Krapp -
Variance doesn’t really bother me, as long as I have an adequate bankroll. I see any loss as a % of BR, so if I lose twice as much, it won’t bother me provided I double my BR. It’s the winning twice as much that makes me want to do it.

As far as confidence goes, I don’t know. I don’t mean to sound arrogant, but it seems really easy for me to be profitable at the Party $25NL tables just playing by the book. And that’s with all the stupid mistakes I still make. I’m just wondering if this strategy will work in the $50NL games. Are the players twice as good? And, repeating my question from above, what is a good sized sample to evaluate my play?

Mike -
Poker tracker is awesome for self-evaluation. For one, I noticed that I hardly ever check/raised unless I had the goods. So yesterday, whenever I felt like someone was just buying the pot, I bluffed the ckeck/raise and took down a few pots with it. I’m also getting better at smelling the slowplay and have pretty much stopped playing shit hands like QJo.
I guess what I’m saying is this: I’ve only been playing for a few months and I know that I have tons of leaks and that I have to work on them, which I am. I just want to make more money as I improve my game.