Fantastic Birthday Weekend

It wasn’t done specifically for any celebratory reasons, but last weekend turned in to a birthday weekend full of fun activities. I began the beginning of my 40th year by cashing in both games at Kajagugu’s neighborhood. That was a nice boost to the live bankroll and I cleared enough to pay my buy-ins for the next 3 months with 2 games each night. During football season, the games in my neighborhood dry up so I really look forward to spending the evening with the EG friends once a month.

Saturday was spent chilling around the house watching football and playing small stakes cash games online. Auburn was able to extend their undefeated season under our new coach. That was subsequently squashed yesterday against Arkansas but I’m still pleased so far. We need a ton of work, but they have proven that the are capable of putting lots of points on the score board.

Speaking of small stakes poker, I rarely can clear any bonus programs that online poker sites run because I don’t play enough when it comes to time or the monetary stakes it takes to accumulate points. Another reason is because I haven’t needed to deposit to PokerStars or FullTilt since my initial deposit to each several years ago. FullTilt did have a Take 2 promotion that didn’t require any deposit to qualify. It was the easiest I have ever participated in because it had such easy terms. I didn’t play quite enough to take full advantage, but I did make $25 of the $50 available. To do it, I played less than 1 hour a day at (2) .02/.05 games at the same time for as many days as I could. I was able to reach the 3rd level by playing 15 of the 30 days. I didn’t realize I was making enough points while playing on my lunch hour so I let some days slip. If I had been paying more attention, the full $50 would have been very easy just by playing 25 of 30 days. I’ve now signed up for the Ivey’s share thing they have going, so we’ll see what that will get me.

Sunday was a full day. It started with me going to Best Buy and picking up my birthday present. I got a Samsung BD-P1600 Blu-Ray player. I am totally digging on this player. It has great load speed along with Netflix, You Tube, and Pandora applications that I can take advantage of since my router is very close to my big screen set up in the bonus room. I have been watching this model since it came out earlier this year but I wasn’t willing to pay over $200 for it. A couple of weeks ago, everybody lowered the price to 199.99 and Wal-Mart even had it for 189.99 I think. Since it wasn’t a must have purchase, I figured I would wait until Black Friday and see what specials could be had. I was willing to wait, but Best Buy had the player with a $50 gift card for 199.99 so I figured that was about as good as it was going to get. I used the gift card to replace a dead UPS and picked up The Dark Knight on Blu-Ray.

In addition to taking most people’s money on Friday night, I was given 2 tickets to the Braves’ season ending game at home. When I got back from Best Buy, I joined Kajagugu, Kajakid, 2 other dads from the poker game along with their kids and we motored down to the ball park. We had a great time but had to leave a little early due to some other party commitments for Kajagugu. We were there long enough for me to get my smiling mug up on the big screen. We left during the 7th inning and the score was tied. I give the players a ton of credit because the game ended up going 15 innings. This was the last game of the year and they still gave the fans more than their money’s worth. Well done fellas.

I got home in time to head to dinner at one of my all time favorite restaurants, Kobe Steaks. You can’t beat their fried rice with bucket loads of the chili paste. I usually order double on the fried rice and this gives me to save for another meal with a little bit of the filet and vegetables I have left. I’ve been to other Japanese steak houses but this one is still the tops for me. It was a fantastic ending to a fabulous weekend that fell perfectly in to place.

Historic Flooding And Words From a Jackass

We had rainfall that measured in feet over the weekend and it caused severe flooding in and around Atlanta with 10 confirmed deaths so far . Our neighborhood is near the Chattahoochee River, but we were never in any danger of having any flood damage at our house since we live on a ridge that overlooks the city. It was still bizarre to watch the news and see all of the damage that is only a few miles from our house in multiple directions. Our county and the 2 neighboring ones are going to account for about $250 million in damage. At one time we had 3 separate interstates closed because they were completely submerged by flowing rivers. At one point, the DOT was actually reporting fish on the interstate.

I have a preferred route that I get to and from work, but it was closed until this afternoon. Luckily, my secondary route wasn't affected and it didn't add but about 5 minutes to my commute. I was able to take my normal route home and was amazed to see the high water marks on the trees and bridge supports.

We've now had a few days of sunny skies but we could have some more coming this weekend, but it isn't expected to be any where near the amounts we had last weekend. Thankfully, we have Kanye to put it in to perspective.

Who Watches My Chips?

Stacie went to Charleston with her best friend over the long weekend and that left me home alone to hang with the fellas for a couple of nights of poker. Kajagugu kicked things off Friday night with a couple of 10 man tourneys. I followed up with a .25/.50 cash night at my place on Saturday after the boys finished watching the Dawgs lose to OSU.

Surflexus, who hasn't blogged in over a year now, joined us for some card action Friday night. He got knocked out of the first game and joined the other early victims who were jamming to Rock Band. Those that have been to Okie-Vegas know that Surf can rock the mic, but did you know he can play piano as well? What a Renaissance man! I was not able to join the band, not that I wanted to, because I was the chip leader in the game. When we got down to 3, we just couldn't kill the short stacked Paul. As we usually do, we decided on a chop so we could get to the second game. We split up the prize pool and I took a 20 spot higher than the other 2 since I had them both covered. I didn't cash in the second game, but I still cleared a profit for the night.

That leads us to Saturday night at my place. I wanted to host a cash game with blind levels a little higher than we normally do. 9 disappointed UGA fans joined me to tilt away their money. I was able to run my stack up to over a hundred due to some more than usual aggressive play and I have been trying to maximize my pots. My new style of play was working well until I tangled with the other big stack at the table. My new found aggressive behavior took me just a little too far when I semi-bluff reraised all in with a flopped 2 pair. He snap calls and shows the flopped straight. I get no paired board love and kiss away roughly 125 on that hand. Why did it have to be against the only other player at the table who could bust me? Because I got greedy that's why. I could have easily folded to his reraise. So did I learn my lesson? Of course not, I gave him my next buyin when I pushed with KK against another one of his reraises on the flop. He turns over another flopped straight and this time I'm drawing dead. Hey, it's 1:30 in the morning and I've lost 2 buy-ins. Screw being a good host, get out! Just kidding, they played it out until roughly 2 and then we called it a night. While I wasn't happy about kissing away a nice stack at the cash game, I managed to keep the weekend to a loss of only 60 bucks. That was well worth the price of admission for a couple of nights with good friends playing a game I love.

The only other thing of note I did over the weekend was watching Watchmen. Really good flick. If you have a spare 3 hours, you should check it out. I knew almost nothing about it so it was it was a pleasure to see it live up to the fanboy hype. I may have to check the library to see if they have a copy of the graphic novel. Hopefully my county is not too Puritan to keep such a piece from their collection.

My 15 Milliseconds Of Fame

While I was watching episode 5 of Inside Deal, I was delighted to see I was quoted from my submission of Phil Hellmuth for the Hall of Shame. I'm sure my regular column is just around the corner.

I'm going to play an online tournament tonight for the first time in forever. It is the freeroll on PokerStars for Inside Deal viewers. Maybe this is the jump start I need to get back in to the blogger tournaments. I will be getting in a little live action this weekend. Kajagugu is hosting Friday night and I have put together a cash game after the college football games.

My New Lappie

Over our tax free weekend a few weeks back, I finally bought a laptop computer. I certainly don’t need one, it has just been a want for a while and I’ve never owned my own before. The one I bought was a pretty nice setup, but I ended up taking it back before I opened it and buying a lesser model. The one I took back is even cheaper this week than it was when I bought it on the tax free weekend when you factor in the rebate, plus you get Norton free.

http://www.staples.com/HP-Pavilion-dv6-1230us-Entertainment-Laptop/product_802756?storeId=10001&jspStoreDir=Staples&cmSearchKeyword=dv6-1230us&fromUrl=home&langId=-1&catalogId=10051&cmArea=SEARCH&ddkey=StaplesSearch

I ended up buying this one because of the really low price. It comes out to about $375 after you factor taxes, and rebates on the machine and Norton.

http://www.staples.com/Compaq-Presario-CQ60-420US-Laptop/product_802760

It does not have all of the features of the first one, but it still has a Pentium processor versus others in this price range with the Celeron. My main use it watching DVDs / Netflix, playing poker, and surfing the net so I was very pleased to get this one. I started playing with it earlier this week. It has a 6 cell, 3GB memory, 250GB hard drive, Vista Premium 16 bit vs 12 cell, 4GB, 320GB, 32 bit for the HP. The Compaq doesn't have a webcam, the Core 2 Duo processor, or the remote control but for about $250 difference I don't mind. If you're in the mood for a cheapie, this might be a good way to go. I have a tendancy to shop things to death but once I do, I can be a good resource.

*Update* - Yesterday got the wireless set up and loaded some poker clients, Netflix, and Yahoo IM so it’s officially the poker box. Overall I’m pleased with the computer but the battery life is atrocious when playing a DVD. I guess I will be buying a 12 cell replacement battery before we go on any trips. The other thing I don’t like so far is the non-functioning media controls on the keyboard. I guess for this model, you can’t control the volume and other functions like stop or fast forward without using the mouse, but they use the same keys as the higher model laptops so it just taunts you with the control symbols.

*2nd Update* - Because I am ignorant in the ways of the laptop, I didn't realize I had to press the Function key while using the media controls. Now that I have figured that part out, I'm liking it even more.

Vegas Trip Report

Short version: I finished up a few bucks. Long version: Read on and enjoy.

We got in to Vegas a little after noon on Friday and Chad picked Mike H and me up from the airport and we stopped for lunch at Hard Rock. The weather was awesome and the scenery wasn’t too shabby. The buckets of beers were a good start to the trip. After lunch, Chad dropped us off at Bally’s and we checked in for the weekend. After getting settled and meeting up with the rest of the boys that flew in Thursday night, we headed out to get our drink and gamble on.

First stop, Paris for some Pai Gow. This was supposed to be a cheap way to start drinking and have a little fun. I had the misfortune of sitting in a terrible seat and quickly dropped $320 in less than 2 hours. My main goal for the trip was poker, so I stopped my Pai Gow massacre and headed back to Bally's to take a seat in their poker room. I bought in for $100 and cashed out for $330 a little later so I got a good chunk of it back. I would have liked to play longer because the table was pretty soft. Unfortunately for me, the combination of too much to drink, being dead tired, and having a screaming headache forced me back to my room. I consumed more alcohol in the first 12 hours of this trip than I did the entire last trip. You just have to hate to see a veteran player making a rookie mistake.

Saturday morning we started with some lower stakes Pai Gow at Bill’s while we were waiting to be seated for breakfast. I had a little better luck and almost was able to cover the cost of my meal. After breakfast, we headed over to Harrah’s for an awesome 1PM deepstack tournament that “Main Event” Mike found. It has a $150 buy-in with a great structure. This particular tournament was brand new so it had a small field of 20 and paid top 2 (1500 / 900). I had a mini rush right before the middle levels but cooled off after that. After consolidating to 1 table, I raised from the button with A,Q after the others folded. The big blind pushed. She had me slightly covered but I made the call anyway since we were both getting short stacked and I had to double up or go home. She tables A,K and I tell the dealer I really need a suck out. He graciously gives me a Q on the flop and I was able to ride the stack for a while. When we got to 4 we chopped. Mike H took 800, 2nd took 700, 3rd 600 and I took 300. Mike H had a huge stack and I still was not in push mode, but we had been playing for 6.5 hours and were ready to be done. I would have hated to put in over 7 hours just to bubble. The other 2 guys were buddies from England so they were happy to take a chop as well. Mike took the biggest hit payout wise, but he said he was fine. I was thrilled to be able to share with Surflexus after he partially backed me.

We wanted to meet up with the rest of our crew so we left Harrah’s and headed down to MGM. Feeling flush with cash from the poker tournament, we made a quick stop in to Bill’s for some more cheap Pai Gow. In 6 hands, I lost another $55 but wisely stopped the bleeding. We got up and went down to MGM to get my money back at poker. We got there just a bit too late to take advantage of an absolutely trashed guy. He only played 2 hands while I was there, but the others in our crew had already taken a few shots at him. Scott had the best chance when he got pocket aces and raised. Drunk guy comes along and I think they get it all in on the flop. Drunk guy shows pocket jacks and “Main Event” Mike tells Scott that he folded A,J so he’s looking good. Hellooooo Doom Switch as the case jack hits on the river. That was a crushing blow and a fabulous opportunity that didn’t pay off for him. For my session, I only remember 1 hand where I had to make a tough call and fortunately made the right one. This helped me maintain a profit for the session. I bought in for 200 and cashed for 303 after about 2 hours.

The last day I said screw Pai Gow and went down to the Golden Nugget to check out their new poker room. It’s a very nice looking room and we had a few wild players at our table with large stacks. I sat down in the big blind and was rewarded with pocket aces on the next hand. I didn’t know the players yet so I didn’t mess around on the flop with straight and flush possibilities. I bet he folded and then I settled in and watched the action. Later in the session, I had 2 big hands that paid off for me. I raised in late position with A,10 suited and got called by one of the loose big stacks. The flop came out A high with 2 of the same suit that wasn’t mine so I bet the pot and he calls. So now I am a little worried about my kicker. The turn is another ace so I am feeling better about my hand and bet ½ -3/4 of the pot. The river completed a flush draw and I checked. He grabs a stack and sets it out. I reluctantly made the call and he immediately says “you’re good” as he tables the bluff. He said he was trying to represent the flush. A few hands later one of the loose players put the straddle on. It folded around to me and I raised it up to 20 with K,Q. The button calls and I figured she was just looking me up and being the straddle police. The flop come A,K, x and I check. She bets out and now I call to keep her honest. The turn is another K and I check again. She bets out and I reraise her all in. I should have played it a little slower but I was happy with taking the pot right there. She folds showing her ace and gives me a disgusted look when I show my hand. Hey, I can’t fold every time an A hits the board. I played here for 3-4 hours with my 200 buy-in and cashed out for 616. Weeeeeeee!

I got in one more session in the evening before we left. Mike H and I went over to Harrah's to play some more cash. I must have rubbed the player to my left the wrong way because he was gunning for me. Early on, his 2 pair was counterfeited on the turn and my kicker came in to play. From that point on, he would enter the pot every time I did. It didn’t matter if I raised or limped, he was in. I ended up losing a $300-400 pot to his rivered 4 outer gutter ball after he called a preflop raise, $25 on the flop, $25 on the turn and another player in the hand. He had like 7,4 or some shit and when the 3 of hearts hit I knew he didn’t make his flush so I called his all in. This was the first time I have ever outwardly expressed amazement at another player’s stupidity. I am no poker genius, but even I realize he was just trying to put a hurt on me and got his 10% to pay off. I have to give the guy some credit, because the jackass got the rest of my chips after I slow played my flopped trips and shoved on his turned flush. I didn’t boat up and decided to call it a night since I was making too many mistakes and I wanted to finish up for the trip.

I had a great time and was happy with my play all weekend except how I played a few hands at the Harrah's cash game. I didn’t clear a lot of cash, but it covered my airfare, parking, and lodging expenses. The only real money it costs me was for food and drink while I was there. I’ll take that success every time.

Getting In Some Poker And Ready For Vegas

I was able to get in 2 nights of live poker this weekend. Friday night was in Kajagugu's hood without the Kaj or Surflexus. I figured this would increase my odds, but nooooo. I was the first one to bust out in the first game and then bubbled the late night second game. I should have just come home after I busted, but I wanted to stick around for another game. I liked my play, I just got unlucky against a very loose call. I had no idea it would take so long to get to the next game. I enjoy hanging out with the usual folks, so its a good night with friends.

On Sunday, "Main Event" Mike invited me to game he was going to that evening. It had a much higher buy-in than I usually do but I wanted to get a little action before my guys trip to Vegas next Friday. We had 16 people for the tournament. There was some wild action, but I kept a low profile. Mike went out on a brutal beat when he hit his set on the flop while holding pocket Aces. His opponent put him all in and showed 3,4 or some shit for middle pair and a gut-shot straight draw. This guy was running supernova hot and of course hits his 4 outer to knock out Mike. He was crushed and called it a night. I was able to hold on and pick my spots to move chips and finished 3rd for a little cash. It more than made up for my losses on Friday night. They were having a big cash game for the bustouts, but it was getting late and I didn't bring the bankroll for a 1/2 game of no limit with Omaha rotated in every 3rd orbit. When I asked about the game, the host warned me that the Omaha pots could see $1k. Yikes, that's a little much for a weekly home game. I'm only good for about 2 of those a year unless I'm in a casino.

Speaking of casinos, Mike, Mike, and I are heading to Bally's next week for a 4 day weekend. I plan on playing cash at Bally's, MGM, and maybe checking out the poker room at the Golden Nugget. Tournament wise, I may do Caeser's again or possibly the Venetian. This time, I hope to play more than 2 hands before I go busto with pocket kings.

I will play one more neighborhood game before Vegas and we are lucky enough to have Falstaff join us while he is doing his Atlanta gigs. It won't be a big game, but we should be able to get 6 handed maybe even a full table.