Poker musings

Which is better? I've read countless posts over the months about how some people ALWAYS do better live, or online, and there seems to be no explanation for it. I've been experiencing this firsthand as of late, and while I don't think there's any real "reason" for it (I believe I can beat this game in almost any environment), there are some sizeable differences between the two.

1) Betting style

It seems to me that people online are a LOT looser than most of the people I see playing live. This of course isn't a universal truth, and it depends on the type of game (L vs. NL), but calling down a $5 bet isn't nearly as difficult when you're not physically handling the chips. All you're doing is clicking the mouse on a button. It's less.... real. Observation has shown me that people tend to bluff a lot more online as well. Especially in limit. -- Also, you have such a lack of information when you're playing online, in comparison to playing live, that when you've been doing one without the other for a while and then you switch it up, it's almost like a culture shock. Going from online to B&M, these waves of information flowing from every opponent at your table hit you like bricks; and they are things you might never have picked up on before. This brings me to my next point.

2) Tells

Online tells are much different than live tells. If you user PokerTracker (and you damn well should) with a few of the available plugins, you'll be able to keep an eye on your opponent's aggression level, how often they see the flop, how often they fold to a bet on the turn, or a re-raise. Other than that, all you really have to go on is how long they take to act. This in itself can be a powerful tool. -- Let's say for instance, you're involved in a hand with 1 other opponent. All other players folded preflop, but you and this guy have been getting into it a lot with each other. He's on tilt because you just took half his stack a few minutes ago when you drew your flush against his two pair, and he's getting super aggressive. The turn has given you the ultimate nuts, and the river is inconsequential, but he's been the aggressor so far in the hand. He bets about a third of your stack here. You have two choices. You could call down the bet, and hope he bets out on the river, or you can come back over the top right now. The object at this point is to extract the maximum amount of chips. Neither one of these choices is always correct, and I haven't given you nearly enough information about this opponent for you to make a valid decision. However, assuming we were going to call him down to see the river card, if instead of just calling right away you let the timer run down a bit... This may make him think that this is a very tough call for you and you're trying to decide whether or not to lay down the hand. This may prompt him to bet out on the river, in the hopes of taking down the pot without a fight, at which time you can then come over the top at him.

In live play there's always such a plethora of information flying around, but most people choose not to notice it. I make it a habit to watch people's faces as the flop comes down (or any card hitting the board). The way they shuffle their chips, the way they bet, or hold their cards; these are all pieces of information that an attentive player can fit together to form an idea of what said person could be holding (Yeah yeah yeah, it's like a fuckin' jigsaw puzzle. Christ.). I always feel more at home when I'm sitting at a live game, because I can really focus all of my attention on the people sitting around me, whereas with online play, it's a constant struggle to keep my mind occupied. I suppose multitabling would help alleviate the boredom, but the combination of watching fish play live, shuffling chips, splashing the pot, and pissing off other players by smoking can't be beaten.

.....


I just lost my entire train of thought. More to come once I recover it.

At least I'm honest with you!

Filed Under:

• PokerTheory

Getting back up on that horse

Trying another $20 NL tournament with 150 people. Wish me luck.

Filed Under:

• Tournaments

It's so del.icio.us

Just trying out a new referencing system....Props go out to this joker.

Filed Under:

• HellaHoldem

Great news for the holidays

To my 1 reader out there, wherever you are, I'm sorry for not posting for so long. Been very busy lately with a lot of things, most of which are not poker related.

Very quick small tiny miniscule poker update.

Played in a $20 buyin at a local bar. 60 people. Made it down to the final 25, got all in with the chiplead at our table with A9 on a 359 rainbow board. He called with K9, spiked a K on the turn and I didn't improve. Yet another scenario where I get my money in with the best hand and then watch everything crumble around me. I should hang out with SirFWALGMan...

Onto other news

I asked my girlfriend to marry me late last week. To my joy and relief, she said yes. I never really logically thought I'd get a different answer, but my mind liked working up all these horrible situations that could foil my attempts to be a committed man.

Until next time.

Another close finish

Played in another of the weekly bar tourneys... $25 buyin, 2 rebuys, 1 addon. 20 people (not much), but almost everyone took full advantage of the rebuys and addons, bringing first place to a cool $520. I had the chip lead through most of the first half... wasn't playing a lot of hands, but all the good ones held up and seemed to connect on the flop. The second half was a different story. No hands whatsoever. About 2 hours after the break, I finally pick up AQ suited, and raise it up in middle position (8 people left). The guy directly behind me pushes over the top for 3x my raise, and gets a caller before it comes to me. I fold. The guy after me flips up QQ, and the last guy shows AK. An ace hits the flop, and QQ goes home. I think that was a good fold on my part. Usually, I would call.... and I suppose, most times it would be good. *shrugs*. I ended up busting out in 5th, on the bubble. I'll get 'em next time.

Stay tuned.

Which cartoon are you?

You are drunk Elmo. You love to have fun and you
drink to lower your inhibitions and allow
yourself to cut loose a little more. You are
always hyper and happy and most people find you
to be very annoying, especially when you're
drunk.


What drunk cartoon are you? (PICS)
brought to you by Quizilla

Time off

I get 4 days off this weekend.

Tonight my girlfriend and I are going to a Children of Bodom concert (metal).

Tomorrow, it's Turkey Day.

'Nuff said.

Another good night

Bought in for $20 in a .25-.50 PL game, and walked three hours later with $130. I love it when variance works in my favor. Now all I need is another tourney win and I'll be ready for full time online play ;)

More coming soon.

P.S. Harry Potter is out today! Who's going to see it?

A modest tourney win

I played at a live tourney here in town last night. It was pretty small... only 12 people. However, they had unlimited rebuys for the first 2 hours, and an addon at the break. I managed to chip up from the starting stack (1k) to 6k by the half, then
purchased the addon for an additional 2k in chips, making me a solid chip lead.

Noteable hands

8:05: I've been folding religiously. We're still at 2 tables (shorthanded, 6 per table). I get AK suited in MP. I raise it to 800 (BB is 200), and 4 people come along for the ride. Flop: AA4... UTG checks to me, I bet 500, everyone calls. Turn K. UTG
checks again, I bet out 1k... guy after me folds, button pushes, UTG folds. I call. He flips up.... QQ? Hahaha. Drawing dead. I win.

8:30: T14,000, 200-400 - First hand at the final table. I draw the dealer seat, and deal myself cowboys. UTG folds, everyone else limps. I make it 1400 to go. 2 callers. Flop is 333. Checked around to me, I bet out 1k. first guy folds, other calls.
Turn 4. He thinks for a while, then checks. I bet 2k. He calls immediately, then instachecks when the river brings an ace. I check behind him. He has pocket 9's. I win.

9:10: T20,000 300-600 - Pocket 3's. I limp in to see a family pot, flop comes 359 rainbow. Short stack pushes, everyone folds, I call. He has pocket 5's. I don't improve, and he doubles up.

10:00 T17,000 500-1k - We're 4 handed, and people are basically in all-in/fold mode. I'm still trying to play a little more poker than that, but I'm running out of room to play my way.

10:15 T15,000 500-1k - AT suited in the big blind. folded to the SB, who has been repeatedly going all in every time I'm in the big. I call. He flips over KT. The ace on the flop lets me breathe a little easier, and the 2 on the turn seals his untimely fate. Down to 3.

10:20 T26,000 2k-4k - I fold UTG and the other two get all in. The shortstack had pushed on the BB and was called with K9. He turned a straight, and we were heads up.

10:22 26,000 2k-4k - I'm big blind. First hand heads up, I get pocket tens. Other guy raises it to 10k, I push, he calls with QT. Nothing hits and it's all over.I made $520 last night, from an original investment of $40. This marks my largest cash in a tournament to date.

Keep 'em coming!

Comfy niche

I think I've found my comfort zone.

"What is that comfort zone, Chris?"

I'm so glad you asked. It's $1-2 NL. There's a very distinct possibility that $2-4 and $3-6 NL may also be well within my mental comfy area, but they're certainly not so for my bankroll. So for now, it's just $1-2. What a wonderful game! I headed over to my regular game last night, only to discover that we didn't have enough people even to make a standard shorthanded table. So instead, we decided to try out yet another local bar that hosts a $20 MTT every Tuesday. As the people drop out, a NL cash table starts up on the side (also $1-2) I bought in for $80 and basically just became a rock. On my second orbit, I hit two pair on the flop after checking the big blind, and relieved two people of their stacks.

None of these guys (with the exception of the two guys I came with) were paying any attention whatsoever, and after folding for an hour, when I raised it up to $12 UTG with pocket rockets, I got 5 callers (blinds both folded). The flop came with my beautiful ace, but there were two hearts on the board, and that ace was one of them. I checked it, UTG+1 bet out $20, called around, and I raised it $50. 2 callers. The turn reveals the Ten of hearts. I check, UTG+1 bets out $10 (Trying to milk me?). I call. River.... Ace!!!!!! I made quads. I bet out $100 into a $300 pot and the guys pushes for another $40 on top of my bet. I call him and he shows pocket tens.

Victory is sweet.

Live Tournament

Man, I hate live tournaments. No, let me rephrase that. I hate local live tournaments. There are probably about 10-15 various bars scattered around town that host holdem tournaments throughout the week. Some are rebuys, some aren't, some are $20, some are $100. They have every flavor. The only problem is, almost all of them are crapshoots. How would you like to start with 1k in chips, with the blinds getting bumped every 15 minutes (starting at 25-50). It's ridiculous. I brought this up today and all my buddies kind of started laughing before they realized I was dead serious. I actually ran into one of the tournament directors last week at Albertsons, and was happy to give him a piece of my mind. Not being a poker player (WTF?!?!), he wasn't aware that the structure was bad. I assured him that if his tournament corresponded to a smell, it would be a mix between a partially decomposed body, and runny dog shit.

/end rant

Car trouble

It's been a long week... way too long. And it's only Monday. *sigh*

I had to take my car in for a tune-up / new radiator. I had been planning on waiting for the tune-up until at least January, but I didn't have much of a choice, seeing as my radiator randomly began belching up gallons upon gallons of coolant. Guess where the $800 came from to fix it? Yeah, you guessed it. Straight out of the bankroll. So now I'm left with just shy of $200 to play poker with. Good news is, I get paid on Thursday. At which time I have to get new insurance, christmas presents, and various other expensive things. So... broke again! Yay.

Sooner or later I'll get this bankroll up and going. I plan on doing a month long SnG challenge. Maybe I'll set it at 300 SnG's spanned over 5 day periods, for a month. That would be 15 per day (75/week). I'd be interested to see what my ROI for something like that would be.

More posts coming soon.

Titan Single Table Jackpot Tourneys

I'm still attempting a recovery from that horrific beat the other night. Pretty hard to get my spirits up after something like that, but I'm trying.

Onto other news

Titan Poker is insane. God! The play is ludicrous. I've never seen people play such shitty poker. I'm seriously beginning to think that all the mental hospitals in the country are now encouraging their patients to play poker online. These people are just.... wow. They'll raise with anything, call with anything. It's FUCKING AWESOME.

Gonna play in a series of the $2 Jackpot SnG's. 6 consecutive wins pays $1k. Also gonna check out the $1k guaranteed and the $5k guaranteed.

More updates to come.

**UPDATE**

The $2 Jackpot SnG's now only require 4 consecutive wins for a prize of $2k! Ehhhhh.... I'll take it.

Why me?

"In confessions of a winning poker player, Jack King said "Few players recall big pots they have won, strange as it seems, but every player can remember with remarkable accuracy the outstanding tough beats of his career." It seems true to me, cause walking in here, I can hardly remember how I built my bankroll, but I can't stop thinking about the way I lost it."
Mike McDermott (Rounders)

The $1-2 NL game. It's a home game I go to here in town. Always full and always fishy, Without fail. I bought in for $150, and started off playing fairly tight, trying not to get involved in as many hands as I find myself playing when I sit down for $.25-.50 PL. A quick outline of the first 3 hours:

$1-2 NL (Started at: 9:00 PM)
7 handed.

9:30 ($140)- Red cowboys UTG. I make it $8 to go. Folds around to the CO who re-raises to $20. Button cold calls, blinds fold, I jam for $125 more. CO has me covered and calls immediately. He flips over QQ. Flop comes with a Queen, but I spike one of my two outs on the river to double up.

9:45 ($290) - I stay in with 9Ts and flop the nut straight. LAG in EP check-raises me *evil grin*, so I call and let him lead out on the turn. When he leads out with a pot-sized bet, I put him all in.. He calls with top pair. He doesn't catch his miracle cards and I'm up to $500.

11:00 ($450) - Pocket 8's, we get a family pot and the flop is all small rags. I lead out with a pot-sized bet and get called by two people. Turn brings my wonderful 8 and I take down another large pot.

I'd like to insert a note here. This next hand was the last hand of the night for me. It has a lot of significance for me, since it represents the largest pot I've been involved in to date. I'm a little sore that I lost so much money here, but I got it in when I was the favorite and that's what matters.

1:30 ($650) - I have JJ on the button. 2 people in EP fold, everyone else limps to me, I raise it to $10. 2 callers. Flop comes J 4 8. Checked to me, I bet the pot. Both call. Turn is a 4. MP player bets $100 (pot bet), player behind folds, I jam for the additional $500, he calls and flips over pocket 8's.

[J 4 8]
[J 4 8][4]
[J 4 8][4][8]

Yup. He caught a 1 outer to take me down. The only consolation I have was the look on his face for the 2 seconds before his miracle card appeared. That pot ended up being just over $1100.

I have no doubts about the quality of my play, or my skill as a player. Still, this is hard to take... my confidence is shattered. How can skill stack up to luck?

I went home and stared at a wall for three hours.

Feeling: Stunned and depressed

Insurance is a bitch

I bought my car in June of this year, from my girlfriend's brother. It's an automatic (yuck!) 1997 Acura Integra LS. Not exactly my dream car, but it gets the job done. I hadn't had insurance since August '03, due to a HORRIBLE streak of bad luck. Basically, I was living in Southern California, up in the mountains near Big Bear. I drove up to Oregon in July to visit my parents, and had mailed a check to the insurance company before I left. A week later, I return. I'm weary from all the driving, but wired from all the uppers I've been taking to stay awake. Bad combination. I'm at a red light in Lakewood (right next to Long Beach) at 2am, and I see a car coming up behind me, perhaps 50 feet back and moving FAST. I don't know where in the hell it came from, but I had no time to act. I frantically revved the engine and simultaneously dumped the cluth. I actually managed to move about a quarter inch before the car rear-ended me doing 40 MPH (Keep in mind, I had a Bronco at the time). The result? 1 Honda accord, pancaked. 1 Bronco with a severely bent bumper and muffler. 1 puppy, who briefly became Superman and flew directly into my stereo deck (She was not seriously hurt). And 1 irate 16 year old female driver (otherwise known as bitch), yelling at me about checking my blind spot. Yes, that's right. I'm at a red light, and she's screaming about blind spots.

As luck would have it, my check never reached the insurance company. My insurance had lapsed at midnight (2nd of August), and the accident occurred exactly 2 hours later. Not being aware of this at the time, I traded insurance information with the girl's mom, and spent the next 4 hours jumping up and down on my exhaust pipe trying to bend it back into shape.

Over the course of the next few weeks, I racked up $800 in cellphone charges consulting with lawyers and the insurance companies. It was looking pretty bad for me. I had a fucked up Bronco, a disconnected cell-phone, and an insurance company breathing down my neck, saying that the girl had hurt her neck. Apparantly, their story was that I changed lanes without signaling as she was attempting to pass me.

I received a court summons in the mail. The family was now suing me because of the $18k Honda that had been totaled. I was still in shock about the whole thing, wondering how there could even be any debate over what happened. I mean, it was pretty obvious. There were rubber marks ALL over the road where she hit me, and the investigation had revealed things that put the case heavily in my favor. Even with that, the fact was that I had no insurance. The most I was entitled to was payment from their insurance company to cover the damage to my car. No medical treatment (if it had been needed), and no pain and suffering. At this point, I wasn't even trying to get money out of it, I was just trying to escape unscathed by the devilwoman.

I show up in court. The judge comes in, reads the file for a few minutes, then frowns at a part of the paperwork, and takes out his reading glasses. He stares at something for a few minutes (I'm sweating buckets by now), then looks up and stares at the girl After a moment, his gaze slides over to me.

Judge: "You're 21?"
Me: "Yes, sir."
Judge: "How long have you been driving?"
Me: "2 months shy of 7 years, if you count when I had my permit."
Judge: "Any other traffic infractions?"
Me: "No sir."

The judge looks over at the girl.

Judge: "And you. You're 16?"
Girl: "Almost 17."
Judge: "And you've had your license for how long?"
Girl: "8 days."
Judge: "8 days??!?"
Girl: "Yes."
Judge: "I assume you've had no other infractions."
Girl: "Um... (gulps) I got a speeding ticket yesterday."

Judge stares at her for a solid minute. Once again, he looks over at me. And.... he smiles. His eyes dart back to her.

Judge: "You are clearly unfit to drive. You have been involved in two completely separate incidents, both of which could have killed somebody. Not to mention that you were driving past midnight by yourself, which is strictly forbidden for the first 6 months you retain a license. I am going to revoke your license until the age of 18. Case is dismissed."

-----

Sleep deprived

About a week ago, I tossed on some warm clothes and headed out in the good ol' Integra, hoping it would guide me to a juicy NL game. Tuesday night usually means the cabbie game, which basically means that it's a bunch of guys that are drunk and/or high that want to have a little fun with a paycheck. Most of them work the night shift, and as this was their weekend, it meant that the game could run from about 9pm till at least sunrise. It was perfect. The stakes were a little low for my taste, but full of fishy play.

I get to the house, mosey on up and walk into a garage. But what's this? It's dark??!?! What the fuck? Whip out my cellphone.

-----

Adam: "Sup Chris?

Me: "Adam? What the fuck? Where is everyone?"

Adam: "Yeah.... no cabbie game. But there's a $1-2 NL game starting in 20 minutes. You in?

Me: "Hell yeah. Let me hit an ATM."

-----

And so the night took an unexpected turn, and I found myself sitting in a very wealthy, unfamiliar neighborhood waiting for my friends to show up. I made a promise to myself to keep my play super tight/aggressive until I felt a little more comfortable with the people I would soon be meeting.

...

To be continued

Good times :)

My blog is worth $0.00.
How much is your blog worth?

Motivation

A few of SirFWalgman's posts lately have sparked some thoughts in my noggin. What kind of money over time could someone expect to make playing only MTT's? Seems to me that if you consistently made it deep into these tourneys, it could be much more profitable than playing ring. For instance.... let's say I were to play 5 $20 MTT/week, each with a gauranteed prize pool of 10k. (I don't know if that would be entirely accurate). I'm investing $100/week - $400/month - $4800/year. That's 240 tournaments per year.

240 tournaments.

I've played in 6 tournaments online, and made the money in 3 of them.

Food for thought.

Poker blogger tourney...

Here's some semi up-to-date notes about the tourney.

*NOTE* I'm on the west coast. Tourney started at 1pm for me :)

1:20: Lost about half my stack when guy sucked out his river second pair

1:40: Hit a set of Queens on the flop and repaired some of the damage.

2:05: Just before break, hit two pair on the flop, took down a modest pot. Up to 4k.

*BREAK*

Forgot to keep updating.

Two hands in the last 20 minutes (3:46PM), first time, QQ, get all in preflop against AA. He wins, I'm down from 20k to 8k.

10 minutes later, I get all in preflop with the same guy with QKs... he's got AA again. I don't improve, IGHN.

Finished in 148th.

Poker Stars Blogger Tournament

It looks like the field is going to be 1400 or more. I wouldn't be surprised if at least a few hundred more hop in before registration closes.

I'm playing to win. Are you?

Getting Close

I've managed to save up an extra $1k, which I will be depositing on NETeller unless disaster strikes in the next seven days. I will also be purchasing Poker Tracker and the Poker Tracker Guide. I've been hearing interesting things about some of the other programs that can be used. GameTime+ and PokerACE are both supposed to be great "plug-ins" for Poker Tracker, so I'll be getting those. I've heard great things about PokerEdge, but to my knowledge Party and the other large poker giants are freezing accounts that use the program. I have heard some interesting things about using it within VMWare..... good thing I just "found" the most recent version online, eh? :)

Hopefully things will start off good for me. I'm going to be keeping close track of my stats, and I'll try to start off playing at least 20-30 hours a week. That may end up being unrealistic as I also work 40-50 hours a week and will be dedicating a large part of the time spent at home with my girlfriend. I'll work it out somehow. I've been thinking a lot about where I want to start out. $2-4 sounds a lot more reasonable to me than $1-2, as I'm used to playing $3-6 (or $4-8) live. For the first week, I'm going to two-table, after that I'll bump it to three, and two weeks later, if I'm doing well there I'll try four.

-----

Things I would like to achieve in the next six months:

1. Work my way up to four-tabling successfully. If I find that I can get to that level and still play without any problems, I may keep moving up.

2. Make the final table in a $20-$50 MTT with a starting field of 1k+.

3. See the bankroll hit $5k. I think that's actually a very modest goal for six months, playing at $2-4. We'll see.

-----

Feel free to leave comments, or criticism. If I actually start getting any significant amount of traffic through here I will start doing comment responses.

My game

What makes a great tournament player? I've heard so many different theories, I'm starting to think that there's no legitimately correct way. Some people like to make it purely a mathematical endeavor. Others prefer to play by instinct, feeling out their opponent's weaknesses as the game progresses. And then there's Doyle Brunson. He talks a lot about playing extremely agressive, betting hard at any pot you think you might have a chance at picking up. All of these "small" pots will give you significant edge later on if you should choose to get into an all-in situation against someone. If all the pot thievery worked out previously, then this is essentially a freeroll.

So. I've been analyzing my play a lot during these last few months, and though I'm fairly tight-aggressive, I think I tend to give my opponents way too much credit. I credit myself as a good player. Not great, yet. But definitely dangerous at a table. The problems with my game tend to revolve around post-flop betting. Not my betting, but my opponents.

Example:

.25-.50 NL
I'm in LP with AKs. All fold to a pothead LAG (He's a pretty good player when he's sober, but after a couple bowls his skill drops like a rock), who raises from $.50 to $1.50. I think for a bit and re-raise to $9.00. He hems and haws, then calls.

Flop is 2s 4s 5d.

He is completely still for a moment, then fires out a $50 bet. This well over twice the current pot.

Now, in this situation, there's only a couple of possible conclusions that I can come to.

1) He's on a straight of flush draw of some kind, more likely a straight draw.
2) He hit a set.
3) He stayed in with trash (completely possible with this player) and hit the nuts on the flop.
4) He's completely full of shit and just wants to buy the pot.

These are all obvious possibilities. The problem I have is that I generally tend to believe that he's got top set, or the nut straight. Now, in this situation, he just priced me off the pot with that bet. I don't have the odds to call, so it would be correct to muck.

However, some of you might also be thinking that this is a very suspicious bet, and you'd be right. 2x the pot? He's trying to buy it! Put him all in! Your A high is good! Yeah, yeah, yeah. In this particular example (which probably makes it a bad example), the player I chose to portray as my rival is a very very aggro player most of the time. He has no problem buying in 10 times so he can hit that one lucky streak and make it all back. In short, the perfect enemy.

Basically, I think the point I'm trying to make is that sometimes the bet overwhelms my ability to play my A game. If I make a read, but it's going to potentially cost my entire stack to see it, I'm not sure I can always make that call. But then again, why the fuck am I sitting at a no limit table if I'm not willing to make those choices now and then?

[For the curious, I did not lay this hand down. I put him on a flush draw (lower than my flush draw, since I had AK spades) and I was right. He had J7s. Neither of us hit and I scooped a $180 pot with A high.]

To be continued... maybe.

The Big Jump

I've been the owner of this blog for the last year or so now, and I think it's about time I actually start writing about poker, seeing as that's why I started this damn thing.

I've decided to make the leap to playing every day online. What with my job, girlfriend, social life and every other variable you can think of, poker has been a luxury (at least on any regular sort of basis). I just haven't had the time. However, due to a lot of peer pressure from my friends, both live and online, I feel that I need to at least take a real shot at this. I don't have an unreal idea of my skill at this game, but I believe firmly that I have what it takes to be a high stakes player, and a long-time winner.

My whole life, I was never really much good at math. I never felt that it was a question of my intelligence, or ability to absorb and process information; it's more that I have hated every math teacher I ever had. And for what reason? Well, to be honest, they sucked at teaching. None of them ever tried to make the class interesting, they just droned on an on out of a textbook for an hour and a half each day. My main problem was always that I'd understand something up to a certain point, miss one thing, and then be lost for four more chapters.

Who am I kidding? Math is necessary to be a long-time winner in poker. You have to be able to figure out odds on the fly. Implied odds, reverse implied odds, pot odds... without the abilities in math, how could someone possibly survive in this game? Before I get into this, let me just tell you. I may suck at some of the advanced math theory that I tried to pass in high school, but I'm not stupid. I can do quick math in my head, piece of cake. I can figure pot odds no problem; I know how often my flush draw will hit with two cards left to come. The things are I have trouble with are concepts like fold equity, or reverse implied odds. I think that if I had the proper teacher, it would be no problem to pick this up. Not to say that Sklansky isn't a good teacher, but if I have a question that the book can't answer, I'm up the creek without a paddle.

The reason this blog still exists and I haven't just thrown in the towel is because I think that even without these skills (Which I will becomed determined to learn as my poker career progresses) I possess something that will allow me to win. Every game that I go to, every tournament I play in, I get comments on a regular basis about making the correct call. When I'm in a tough spot to call, and I think he might have me beat, but something.... something makes me hesitate. And then I make the call, and I get commended on it by everyone at the table. You might call that a read, you might call it whatever the hell you want. I call it intuition. Maybe my brain is unconsciously figuring the odds for me without me even knowing. Who the hell knows. All I can say is that I am consistently making the correct calls / laydowns. And it feels right.

If any of you want to laugh at me for this, go ahead. I understand. :) I bet if Matt read this he'd be calling me a donkey in no time.

Why is it so funny to watch a chubby kid singing a strange song to a web cam? I don't know. And please stop asking me. Link

"MIA", "AWOL"..... they both apply

And I have no excuse. I'm sorry. Metaphorically speaking, I've been trying to juggle 15 plates on a tray that's a foot in diameter and has spikes on the bottom... you get the idea. It's been an orgy of stress and worry, to say the least. To start it off, my girlfriend got pretty sick a few weeks ago, and what with balancing work, finances and and sleep, I'm not entirely sure I had what it took to keep her spirits as high as they could have been.

The situation at work isn't great either. My company is primarily a software contracting company; people pay us to make and/or perform regular maintenance on their web sites. We just found out that our annual budget has been frozen, and at the current burn rate, we'll make it through November. So, that means layoffs. 5% of the company staff just got axed in the last week. I hope they're all done now, but who the hell knows. Yet another knot in my back. Just gotta keep my head down and try to be invisible for the next two months. I'm not really all that worried about it, if anything happened I think I could probably land another decent job in a week or two. Maybe at Symantec. *shrug* As long as I have my Tara, I really don't care.

For me, the sun rises and sets with her. I can't say that I'm a great catch, and I would find it simply amazing if she decided to stick around for the rest of her life, let alone the next couple of years. I think a lot of the reason she's still here is the simple fact that I employ a few seemingly old fashioned values; namely, that she knows that no matter what happened, I would never EVER raise a hand to her. She also knows without a shred of a doubt that I've never lied to her. She feels safe with me. And that's good. Because I'm not a mean person. But.... don't nice guys finish last?

That's what I always thought.

Registered for the Blogger Championship at Pokerstars!

I have registered to play in the
Online Poker Blogger Championship!

This event is powered by PokerStars.

Registration code: 5661893

Shorthanded NL is better than sex? Could be.

Played in a friend's shorthanded .25-.50 NL game last night. Buyins started at $20 (5 people), which may not sound like the makings of a large purse, but as the night wore on there were rebuys aplenty. After the first few hours, the standard rebuy amount was up to $50. I believe by the end of the night, the purse was somewhere around $600 or $700.

And I absolutely KILLED the game.

I played very aggressively, defended my blinds, and caught every single card I needed. I hit quads twice last night; First time was with pocket threes, and the flop made my hand. Didn't get as much action as I wanted, but I milked a couple of bets. Second time was with Kings, and when the board hit rags on the flop, I came out firing. Turn and River were both kings, and I actually managed to re-re-raise. You should have seen the looks on both of these guys' faces when I laid down the nuts. It was beautiful. This marks my biggest pot in a NL game to date ($230.50).

Long story short, I bought in for $20, and left with $560. It was really just an amazing night. Even though I did some bullying with my huge stack, I feel that all of my play was justified. I didn't make any stupid calls; I felt like my read was dead-on.

Whatever's left of my writing ability (was there anything to start with?) is gone, since I'm working on 1 1/2 hours of sleep from last night. It took me damn near an hour just to grind this post out. Best of luck to all of you, and the deepest of sympathies for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. My thoughts are with you.

Almost

Don't feel much like a large post right now, but I'll give you all the latest.

Played in a NL $20+2 at Stars yesterday. 1054 entrants. I try to play tight in tournaments, but for this tournament, I thought I'd really try to patch all the leaks and just play the premium hands. No raising with AJ in early position (which I'm sure you all would slap me for). I folded for pretty much the first two rounds, then found aces on the button. Doubled up through a guy that made his top pair (8's) on the flop. And then... more folding. And some more. My stack hit average, then sank below. I got Hilton sisters in early position, and ended up knocking out someone with a slightly smaller stack. I never really managed to build up an impressive lead over anyone, just got my money in when I could and folded everything else.
After we got down to three tables (top 100 positions paid), I started loosening up a little bit, stealing blinds when I could.

One hand I remember had me on the button with T6. Mucked around to me, so I raised into two guys that had both been surrendering their blinds habitually. Both of them called. Flop came with a six and a ten. Check check. I bet out half the pot, and they both called. Turn came another Ten. SB bet out a quarter of his stack, BB folded, I had him covered and raised all in, and SB called me with pocket 6's. The river was inconsequential and all of a sudden my stack was looking decent again.

Down to two tables. I'm starting to get a little antsy. I've never done this well in a large field before. The poker gods must have sensed my anxiety and decided to punish me, because I didn't get another decent pocket all night. I ended up busting in 10th. I feel like I could have done better, but still good for $190. Too bad though, that's where the payouts really started multiplying in size. 1st got $5270. Oh well. It's a start. This is my first final table in a field of over 200 people.

"Hooray Beer!"

Avoiding the Pitfalls

Sorry about the lack of posts lately. I've been uber-busy with work. Yes, that's right. Uber. Busy. Let me explain. I work in QA for a mid-sized software development company. Under optimal conditions, there should be: A manager, a lead, and three others who each have their own list of projects and work independently. For the last two months, two of the three "others" have been gone (I, obviously enough, am the third "other").

One of them, a 23 year old Japanese girl, just got married a few months ago and is awaiting her green card in the mail (Conveniently enough, she happened to get married a few days before her student visa ran out). She's MIA until the federal documents come knocking on her door.

The second missing person is a father of one of the troops that was deployed to Iraq. The kid saved his commanding officer from a grenade by throwing himself between the two, thus resulting in the quickest disappearing arm (and part of his left leg) act ever. It was a miracle that he even lived. The son was rushed home after receiving the proper medical attention, and like any good father, this guy was waiting for him at the gates. My heart goes out to him. It's hard enough to raise a child these days; when you throw in the amount of worrying this man must have done, what with the military and the missing limbs, it must have been a real head-fuck for him (As a lifetime resident of Eugene, Oregon he is obviously anti-military, and he didn't want his boy enlisting). But he stuck in there, and is trying to spend as much time as he can consoling his son, helping him move forward with his life.

Bug I digress.

These two people would have been at work this whole time (though now we can establish that they had valid reasons not to be) under normal circumstances, but since they weren't, I picked up both of their workloads. Then, to top it off, the lead on my team gets promoted to an Assistant Project Manager (big pay jump). All of a sudden, I'm the only guy left in QA, with the exception of my boss. Can we say 60-70 hours per week on salary pay? Bad times.

Good news is, when this evens back up, I should be due for a two week vacation (crosses fingers). I'm currently trying to decide if I want to spend that two weeks relaxing, or playing poker. Life is full of such tough decisions.

A painful update

Well, I had a horrific run of cards these last few days, and have abandoned the $5 HU SnG challenge. I simply cannot continue. The main reason? In order to really do this well, I think I need to move up the scale a little bit, maybe to $10 or $20. I know that in heads up play your range should open up exponentially, but some of the shit these guys are calling with (to the river) are ludicrous. They just don't care. And who should? It's only $5, right?

Here's one HU SnG that really pissed me off.

Super LAG and I start with T1000 each. I resolve to play tight until I hit something, and then try and double up. Sure enough, about 4 minutes in (I'm down to about 950), I get pocket kings. He raises preflop, I call. Flop comes with a king. I check, he bets 300. I call. Turn x. He goes all in, I call. And we're at 1900 and 100.

Next hand I get AJ. He raises half of his stack and I raise him the remaining 50 to put him all in. He..... folds?!??

Chip count: Me: 1950 - LAG: 50

I get 8 5 off. He raises all in for 50 and I call. He has T 9 suited. I pair on the flop, he gets his flush on the river.

Chip count: ME: 1900 - Lag: 100

AT suited. He pushes again. I call. He shows 4 6 off. Hits a goddamn runner runner straight.

Chip count: ME: 1800 - Lag: 200

K8 off. He completes. I check. Flop is 8 high. He checks, I put him all in, he calls with 8 2. Turn brings a 2.

Chip count: ME: 1600 - Lag: 400

You see the direction this is going? Yes, he rivered his way through 5 or 6 hands in a row to even back out with me. This guy was literally hitting EVERYTHING he stayed in with. Didn't matter what it was.

The fateful hand.

He has a very tiny chip lead on me. I get JJ. He raises to 200, I raise to 600, he pushes and I call. He flips over 99.

Flop..... 9 9 J.

Can you fucking believe it?

Quick Update

I'm going to be adding a section into the column on the right to show my progress with the SnG's this month. Feel free to check up on it regularly and/or leave comments. I'll update it in a few hours, as I have a full schedule at work for the next three or four hours.

* * * * Update * * * *

See what I'm saving up for here.

I am a very bizarre person

A few buddies of mine from work play in a .25-.50 pot limit game every Thursday night with some laywers from around town. It's actually a pretty solid game, with the exception of one or two people who donate their money every week. The host is a rock, while his wife is the typical mother who thinks of this weekly game as her chance to socialize and get drunk. Fine by me, since she plays junk like Q3 all night. I've been a regular here for the past few months and have taken at least four or five hundred off them in that time.

About four hours in (we start at 9pm), I get red aces UTG. I've been folding for the past 30 minutes or so, and I open up with a max raise ($1.75 after I call the blind). I get two callers, one of which is the socializing wife. The host (a rock, as I mentioned earlier) thinks for a second, and re-raises $8.75. Both blinds fold, I call, one limper folds and the wife calls. Flop is ATx rainbow. I bet $4.00, and the wife absentmindedly mucks while talking to her neighbor about the price of paint at Home Depot. The rock insta-calls. Turn x. I bet $4.00 again. Rock pauses, looks at me, and fires out a $20 re-raise. I push for another $30. He has me covered, calls and flips over KK. River x. I win.

Here's the spooky hand of the night. I get the black Hilton Sisters in late position. UTG (very loose) raises, everyond folds to me, I call. Everyone behind me folds, including both blinds (Heads up for flop). Flop comes AsKs4c. UTG bets $3. I know you guys will think calling is a bad option here, but this guy's been bluffing shit all night, and I just had this feeling that I was ahead. I will admit that there is absolutely no rational reasoning behind this, I just couldn't put him on an ace or a king. Turn is a blank, and he bets $5. The feeling is still there, and I call (too passive?). River blank. He stares me down for a long while, and bet $10. Once again, I have no rational explanation for even holding cards at this point.

"If you have an Ace or a King, I'm fubar. But you don't have an ace or a king, you have pocket Jacks."

He just looks at me.

"You know what? I've more than quadrupled up, I'm tired, I think you're full of it, and.... I call." My chips go flying into the pot.

His head tilts to the side a bit, and I hear "You know, you're a very bizarre person.", and up come the pocket jacks. I leap up and almost tear the felt with my bitches as I throw them down.

And that's how you win a nice chunky pot in .25-.50 PL Holdem. I must be a huge donkey :)

HU SnG Day 1

Off to a good start for the SnG challenge!

Progress for today:
Win: 6
Loss: 0
Profit for the day: $30

Total Stats since 08/02/05:
Win: 11
Loss: 1
Total Profit: $50

I'll keep you all updated.

I'm sure you've read about it a dozen times...

In light of my recent victories at shorthanded play (The last 6 live SnG's I've played in the last few weeks I've come in 1st; an astonishing track record) I've decided to undertake a HU SnG challenge. I will be starting off small, but that's the way it works when you haven't yet made any significant amounts of money from poker. Well, at least when you spend your winnings, and don't create any sort of definable bankroll.

Starting today, I played 6 $5 HU SnG matches. I won 5 of them. I will continue this pattern for the next month, posting regularly about my win/loss record. My bankroll and other info will also be reset at $0 profit, since I haven't really tracked it as much as I want to.

Back soon with more news.

More Tournaments

After the very quick end to the rebuy tournament last week, I went all of about 15 hours before getting back on the old horse. I played in a $30 rebuy tournament (two $15 rebuys and a $15 addon), and made it into the second half with a massive chiplead. I think I was sitting with over 16k in chips in an average field about 4k. As soon as we hit the second half, we got the most obnoxious old idiot in the world. This 50 year old guy, wearing a straw hat and absolutely reeking of B.O. (remember, it's been about 95 degrees every day for the last week). As soon as he came to my table, I went completely card dead. I made a few steals at the appropriate times, but got into no battles with anyone.

And then the blinds starting going up faster.

What?!?!?! You're going to increase the rate of the blinds because this building has to be locked up in two hours? Bullshit!

So we played, and we played, and I finally got a respectable hand. Blinds are 500-1000 and I find [Jd Jh]. Not the best, but hopefully good enough. 3 people limped ahead of me, so I made a 4xBB raise. Folded to the big blind who called, and the 3 limpers all mucked. I had the big blind covered by at least 4 or 5 thousand.

Flop [8d Js 4s]

I thought for a while, and decided to make a minimum bet into this guy. I'm pretty sure he'll read me for weak and come back over the top. Sure enough, he looks at me for a few seconds and pushes his stack in. It's another 4k to me. I call and we flip up.

Hero: Pocket [Jd Jh] (Set of Jacks)
Big Blind: [8s 2c] (Pair of 8s)

Turn [ Ks ]

River [3s ]

Runner runner flush.

Very next hand, I get AKo. It's raised ahead of me, and I jam for 5k. Same asshole calls me with pocket 5's. No help on the board, IGHN.

Disappointing Results

No Limit Texas Holdem
$50 buyin with a maximum of two $25 rebuys.
115 players
Starting stacks: T10,000

The tournament got off to a loud start, and by the end of the first hand I felt like the kid who just got all his lunch money stolen and was left in some alley after getting kicked in the junk.

Hand 1
Blinds: 100-200
Seat 1: T10,000 *Button*
Seat 2: T10,000 *SB*
Seat 3: T10,000 *BB*
Seat 4: T10,000
Seat 5: T10,000
Seat 6: T10,000
Hero : T10,000
Seat 8: T10,000
Seat 9: T10,000

Dealt to Hero: [ Kh Kc ]
Seat 3 folds
Seat 4 folds
Seat 5 raises T200 to T1000.
Seat 6 cold-calls.
Hero raises T1000 to T4000
Seat 8 folds
Seat 9 folds
Seat 1 folds
Seat 2 folds
Seat 5 raises T4000 to T10,000
Seat 6 folds
Hero calls T6000 (Pot is T21,300)
Seat 6 flips over [ Qs Qc ]

Flop [ 3h 5h 9c ]
Turn [ As ]
River [ Qd ]

Seat 6 wins T21,300.


And that's that.

Huge re-buy tourney tomorrow

Tomorrow will mark the first tournament I've ever played in with a prize pool over over $10k. About 110 players, most of them trust-fund babies. Can't ask for a better opportunity. Apparantly this tournament is held once a month, but the location varies. Have to make sure I get some good rest the night before. I realize for some of you this tournament is probably peanuts, but we all have to start out somewhere. Maybe in a few years I'll be chewing it up with the big dogs. Wish me many well-placed reads.

WSOP and other poker news

Well.... I haven't exactly been as faithful to this blog as I should be. I've been on a recent binge of tourneys lately. Played some rebuy tourneys, a few shootouts, and way too many NL cash games. All said, I think I broke about even, maybe a little up. I'll try to be more reliable in the future, even though I highly doubt anyone's actually reading this...

WSOP updates at the end of day 4:

01 Tim Phan $ 3,244,000
02 Mike Matusow $ 2,561,000
03 Farzad Bonyadi $ 2,402,000
04 Steve Dannenmann $ 2,143,000
05 Phil Ivey $ 2,027,000
06 Tex Barch $ 2,025,000
07 Tiffany Williamson $ 1,992,000
08 Johnny Howard $ 1,806,000
09 Scott Lazar $ 1,629,000
10 Tuan "Tommy" Vu $ 1,571,000

Raymer was doing pretty well until yesterday, but suffered a 500k hit when he got into it with Bart Rice. Raymer had KQ and was outkicked by Rice's AQ with a board of 7235Q.

I'm putting my money on Ivey at this point. If he makes the final table *crosses fingers*, I think it's pretty much over. But, we'll see.

Institute for Data Trauma

Gratz to Andrew for finding this awesome vid.

John Cleese makes a case for the Institute for Data Trauma (Flash player required)...

Watch it. Trust me.

Linkalicious

I don't know why I'm doing this, considering I currently have zero readers. That's right, zero. Not that you'd know that, since you're not reading my blog. If you want some great info on the WSOP, check the links below (or any other poker blogger's site).

World Series of Poker Live Blog
World Series of Poker
World Series of Poker News
World Series of Poker Podcast
World Series of Poker - Pokerstars Live Blog

Kissing about $10k goodbye.

We had a thunderstorm this weekend. A huge, nasty thunderstorm. It's Saturday morning, I'm taking my Integra in for an oil change and it's about 70 degrees outside. Beautiful and sunny. I pull into the shop, and my buddy Rich goes out for a smoke. I linger by the car, always watchful for the presence of that one bastard mechanic who will "accidentally" jab a flathead screwdriver into some tender area of my car and then explain that the hole was already there, but that I shouldn't worry because they can fix it for $100.

As I'm standing by my car, I hear the all too familiar sound of rain on sheet metal. Not much of it, yet. Richie's cigarette isn't even burned down halfway (For those of you who don't smoke, an average cigarette takes about 5-6 minutes to finish). It's still sunny out.

[Editor's note] The next three minutes have been removed, as they are completely boring, and would be a waste of your time to read.

Richie's cigarette is now finished. There are torrents of water rushing down the sides of the road, and my oil change is done. (6 minute oil change. Kickass.) We get in the car and start the 15 block journey back to my apartment. Most of this drive was done in a state of blindness, due to the fact that the windshield wipers couldn't respond fast enough to the vast amounts of water that seemed magnetically attracted to them.

I flick on the right blinker to pull into the apartment complex. The right front tire touches the outer limits of the parking lot, and as if synchronized to some all-powerful weather device, the rain stops. No, I didn't say it was drizzling, or that it slowed down a little. There was no longer any water falling out of the sky. None. By the time we get to my parking spot (about 40 seconds later), the majority of the sky was blue. How much a mindfuck is that? Seriously.

So I come into work today at 9:00 AM, and nothing works. Hm....... call IT.

I pick up the phone and dial the extension.

-----
IT: "Yeah, what's up?"

Me: "Yeah, not sure if you guys know or not, but the entire server seems to be down..."

IT: "Uh, yeah. I just noticed it. [Laughs]"

Me: "So..... why isn't it working?"

IT: "Ya know, I was just wondering the same thing."

Me: "Do we have an ETA?"

IT: "Well, like I said..... oh, hold on, I got someone on the other line."

[Editor's note] The next two minutes have been removed. Chris spent the majority of this time staring at his computer screen, drooling slightly on his keyboard. He may need a TardGuard(TM).

IT: "You still there?"

ME: "Yeah, what's up?"

IT: "I guess the air conditioning in the server room broke last night and the temperature is pushing 105 degrees. All the machines are blown. We think it's because of the thunderstorm yesterday. Probably won't be fixed until tomorrow."
-----

Even though I got the distinct impression that the IT person I was speaking to had an IQ similar to that of a fruit fly, I have to give the rest of his team credit. They managed to find and replace the fried parts in all of the machines that weren't completely blown and get them up and running by mid afternoon. That, along with the server boxes they had to completely replace, and the air conditioning system took the company for about $10k. And I got to go home early.

The pot limit laywer's game

A friend of mine at work swings by my desk yesterday, so excited he can barely breathe (He's a very heavyset individual). After several minutes of waiting for him to catch his breathe while he tries to form coherent sentences, he finally gets it out. There's a pot limit .25-.50 game on the other side of town that a friend of a friend of a friend is hosting, and it's apparantly filled with a bunch of wealthy fish. They're all laywers. After mulling and pondering, I finally decide to check the game out. I pick up a completely different friend (For the purposes of this story, we'll call him Richie) and we both head over to this guy's house. Armed with Powerade and cigarettes, we bust through the garage door to find the host (a foreign guy whose name I can't pronounce) and Hal (My overweight friend). Oh well. Guess I'll smoke half my pack waiting for the rest of these jokers to show up. I check my watch. 8:30 PM. I have to get up at 8:00 AM. *sigh*

Finally everyone shows up and we get the game underway. Richie and I buy in for $20 each. I've decided that since at this point I have no idea who most of these people are, I'll be better off playing extremely tight until I see what kind of players they are. Yeah.... about 5 hands in I realize that they're all draw-chasers. Every last one of them. 6 high flush draw on the turn? No problem, I'll call your $4 bet and raise you $12. And to top it off, after they river their flush, they start prattling on about how they played the hand SO perfect and wondered how I could call them down with trips with an ace kicker. I kindly excuse myself, go outside and proceed to smash as many windows as possible in 2 minutes, then like the gentleman I am, go back inside and pretend like nothing happened.

One hand in particular that comes to mind.

.25-.50 PL 8 handed.
I'm dealt ATs on the button. It's folded to MP (foreign guy), who limps along with MP1. I raise it up to $2, small blind folds, big bling (Hal) calls, MP and MP1 both call.

Flop Tc Td 4c. Hal bets $1, MP raises to $3, MP1 folds, I re-raise to $10. Hal immediately calls, foreign guy thinks for a minute, and folds.

Turn Qs. Hal checks, I bet $6, he thinks for a long time and raises to $12. I go into the tank.
Based on the way he's been playing I can put him on a pretty wide range at this point. He's been bluffing at some pots pretty heavily all night. On the other hand, he knows how tight I've been playing, and I don't know if he has the balls to try and bluff when he thinks I'm already made. So. What could he possibly have? Based on how quickly he called the flop raise, I have to assume that he hit the flop in some way. Possibly pocket 4's? I don't think so. T4? I don't think so. An overpair? Unlikely, he would have re-raised me preflop with 9's or better. I'm pretty sure I have him beat at this point, but I decide just to call.

River 7c. Hal checks, I go all in for another $14.50. Hal calls without hesitation (Pot is now around $70) He flips over 6c8c for the rivered flush.

How do you think he played this hand? Feel free to leave comments.

What a great hand. For him.

Here's a hand that made me want to grab the guy, rip out his eyes and tongue, messily remove his arms and legs, so that he might live the rest of his life blind and mute, only able to hear the children scream as they run from his horrific, unsightly form. (Gratz to The Princess Bride for that one)

.25-.50NL 6 handed.
I'm the small blind with KK. Everyone folds to MP, who raises to $1. I re-raise to $3. Big blind folds, MP calls.
Flop K59 rainbow. I bet $2, MP raises to $4, I re-raise to $20, MP pushes all-in (He had $65 at the beginning of the hand), I have him covered. I call (Pot is $130, which constitutes the largest pot I've been in). MP flips over 55.
Turn blank.

Do I have to say it?
*sigh*
He rivered quads.

On this note, with absolutely no faith in the universe, I advocate strongly that the various hardware companies, specifically the ones who make keyboards, include a new key just for us poker players. The key will only be sold to poker players who have proven themselves capable of walking and breathing at the same time, only to be used in the most dire of circumstances. The desperation one feels when he or she is repeatedly sucked out on; the overwhelming desire to find the person that could have been capable of this idiotic, horrific act, and remove their ability to have children. All of these feelings can be abated with just one key. The key that removes our choice. The key that will fix the world.

Bonus Code: SETACES

You should sign up at Full Tilt Poker.
Trust me.
Do it.
...
Do it.

$30 Rebuy

This happened yesterday.

A friend of mine told me about a tournament that a local bar was hosting, so I figured, what the hell? How bad could it possibly be? I find out the tourney is starting on Tuesday night at 6pm, so I make sure to get off a little early to make enough time for registration. I pick my buddy up and we make our way over there, arriving at about 4:45 (registration was at 5:00). My impression up to this point was that the tournament was a $20 shootout. I go and ask the head bartender and he tells me in no uncertain terms that I'm very wrong. It is in fact a $30 rebuy. (Unlimited rebuys for $30/starting stack up until the end of the first half, at which time you may purchase an add-on for $30 regardless of current stack size) Grumbling under my breathe as I sign in, I take a peek around the room to see what sort of competetion I've got. Old guys, old guys, an old mexican guy, a few more old guys, and one young white trash girl that's letting a bunch of random guys spank her with a paddle. Yeah. No joke.

So I go outside and smoke something like 10 cigarettes in a row. 6:00 rolls around, and I go in to see how the set-up is doing, where I find out that the tournament has been pushed back another hour because the turn out was much larger than expected.

...

FUCK!
BULLSHIT!
... I need more cigarettes.

...

10 cigarettes and 5 games of pool later the tournament starts. I hit pretty much nothing for the first 1/2 hour or so, then look down and see red 2's on the button. Everyone (Yes, everyone) limps in, so I raise to 40. Flop comes As 2s 4c. SB checks, MP bets 40, MP1 raises to 100, everyone folds to me. I call. Turn is a blank (something like an 8d I think). MP bets 40, MP1 calls, I raise it to 200. Both players call. River is a 4h. MP bets 50, I raise it to 200. He calls, and rolls over Ks 4s (had the flush draw on the flop, made trips on the river). Too bad I have a full house. Easy way to almost double up.

Another 30 minutes or so go by and I look down at aces. Problem is, I'm the big bling, and everyone else thinks it's the right time to fold, so I don't even get an opportunity to check them.

1 hour later. Best hand I've seen since the bullets is A8 off. I look down and find AKs. Long story short, I played them a bit too hard (Yeah, I know.)and ended losing to trips. Still had about 800 in chips.

Here's the last hand. Everyone folds to a known bluffer, who makes it 200 to go. Everyone folds to me. I look down and see black 7's. I decide to call. Flop comes 37K rainbow. He deliberates for barely a second and throws out a bet of 250. I spend a long time looking at him and I notice something interesting on his face. Up in between his right eye and his forehead there's a vein that's throbbing a mile a minute. I figure this means one of two things. Either this guy snorted a few pounds of speed, or he's nervous. Why would he be nervous right now? Unless..... he doesn't want me to call him.

"All in!" I proudly announce, and shove my remaining 600 or so chips towards the middle of the table.

And before I had barely finished my statement, he almost fell out of his chair in an attempt to shove his stack in as well. Oops. He flips over pocket kings. Set over set, and I didn't improve. Next time I see a vein pumping that much blood to a dumbass's miniscule brain, I'll take another second to think about it.

Time to get drunk and watch the Family Guy.

Straight Flush and Aces

Here was a fun hand. Or should I say, two hands? :)

Yes, it was only play money. Doesn't matter though, I'd rather practice for free.

Enjoy

Made me laugh...

What can I say? I'm simple. I found this over on GRob's site.

Poker is Stupid
I am Stupid
-------------------
I am Poker

Like I said, I'm simple. But it's funny. Really. Yeah.