Home Games - Taking candy from ...

It's fun playing poker with people who don't care about money. Rather, it's just fun to have cards in my hand again. Just cleaned up a quick home game with my poker set that I've had for a year and have used once prior to tonight. 20$ + 1 R, went very quickly .. Three big hands ..

First QQ finds me UTG and I raise, called twice.

Flop comes As Qs 3s. Nice. So I lead, Gal to my left doubles my bet and puts herselft almost all in. I throw in the extra chips and before we even get our cards turned up the dealer of the hand turns up the 3d. She ends up showing me Ts 6s and she's the first player out.

Next was KQo. My buddy who had let himself get brutally short pushed it in, the other guy who was playing ATC all night called and I called. The board ran out something like 5J28Q and my KQ beat out Q6 and Q6 ... lol. 2nd player out.

The final hand of the match I had a monster K3 and checked my option to see J23 flop. ATC guy was making noises like he had nothing but would call so I put him all in and he turned up AK. I held off the 3 aces and won myself a nice little pile of 20's.

Physical reads make the game SO much easier its not even funny. I want to take money to a casino soooo badly but I'm just not rolled for even the smallest of games. I could play out of my bankroll and hope for the best. If I variance it all off life goes on.

I want to get a regular home game going, but I have the feeling I'd have to deliberately loose somewhat regularly to keep the attendance respectful, which sucks. Apparently one of my friends placed 3rd in a big tournament that happens once a year in this city .. so maybe I'll get him in too.

Anywho, I'm just happy and ranting cuz I got to play cards and I won a bit of cash. haha.

Cheers

Funny Coincidence

For those of you who read this blog closely (if anyone fits that category), you'll remember a few posts back I made a comment about "Dismantling my shitty Sony laptop into tiny pieces."

Well, the above mentioned device stopped working a couple weeks back, so I replaced it with a Toshiba and sent the Sony off to be fixed. A couple days ago I got a phone call informing me that the cause of the malfunction was a liquid spill (which happened well over a year ago - unless my ladyfriend did it and didnt tell me). Of course, this means my warranty doesn't cover the repair and it would cost me 1200$ to fix it.

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

So yeah, this weekend I get to go pick it up, and you better believe you know what I'll be doing with it, as it won't boot at all, so it's an oversized paperweight for me now. I'm gonna have to go buy a sledgehammer. *claps hands giddily*

The poker gods are really testing this newfound patience

Bankroll: $402.44

Well, this is my last chance to play solid hours of poker before school starts tomorrow, so I'm multi-tabling 4$ 180's. Off to a tough start.


Here's a nice limp-RR.

PokerStars Game #11970098232: Tournament #60741890, $4.00+$0.40 Holdem No Limit - Level II (15/30) - 2007/09/09 - 21:50:24 (ET)
Table 60741890 18 9-max Seat #9 is the button
Seat 1: DRSORDERS420 (1690 in chips)
Seat 2: codyc54321 (1370 in chips)
Seat 3: B.Drizzop (3485 in chips)
Seat 4: Su_dinero (565 in chips)
Seat 5: Sabo17tage (7962 in chips)
Seat 6: jimt2112 (1710 in chips)
Seat 7: HoustonDude (4080 in chips)
Seat 8: crushmastac (2180 in chips)
Seat 9: l3rodie222 (1245 in chips) is sitting out
DRSORDERS420: posts small blind 15
codyc54321: posts big blind 30
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to crushmastac [Kh Kd]
B.Drizzop: calls 30
Su_dinero has timed out
Su_dinero: folds
Su_dinero is sitting out
Sabo17tage: calls 30
Su_dinero has returned
jimt2112: folds
l3rodie222 has returned
HoustonDude: calls 30
crushmastac: raises 150 to 180
l3rodie222: calls 180
DRSORDERS420: folds
codyc54321: raises 1190 to 1370 and is all-in
B.Drizzop: folds
Sabo17tage: folds
HoustonDude: folds
crushmastac: raises 810 to 2180 and is all-in
l3rodie222: folds
*** FLOP *** [Jc 5d 4s]
*** TURN *** [Jc 5d 4s] [3d]
*** RIVER *** [Jc 5d 4s 3d] [As]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
codyc54321: shows [2h Qc] (a straight, Ace to Five)
crushmastac: shows [Kh Kd] (a pair of Kings)
codyc54321 collected 3025 from pot


That's the worst of it. I also ran TT into JJ on a 6 high board.

AK hasn't hit once. Neither has AQ. KK has seen Aces flop twice and both times the opponent showed an Ace. AK lost to A2 in a raised pot when the flop brought a deuce.

I'm still playing my game. My blood pressure only went up a little when the runner-runner straight took out my K's.

Oh well.

The best advice I can take right now is: Run better. Seriously.


CONTINUED: Oh yeah, it keeps on going. When I wrote the first part of this, I had two tournies left. Well I started getting some things going my way, and these two waited until the final 25 players before they ganked me...

Guy thinks I'm bluffing and KK fucks me again.

PokerStars Game #11972342837: Tournament #60744381, $4.00+$0.40 Holdem No Limit - Level IX (300/600) - 2007/09/10 - 00:08:46 (ET)
Table 60744381 20 9-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: mariachiinc (12179 in chips)
Seat 2: Poeta (4370 in chips)
Seat 4: crushmastac (10941 in chips)
Seat 5: gut88 (18349 in chips) is sitting out
Seat 6: DFDPhantom (25711 in chips)
Seat 7: sexincity (13820 in chips)
Seat 8: vznyisleszv (3441 in chips)
Seat 9: mikey80i (7375 in chips)
mariachiinc: posts the ante 50
Poeta: posts the ante 50
crushmastac: posts the ante 50
gut88: posts the ante 50
DFDPhantom: posts the ante 50
sexincity: posts the ante 50
vznyisleszv: posts the ante 50
mikey80i: posts the ante 50
Poeta: posts small blind 300
crushmastac: posts big blind 600
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to crushmastac [Kh Ks]
gut88: folds
DFDPhantom: folds
sexincity: folds
vznyisleszv: folds
mikey80i: folds
mariachiinc: folds
Poeta: calls 300
crushmastac: raises 1200 to 1800
Poeta: raises 2520 to 4320 and is all-in
crushmastac: calls 2520
*** FLOP *** [6h Th 2d]
Poeta said, "gg lol"
*** TURN *** [6h Th 2d] [9h]
*** RIVER *** [6h Th 2d 9h] [8d]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
Poeta: shows [7c Qc] (a straight, Six to Ten)
crushmastac: shows [Kh Ks] (a pair of Kings)
Poeta collected 9040 from pot
Poeta said, "NICE"
Poeta said, "lol"


And then ONLY I could miss 28 ... yes, twenty-fucking-eight outs when I pushed a few hands later.


PokerStars Game #11972410380: Tournament #60744381, $4.00+$0.40 Holdem No Limit - Level IX (300/600) - 2007/09/10 - 00:13:53 (ET)
Table 60744381 20 9-max Seat #2 is the button
Seat 1: mariachiinc (11479 in chips)
Seat 2: Poeta (9040 in chips)
Seat 4: crushmastac (6621 in chips)
Seat 5: gut88 (19599 in chips)
Seat 6: DFDPhantom (30452 in chips)
Seat 7: sexincity (11320 in chips)
Seat 9: mikey80i (7675 in chips)
mariachiinc: posts the ante 50
Poeta: posts the ante 50
crushmastac: posts the ante 50
gut88: posts the ante 50
DFDPhantom: posts the ante 50
sexincity: posts the ante 50
mikey80i: posts the ante 50
crushmastac: posts small blind 300
gut88: posts big blind 600
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to crushmastac [Qh Ah]
DFDPhantom: raises 600 to 1200
sexincity: folds
mikey80i: folds
mariachiinc: folds
Poeta: folds
crushmastac: raises 5371 to 6571 and is all-in
gut88: folds
DFDPhantom: calls 5371
*** FLOP *** [8h Kh Ts]
*** TURN *** [8h Kh Ts] [5s]
*** RIVER *** [8h Kh Ts 5s] [Kd]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
crushmastac: shows [Qh Ah] (a pair of Kings)
DFDPhantom: shows [7s 7h] (two pair, Kings and Sevens)
DFDPhantom collected 14092 from pot


I just doubled up twice on the other one so I might still have hope to make ONE cash.


Final Update:

LoL. As usual, I finally start running good and then play like shit. Tried running a huge bluff and it failed, giving the next guy close to the same in chips (he had me barely covered) .. next hand I have Ad9d in the SB. Same guy raises and I call. Flop comes KQT with two diamonds. I make a weak lead wanting him to jam on me, he does, and to my dismay shows me AJ for the made straight. Turn and river both brick and I'm done in 6th ... from dominating chip leader to out in 2 hands. Only me. Totally my fault though. Amazing how when the poker gods finally decide to serve me one up on a platter I turn it down. *grin*

At least I made all the money I lost today back.

Haha I still run like shit, but my blood pressure is staying lower

Ending Bankroll: $406.29

Not many brutal suck outs, but a few that stung. I played a couple MTT's. Busted out pretty quick in two after repeated steal attempts kept failing when my hole cards reaked. The 3rd MTT was one of my fave 4$ 180's. I got deep in that one after a few favorable hands launched me to #4 in chips with 30 remaining. I proceded to build up to 2nd in chips, and then decided it would be fun to donk it all off being over-aggressive. Apparently I still need to find the line between "protecting a big stack" and going for the "monster stack domination". The hyper-aggression was working great from 30 players down to 16 and then all the wheels came off the cart simultaneously. The hand that started it, coincidentally, was my worst suck out of the day. 17 players left, a MP player who's been open jamming his 5K stack multiple times per orbit does his thing, and I'm OTB with ATo. I reraise to isolate, and get HU against his A8o. The flop drops 8K8. I bit my lip and smiled, glad that I'd built my stack to 30K where a beat like this didn't cripple me. I kept playing the same style, and proceeded to lose 4 raised pots in a row (all 4 times I had no kind of hand - I think I saw an AK sooooted early on but I was painfully card dead as usual today). I'd like to make a point of the fact that I did not feel at ALL like I was on tilt. The beat happened on the last hand before the break so I had 5 minutes so get some water and shake it off. Anywho, carrying on, I then got Q9 soooted in the BB and it folded to the SB who made a stealish looking raise. I jammed on him, he called and barely had me covered .. AK beat me down and I was out in 15th. Little disappointed with that, but I don't hate the way I played .. I'm going to have to get used to being hyper aggressive because I'm anything but a luckbox, and I certainly can't rely on my cards to win me a tournament. Yuck.

Then I shifted to the STT's. Long story short, I bubbled twice when 60/40 favorable positions got rivered by a 2nd draw that the trailer picked up on the turn (straight first time, flush second). I just finished the last ass whipping now when I got all in with AJ against KsQs. The flop was a friendly 234 with one spade. The turn was a 8s, and the river was the 4th spade, and my fifth 4th place finish on the bubble in my last 7 STT attempts greeted me.

I'm glad I stepped down a level. Many days this would have put me on tilt, but I stuck to the strategy I outlined in my last post and I'm actually sitting here smiling, happy with how I played today.

Hopefully tomorrow will bring better luck. I'm overdue.

Back from trip, itching to get back to it

Well the vacation was nice and relaxing. Watching my younger brother get married was definitely a strange experience, but it was very fun none-the-less. Much to my horror, my girlfriend of 9 months caught the bouquet, but I'm sure everyone will get past that, despite the fact that my dad caught the whole thing on video. Needless to say, I'm not in a hurry to get married and I sit mired in the beginning of my 4th year (out of 5) at University, with no car, no money, and not much else aside from my friends and a few semi-styling clothes. Oh, and my 400$ bankroll.

Yes, I'll start posting the numbers again now. I don't remember exactly what the number is, and thanks to my dispondant (sp?) Sony Laptop (shitpieces, for the record), I can't get onto my account from home. But not to worry, I'm going to pick up a nice new Toshiba today and send the Sony away to be repaired for god knows how many months, and then I can move on with my life.

But anyways, the last few weeks before each of these respective vacations had a lot of ups and downs. Okay, one up, and a lot of downs. My bankroll went from 670$ down to 530$ back up to 670$ and then collapsed to a medicre 400-some$. I think it's like 411$ or something to that effect.

Needless to say, seeing my biggest bankroll of all time diminished to almost half of what it once was put me on one hell of a tilt rollercoaster. Vacation has definitely helped get things back in perspective, I'm ready to start with a clean slate, and a lesson learned in how to avoid tilt. I know this is a problem for me because I'm an immature poker player, and since I'm limited to how much I can play, when the bad streaks happen, it has the potential to absolutely ruin my mood, because I really, really, really like to win. It especially stings when it happens on the heals of a hot run ... but through my two year history of playing, this has now happened three times. The previous two times were much less cataclysmic. My bankroll would go from 50 to 200 to 0. And then from 50 to 120 to 0. My first two (and only two) busts, both of which are now almost a year behind me.

This swing comes after I'd taught myself a little more control, and learned some valuable information thanks to the wealth of information available at the cardplayer poker forums. So while I have increased my ability to control my emotions, obviously it's nowhere near enough. So I'll have to take a page out of "Ace on the River", and stop caring so much about the money I have invested on PokerStars. I know it sounds a little funny... But I understood it after I chomped on it for a while. Right now, being a (relatively) poor university student, losing any amount of money is frustrating for me. So I have to let go of the notion that my bank roll is "my money". I have to treat it like it's an investment that will always grow in the long run as long as my "business" decisions are sound at every juncture. I have to stop thinking like "Shit, I just lost my 10$ buy-in .. I've lost five in a row now, so holy shit, I'm out 50 bucks!!!", and start thinking like "My investment will always grow in the long term if I keep making sound decisions."

So as long as I stay within my bankroll, keep my emotions in check, and make the best possible decision at every point, poker should continue to be a mildly profitable, extremely enjoyable hobby that allows for the ocassional luxury. As much as I hate to, I'll be stepping down to 10 NL and 5$ SNG's just for a bit to get my bearings back, and to ease the bankroll back up over $500.

I am still shooting for the 10K though ;)

Good luck on the felt, thanks for reading, and see you again soon.

-- Ken