24 Hours In A Day...

...is not enough for everything I want to do.

I haven't abandoned blog. Just not much really going on. I've been playing copious amounts of poker, and have been getting some horrendously bad beats laid on me, but even so I have managed to make some gains. I countinue to play without reference to my stack and only take a look at my progress every couple of days to see where the bankroll stands. It's helping some now, but I figure it will help me even more not to know what my stack looks like when I get into the higher limits.

I was playing 4 tables last night and about 20 minutes into it I look and see SirFWALGman sitting there. Funny thing is, I had played against him before and hadn't realized who it was, but it struck me this time and I mentioned it to him. He, likewise, didn't seem to know who I was until I mentioned it. The table we were at was pretty weak so he and I were pretty much running over it. He invited Doubleas over to play and it got interesting. It was refreashing playing with some good players! At one point we got to talking about stacks. I was apparently treading water at that point, but of course my stack was covered so I didn't rightfully know. We played on for a while and at the end Gman said I did well, so I took a peek and indeed I was up around 20 or 25BB on the table. The nice part about THAT was, that wasn't my most profitable table. I got up almost 45BB on the other one, including this winner of a hand...


Party Poker 0.50/1 Hold'em (10 handed) converter

Preflop: The_ICP is BB with Th, Kh.
UTG calls, 1 fold, UTG+2 raises, MP1 calls, 2 folds, CO calls, 1 fold, SB calls, The_ICP calls, UTG calls.

Flop: (12 SB) 9h, Jh, Ah (6 players)
SB checks, The_ICP checks, UTG bets, UTG+2 raises, MP1 folds, CO calls, SB folds, The_ICP calls, UTG calls.

Turn: (10 BB) Tc (4 players)
The_ICP checks, UTG checks, UTG+2 bets, CO calls, The_ICP raises, UTG folds, UTG+2 calls, CO folds.

River: (15 BB) Qh (2 players)

The_ICP bets, UTG+2 calls.

Final Pot: 17 BB
Main Pot: 17 BB, between The_ICP and UTG+2. >

Results:
The_ICP shows Th Kh (Royal flush, ace high).
UTG+2 shows Js Jc (three of a kind, jacks).
Outcome: The_ICP wins 17 BB.

Third time ever! And I got some action on it. What more could a growing bankroll ask for?

Where's Summer?

It's been entirely too frickin cold out here for this to be considered a summer. I don't think we've had one 90 degree day YET here in beautiful, exotic northern Wisconsin. We certainly haven't seen 80 degrees in the last 3 weeks, and except for today, we haven't had any appreciable rain since June. Now, I'm not a huge fan of constant 90 degree days for weeks straight, but I would at least like to see some evidence of this whole "global warming" thing everyone is going ape about. For now, I'd wager the opposite; we're heading for another ice age.

So, since I managed to miss out on the Blogger Tourney that wasn't (I thought I was going to be busy on Sunday.. I wasn't), I hopped on the $5 mega-multitable on Party, along with almost 1400 others. First hand, I'm in MP and look down to see AA. Hmmmm.... Hero or goat time on the first deal. Go figure. 3x the BB gets 4 callers and the flop comes with my set A and two clubs. Checked around, and I bet half the pot to keep people in. I lose one and we're three to the turn, which is the third club. Suddenly EP wakes up and throws a half pot bet in. I just KNOW he's hit his flush, but I've still got a whole boatload of outs so I call. The river is a beautiful 4 to pair the board and fill my boat. EP shoots out another half pot bet and I shove. He insta-calls and I double up on the first hand.

About 10 hands later I hit a flush on the turn and scrape another monster pot and I find myself with a healthy lead early. I do reasonably well, but still manage to bust out 78th when my cards dry up and the blinds are huge. My last act was to shove in the face of an all-in from the CO from the BB with 77. The good news is, I did isolate him, the bad news was he flipped over AA, and it was all over but the crying. It's frustrating to make only $14 in profit for over 3 hours of work, but I do like the multi-table tourneys.

I think the grinding at the 50/1 is doing well, though again I don't have any idea, since I cover my stacks and I am only checking my balance every week or so. I really think this is helping to get my game back to an even keel. I have no idea whether I'm up or down, and when I'm multi-tabling, without the stacks to remind me, I don't linger on bad beats or wins too long. The next hand is waiting for me.

This has also been helping my home life. I would get way too upset when I got brutalized because I would know just how brutalized I was. I still have bad days, but I don't have any idea HOW bad of a day I had. I just sort of take it as it comes. Likewise, if I have a great run at one of the tables, I don't feel inclined to push edges and make loose calls.

It's impossible to be results oriented when you don't know your results.

So, the grind goes on.

In other news, my wife and I had a rare day off together yesterday. Couple that with a very good month on the money front and suddenly we had some disposible income, so we went out for a day on the town. Anyway, we're driving down the road and I see a guitar shop I wanted to go to earlier but it was closed last I went there. It was open now, and I wanted to look for an electric guitar, so we stopped.

Now, as an aside, I'm a lefty. Apparently, unless I go Jimi Hendrix and just string the guitar upside down, I'm pretty much screwed. If I want a left handed guitar I'll have to order one. Sounds expensive.

Okay, so we're in there and I get to talking to the guy in there about, well, guitars. Now, I know just about dick about guitars. I have one. I've had it for 10 years and have played it not much at all until recently. So this guy starts asking me questions about what sort of guitar I want and what style music I'm looking to play. Dude, I don't friggin know! I want a guitar that sounds decent and won't break me financially! Who do I want to sound like? Yngwie Fucking Malmsteen, but I'm about, oh, 15 years of constant playing away from that, so let's stick to "I'd like to get through 'Mary Had a Little Lamb' without screwing up more then twice". The conversation gets to lessons, and I mention that I've been using EGuitar Method vol 1, which is good, but I think that now that I've figured out how to make some somewhat passable sounds on this thing I might benefit from some live lessons, so I sign up for the guy there and am now taking lessons once a week. We'll see how it goes. I was a music major in college and was heavy into theory and performance. This seemed to really catch this guys attention and I got the impression that he and I are going to have some long sessions talking over theory. Hopefully he and I get along well. The last guitar teacher I had really didn't gel with me. Hopefully this guy and I will. We shall see.

Blind, Broke, Bedlam

Well, after a couple of days of "going blind" I checked up on my progress. It really wasn't that bad, but looking at the individual table results, I'm very glad I had my stacks covered up. One table I left with $4 of a $25 buyin, while another one I walked away almost doubled up. All in all, I ended up up about $6 on Thursday and around $15 on Friday.

Then I played some today. Now, of course, I didn't look. I don't want to look.

Ever.

You know those hands where you have a pocket pair and the board flops all undercards, expect, well you know that pair on the board? They had the set.

Every
fucking
time.

Again, no idea how bad the damage is, but even NOT knowing how bad it is I feel it. It was even more frustrating then that. On one of my tables was a bone-fide maniac. Bet and raise. That's all she knew. And people were just cashing in on her ass. That is, except for me. See, every time I'd get into it with her, she'd pull some funky ass hand out of her ass and smack me down with it. I wanted to put my fist through her avatar.

It's been that kind of poker day. But what the hell, it's not my money.

Onward

A few days of reflection and perspective have a way of sharpening the senses. Talking with others who have an outside view help to point out things that should be obvious but aren't. Talking with an old friend brought about a very interesting point that should have been as obvious as the nose on my face.

I've been results oriented.

As soon as he said it it was like a cold shot of water. I looked at my blog. Right there on the right. Total winnings. Total bankroll. Win rate per hour.

I was keeping score and let me tell you, I don't like to lose. Looking back on it, the last couple of losing sessions weren't very damaging from a bankroll point of view. I mean, I've dropped $100 before on losing streaks, and I had just gotten there in a few days of losing, but let's not forget I won $90 in one sitting the day before the slide too.

I think part of the "focus on the negative" aspect has much to do with what's been going on in my life lately. I'll not bore you with the details, but suffice to say I haven't had spendable green in my pocket in months. I mean ZERO disposable income other then my poker money, which I really didn't want to tap into because I'm trying to build into a bankroll I can contend on the higher levels with. Alas, after the stress of the impression of not getting anywhere and faced with a computer that has started to do some funky things (my hard drive is starting to show signs of hanging it up), I decided it was time to upgrade. So, my bankroll is back in the .50/1 realm. Given the success I've had at that level I'm not too worried about the extra time I'm going to be spending there.

Seeing as how I've been getting very worked up about the status of my stack at the tables (results oriented), Hank suggested I start covering up my stack size with sticky notes as I was doing a few months ago.

I forgot how much that helps. It makes me concentrate on playing the hand correctly. Lately I've found myself looking at the raises on the table and checking them against my stack to see if I should pop it again or not. This isn't good. Play the hand correctly, and it's irrelevent what's in your stack. So here's the deal. I'm not going to look at ANYTHING related to how my money is doing for the immediate future. I have the appropriate bankroll to handle standard varience on the 50/1 tables, so I'm not worried about busting. I haven't quite decided yet at what intervals I'll take my bankroll's temperature. For now, I'm inclined to never look at it, but that's unrealistic. Maybe once a week, maybe once a month. I've just got to get my head out of the results and into the play of the hands or the higher levels will eat me alive. In the mean time, I've got other distractions.

So, what will this do to this blog? Well the last couple of months worth of posts has been a "state of the bankroll" sort of dialogue. Since I won't even know how my bankroll is doing, that's obviously going to go away. I suck at theory dialogue, though I might make occasional stabs at it, but for good solid discussion of theory I suggest you head over the the masters of the game. What the Hell, no one reads my mindless drivel anymore anyway. It certainly hasn't made for very mentally stimulating reading, I admit, but the silence from the peanut gallery is deafening as of late. I've resolved to begin studying the game more, and I'll probably start with a review of Lee Jones, but I need to get a hold of Miller's new book too and I've heard that Ciaffone's tome on the middle limit games is decent, but a few weeks off yet for me.

I want to thank my 6 1/2 readers for sticking with my humble little blog. I'm not as verbose as The Man Guiness Fuels or as theory savvy as Hank. Hell, I'm just some idiot from Illinois who is living within morter shot range of the enemy stronghold who happens to be able to count decently well. Never the less, I'll head to the front line and fire a few theory salvos from my pea shooter and maybe someone will recognize my effort for a second or so.

Or at least long enough to tell me I'm wrong!

Whipped

Taken to Dash n cash - $50
Taken From Dash n cash - $0

Jesus Christ am I tired of fucking losing.

Seriously thinking of just hanging this game up for a while. It's so hard to gather enthusiasm after getting hideously beaten down by people with far better luck then I.

Bottom To Top

My luck has, for the moment, run out on the short handed tables. The ugly side of a shorthanded game has shown itself, in that, if you don't get decent cards or they don't hold up to any action, you're in a world of shit. Of course, when you're running good you can make a mint, since it seems that players on the 1/2 short handed tables think that you couldn't POSSIBLY have a hand so they have to keep raising you to get you to fold the ace high flush you hit on the turn. Great work if you can get it, but I've been getting my ass handed to me the last few days.

Given this fact, I figured I would ride out the dry spell by heading back to the .50/1 tables and running 3 tables of that for a while.

Two and a half hour later, I walk away $90 towards the green.

Why do I even bother playing $1/$2 anymore? I'm semi-serious. Seems that the only tables that are ever open are the short handed ones, and so table selection on $1/$2 full ring is impossible. The 300BB bankroll gap from $1/$2 to $2/$4 is only $400, and I'd rather make slow upward progress towards that then deal with the goofnut swings of the short handed games. Don't get me wrong, I still really enjoy the shorthanded games, but I think since Party's hand history generator is porked and I can't use the GameTime window in PokerTracker, I might as well head back to the bottom limit for a bit, and see if I can't leapfrog the 1/2 tables and go right to the 2/4 full ring games when the bankroll supports it.

For those who do play shorthanded, let me strongly recommend using the Gametime window in PokerTracker. If you play one or two tables, you can set PokerTracker to get 20 hands every 5 minutes, and when it gets a hand, import it immediately and it will update the Gametime window with the information. It's great to be able to tell at a glance whether you should take that early position raise seriously or not. Of course, until Party gets it's shit together, nevermind, since the chance of getting valid hands at this point are around 50/50.

Needless to say, this months statistics are going to be completely invalid. I figure at this point I'm missing around 300 hands that I'll never get back. It's insanely annoying, but I'll get over it, I guess. Don't have a hell of a lot of choice.

Fun with desk training continues at work. The kid sure has his regulations down and he's getting better with the dispatching system. All he needs is practice. My only complaint thus far is he tends to get loud and has the habit of cutting people off in conversations. Since he basically knows what he's doing, I find myself not doing much except monitoring and giving the occasional suggestion. Really, I find this to be extraordinarily hard for me. He's not checked out to work the desk yet, so he's releasing flights under my certificate. I'm not concerned about him doing something stupid or illegal, but still I just feel out of control since I'm not working the desk myself. For hardly doing anything for 10 hours, I find it the hardest days of work I've ever had.

In Living Color (Oneida Trip Report)

So the casino right up the street from me finally opened a card room. This is interesting, since many of the casinos in Wisconsin are closing theirs, but I'm never one to complain when things fall my way.

I manage to scrape together a few hours to go check out the action. Now, this casino actually has two properties within 3 miles of each other. There's the main casino, and there's a "slot hall". The card room is set up in the Slot Hall, which initially made me nervous, thinking about how noisy it would be. I was pleasantly surprised to find it rather quiet.

The room advertises betting starting at $2-$4 and going up to No Limit. I found this to be a bit of a misrepresentation. I called ahead to the card room and got a message machine, so I requested to be placed on the $2-$4 list for 6:30. I got there right around 6:30 and found myself on the $4-$8 list. It appears there is no $2-$4 LIMIT table, but rather the NO LIMIT table has blinds of $2-$4. Uh huh. This seems to be a confusing trend in this cardroom, as they occasionally referred to the limit structure as the "bet structure". In any event, the lowest limit game they were dealing was $3-$6, so I bought in for $100 and sat down there.

My first impression was that this game played almost EXACTLY like Party $.50/$1. This, remarkably, was the tightest live game I had ever played at, and it was MUCH easier to get a bead on the other players. Mostly the table was loose/weak, with the obligatory loose/idiotaggressive guy who would raise complete crap just to try to run over the table. The guy on my immediate right was a semi-loose/calling station, but he seemed to have a decent read on the rest of the table and felt obligated to share it with me. He and I immediately set our crosshairs on the LAG.

Of course, my live luck followed me there. After a good hour of mucking garbage, I finally find myself in early position with KQo. I raise it UTG (with a comment from the guy to my right muttering about a raise under the gun) and it's called 4 ways. The raggy flop completely misses me low but the pot is big enough to call the 1 bet for the turn card, which comes a K. Now I'm thinking I'm in good shape, and bet out, eliminating everyone but the small blind, who mumbles some more and calls me. River is an unremarkable 7 and I bet out again and get called. I turn over my top pair, and he turns over 36o for the turned 2 pair. I chew on a couple of words, but decide against saying anything other then "nice hand" and silently stew.

Then the evening took a turn for the surreal.

Later I'm dealt ATo in middle position. 5 people to the flop, which is not that impressive. Early position bets and I call, along with 2 others. 4 to the turn, which brings my ace. EP bets again and I raise to see where we're at. LP cold calls as does EP and we're three to the river which is a K. I start to wonder if I might have run into Slick here, but EP checks. I bet and LP and EP call me. I turn over my ATo.

EP turns over ATo
LP turns over ATo.

3 way split using both cards in hand?! Someone please tell me the odds of THAT happening? I think, after the rake, I actually ended up losing a buck or two on that hand.

A few orbits later I look down at JTo in the SB and get to see a cheap flop, which comes QKA, all spades. I have the ten of spades and the Jack of hearts, so I've flopped a straight and the gutshot royal. I bet out, everyone except LAG and the BB fold out. Turn comes a JACK...of diamonds. BB bets and I curse my luck and call him down to the river for another split.

All said, I managed to walk away about $46 lighter. If I would have won the split pots I'd be waaaaaay up (the AT debacle was a HUGE pot).

I feel much better about my live play this time around. I'm getting over my "oboy we're playing live" jitters and am starting to play my game. This table was VERY accommodating to a tight/aggressive player. If someone raised, it was because they were sitting on paint or a decent pair, with the exception of LAG-boy. There were three or four people who would call down anything, and I identified only one player that I would consider dangerous.

About the room, the things I liked were, well, it's close. Only about 30 minutes from door to floor. They have an autoshuffler built into the table, which makes the time between hands much shorter, but the autoshuffler device was sort of recessed into the table, and occasionally cards and chips would prove difficult to extract. The dealers all were very competent, accurate and quick. No booze at the tables, which I think is verbotten at all the Indian casinos, far as I can tell, but I don't drink at the tables, so that didn't bother me.

There were a few things I found annoying. The rake is 10% up to $5, but I found that the $5 would be extracted from the pot long before there was $50 in there. I adjusted my dealer tipping accordingly. Eventually a player asked for the pot to be counted out because of the rake situation, and it ended up the pot was $45 at the river, so the appropriate rake was taken out, but the full $5 was on the drop before the river betting took place. Also, if you're not playing, they don't allow you to stand in the card room and watch. I imagine this is to keep everyone from crowding into the cardroom to watch the action. The rail is pretty close to some tables, but not all of them. I didn't know this and wandered into the room to sweat the No Limit action. When they called my name to the cardroom I wandered over from the tables and was admonished (pleasantly) by the floorman. No one apparently noticed I had wandered into the cardroom and I was there for about 5 minutes. Whatever, that's really not a big deal. As it was, I really wanted to sit in on the No Limit action, but I didn't have the bank for that yet. I told myself if I ended up $100 up at the 3/6 action I'd pick up and go to the No Limit table, but, clearly, THAT never happened.

As for online action, I've hit a bit of a dry run on cards. I haven't been able to find a real good $1/$2 short table, so I picked up 4 $.50/$1 bad beat Jackpot tables. Yes, I know. I told myself I'd never play there again, but I noticed the Jackpot was up to almost $8000.

What I didn't know is they changed the requirement for hitting the Jackpot. Now Aces full of Kings has to lose to hit the Jackpot. As it was, though, there were plenty of bad beats being dealt out at the table. Your's Truely received a soul crusher.


Party Poker 0.50/1 Hold'em (10 handed)
Preflop: The_ICP is MP3 with 7d, 7h.
UTG calls, UTG+1 calls, 2 folds, MP2 calls, The_ICP calls, CO calls, Button calls, SB completes, BB raises, UTG calls, UTG+1 calls, MP2 calls, The_ICP calls, CO calls, Button calls, SB calls.


Flop: (16 SB) Js, 7s, Qd (8 players)
SB checks, BB checks, UTG bets, UTG+1 folds, MP2 calls, The_ICP raises, CO folds, Button calls, SB folds, BB folds, UTG calls, MP2 calls.
Turn: (12 BB) Jh (4 players)

UTG bets, MP2 calls, The_ICP raises, Button folds, UTG 3-bets, MP2 calls, The_ICP caps, UTG calls, MP2 calls.

River: (24 BB) 6c (3 players)

UTG bets, MP2 calls, The_ICP raises, UTG 3-bets, MP2 calls, The_ICP calls.

Final Pot: 33 BB
Main Pot: 33 BB, between UTG, MP2 and The_ICP. >

Results:
UTG shows Jd Qh (full house, jacks full of queens).
MP2 shows Tc Jc (three of a kind, jacks).
The_ICP shows 7d 7h (full house, sevens full of jacks).
Outcome: UTG wins 33 BB.

Yup. Bad beat jackpot indeed.

Party Poker's hand history system is fooked up, so I'm probably missing some information from many of the hands I've played in the last day or two. Hopefully they'll get their shit back together and I can get this information to me, but for now, Pokertracker is rendered useless.

Getting Off The Mat

Few things bother me quite as much as constantly losing to the same friggin guy at the table. The guy in the 2 seat had a VP$IP of damn near 80%, and the only freaking time he'd hit a hand is when I was in it.

Infuriating.

That being said, I did manage to take money from the rest of the table, and the aformentioned guy was certainly paying everyone else for his indescretions, though he was on a legendary tear for a while, going up as much as $80 he finally got his come-uppins.

Holy crap was that a run-on sentence. Oh well. Onward.

I'm now back to where I was before the huge slide of a few days ago. It seems in the last few days the shorthanded tables have changed, but the numbers don't bear that out. The players are just as loose/aggressive as ever, so that leaves two possibilities; my play has changed or my cards are cold. I did a little research.

Last month I played 1,930 hands of $1/$2 (6 Max). For those hands, my VP$IP was 29.22%, I saw the flop from all hands 42% of the time (27% when not in the blinds). I won $ when seeing the flop 29% of the time... I'm not sure why that would be important, but there it is. In any event, I won at showdown 61% of the time. My aggression factor is 0.91

This month so far, I've played 1,221 hands of $1/$2 (6 Max). My VP$IP is 27%, I saw the flop 41% of the time (25% when not in a blind). I won $ when seeing the flop 29% of the time. I won at the showdown 60% of the time. Aggression factor? 0.91.

A model in consistancy. Clearly my play has not changed, yet last month I was on an incredible tear of almost 13BB per 100 hands, whereas this month so far I'm at 3.24BB/100 hands. Nothing to be complaining about, to be sure, but before today, that number was much, much worse. Variance is a bitch.

So, it looks like I've hit a slower patch of cards. This is, surprisingly, encouraging. It means that even with reletively suck ass cards, I'm still able to scratch out a meaningful profit. I've also learned a few things.

- You can still fold in a shorthanded game and win.

- Even though you're seeing people playing any two cards to the river and you really really want a piece of that cash on the table, it doesn't allow you to play as loose as them.

- Don't bring a knife to a gunfight.

The point of the last point. You get dealt JTs. Naturally, you raise it up, and naturally, you're called 4 ways to a flop of 67T all of a suit you don't have. You call down the 1 bet (or better, raise) with 4 still in and the turn comes a Q. It's bet around to you again... You look around the table and your notes and notice that these are typical "play any two" kind of people. There's a decent, but not huge pot in there, and you know that you're going to see a showdown.

Do you really want to pay at least 2 more BB with this hand? Yeah, your hand MIGHT be good given the crap these jokers will call down with. The temptation is maddening.

Off to get some food and head on to the office again for more +EV goodness.

The next time you think you've had a bad day at work, just remember it could be worse. Welcome to my nightmare.

Stuck

Super quick post.

Not making much ground. After the assbeating the other day, I managed to scrape back a little bit, but the last two days have been spent in a very slow bleed. Nothing severe, but it's been brutal in that I've been up pretty good and then the cards turn to shit.

I can't tell you how many times I got good starting hands that just didn't materialize on the flop, or were obviously beat. Frustrating as Hell to get AKs, hit both the A and K, and watch the board come 4 to a suit. Expensive too.

I see that Party is now doing a "progressive" bad beat jackpot thing (which sucks) and they have 50/1 tables there now (which doesn't suck too much). I fired up one of those tables. An hour later, I got two or three bad beats. It sure lives up to its name of being a jackpot of bad beats. Unfortunately, I never saw a Queens full of 9's sink to a bad beat, so no prize for me. Just brutal suckouts.

A frustrating, though not bankroll damaging day at the tables.

Work is really taking the life out of me. Yesterday was, and I shit you not, the worst day I have ever had at work. We took on a whole bunch of new flying. This is great, except that the system we have in place right now can't handle the existing work, so when you add 40 more flights a day to it, it just collapsed into a pile of shit. It was downright hostile in that office yesterday, and I fully expect that it will be this way again today, seeing as how they've not made any changes. It may get to the point where we cite a safety issue and stop the operation.

Yes, it's that bad.

At least the rest of this month will be overtime, since I'll be training someone. If I survive this month, I'll be pretty good money wise.

Let's hope I don't have a brain attack first.

The Other Shoe

In case you haven't been paying attention to current events, we just got our asses kicked, pal! - Hudson - Aliens

-$71.

That sucks, indeed. Here's the kicker, though. I lost $30 of it in 6 minutes. Nothing like sitting down and getting sucked out on twice in 4 hands.

Not much to say here. I knew this day was coming. Let's just hope it's one day, and not the beginning of a trend. Yesterday should have been the warning, what with the cards I was getting. It pretty much continued today. No cards, and the ones I were getting didn't amount to anything. Draws missed, flops missed, and I don't think I've seen a pocket pair turn a set in a week. No, I take that back. I had a pair of Kings that flopped a set yesterday. They lost to a straight.

I tilted a little today. When I was getting the shit kicked out of me at the shorthanded tables, I moved over to the Bad Beat table. I figure if I'm going to get hideously sucked out on today, I might as well get paid a jackpot for the pleasure. Of course, I forgot that to win the jackpot, you need to at least HAVE A FOOKING SET. Duh. Finally, I went back to the 50/1 tables and 4 tabled to try to get through this bad run of cards faster, whatever that means.

So, I'm bleeding, but I have to acknowlege the amazing run I was having to this point. This time last week, my bankroll was $590, and now even after this ass beating I took today, I'm still at $788.

Just not my day, I guess.

Bitchslapped

"Look, defenseless babies!" - Erwin Fletcher - Fletch

You know how I was saying I love short handed tables because you'll find people who will put their money in there with terrible hands? It's great fun, but I think I'm going to avoid entire tables of them. Here's a little background. I sit down and do my typical tight thing until I figure out what these people are all about. After two orbits, I'm seeing an AVERAGE VP$IP of over 80%. I can't make this stuff up. So, I get ready to start punishing these guys...

Riiiiiiight.

Party Poker 1/2 Hold'em (6 max, 4 handed) converter

Preflop: The_ICP is SB with Ad, Ah.
1 fold, Button calls, The_ICP raises, BB (Luckybitch) calls, Button calls.

Flop: (6 SB) 7h, 5d, 2h (3 players)
The_ICP bets, Luckybitch raises, Button folds, The_ICP 3-bets, Luckybitch calls.

Turn: (6 BB) Td (2 players)
The_ICP bets, Luckybitch calls.

River: (8 BB) 4h (2 players)
The_ICP checks, Luckybitch bets, The_ICP calls.

Final Pot: 10 BB
Main Pot: 10 BB, between Luckybitch and The_ICP.
Results:
Luckybitch shows 7s 2c (two pair, sevens and twos).
The_ICP shows Ad Ah (one pair, aces).
Outcome: Luckybitch wins 10 BB.

Nothing like getting hammered by someone who defends the friggin HAMMER to a raise.

So, I'm stinging from this, but hey, shit happens and my toes are still tappin'. A few hands later this unfolds.

Party Poker 1/2 Hold'em (6 max, 5 handed) converter

Preflop: The_ICP is BB with Kh, Ks.
UTG (Luckybitch) calls, 2 folds, SB completes, The_ICP raises, UTG (Luckybitch) calls, SB calls.

Flop: (6 SB) 5d, 5c, 9h (3 players)
SB checks, The_ICP bets, Luckybitch calls, SB folds.

Turn: (4 BB) Ac (2 players)
The_ICP bets, Luckybitch calls.

River: (6 BB) Ah (2 players)
The_ICP bets, Luckybitch raises, The_ICP calls.

Final Pot: 10 BB
Main Pot: 10 BB, between Luckybitch and The_ICP.

Results:
The_ICP shows Kh Ks (two pair, aces and kings).
Luckybitch shows 5s 9s (full house, fives full of aces).
Outcome: Luckybitch wins 10 BB.

What the fuck? That's twice now in short order. I have to admit to a little raised blood pressure now. I'm still okay, though... I've pulled the occasional small pot to keep the damage to a minimum. After a few more hands I look down and see KK again.

Party Poker 1/2 Hold'em (6 max, 6 handed) converter

Preflop: The_ICP is SB with Kc, Ks.
UTG calls, MP calls, CO calls, 1 fold, The_ICP raises, BB calls, UTG calls, MP calls, CO calls.

Flop: (10 SB) Qh, 9c, 2h (5 players)
The_ICP bets, BB calls $0.50 (All-In), UTG calls, MP folds, CO calls.

Turn: (6.75 BB) Jd (4 players, 1 all-in)
The_ICP bets, UTG calls, CO raises, The_ICP calls, UTG calls.

River: (12.75 BB) 9d (4 players, 1 all-in)
The_ICP checks, UTG checks, CO bets, The_ICP calls, UTG calls.

Final Pot: 15.75 BB
Main Pot: 6 BB, between BB, UTG, CO and The_ICP. > Pot won by BB (6 BB).
Pot 2: 9.75 BB, between UTG, CO and The_ICP.

Results:
The_ICP shows Kc Ks (two pair, kings and nines).
BB shows 2s 9s (full house, nines full of twos).
UTG shows Qc 8s (two pair, queens and nines).
CO shows Kh Td (straight, king high).
Outcome: CO wins 9.75 BB. BB wins 6 BB.

Wooot! Not only did I lose, I lost TWICE! I ran like a sissy from that table and headed for greener pastures.

Even given the hideous suckouts going on at that table, I was still able to post a nice $43 profit for the day, so I'm certainly not one to complain.

Okay, I have to go work some bonus dollars at work today. Not by choice, believe me. I will get that "month in review" post up here in the next week or so...