[bav]

If you aren't willing to tip $1 for (almost) every hand you win, don't play live poker. That's simply a part of the price for playing, much like the $4 or $5 rake.

You'll get MUCH better with practice at keeping track of what's going on at the table. Right now you're used to relying on the online crutches. But the same information is available to you playing live, you just have to work a little harder at getting at it.

You actually need to look around the table pretty constantly. You've seen Phil Ivey's shifty eyes, right? You should be watching everybody else at the table as things are going on. Watch as they look at their cards. Look to your left as the action starts to get to you to see if you can pick up on what the player or two behind you is planning to do. Keep an eye on the stack sizes of all the players in the pot so you can plan your bets accordingly; nothing QUITE as frustrating as holding the nuts on the turn with a set of queens with QsJs on the board, raising from $25 to $125, having someone go all-in behind you for $220, getting three deepstack callers, and being unable to raise because the all-in was only a $95 raise instead of $100, and then watching the Ts drop on the river.

You didn't sit down and start 6-tabling online the first hour, did you? Same learning curve applies. It'll take a few multi-hour sessions.