If you want to find out how to play poker better, one thing you might want to try is to treat it like your religion. The poker religion is no different from other forms of worship, it has rules and laws it rewards persistence and has strict observance.

If you join the church of poker you must worship regularly. The God of poker expects you to. Try to create a schedule for your poker play and stick to it. Just like religion you must make it fit into your daily routine and apart of your life. You will find that the people around you will be much more understanding if they know that you play poker everyday from two to five.

In the poker religion the God’s frown on those who stray from the path. Of course the penalty for this will not be an eternity in hell, but a bank roll retraction. Learn to play poker to win and stick with what works for you, in the long run you will always be ahead.

Lastly at the church of poker you must always study the scriptures. There is so much great writing on poker that you will never feel lost.

The NBA does tend to harp upon its charity work. But the work needs to be done, and it speaks well for both the players and the less athletic who spend their time and money to help others.

It doesn’t hurt to throw a poker game in there, too. Phoenix Suns forward Shawn Marion will be hosting the Hearts & Helmets Charity Poker Tournament in Scottsdale on Jan. 30. The $1,000 ticket price gets you access to some pretty swank auctions, but the big draw is the chance to play poker with athletes like Marion, Jermaine Dye and various members of the Suns and the San Antonio Spurs.

The tournament is hoping to raise $1 million for charities like the Brad Pitt-sponsored Global Green USA project to rebuild New Orleans, and the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. Plus, the event is being held at a private location that will only be disclosed upon registration. Go to www.allinforacause.com for more information.

1. The Borgata Winter Open, Jan. 15 to 31. There will be 13 events with a $10,000 Main Event.

2. The Aussie Millions, Jan. 5 to 20 at the Crown Casino in Melbourne.

3. WSOP Harrah’s New Orleans, May 9-21. They’ll have 10 events including the $5000 Main Event.

4. WPT L.A. Poker Classic, Jan. 24 to Mar. 3. There will be 30 events including the $10,000 Main Event.

5. WPT Bay 101 in San Jose March 10-14 will also have a $10,000 Main Event.

6. WPT World Championship in Las Vegas on April 19-25 will have a $25,000 Main Event.

7. EPT Grand Final Monte Carlo Bay Resort April 12-17 will have a 10,000 Euro buy-in.

8. WSOP Las Vegas May 30 – July 17 will have 55 events this year.

9. PokerStars Caribbean Poker Adventure Atlantis, Bahamas, Jan. 5-10.

10. EPT Scandinavian Open Casino Copenhagen, Denmark, February 19-23.

There are a millions of poker gifts out there for the holidays this year. I’ve found a couple of good ones that might make the poker player in your life jump for joy on Christmas morning.

At http://www.church-of-texas-holdem.com/poker-supply-poker-gifts.html  they have a collection of cool t-shirts to choose from. They have them for the ladies and even your kids.

http://www.poker-wear.com/poker_gifts.htm has a wide selection of poker gifts. My favorites include a framed collection of poker cards and chips from 20 Vegas Casinos and the “GSeat”, which is a gel seat for your butt to save you during those long sessions.

My favorite gift is the “PokerPadz”. It’s a mouse pad that looks like a poker table, with enough room to use your mouse and to shuffle chips. It’s a great way to get the live game feel when you’re playing online. This gift has been out for a couple of years.

There once was a time when playing poker meant getting five or six friends together, buying a bunch of snacks, and getting permission from your wife to have the boys over for the evening. Today we can play poker 24/7 for just about any stakes from the comfort of our own home. Phone companies now have recently added versions of the game for your cell phones. Even Facebook has a poker application.

That just about covers any time, except when someone is in the air at 20,000 feet. Cell phones and internet service don’t work up there. So should airlines start to provide Texas Hold’em with their in-flight entertainment? If it’s possible to play poker just about everywhere else, it only makes sense to expect that it will eventually be offered to customers. The airline could rake the games, and if you win you could get credit towards your next flight.

Players that have just started playing poker almost always have a ton of leaks in their game. It takes years to become a really good poker player, despite the common opinion of new players that they are already good. The most common mistake that new players make is that they play too many hands. They don’t yet understand starting-hand winning percentages and think they have an equal chance to win before every hand.

The other common one is to call too many bets when all they have is a draw hand. Novice players believe they will hit their draw too much because they don’t know the probabilities of the draw hitting. They don’t understand pot odds, and that calling large bets with drawing hands puts them in a negative wagering situation. And novice players play their cards too much, and not the player, which is rarely enough to win.

Playing poker for 24 consecutive hours would no problem for most serious players. When you love something, the time just flies by. Gus Hansen is rumoured to have had sessions lasting over 70 hours, but the official recorded game goes to Larry Olmsted in June of 2004. He played a 72-hour session at Foxwoods in Connecticut. He played $.05 ante Seven Card Stud, starting with only $100. He ended up leaving the session with $1000.

A group of players in Greenwich, U.K. set the record for the same group playing non-stop. They played for 43.5 hours uninterrupted, and gave half of the money to charity.

I’ve had 16-hour sessions lots of times, and I usually only stop because I have to do something else, like sleep. Playing another eight hours would be no problem to do if there was a particularly valid reason to play the game that long.

Playing AK is one of the most common mistakes players make in hold’em. We wait so long for good cards that once big slick shows up we treat it like we have pocket aces. Now don’t get me wrong, big slick is a good hand, but if you’re up against a pocket pair you are a slight dog to win, and a bigger dog if it’s aces or kings.

Deciding how to play big slick against a raise depends on the circumstances of the raise. If it comes from a player in late position, after there have been no other raises, you may very well be up against AQ or AJ and be in really good shape. If it comes from a player in an early position, it usually means a small or medium pocket pair, and depending on your position, it may be wise to fold your big slick.

The difference between 5-card poker and 7-card poker is action. 5-card games are mainly draw games where a pair of aces is usually good. The pots in these games don’t get as big as in the 7-card games. 5-card games limit the size of the hands, and it’s rare that two players have a monster. 7-card games can crank the action up when multiple players have outs or a big hand simultaneously.

The 7-card games are also better for gaining information. Draw games of five cards keep everything hidden, with only the amount of cards drawn as a hint as to what an opponent may be holding. The 7-card games display cards for everyone to see, giving you lots of information to consider before you make your decisions. Often you can find the outs you need on the table, making getting off a hand a lot easier.

Whether you classify an event as a late-night poker tournament all depends on where you live and log-on. European players, for example, have all the North American daytime tournaments occurring at night. If you’re in North America though, here are my Top 5 late-night tourneys. (All these times are EST.)

1. PokerStars has its $20,000 guaranteed no-limit holdem tournament every night at 1:00 am. The buy-in is $109.

2. Full Tilt Poker has a nightly $12,000 event starting at 3:00 am. Buy-in is $109 and the game is no-limit holdem.

3. Bodog Poker has a $10,000 event starting just past midnight at 12:15 am. The buy-in for the no-limit holdem tournament is an inexpensive $55.

4. Hollywood Poker’s $108 buy-in late night event is at 4:00 am. It usually is only guaranteed for $4000, but can be much bigger.

5. PokerRoom also has a nightly $3000 no-limit holdem tournament at 5:00 am for $54, if you’re still going that early.