Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Playing the Bodonkey TV Table

Caught the news late that Josh Arieh would be playing this week's Bodonkey, but after a longish day with no good news stories I decided I'd log on myself and have some fun. Darned if I didn't catch the TV table, with Josh on my immediate left. Gary Cox and Dave (Yestbay) and a couple of others I recognized where there as well, and I did my best to yak it up.

There was a $100 bounty on Arieh's head, which 'Abby17' claimed after Josh decided to mix it up fairly early and lost a race with 7-7 against A-Q. That'll cement the "bloggers are donkeys" image a bit, as will the fact that Josh lost not one, but two, pots to Hammer players. Though, to be honest, knowing a bit about Josh's game, I'd likely have taken the same chance with A-Q, particularly in a bounty event. Bounties neutralize aggressive players.

Sadly, I had neither one of the two Hammer hands.

I didn't catch much else either, and I went out after deciding to defend my blind with K-10 suited against a SB raise. The SB had K-Q and the flop came K-4-4, and we were off to the races. I finished in the "place" spot in the two-horse race; second place gets the "dingleberry close-up" view of the first-place finisher, y'know.

Very busy times for me. I'm headed down to Caesars Indiana on Friday for some early WSOP Circuit doings this weekend. There are so-o-o-o-o many things I'm needing to blog about but the last couple of weeks have been pretty hectic. Hang in there; my blogging always comes in spurts.

Saturday, March 15, 2008

Good Times, Bad Times

Whereas February had been a really good month for on Stars, March has been the polar opposite to date, so much so that I've fired up alternate sites on occasion just for the change of pace. The start of March was pretty ugly on those sites as well, until a first and a second in a couple of small MTTs at least trimmed the overall losing buy a bit.

Still, it's been a struggle. Here's the epitome of good news / bad news, as occurred in a Bodog turbo SNG I was playing while being bounced on the bubble in last week's Bodonkey. (First time I've made that in a month, by the way.)

The Good News: Making quads in back-to-back hands. I don't remember doing that before in any "normal" poker game.

The Bad News: Still only finishing third in the dang SNG.

Wednesday, March 05, 2008

The Wednesday Blahs

A handful of small setbacks in the online game might have had a bit of an extra explanation --- I woke up overnight and realized I had a small cold coming on. Since I've already had both that lovely flu and a nasty cold in the last few months, I figure this one won't get a chance to do much more than take a mild swipe at me. I also got to the echinacea jug tuit de suite.

Being old and gray and feebleminded, something occurred to me that might or not be accurate. It seems like whenever I'm coming down with something (and don't fully realize it), my play produces horrible results. I think this has happened several times. Anybody ever experience something similar?

I probably picked up the bug at a weekend game where I actually ran well, so I guess by the time I've sneezed my last, at least the cough drops and kleenex will be paid for. Weekend game saw me viciously wielding a short stack and staying alive long enough to sneak into the money, then pick up over two buy-ins in a $1/3 NL game where I was running well against some guys that I knew could not stop calling my value bets, and even though they're not the type to allow themselves to be bluffed often, darned if I didn't manage to buy a couple of pots with air as well.

Today sees the delivery of the new sofa, bought over the weekend at a nearby Wickes Furniture "Going Out of Business" sale. Wickes is one of those regional chains caught in the economic downturn and they were featuring 25% of all furniture and 50% off the decorative stuff, but I settled for a recliner sofa to replace my old "drug dealer" sofa, which had utterly collapsed to the point that springs were poking through the cloth and an exposed bracket on the front was offering occasional rude scrapes to the back of my leg. The back lining was so torn whole cushions could disappear down inside the back of the couch. What time is it? Yep, time to get a new one.

The store on Saturday AM was a mob scene, featuring hundreds of would-be furniture buyers and maybe a half dozen employees who didn't really want to wait on them, since they're all gonna be out of a job soon, anyway. And of course, the store's computer system wasn't operating, so all the credit-card purchases had to be entered manually. Word of the day describing the sales staff: SURLY.

Wickes actually has gone into bankruptcy and is closing all 38 of its stores, including seven in the greater Chicago area. I'd find you a picture of the couch, except Wickes has essentially disabled its online site. It's a decent couch for what I spent but if something breaks on it I'm pretty much kayaking up Pooh River.

Then again, it could have been worse. The older guy who finally sold me my sofa remarked that at a similar store closing in Lake Zurich, perhaps 25 miles away, all the employees but one walked off the job. Now that would've been a fun sale to attend, don't you think?

Monday, March 03, 2008

"Bad Poker Day" Recipe --- Add Chips and Beat(s) Thoroughly

Just follow the easy recipe and you, too, can watch TV for the rest of the night!

1. Turn on computer.

2. Fire up PokerStars.

3. Fire up a turbo to get the brain workin'.

4. Take this beat in the first level of play:



5. Close Stars client.

6. Turn off computer.

Serves... for a good laugh, if nothing else. Last of the chips went in on the turn. Re-buy!!