I think dipping my feet into some 45-mans and 180-mans has helped freshen up my game a little bit, and it's been good to avoid seeing the same regs at the tables every day, but I feel comfortable enough to pick and choose which of these games I want to play dependant on how I'm feeling each day.

If you have been following my blog recently, you will know I've really been struggling over the last few weeks.

After a 6 week break over the summer in which I moved house, got married and went on my honeymoon, I have had my most testing time in poker ever.

The funny thing is, if you look at some of my results since Sept 1st 2011, you might wonder WTF I'm complaining about, as it would appear I am doing very well:

Unfortunately, that isn't the whole story. I'm on an insano-brutal-getthefkouttahere-death run in $60 and $100 18-mans, and am on an ever-pleasant 200 buy-in downswing in $15 180-mans:

I really don't understand how I can be such a consistent winning player in the lower buy-in 18-mans but be dying a death in the higher buy-ins 18-mans. I don't believe myself to be playing them any differently, and I don't think they are particularly tougher. Is it really possible to be running this far below expectation?  I'm not so worried about 180-mans as there is no way I'm not beating those games, and 200 buy-in downswings aren't out of the ordinary. It doesn't make it any less painful though.

You might wonder why I am continuing to subject myself to the pain of the higher buy-ins when I can apparently do perfectly well for myself in the lower buy-ins. I think it's mainly because I refuse to give in to variance. I'm trying so hard not to be results orientated. I know I'm not a -12% ROI player FFS. That would make me a fish. Even if I had many leaks I couldn't be doing that badly.

I've found myself hunting through hand histories, instilled with paranoia that I'm somehow getting sat out on random tables and that's why my win-rate is so disastrous in places, but I haven't been able to find anything like that.

All I can do is work on my game, try and put as much volume in as I can before Christmas so that variance evens itself more quickly, and pray to the Poker Gods that my luck changes.