Weekend Update

Thursday

Thursday Thursday evening I went to a bachelor party at a Sullivan's. The party was held in a private room. We ate some steak and then played a NL Hold'em tournament afterwards. The steak was good, but not sure it was worth the $30+ I paid for it. (not counting the side dishes, drinks, etc.) Maybe it's just cause I am not cultured or something, but if you were to blindfold me and give me a steak from Outback and one from Sullivan's, I wouldn't be able to tell the difference. Even though I was knocked out pretty early in the tournament, all in all it was a fun time.


Friday

Friday we hosted the 2nd Annual Big O Halloween Costume Tournament. The basics are if you come dressed up, you get one free rebuy for the tournament. This year we had 14 out of 21 players come dressed. Also, everyone brought a special card protector, and it was used as your bounty. So when you got knocked out of the tournament, the other player got your card protector. Since alot of the women went to a Lady's Night Out party ("special" toys) an hour before the tournament, they showed up with some interesting card protectors !

I dressed up as the 2000 World Champion:
















I ended up going out on the bubble, as I could continue the hour and half long streak of nursing the small stack.

Saturday

That evening we went to our friend's wedding. It was held outdoors and was very nice. They actually met each other playing in our weekly Wednesday night poker tournament here at work. They are going to Costa Rica for 10 days, two of which will be all poker in San Jose.

Sunday

Did absolutely nothing but sit on the couch and watch football, play Age of Empires III and watch the kiddos.

Vegas Update

We fly out this Thursday at 3pm and will arrive in Vegas 4pm local time. Everyone is very excited and I am sure this will be the 3 longest days of work for me.

Misc.

One of blogs I love to read is Tao of Poker. Dr. Pauly is getting ready to host some pretty cool tournaments on Pokerstars. Even though I will be in Vegas this weekend, I am thinking of registering and posting/folding so I still have a shot at the cool prizes (along with some cash if you money). Check out the details and schedule here.

Week in Review

Thursday

Friends of ours are getting married on October 29th, so the Big O Poker Room has a tradition of hosting a Wedding Shower Tournament. The buy-in was $50 and the bride and groom to be received free entry into the tournament. We ended up with 16 players, not too bad for a Thursday night I guess. The tournament went by pretty fast considering it was a freezeout and in the past the play was tight and slow. We have added a new rule that may have something to do with this. To prevent people rabbit hunting, the rule is the player who asks for the hunt has to post the big blind the next hand. If they are in the blinds already for that hand they have to post double. This has proven to be very successful.

Nothing too exciting to report as far as my results in this tournament. Never could get anything going for me. Ended up trying to make a move on the button (groom to be) with AJd in the BB, but he had 88 and called and his hand held up.

The groom to be ended up finishing 2nd for $200 and the bride to be finished 7th.

Saturday

I watched some of the UT/Texas Tech game. It is weird to see Texas undefeated this far into the season. It's also hard to get your hopes up as Mack Brown has never won a championship.

After taking the kiddos to the park, we came back and played dealers choice with TW, Crazy Asian and my sister. TW and my sister had never played any other games besides hold'em and stud so it ended up being a lot of fun.

Sunday

Watched football and then played in the Pokerstars Bloggers Tournament. It was a lot of fun, but I bombed out in 981st place.

Countdown to Vegas

We are almost a week away from being in Vegas (Nov. 3rd) I am very excited to get back out there. Although TW was out there a month or so ago, I haven't been out there since January.

MissT74 said she is gonna be in Vegas on Nov. 6th for the TOC tournament at Binions since she did so well in the two tourneys she played there this past week. So there is the off chance we may see/meet her.

Some of the awesome blogs I am reading...

Tao of Poker (his latest post is one of the funniest I have read in awhile)
This is not a poker blog (another Austin blogger)
Party Poker Blog (always keeps me from working)

Weekend Update

After having to work late on Friday night, I crawled out of bed in time to watch the Horns crush Colorado. Later in the day we had to go to my niece's birthday party where I spent most of my time watching the awesome ND/USC game. At first I was crushed that USC came back and won since that would have put UT at #1, but I think its probably best to have less pressure on a Mack Brown coached team.

Later that night I went over to friend's house for a poker tournament. The first tournament had 20 players. Things started off great as I flopped quads and got paid off twice each time I got AA.

How would you play it ?
Level 2 (200/400 blinds - 7 handed table)
I limp in with 88 UTG +1. 4 players see a flop of:

8 8 9

I check, button bets 800, SB and BB both fold. I call. Turn card is:

8 8 9 (T)

I check again, button best 1600. I call. River is:

8 8 9 T (3)

I check again, button checks. Quads hold up.

I should have bet the river or maybe check-raise the turn ?

I ended up making the final table, but as a shortstack. I ended pushing all-in with 99 in the SB against the BB who woke up QQ and that was that (finished 7th).

While we were waiting for the remaining four players to finish up so we could start the 2nd tournament, some us created a new side game to bet on. We made the rules up on the fly, the basics were this:

• You have to out of the tournament.
• $1 per hand/player
• Each player picks their two hole cards. You cannot pick a pocket pair and you cannot pick the same card (suit) as another player. (You could pick 9d8d and I can pick 9s8s)
• You then use the board of the final table (in this case, the four players left in the tournament)
• All five cards must be seen for there to be a winner. (So if you only get to the turn, then the hand is a push)
• You cannot win the hand with a high card, you must have at least a pair.

We played about 6 hands of this and it was very loud and exciting. I think the remaining 4 tournament players were a little ticked since we were yelling and screaming everytime their flop was dealt.

I ended up playing the second tournament (13 players) and came in 5th. No special hands to discuss here.

Vegas Trip Update

15 days till we go to Vegas. I think we have about 9 people total going together. It should be alot of fun. The only issue we may run into, is having all or a majority of us at the same cash tables. We are all staying at the dumpy Plaza (mainly because we plan to play alot of tournaments there). We also want to go to other casinos that we haven't been to so we can try out their poker room. (Wynn, MGM, etc.)

Update from the weekend

The Big O Poker Room was open for tournament action on Saturday. In an effort to get ready for our Vegas trip on November 3rd, we switched up the tournament format to mimic those run at places like the Plaza. The Wife (TW) was able to back her way into the money. After the main tournament we ran some single table shootouts/SNGs structured exactly like at the Plaza. TW continued her winning ways and cashed in both of those as well.

Before the tournament started the Crazy Asian asked me for a single college football pick. After looking through the lines, (and being in Big 12 country) I noticed an easy one - Texas A&M (+3.5) at Colorado (-3.5). Going into the game A&M was 3-1, but barely beat Texas State and Baylor at home. So the Crazy Asian put his money on Colorado and easily cashed - Colorado 41 Texas A&M 20.

The next morning the Crazy Asian called again asking for a single pick to put all the money he won from the college game on an NFL game. I went with what I thought was an easy pick - Dallas (+3.5) at home against the Eagles (-3.5). The Crazy Asian put all $90+ he won from the night before on this game and then a little extra on a 3 team parlay including this pick (2 picks for the early games). So going into the Dallas game his parlay was 2-0. Once the Eagles whooped the Cowboys the Crazy Asian would clear an easy $300 or so.


Dallas 33 Philly 10

OUCH !!!

Needless to say I don't think the Crazy Asian will be asking me for any picks anymore.

Wife comes home

Well for the past four days or so I have been Mr. Mom while my wife was away playing poker in Vegas. She flew back in and was home around midnight last night.

My wife played mostly tournaments downtown at the Plaza. During the day from 10am - 5pm they run single table shoot-outs/SNGs. They offer 3 flavors - $25/$35/$50. You start with 1000 in chips and the blinds are 15 minutes long and start at 25/50 and double each round. She said they lasted about an hour on average. At 7pm and midnight they host a multi-table tournament with 20 minute blinds and a starting stack of 2000 chips and the option to rebuy one time.

She chopped 1st three times in the SNGs ($100, $100, $150) and then took 3rd place in one of the midnight tournaments for $280. Not too shabby...

We have less than a month till our trip together to Vegas (Nov. 3-7). We are taking a small group of friends so it should be fun. At my home tournaments Big O Poker Room, we are going to start running them with the same structure as in Vegas to help get us ready.

My wife leaves....and "weird" poker

Each year my mom, g-ma, sister, aunt, etc. all meet in Vegas for one week during October. This year my sister tryed to talk my wife into going out there with them. She really wanted to go, but in the end decided against it. This past Saturday night, my sister and her b-friend (Crazy Asian) come by our house and she starts talking my wife into going to Vegas with them. After checking flights, pricing and availability, she again decides against it. Sunday morning she talks with my sister who is now in Vegas and decides to go out there. So yesterday afternoon me and the kids drive my wife to airport and see her off.

Now for the next 4 days and nights I am Mr. Mom - taking care of all FIVE of my kiddos all by myself (ages 11, 8, 6, 2, 6 months). So what does any responsible father do in a situation like this ? Have people over for poker of course :)

My sister's boyfriend - Crazy Asian (he is half Vietnamese and half American, and loves to talk trash at the poker table) wants to change it up from the usual Hold'em tournaments and have a dealer's choice cash game or what I call "weird" poker. Before the Hold'em boom, I don't think I have ever played one hand of any kind of poker. The Crazy Asian on the other hand has played every home game variation of poker, plus will gamble on just about anything. (He had a bet with my sister whether or not my wife would end up going to Vegas at the last minute)

So at 7:30 we had five guys buying in for a cheap $20 and after a quick 15 minute tutorial on how some of these games (criss cross, little L, 44, 55, 33, two or none, guts, follow the queen, elmira, little chicago, etc.) are played, we are off and running. Some of these games have progressive pots, so even though the antes are only a quarter or fitty cents, you could be playing for $20 or more on one hand.

Fast forward to 12:30am and I am stuck like $60, my wife calls to say she has landed in Vegas and asks how I am doing. :) After that conversation we play a hand of 55. (Each player gets five hole cards and there is 5 community cards that are turned over one at a time with betting on each round. The third card turned over is called the "splitter", if this card is 8 or lower, whoever has the lowest card of this suit automatically gets half the pot, if it is 9 or higher whoever has the highest card of this suit gets half the pot). Long story even longer, the splitter is a 2 of diamonds and I have the 3 of diamonds and I have a full house. So after two rounds of capped betting along with more betting on the other rounds. I scoop the whole pot for $75 which gets me unstuck. I just love that feeling of getting unstuck, it's almost better than booking a nice win.

By 1:00 am everyone has left, and I spend the next hour and a half getting stuff ready for the kids and school the next day, preparing bottle for the night for the baby etc. When the alarm goes off at 6:45am this morning, I have about 3 hours of sleep in me. Geez do I miss my wife already :)