StudioGlyphic

This is five times the initial figures released Sunday. More than the population of Beverly Hills and Malibu combined.

How to help:

American Jewish World Service
45 West 36th Street, 10th Floor
New York, NY 10018
800-889-7146

American Red Cross
International Response Fund
PO Box 37243
Washington, DC 20013
800-HELP NOW

Catholic Relief Services
PO Box 17090
Baltimore, MD 21203-7090
800-736-3467

Direct Relief International
27 South La Patera Lane
Santa Barbara, CA 93117
805-964-4767

Doctors Without Borders/Medecins Sans Frontieres
PO Box 2247
New York, NY 10116-2247
888-392-0392

International Medical Corps
11500 West Olympic Blvd., Suite 506
Los Angeles, CA 90064
800-481-4462

International Orthodox Christian Charities
Middle East Crisis Response
PO Box 630225
Baltimore, MD 21263-0225
877-803-4622

Mercy Corps
PO Box 2669
Portland, OR 97208
800-852-2100

Operation USA
8320 Melrose Avenue, Ste. 200
Los Angeles, CA 90069
800-678-7255

The PokerStars Caribbean Adventure blog is up, authored by none other than Otis from Up For Poker. If you haven't read the background story on Otis getting the gig, check it out at Rapid Eye Reality.

In some parallel universe I could spend my days reading blogs and the New York Review of Books and drive about in a 911 Turbo. In this universe, I have to settle for the blogs and the NYRB. In "How Bush Really Won," Mark Danner shares his personal experiences with Bush supporters and analyzes the competing campaigns.

It's also somewhat unfair to make a blanket statement about Bush supporters. I've spoken with Republicans who have admitted Iraq was a mistake, or that the case for war was misleading, but it didn't change their support for their candidate. Anecdotal, sure, but I think you get my point. I may not have agreed with their perspectives/conclusions, but at least we were talking about the same reality.

The main idea that comes across in Danner's piece is that it was the Man, and not the facts, the logic, or anything else, that decided this year's election.

For those of you who refuse to bet on my lucky numbers (8, 20, 23, 25) and prefer to play in +EV games where you have some kind of mathematical "edge" instead, consider what would happen if instead of being a 38:1 dog, you were only 6:1, and the house still paid 35:1:

I played some $50 NL tonight after a terrible day of 1/2 and managed to make back most of my losses (I think I'm going to stop playing limit for a while). After taking some poor guy's entire buy-in, I decided to relive the glory by checking out the PokerTracker hand history. That's when I noticed an exorbitant rake for that hand. Wait a tick, that's a negative number! So for those of you who think PokerTracker is the best thing you ever purchased with your ill-gotten gains (SSHE is in the running for first), you'll want to get the latest patch:

Unfortunately PokerTracker's delete function only works for entire sessions, so if you have older sessions with these rake errors, you might be SOL. Hold on, just thought of something. PT doesn't delete these hard drive hand histories. It moves them somewhere else. You might be able to delete the session from PT and reload them from your archive directory. I take no responsibility for anything that happens to your PT db. Make a backup copy and proceed with caution.

Specifically South and Southeast Asia.

I hope you all are having a nice holiday.

Drink lots! Eat lots! And stay safe.

Sure, having pocket pairs and flopping a set, a boat, or quads is always appreciated, but honestly my favorite flop goes something like this:

I have AXs and flop top pair, ace kicker + nut flush draw, where the X is a 10 or lower.

Sure, this hand is vulnerable to two pair, overcards that hit on the turn or river, low straights, overpairs, etc., but that just means you'll usually be well compensated when your hand improves.

Mean Gene is back. And in rare form. He's one of those bloggers that make you want to stop blogging out of embarassment.

Another week, another weekly home game.

JC -$5.00
ER +$1.10
CR -$0.10
PC +$6.85
JB -$5.85
EM +$3.00

JB was running bad; lost his entire buy-in within the first hour or so. Though I think he made it worse when he stayed in a hand against CR who turned out to have trips to JB's two pair.

JC ran out of chips one hand away from the last hand of the night. Good timing. He was almost out at one point when I had JJ UTG and he had 57 in the BB. He had previously announced he was going all in on his blind, so I raised the max and put him all in. We played our cards up and watched as the cards came up, giving him a gutshot on the flop, a pair of fives on the turn, and two pair on the river. Heh. Lucky bastard.

In case you're curious, ER leads in the cumulative winnings. JC comes in second, and I'm third with a barely positive cumulative.

Cleared the Party 20% bonus and netted a whole $29! That's with the $200 bonus, mind you. Oh, man.

Posted some heavy losses at the 2/4 BBJ tables. High -EV. I guess when you have a lottery-type deal attached to those tables, it tends to attract the worst of the gamboolers. I may be wrong, but it seems like you have to be a fish, a maniac, or a rock in order to post profits on those tables. Either that, or catch the variance upswing when your bankroll allows.

One of the most successful players I saw at these tables was a maniac who raised virtually every pot. He'd sometimes have cards, sometimes not. Sometimes got lucky, sometimes not. But he owned that table. He was very good at playing the players. After a while, he never raised if I limped, but raised when I was a blind. Aggression from fellow maniacs was met with aggression in kind, but aggression from me or the fish usually meant a fold, or a call and a fold on the next street. He'd also fold on the river a lot after getting raised. I think he knew damn well what he was doing. See The Cards Speak and Poker Nerd for more on the virtues of being a maniac.

I did have a great winning session at a 2/4 non-BBJ table today: +22BB. That and some other small wins made my 2/4 losses equivalent to a 20BB buy-in. I've done worse, but I really should be more careful with table selection. My game's not currently equipped for handling skilled mania, though I've found that the rules of 6-max apply when faced with a maniac in full-ring: catch a piece of the flop, push back on the turn (hopefully improve there, too), and see what happens. The less-skilled of the maniacs will crumple and fold. High variance, that's for sure.

And so we come to NL. Down a little over a buy-in from my NL play, but that's due largely in part to the 4 buy-in losing session a couple nights back. I don't think we need to go over that again.

Speaking of NL, I was down a few cents from my Party deposit earlier tonight after a thoroughly -EV session of Omaha 8, so I decided to play some NL. 'Cause I couldn't cash out of Party with less money than I deposited. Oh yes. I am so results-oriented.

Party dropped me on a NL table with the biggest NL maniac ever. I think he set the table on tilt. After I saw him suck out aces on the turn against someone else's queens, I knew that if I were ever ahead, I'd have to push all my chips in. So I did. Three times. The first time I doubled up (QQ vs. Q5?!). The second time I was pushing my two pair (KJ) against a straight (KQJT9) and lost everything (though truth be told, I tried to slowplay the flop and got spanked by giving away the free turn card). The third time he doubled me up again and I won what was previously in the pot (AAJJ vs QQJJ). The net result was that I was down slightly for the evening. Then he left before he could double me up a third time. Crap.

Luckily I later caught a 5-outer against two pair (I thought this other loose aggressive player simply had a worse kicker and put him all in... oops). Then I flopped a straight and made an underbet in late position. One of the blinds raised 8x my bet. It was folded to me and I reraised to put him all in. When the 3-flush appeared on the turn I was worried, but I was good: he risked all his chips on top pair, deuce kicker. Oh the humanity.

So I don't know. This whole Party bonus whoring experience has been just a series of -EV sessions. I'll still play with the damn bloggers, but be a little more careful about drinking and pushing. And I'll stay away from the goddamn BBJ tables. But now that I'm moving on to Empire for their reload bonus, that evilness won't be able to tempt me. I still think I suck at limit. And in NL I happen to catch some good cards and flops and make 'em work for me. There's probably only one or two bluffs per session, and I only catch someone out on a bluff a couple times per session, so how good am I really?

I should change my Empire name.

Another no limit session with the bloggers last night. Biggest, and possibly only pot I won went as follows:

Well if you believe in karma, I lost most of these winnings to Iggy, who went all in with a board pair on the flop (two sevens, wouldn't you know?) and counterfeited/beat my two pair on the river. Oh, the humanity.

I then proceeded to lose big pots to Pauly and SirFWALGMan and paid off a number of other bloggers with better hands.

I think I ended the night down five buy-ins. Karma's a bitch. I might also want to reconsider drinking lots of whiskey while playing no limit. Nah.

Unfortunately, they don't count for the jackpot.

Warning: this post consists entirely of hand histories. Don't read on if you hate those things...

Hand #1:

Hand #2:

Okay, so the same guy beat me twice when I had great cards/hands, but I can't really fault him for playing the way he did. He just happened to catch his flush or his straight when he was ramming and jamming. According to PT, he's actually a sLA-A on the tighter end. I just happened to be unlucky enough to have him hit his draw when I was ahead on the flop and turn. Ouch.

Recovered some big bets with cowboys twice, missed a flush, prematurely folded two suited broadway cards, and got out of there down slightly over a big bet. Rough stuff.

A word of advice: unless you want to give Maudie your money, don't get tangled up in a hand with her. Can I say now after the fact that I meant it when I said it was a donation? Yeah, I don't believe me either.

Had another three hour session of $25 NL ring with the bloggers again tonight. In attendance were Pauly, Maudie, NegativeEV, UWannaBet, and Pauly's friend Hank. Never figured out who the guy in the 4 seat was, but he was there, too. After giving most of my stack to Maudie (respect her preflop raises!), I rebought and ended the night quadrupled.

I've appreciated all the great trip reports to come out of last weekend's Vegas trip, but man, I've really missed the nightly NL sessions. When you're sitting at a table by yourself, it gets boring really quickly. In these NL sessions, half the time I'm paying attention to the hand I'm playing and the other half I'm paying attention to the chat. It's also good to have a cheering squad when you win, and people to commiserate when you get sucked out by a maroon.

Too obvious?

Tonight I had the distinct displeasure of being put on a hand three times by NegativeEV. Not that that's a bad thing. It's an eye-opener. He knows what hands I play and how I play them. I need to have a talk with that guy. This is a serious leak that needs to be patched, and who better to help me than a fellow blogger? For the most part in NL I play a pretty straightforward game, and I suppose this makes it obvious to an observant Joe whether I've got something to fear or not.

Destroying the odds

If I've got a hand that's vulnerable to draws, I usually bet enough to destroy the pot odds. So here's the question: am I leaving bets on the table by not taking on the risk of getting outdrawn? Because the goal in NL is to take everything in the other guy's stack and/or use him to double up. I do think, however, that this straightforward play buys me a lot of respect at the table, allowing me to take down pots with strong draws or second pair after I've established myself.

Getting outdrawn

Of course, in a 3-way pot, if opponent 1 calls my bet, opponent 2 with his good draw instantly has odds to call (well, he doesn't, actually, but it becomes much more justifiable--missing the turn with these draws is a disaster in terms of odds since you won't see the river for free). This leads to the following dilemma: Most times I bet the turn and take it down right there. But there are those memorable times where the person who made the mistake calling on the flop is suddenly ahead. I have a very tough time letting go of a hand that was ahead on the flop (which means, of course, that the caller actually had great implied odds for his draw--poker is such a mindfuck). Yet I've also made "good" laydowns to good players who figured they could get me off. Iggy has done this to me (you bastard), and a few people at Doyle's Room have done this to me, much to my dismay. I think the British players I've run into there have bluffing as a standard tool in their repertoire, which makes for some pretty high variance games (I've never made 13 times my buy-in at Party, but I usually don't lose my stack, either).

A little help?

So these are the situational weaknesses in my game: not making my hands as profitable as they can be, calling when I shouldn't, and folding when I shouldn't. And I have no idea what I can do to address them other than to play more hands and improve my subconscious feel for the game. If anyone out there has some good insights or tips, they'd be much appreciated.

Addendum

I just went back and read HDouble's "How to beat low-limit no-limit: a beginner's guide" and RDub's follow-up "No Limit Part Two: RDub manipulates the pot." Good stuff. Then I came across this:

Ladies and gentlemen, the world's tallest road bridge:

Wow.

The BBC has the full story and some more photos.

Some crazy .nl guy has some photos of the bridge as well as some other things he saw on his motorcycle trip through the mountains over the summer. Like an explosion!

And a Malaysian has posted a photo of it on his blog as well. This photo shows the old route at the bottom of the valley. Hmm.

The question is whether to reload at Empire or reload at Party. Empire has a 15% bonus up to $100, but Party has a 20% bonus up to $200. But where's the rub, you ask? Here it is: Party requires you to log 7x the bonus in raked hands in 7 days. To get the full bonus, you'll need to get 1400 hands in.

I'm going for the 20%. And the 15%

If everything goes as planned, I should be able to start clearing that Party bonus on Monday and then the Empire bonus the following Monday. There'll be some hardcore online poker sessions in the coming weeks...

It's been over a month since our last home game.

JC +$6.30
ER +$13.70
CR -$10.00
PC -$5.00
JB $0.00
EM -$5.00

Yep. Lost all my chips on two hands in the last half-hour: ~$2 in a QQ vs. KK match, and ~$4 in a 93 vs. A3 match on a 3238J board. For whatever reason, JC refused to cap every street with his A3 (why be satisfied with 3 bets when you can have 4?), so I threw him my remaining thirty cents at the end of the night. Come to think of it, ER wasn't doing that much raising with her KK either. I have a feeling the home game might be slightly sLP-P.

Of course, I was doing my best to be LA-A last night. I jammed most of the pots where I thought I was ahead, which probably drove some of the regulars nuts. For instance, in one early hand I had second pair and after CR checked the flop, I bet the max, and he called. He checked the turn, I bet the max, he called. An ace hit the river, he checked, and I checked along because I knew the fucker spiked his ace. He flips over his AQ and insisted he had to stay in because I had nothing, but I was ahead the whole way with my pair of nines. There's no way he was getting odds to call a 25c bet into a 20c pot with overcards, but oh well. At least when JB makes unprofitable calls he admits it.

I only bluffed one hand last night, and this was early on. I had two cards that I was going to fold, but I was curious about the flop, so I raised preflop to see it, got one caller, missed the flop completely, bet the max, and took the pot when the preflop caller folded.

CR lost his buy-in twice, as you can see (though really he just ceded his remaining chips to ER after getting overly frustrated), but that came from a combination of letting others outdraw him by trying to build pots with draws on the board, and trying to represent hands with big bets. I think CR ought to consider playing no limit if he's that fond of being tricky.

Oh, and JB brought presents for everyone. He gave me the Theory of Poker. So I guess I'll have to buy something for him, too. Or just cancel next week's game. Heh.

"Don't like her?! What's wrong with her? She's beautiful, she's rich, she's got huge..."

Swings. Huge swings. That bitch Variance came around again today.

Session 1: +80 in 2/4 6-max and .25/.50 NL 6-max

Session 2: -130 in 2/4 6-max, .25/.50 NL 6-max, and 1/2 full ring

Session 3: +52 in .25/.50 NL 6-max

Net: +2

What a day. I don't even want to think about the hourly. But at the very least I'm within "I can't believe I lost my entire buy-in" distance of the 35% bonus.

This follows, of course, a Monday where I lose two buy-ins in NL and then join a multi-table tournament because HDub insists the overlay is great. Heh. Stupid re-buys and add-ons eliminated the overlay and committed me for double the money. I was doing okay in that tourney, definitely within one good pot of the money, but the blinds were advancing rapidly, and none of us except maybe the four largest stacks were in good enough shape to fold into the money. So I moved in with AK suited and got severely crippled by JJ when I didn't improve. I bounced out when my KT ran into KJ and AQ on the way to XXTQA and decided to let KJ take the rest of my chips. 30th place.

Afterwards I decided to enter a turbo freeroll because I like roulette. The funny thing is that I don't think roulette lets QQ get beaten by 24 (who's all in preflop) with a 2 on the turn and a 4 on the river. Roulette might let KK get beaten by AQ, but it seems so unfair when all my chips are in preflop. Anyway, I don't even recall how I went out, but I do remember it was in 30th place. Must have something to do with my birthday next month.

So it turns out the deadline for one of my finals has been extended to January. That means I could have made the event this past weekend. Rats.

Fortunately, this being a blogger event, there are write-ups all over the Internets. I suggest reading them all. And, of course, now that Iggy's listed all of them on his site, there's almost no point in my continuing on unless I add some "value" to the list.

Las Vegas and Poker Blog - And here I thought all of Sin City would have stopped in its tracks when the bloggers arrived. Read the rest of the blog for the weekend's other goings-on, but only after you check out flipchipro's pre-event write-up and tourney report, especially the 9's list: "How do you know you’re in a Blogger’s Poker Tournament?" Good stuff. PokerProf gets in his acknowledgements and thanks and foiledcoup gets in his.

Tao of Poker - Pauly is, of course, the uber-organizer of the Holiday Classic, and in true blogger fashion, posted several entries live from the event. Don't miss the one about the fight where Pauly had the nuts.

FeliciaLee - One of the few professional/bloggers at the Holiday Classic, and of course, the eventual winner. Wish I'd had money on her. Check out her report to see what a tournament looks like from a winner's perspective. Heh. Congrats, Felicia! She's also added part one of the weekend recall. Apparently Felicia doesn't hate Hold'Em. Who knew? Kidding... Part two goes into more depth on the tournament, and shows us once again why Felicia's got the best damn tournament reports in the blogosphere.

Bill Rini - Winner of the first-to-bust-out Gigli prize, which is like pouring salt in one's wounds, in my opinion. A good overview of Bill's trip, with some photos of the professionals.

Glenn's Poker Journal Felicia's husband Glenn has a tourney report and some photos taken with his new digital camera. Then he travels back in time and tells us what happened on Friday. More photos with funny captions.

Poker Perspectives - Maudie's got the day before, the first day, the day after, and a live from the event post. If you didn't quite catch that, there's a gap or two in there. Check back for her updates.

The Cards Speak - Hdub does bisonbison one better and auto-rates the bloggers based on friendliness, intelligence, and post-flop "I could hang out with him at a poker table all night" -ness.

Up For Poker - CJ says, "Get ready for an onslaught of trip reports." Find out how Vegas can remind you of Barbie and where you sleep when you're the sixth full grown adult male to enter your hotel room for the night. Also, CJ's tourney report.

BadBlood plays Poker - It's a good thing poker bores Mrs. Blood 'cause that's not all Mr. Blood blogs about.

Guinness and Poker - Iggy on why you shouldn't send a midget to do a man's job.

random thoughts and thoroughbred selections - BG with some actual thoroughbred selections and putting the blues in gamblingblues.com. That last one's got more bite than a first-year co-ed.

Riding the F Train - Asphnxma tries to trap the bloggers twice and ends up on the other side in part 1, then makes good the next day at the Horseshoe. Finally, some hints of a WPBT leg right here at home. That would be awesome.

This is more work than I thought. I've probably re-edited this post 12 times already. But really there're a lot of great stories out there. Here's three more to read:

Genius of the Poker

SnailTrax

Bob

Yes, this is a truly crazy thing. One weekend from dozens of perspectives. Let's hope Iggy steals some content and makes one consistent narrative out of it all. In the meantime, enjoy.

I have Small Stakes Hold'Em and Winning Low Limit Hold'Em--both of which I like very much, though I'm more likely to go back to SSH than WLLH for rereading.

Anyone know a good no limit book? I bought Pot-Limit & No-Limit Poker by Bob Ciaffone and Stewart Reuben and found it a little lacking. Some good stuff on opponent stack sizes, I suppose, but I don't recall getting that much out of it.

BadBlood had suggested McEvoy's book. There appear to be two:

Championship No-Limit & Pot-Limit Hold'em (Championship Series) by Tom McEvoy and T.J. Cloutier

No-Limit Texas Hold'em (New Player Series) by Brad Daugherty & Tom McEvoy

Any thoughts on which one is better for ring play?

Well, I've finally done it. It only took 18 months for this miserable hourly.

Had a very good NL 6-max session tonight and ended up with 13x my buy-in. I owned that table. It got to the point where any post-flop action from me basically won me the pot. I usually only used this power for my strong draws, but I think one time I frightened off pocket rockets with my cowboys and a queen on the board. And here I thought I just had the best hand.

I also showed the maniac to my right a thing or two. Stealing my blinds is one thing, but if you lose all or a big percentage of your chips with some bad plays, you're just going to bust out, which, of course, is what he did. One time he raised and I re-raised the amount of his stack for fun--about 25x his raise. Probably a waste of cowboys, but then again, they can be cracked. Don't worry. I don't do this all the time.

Not only did I take some big profits off the table, but I also tripled my bonus point count while doing so. Not sure what I think of a bonus system that disproportionately rewards winning players, but as long as I'm one of those winning players, I guess I can look the other way.

This winning session followed a few mediocre sessions at Party and Doyle's, of course. 1/2 full-ring and 1/2 6-max just caused me to lose my chips slowly over the course of many hands. I don't know why, but a lot of times I just don't feel it when I'm playing.

"Right but, what is it?"

"It's just what they bring ok?"

That's usually a sign to leave.

So now that I've broken that 1G mark, I expect I'll dip and rise past this boundary many times. Let's hope I keep my head and don't bust out.

Here's a look at some of the stuff I did for that Demography assignment:

One year of high school or more by age and race/ethnicity

Universe: Native born Californians 25 years old and over.
Source: US Census 2000.

This graph shows the percentage of persons by race/ethnicity and age group who have completed at least one year of high school. The x-axis shows age groups from oldest to youngest. Below each age group is the year that those persons would have been in their high school/college years (e.g., the 65 to 74 group would have been 15 to 24 in 1950).

All groups show improvement from 1940 to 1970, with Latinos showing the most rapid improvement. All groups also seem to hit a plateau between 1970 and 1990.

Since this graph relies on Census 2000 data exclusively, there is no way to tell if there has been any improvement within age groups between Census administrations. However, the assumption is that educational attainment is usually a static characteristic for most people once they hit 25.

One year of post-secondary education or more by age and race/ethnicity

Universe: Native born Californians 25 years old and over.
Source: US Census 2000.

This graph shows the percentage of persons by race/ethnicity and age group who have completed at least one year of post-secondary school (e.g., community college, college, technical school).

Once again, all groups show improvement from 1940 to 1970, but this time Asians show the most rapid improvement. The rate of change from 1970 to 1990 is different for different groups: slight increase for Asians, virtually no change for Whites and Latinos, and a slight decrease for Blacks.

Interpretation

As far as the first year of high school is concerned, it appears that Blacks and Latinos have significantly closed the gap over the years. However, their progress has stalled. Also, since the dataset I worked with did not differentiate between the first year of high school and a high school diploma, it is difficult to tell how much the numbers reflect graduation rates. However, the broad trends we can see are important.

The numbers and trends for post-secondary education are worrisome. Much wider gaps remain among the different racial/ethnic groups, and there doesn't appear to be any positive trends for those groups that are "behind." If the only way to earn a decent living requires a college or some other post-secondary degree (or mad poker skillz), then a significant proportion of the population, particularly Blacks and Latinos, is going to face a struggle.

Extrapolating to 2030

The California Department of Finance has a population forecast that covers 2000 to 2050. Using this as a base, educational attainment rates were applied to the corresponding age groups. For example, if 20% of Blacks 45 to 54 had one or more years of post-secondary education in 2000, it was assumed that this rate had not changed in 2030 when this group was now the 75 to 84 group.

Groups that were not covered in the 2000 data (e.g., 25 to 34 year olds in 2030 would be 0 to 4 years old in 2000) were given the rates that the trends tended to show. Since most of the trends showed little movement for all groups post 1970, the 25 to 34 attainment rates were applied to all new groups.

Here's how the makeup of the state changes in terms of population and educational attainment:

The percentages are, in order:

Share of population.
Share of population with one or more years of high school.
Share of population with one or more years of post-secondary education.

As you can see, Latinos become the new plurality population by 2030, but remain in third place in terms of their share of the "college educated" population. Asians remain in third place in terms of population numbers, but represent a disproportionate share of the "college educated" population. Greater college pot equity, if you will. Does this mean that Miller would advocate that Asians push for more funding to go to colleges and universities since they will benefit most?

More seriously, though, I think that if this forecast is in any way accurate, it is not a good thing for the state. Please note that I have no clue why the attainment levels are the way they are. It's probably a number of different things working together, and I don't know what the fastest and most cost-effective solutions to change the situation are. But if current trends continue in the way that they are going, we'll have a big imbalance in attainment, and presumably well-being and financial success. Given the problems with riots and things that we've faced in the past, as well as our sense of fairness and equality, we should move now to head off future problems.

If I were truly hardcore, I'd have turned in my final paper for Demography on Friday and headed straight to Vegas with no room reservations, no bankroll, and no sleep. But I'm more of a softcore kind of guy, so I drove home. Good thing I did, since I'd probably be stuck in some god-forsaken town between here and Vegas. My engine developed a weird noise again on the way home. Note that this is the second engine for this car, so I'm thinking my car likes to eat engines for lunch. I hate cars.

Car troubles aside, I really think I'm missing out on a good time this weekend, and that blows monkey chunks. And Pauly's a bastard for scheduling it for this weekend versus next.

So of course when I decide that I can't go off into the desert to play poker because I have finals, what do I do? Play poker at home. Mostly bonus whoring at Doyle's, but I have sat in on SirFWALGMan's 5/10 6-max game at Party. I know, way above my bankroll limits, but it was an interesting experience.

I'm not the first to say it, but I certainly won't be the last, so why don't I just add my flavor of noise to the Blog-o-sphere: any pair can go to the showdown and stand a chance of winning in a short-handed game. Now, I don't think this means I should play anything and everything, though your starting hand requirements can definitely be looser, but here's the corollary to what I just said: Top pair is much more likely to hold up. Wow. Great feeling.

And I was getting hit with all sorts of great hands--monster and big pocketses, and big broadway cards that connected with the flop. And since there's so much bluffing and pre-flop raising in these games, I found a lot of people were initially paying me off. Then they caught on to the fact that I was betting good cards, which usually made them fold in later hands even when I missed the flop with my AQ.

You know, it's really a whole different level of fun when the pots get to be sizes where you'd really miss the money if it fell out of your wallet. Okay, so I'd miss losing a fiver, too, but that's beside the point.

I think online poker is rigged to suck me into playing in high variance games like 6 max and NL. Oh? There's a NL 6 max table? I shudder to think. Which reminds me... clearing the bonus at Doyle's playing limit sucks ass. No limit's much better for that kind of thing. And getting a guy to hand over his entire stack is also one of those different levels of fun.

Yeah, this post sucks, but not as hard as everyone who's having fun without me.

I'm not sure I can explain it, but there's a grocery bag full of candy sitting on top of my fridge. Leftovers from Halloween, I think. So feeling the urge for some cheap candy, I open a bag and find a box of something called Cherryhead candy. Cherryhead? Hmm. Wait, this box says Ferrara Pan! This used be to be called Cherry Chan! Why'd they cha-- oh... hey, I never thought of that. And I'm Asian, for Chrissake.

For those of you who never spent a quarter with the neighborhood ice cream truck, here's Cherry Chan:

Wow. The nostalgia. The borderline racism.

Unfortunately when they changed the name to Cherryhead, I think they changed the formula, too. I recall these being chewier on the outside, with more sour on the inside. But maybe I'm confusing them with Lemonhead candies. And what's this crap about Cherryhead being a "fat free food" and containing "real fruit juice?!" Seriously, who gives two shits about whether a twenty-five cent box of candy is healthy or has real ingredients?

By the way, I found that image over at The Candy Wrapper Museum (Don't you just love the Internets?), which also has this great candy packaging image:

Wow. That's not kosher by any standard. I wonder if Candy Crafters' Inc ever had Darkie Licorice Chews or Spicy Spic Jumping Beans?

Oh, and I just opened a box of Lemonhead candies, and they are exactly the way I remembered them. Thank God. Though they, too, apparently, are a fat free food made from real juice. Good Christ.

Ooh, one more thing. A real life example of inflation at work. Notice the Cherry Chan box says 1.05 oz? Guess how much candy the Cherryhead box holds? You guessed it: 0.8 oz! Man, a quarter just doesn't buy you much these days. Then again, I used to empty the whole box into my mouth sometimes, so this may be a good thing.

I definitely stayed at that NL blogger table for far too long tonight. 100 hands I can do, 200 hands is stretching it. The other disadvantage of playing the extra 100 hands is that you have to remember to ask for your hand history earlier on if you want the chat transcript. Sure, it's there somewhere in that gargantuan PT database of mine, but parsing the emailed hand history is enough work as it is. Well, I guess I could export it.

Good Christ, is it already December?

The biggest pot I lost was when I re-raised SirFWALGMan all in with second pair after he flopped the nut straight. Heh. That was kinda funny. Almost worth the $28 I handed him. Wait a tick, no it was not worth it! Oh boy.

Second biggest pot I lost was when Iggy pushed me off a pot where I had TPTK and he had Big Slick. I think that put me on tilt. Well, maybe not quite, but it probably contributed to big pot loss #1 above.

So I ended up doubling up, but could have ended quadrupled. No, wait, way more than that. Iggy was all in. Damn. For some reason that story SirFWALGMan told about Iggy taking his money popped in my head at that very moment. I should stop reading blogs.

On the other hand(s)...

I pushed SirFWALGMan off one of the larger pots of the night, netting me and MisterD2U some good profits. You're welcome. We both had top pair top kicker while SirFWALGMan had an overpair that would have been good had the hammer not reared its ugly head on the turn.

He got his revenge, though. See pot #1 above. He also bluffed me off a pot when I had a weak boat with pocket threes and the sign of the devil on the board. All together now: StudioGlyphic sucks.

I also had the pleasure of withdrawing some cash from the dot-com ATM that was at our table when my aces bitch-slapped his Big Slick into submission. Too bad he was slightly down on his fourth re-buy when it happened. He was NegEV's best friend, handing him three buy-ins, at least.

My crazy 88 also stood up against HDouble's QJ after I put him all-in preflop. He left soon after that, which was too bad, since I really do enjoy watching him play. Iggy and HDouble are both front-runners in the raise-with-crap race. But Iggs usually follows up with strong hands to catch people off guard. He also makes up whatever he loses when raising crap by chasing the limpers out in half a dozen subsequent hands.

So I think I did a decent job in giving as good as I got, though when I got it, I got it bad. War crime bad. Someone call the Hague.

Thanks to Maudie for the inspiration.

Read around and you'll find lots of accounts of playing no-limit ring with other poker bloggers. It's all fun and games until someone loses his stack. These games are sometimes a little nuts. Someone, somewhere, always feels obligated to go big with the hammer. Oh, Grubs, what have you done to us?

I think this was an interesting early moment:

Holding Jc 2c in the big blind and I flop the flush with [ Kc, 8c, Qc ] on the board. I've got the second nuts and bet out $2. This is raised to $4 and called in one place. I reraise to $12 and get called by both.

The turn is the 7h and I start telling the story:

StudioGlyphic: Film geek was telling me a story
StudioGlyphic: bets (14.6)
StudioGlyphic is all-In.
StudioGlyphic: Someone flopped the flush
StudioGlyphic: He had the Ace draw
StudioGlyphic: River came, no help
StudioGlyphic: Down 200 bucks
Pauly: lol
Guy #1 folds.
StudioGlyphic: Down in Commerce
Guy #2 calls (12)
Guy #2 is all-In with the ace of clubs.

Sure enough, the river is the [ 5s ] and I net a big pot. Unfortunately I think Guy #2 was a fellow blogger, though I've never read him. I really wanted Guy #1 to call and bust out, since he was just some jerk-off who happened to be at our table. Oh well.

---

I happened to be playing my MultiPoker persona this evening, so there was a lot of guessing as to who this mysterious "Cindy" was...

Iggy: TASTEOFFELICIA
SirFWALGMan: Cindy=Felicia?
StudioGlyphic: Heh. No.
SirFWALGMan: Glenn?
StudioGlyphic: Nope.
Pauly: cindy=evelyn ng
Up For Poker: The question of the night: Who is Cindy?
Up For Poker: Cindy = Bob
Otis: she's a humdinger folksinger
Pauly: bobby? cindy?
StudioGlyphic: Ooh, let's contact Grubby for a PS2 prize for the correct guesser.
StudioGlyphic: Pauly's disqualified cause he knows.
Up For Poker: lol
Iggy: lol cindy
StudioGlyphic: Though he may have forgotten.
Pauly: wow know one else knows?
StudioGlyphic: He does a lot of drugs.
Pauly: im not THAT high
Iggy: is that grubbette?
StudioGlyphic: ha ha
StudioGlyphic: no
StudioGlyphic: Boy this is going to be fun.
Pauly: hint... he lives in a blue state
Up For Poker: Hmmm.. narrows it down...
StudioGlyphic: And lets you know it.
StudioGlyphic: FWALG and Iggy should be able to guess.
jeckyleng: Cindy = TFG?
Iggy: lol no
Pauly: LOL
Iggy: mebbe snail
Up For Poker: He's redder than red
Otis: fat guy a redstater
Pauly: no not snailtrax
jeckyleng: no kidding
Iggy: he/she is a stinky hippy
Pauly: stinkypants?
Iggy: i love that guy
Iggy: p0 p0 stinky
Iggy: ive eaten things smarter than him
StudioGlyphic: see you kids are having a hard time because you don't read me.
SirFWALGMan: how did I lose all my money
Pauly: lol
Iggy: where is al damnit
Pauly: i think he's "gettin some"
Up For Poker: what does that mean??
SirFWALGMan: some beer?
Iggy: a happy meal?
Pauly: he said a "movie with the wifey"
jeckyleng: thanks for the visual
Pauly: which is some code for S&M

Otis plays the hammer.

Iggy: woohoo
Otis: suited, but still
Iggy: nh
Up For Poker: boooooo
StudioGlyphic: that doesn't count
SirFWALGMan: better than Hank
SirFWALGMan: heh
Up For Poker: That's just the anvil

Iggy: cindy, you silly bitch, give me your blog url
Iggy: so i can mock you
Pauly: www.avrillavignerocks.com
Otis: hehehh
jeckyleng: avril levigne is punk rock
StudioGlyphic: I was in Vegas a couple weeks ago...

StudioGlyphic: hey so FWALG means what?
Otis: thank god somebody asked
Up For Poker: lol
pokercode: lol
Up For Poker: f-in weird a$$ little guy
SirFWALGMan: im saving it for my 1 year if I make it.. lol
Up For Poker: right?
Pauly: is it a dungeouns and dragons thing?
SirFWALGMan: Fuck Women Always Little Guys
SirFWALGMan: it does actually mean something.. not all that meaningful
Pauly: farts worth a little gas

Iggy raises my limp.

StudioGlyphic: I don't need to give *you* three dollars.
StudioGlyphic: I already signed up for Empire through your code.
SirFWALGMan: lol
Iggy: lol
Iggy: liar

Otis: FWALG is Klingon...Wil said so
SirFWALGMan: yeah, Wil watches Aqua Teen Hunger Force! He's Brainwashed
jeckyleng: Cindy = Wil?
Up For Poker: There's no W in the Klingon dialect... loser!
Pauly: i always knew wil was a closet stoner
jeckyleng: you know Klingon dialects, and he's the loser
Up For Poker: lol
Otis: hehhehehh
Iggy: hehe
SirFWALGMan: ok, im tired of these freaking posers

Everyone folds to Iggy for the twentieth time.

StudioGlyphic: giving Iggy too much respect, guys.
Iggy: i'm ready to gamble damnit
Otis: PAI GOW!
Iggy: ive had 22 guinness
StudioGlyphic: casino war
MisterD2U: this isn't the play money tables???
Up For Poker: last hand of the night... we all go all in!
Up For Poker: love and casino war?
Otis: i miss jeremy's regualr posts
Pauly: just start listing the blogroll
Up For Poker: me too
StudioGlyphic: i'm partial to roulette myself
Otis: waitaminute. i got you cindy
StudioGlyphic: ooh, where's the PS2?
Otis: i read this post the other day
Iggy: lol
Otis: bad fucking snow storm and a dude hooked on roulette
StudioGlyphic: bet on 8, 20, 23, 25.
Otis: and couldn't stop fucking winning
Iggy: hrm
StudioGlyphic: ha ha, that's right.
StudioGlyphic: Roulette paid for my trip.
Otis: great post
StudioGlyphic: Sad, sad, sad.
Up For Poker: who is Cindy!?!??! Come on Otis... give it up!
Iggy: i second

At this point I raise the amount of SirFWALGMan's stack with JJ.

SirFWALGMan: small pair?
StudioGlyphic: call
jeckyleng: didn't they just say jeremy from loveandcasinowar?
StudioGlyphic: SirFwalgMan would call
StudioGlyphic: I read it last week

Crap. He called and got his ace on the flop. Good call, man.

Iggy: i am going to reserve tasteofsirwalgman.com

Ooh, and later:

SirFWALGMan: I would say Taste was Studio, but I know his handle..
Otis: it's one of his fucking buddies....
pokercode: who was in vegas w/ you iggy? he said he was there a few weeks ago?
Otis: that was hank
SirFWALGMan: Studio has buddies?

Thanks.

Otis: hdouble
StudioGlyphic: Yeah Hank's off making money
Pauly: quote from my brother, "Don't you guys have jobs?"
pokercode: one of hank's buddies
Pauly: casey affleck?
Pauly: i loved u in oceans 12
pokercode: so it's casey
Pauly: couldve given u more lines
Iggy: heather graham wanted midget sex
StudioGlyphic: well i just feel luck to work with brad pitt again
Iggy: but i resisted
Up For Poker: uh oh
StudioGlyphic: er, lucky
StudioGlyphic: brad's a hottie.
Pauly: felt you didnt have a chance to have a complete character arc
Up For Poker: hiltons!
StudioGlyphic: Why does an Ace fall when I got those or the Helmuths?
Otis: i thought we were going to get the roller girl story
Iggy: this is one of the worst tables ver
Iggy: ever even
StudioGlyphic: yeah this sucks.
Up For Poker: I'd say.. we suck
Iggy: o8
Otis: yep....last orbit for me
Iggy: i am gonna try to take that bitch cindy's stack
StudioGlyphic: i gotta be in a hand with you to do that, don't i?
pokercode: lol
StudioGlyphic: I'm boycotting Iggy

I win aces full of sixes.

NolanVoyd: nh
Otis: oh my
Up For Poker: ouch
pokercode: nice
Iggy: poorly played on all streets
StudioGlyphic: danke

StudioGlyphic: < -- StudioGlyphic
SirFWALGMan: yeah?
Up For Poker: really?
SirFWALGMan: So I did guess right

I raise preflop with AK suited and Pauly calls.

Flop is [ 9s, 3c, Ac ] and it's just the two of us.
Pauly checks.
StudioGlyphic bets (3)
Pauly raises (30.25) to 30.25
Pauly is all-In.
Up For Poker: uh oh
SirFWALGMan: go Pauly!
StudioGlyphic: What was it that PhilIvey would do?
Pauly: call
SirFWALGMan: she slow played AA
Up For Poker: call
Iggy: gl pauly
SirFWALGMan: he
StudioGlyphic: I'm either ahead or behind. Crapper.
Pauly: ty
Up For Poker: maybe you're tied
Pauly: one way to find out
StudioGlyphic calls (27.25)
** Dealing Turn ** : [ 6h ]
** Dealing River ** : [ 7d ]

We chop. Blast.

Up For Poker: lol
SirFWALGMan: NICE!
Pauly: damn
MisterD2U: boo
SirFWALGMan: Excellent call!
Pauly: thats what i put u on
Iggy: hehe nh
Up For Poker: I'm a freaking genius
StudioGlyphic: Oh yeah, there was that, too.
Up For Poker: when it's not my money...
SirFWALGMan: heh
StudioGlyphic: what was that, net fifty cents each?
SirFWALGMan: probably loss because of the rake
Pauly: i ost money
Pauly: lost
StudioGlyphic: Right...
Pauly: rake
SirFWALGMan: huge rake on 60 bucks! lol
StudioGlyphic: well party should kiss my ass and give me a baseball cap.

SirFWALGMan: is -26 BB/100 bad?
StudioGlyphic: you reading my blog again?
Pauly: i dont believe in bloggers, i only believe in me
Iggy: a positive winning force surrounds you
Up For Poker: bloggers, schmoggers

Then the craziest thing happened: 4 players all-in preflop.

AA vs. QQ vs. The Hammer vs. KQ

Oh, man. AA won, of course, but damn it, Grubs, where's that PS2?

pokercode: t-shirts for all bloggers... but cindy, i need to know who you are
StudioGlyphic: oh man, you missed the big reveal while you were taking a leak.
pokercode: shit, ?
StudioGlyphic: heh
pokercode: let me scroll up
StudioGlyphic: StudioGlyphic -- I'm on Google!
pokercode: ahhh
pokercode: will add to my list
Pauly: i thoght u were caey affleck?
StudioGlyphic: I did Casey Affleck, but that's not quite the same, is it?

Iggy: cindy - well done
Iggy: shall we play heads up now?
StudioGlyphic: Heh, no way.
StudioGlyphic: I'm making myself a shirt that says "dead money"

---

Fun stuff. But now that the secret's out of the bag, I'll have to come up with another name. Put me on your buddy list guys, or you'll never track me down.

Omaha 8's a nutty game. Put another way, "Omaha is about having the nuts."

It sure is. If the fish think small pocket pairs are surefire winning Hold 'Em hands, then surely A2 is the Omaha 8 equivalent. This makes for some really amusing outcomes:

[ 8h, Kc, 7h ] [ 4d ] Betting is Capped! [ 3s ]
Low #1 bet $6.5, collected $5.46, lost -$1.04
Low #2 bet $6.5, collected $4.89, lost -$1.61
High bet $5.8, collected $9.2, net +$3.4

[ 4c Ad 7h ] [ 5c ] [ Kd ] Betting is Capped!
Low #1 bet $6, collected $5.47, lost -$0.53
Low #2 bet $4.38, collected $3.84, lost -$0.54
High bet $6, collected $9.32, net +$3.32

If you'll notice, people like to cap with the nut low. They throw in all their chips so they can lose half a bet.

Here's a tip:

If you've got the nuts, but it's a hand that can be counterfeited (especially the nut low, but sometimes the nut straight, etc.), you want as many people contributing to the pot as possible.

Both the examples above are cases in which the people were involved in a three-way pot with one high hand and two lows. The high hand contributed one-third and took one-half the pot. The low hands contributed one-third and took one-quarter of the pot. Actually, less because of the rake.

You would need four people in the pot to break even, but I've also seen low pots split 3 ways, and who the hell wants to risk his chips just to break even? If you just check-call with the nut low, you might get someone with the second nut low to stay in and ease the pain of chopping. You're not likely to cause the high hand or the other nut lows to fold, so raising is -EV.

But that's a terrible situation to be in. You really want to scoop the pot. So stick to hands that can win the high and the low and have draws to the nut straight, flush, or boat. That said, I saw a lot of flops today. ;) My highs were profitable, my lows were break-even, and some outcomes surprised me entirely:

1. I folded to a bet on the turn with a pair on the board. He had AJ and took the high. My AK would have been good.

2. I ended up with the best low while the other two split the high. When I saw half the pot coming my way, I thought my trip sevens had held up!

3. I called down a guy who check-raised the turn when I had a boat (hey, this is Omaha, he might have had the better boat). He just had trips and spiked the second best boat on the river!

Anyway, my first foray into Party Omaha 8 was interesting. I managed to more than double my buy-in, which is a lot more than I can say about my recent Hold 'Em sessions.

So in my last "woe is me" post I'd mentioned that KK went down to 57o after he'd called two bets cold. But this has to take the cake:

So I'm playing 1/2 and 2/4 on Paradise and generally having a rough time of it. Paradise flashes me the announcement that their $35,000 guaranteed multi-table tournament is just about to start, and I remember what some poker bloggers have said about overlays in some of these guaranteed tourneys. I look at the registration page and notice that there aren't that many people registered, so I figure, "What the hell? I'll get more than my $30 worth" and throw my entry fee into the pool. Registration closes a few seconds later and I realize that this is a re-buy and add-on tournament. Uh oh. This is going to be a lot more than $30. Then I notice that they allow late registrations. Uh oh again. There goes the overlay.

Yup. When the second hour started, there were 581 entries, 783 re-buys, 330 add-ons, and a total buy-in pool of $50,820. Top 60 finishes paid. My contribution to this pool was $90. My fee + 1 re-buy when I thought AQ could beat AA + 1 add-on because that's what all the cool kids were doing.

After busting out with the AQ vs. AA confrontation (board was AKTT8), I went into Pauly mode and folded nearly everything. Then I got the assrapers in MP and watched as it was raised and reraised to two-thirds of my stack. I pushed. Someone in LP pushed. The first raiser pushed. The second raiser called. Four of us all-in in an AA vs. JJ vs. 88 vs. 66 race. The board paired, none of us got a boat, and I quadrupled up. Sweet Mary Mother of God!

As the big stack at my table, I felt obliged to raise ATs to 4x the blind and was surprised to see two callers. Three diamonds hit the board, with the ten high. The second caller put out a bet of about one-third the pot and I called. The turn was a non-diamond and he put nearly all his chips in the pot, I raised him all-in and he called. He had paired the 6 on the flop and had the nut flush draw, but the river gave no help and I won.

After a lot of dedicated folding, I became tied for second with the big stack outchipping the two of us together. I did notice, however, that he was playing some terrible cards; I guess his stack size gave him a sense of security. I got the Hiltons in middle position and raised it to 4x the blind. Big stack raised another grand. I called. The flop came up 882 and I pushed. He called and showed me his Jacks. Turn gave me the boat and I doubled up.

Some time into the second hour I was sitting on AK in the BB when a short stack in EP pushed. Another short stack pushed. It was now about 25% of the pot to call, which also corresponded with 25% of my stack. At this point I felt I could fold my way into the money, but it was only 25% of my stack for the chance to double-up, so I figured it might be worth it. Both short stacks had A8s, and I was feeling pretty good. Paradise thought it would be nice to screw around with me and decided to give the second A8s a runner-runner flush. Ouch.

After that I waited a bit until I had about 6x the BB left. I was close to the money, but I needed to steal some blinds and antes to make it. I passed on ATo (I know, I should have) and pushed instead with AKs and AJs. The blinds and antes at those levels are crazy. Those alone propelled me from 70-something to 30-something. After that I folded into the money. Getting marginal hands helped with that decision making process, too.

With about 57 people left I found myself in LP with AQ. I pushed. KK called. Yikes. Flop came TXA. Yay! Turn was a K. Boo! River was a J. Yay! Phew.

Plenty of hands went by, and I think I pushed with AKs UTG when there were fewer than 50 left and took the blinds. By this point, the blinds were crazy. 2-3 orbits and I was done. Then I got a bunch of crap and folded (including my blinds) until there were 34 people left.

AJ in LP with one limper in front? Call all-in for two-thirds the bet. Flop is JX6QQ. I don't know what the big stacked big blind had, but the MP limper let him bet into him while he was holding 66. Damn. And here I thought I was safe.

But what's this? I netted $70 in a big multi-table tournament? Wow. I rock! Well, maybe not. I got lucky. Thanks go out to Maudie and HDouble for their support. I may not have been able to do it without ya. And after all that, I'm still down for the day. Ah... poker.

Woah. More pics at Automobile and some information and pics at Edmunds.

Spent about six hours on Wednesday playing on Paradise with some sad results: -35BB. Brutal. And it wasn't my starting hands, either. I was getting some pretty good cards:

AA, 3x, 100% win, +2/hand
KK, 3x, 33% win, -1.38/hand
QQ, 2x, 0% win, -4.25/hand
JJ, 4x, 25% win, -1.19/hand

TT, 1x, 0% win, -10.75/hand
AQs, 1x, 100% win, +3.13/hand
AJs, 2x, 0% win, -.75/hand
KQs, 2x, 50% win, -.25/hand
AK, 8x, 25% win, -2.27/hand

QJs, 2x, 0% win, -.75/hand
ATs, 2x, 100% win, +5.13/hand
AQ, 3x, 33% win, -.75/hand

Roughly organized according to the Sklansky hands listed in A New Guide to the Starting Hands in Texas Hold'em Poker.

There are some other hands like AJ that I haven't included, but overall, I was getting great cards more than 10% of the time, which would seem to indicate that I was getting my share, or more than my share of good cards.

And of course, in my 26,000 hands or so, I see AA winning 80% of the time, KK winning 75%, etc., etc. These are group one and group two hands for a good reason. But tell that to the guy who called the raise with 57 on the button and flopped the open-ended straight draw. Tell it to him again when he calls 2 bets cold with J4s in the CO and then calls 2 more bets cold with a gutshot staright draw. Yep, he got them both on the river.

Oh yeah, about that -10.75/hand. What? You missed it? Go ahead, scroll back up. Okay, so here's how it went down:

Nah, that didn't really happen. The crying bit, I mean. There was some cursing and shouting, but only at the poker gods.

So down another 35BB. I'm getting good at this.

It's pretty pathetic, actually. A number of us LA-based bloggers are probably not going to make it to the big pokerfest at Sam's Town next weekend. Whether it was that sad fact or some incomprehensible desire to drive to the Valley that led us to do it, I don't know. But when the big hand hit the 8 last night, I found myself sitting with the Film Geek, HDouble, FHWRDH, and some non-blogging guy (NBG) in Film Geek's NoHo pad.

We were originally planning to play a small no-limit tournament, but with only five players in the game, we thought it best to play NL ring. I do believe that Iggy and Pauly were playing online at around the same time, but what that says about poker blogging and NL ring, I don't know. Lots of things I don't know, apparently.

Seat 1: HDouble
Seat 2: FHWRDH
Seat 3: StudioGlyphic
Seat 4: The Film Geek
Seat 5: NBG

Hand of the night:

Poker Geek in the SB, etc., etc. Folded to Poker Geek, who limps. NBG makes it another $1.50 to go. Poker Geek calls. Poker Geek's often shows down the best hand if he's in in. Flop comes J73 or something like that. Poker Geek throws out $4 and NBG folds. Poker Geek flips over the hammer, which makes it the second time he's won/stolen a pot with it that night.

No, that wasn't the hand of the night.

NBG in the small blind, etc., etc. Three limpers, including NBG. Flop comes 77Q. "That's good for the hammer." Checks all around. Turns comes 2. "Even better!" Checks all around. River is a 7. NBG puts out a small bet. Everyone folds and he flips over the hammer. From trips to the boat to quads, but alas, no action.

No fish:

No action was what I got with my biggest hands. But I played them wrong. I kept forgetting I was playing with guys who were watching most of my moves, who could calculate outs and odds, who could tell the difference between desperate and confident overbets. My last live experience (and granted, that was limit) had me showing every single one of the hands I was involved in, and I failed to adjust my postflop play to the changed circumstances.

All in all, it was nice to play some real poker for once and it was good to meet the others. HDouble's a stand up guy and just about as tall as he claims (poor guy had to squeeze all six feet plus of himself into my MR2). The Film Geek does a mean David Spade, and really ought to consider audio blogging his posts from now on. NBG was pretty damn amazing in putting people on hands. Sometimes eerie. And FHWRDH played some solid poker: you probably want to fold when he raises. I'd love to see all these guys in action at Hustler one of these nights. Maybe we can make it happen.

Finally made the transition over to Movable Type from Blogger.

One casualty of the move is the loss of all comments.

Another casualty of the move is the loss of all other web content, including images embedded in blog entries. I'm hoping DotEasy will fix that since it was their crappy free hosting service that prevented me from retrieving all those files in time.

So things may be in flux over the next few weeks as I go through the documentation and try out different things.

In the meantime, please update your links to point here:

http://www.studioglyphic.com/mt/

Thanks!