTC - PAT and YTC - Scalper ebooks are $197 and $99 respectively, it's still roughly $300 for the pair. Spend a LOT of time on www.yourtradingcoach.com reading the articles there, view the videos, they are all free!!! Maybe that's enough info to get you going... but more importantly you will have a very clear read on what Lance is all about, his style of teaching, and his type of trading... so you will be able to determine whether the ebooks make sense for you. He even has sample chapters on there, so definitely check it out before purchasing.

If you've done your homework and are ready for the next step, please use this link . As an affiliate I do get commission but it has to be via that link... but really I think it's an awesome resource, and I know some poker players want to make the switch... but like I said, do your own study first, and read up all the free resources on the site to both educate yourself, and to get the jist of Lance's style... if the free articles are enough to get you trading profitably, maybe you can buy the ebook with your profits in a few months?

I'm not really the salesman type person, so it always feels a little weird pushing a product, but suffice it to say that in the 3+ years I've had this blog going I've never felt compelled to recommend too many things at all, but I found the ebooks useful enough to want to share them with others who might find them equally as useful.




So super long winded blog... I've been doing a lot of fishing lately... I can't be the only one who enjoys it? The boat is running better and ever, striper season is gearing up here in Northern California. And most excitingly, after 5ish years of a total ban on salmon fishing, our season opened up for both Ocean and River salmon fishing starting July 16th! When I was growing up we lived very close to the river, I used to fish all the time in the Fall, but haven't since. I really hung up the rods in college, but it's good to be back.

Going fishing tomorrow after the trading session, and early on Saturday with Mike, hopefully I'll have some pictures.

Oh yeah, I'm taking a different approach to the new series that I'm making for CardRunners... I am releasing the first video before I make the rest of the series. I really want to take in member feedback to really give you guys the "wow factor". Again, the theme is as if someone asked me "what does it take to crush?"... coupled with a framework of how to think. This is primarily what I teach in my private coaching sessions. I don't want to simply present a spot and show you what I do... I want to show you all the elements that go into the decision making process, and let you figure it out. Of course there will be some hand-holding examples of how to do this, but it should be 3-5 videos, and if you have anything in particular you want to see that you think coincides with the theme (or hell, even if it doesn't) just leave a comment here.

Best of luck at the tables, charts, rivers or lakes!