bad beat post

i haven't felt like blogging much lately. some cool shit going on, went to game 4 of world series, having fun, etc. etc. also some bad stuff -- woke up last saturday w/ crazy back spasms and had to cancel a trip to dc for my friend's wedding. poker's been horrific. i haven't been playing well and can't get anything going. i've had a few deep runs, but am not winning the big hands that matter toward the end. got hu in small turbo tournament and lost w/ tp to 2p. later in stars 50k AJss gets reshoved by A8, and he spikes an 8 on river for top 10 stack when down to 25. sigh. i did bust rizen in the bodog tournament tues night, which not only won me an autographed copy of his book and 75 bucks, but had the added benefit of tilting smokkee.

i was hu in the dookie tonight when lilkimmer suggested shoving, which i did for the next two hands while he folded. i think i got angleshot by a bot.

yay for turbo mookie, was def fun. either nobody who reads my blog has a hankering for a turbo tournament (except mondo, thx), or nobody reads my blog, so i'll just count on mookie and anyone already running tournaments to switch to turbo every now and again.

as promised by title, this was my fitting exit from the turbo fiddy, i run so good.

Full Tilt Poker Game #8725844269: Turbo Fiddy (66535217), Table 34 - 20/40 - No Limit Hold'em - 1:07:09 ET - 2008/10/30
Seat 1: INTHEZONE2 (1,930)
Seat 2: Emakers1015 (1,845)
Seat 3: Scotty0617 (2,000), is sitting out
Seat 4: pvanharibo (2,215)
Seat 5: Cmoney3 (2,115)
Seat 6: HiWayPatrol (2,360)
Seat 7: Junior976 (1,950)
Seat 8: tycoonish (3,305)
Seat 9: JockinJayZ (2,640)
JockinJayZ posts the small blind of 20
INTHEZONE2 posts the big blind of 40
The button is in seat #8
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to pvanharibo [Ah As]
Emakers1015 folds
Scotty0617 folds
pvanharibo raises to 120
Cmoney3 folds
HiWayPatrol has 15 seconds left to act
HiWayPatrol is sitting out
HiWayPatrol has timed out
HiWayPatrol folds
Junior976 folds
tycoonish folds
JockinJayZ raises to 2,640, and is all in
INTHEZONE2 folds
HiWayPatrol has returned
pvanharibo calls 2,095, and is all in
JockinJayZ shows [Qh Qc]
pvanharibo shows [Ah As]
Uncalled bet of 425 returned to JockinJayZ
*** FLOP *** [6d Qd Qs]
*** TURN *** [6d Qd Qs] [5h]
*** RIVER *** [6d Qd Qs 5h] [7c]
JockinJayZ shows four of a kind, Queens
pvanharibo shows two pair, Aces and Queens
JockinJayZ wins the pot (4,470) with four of a kind, Queens
pvanharibo stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 4,470 | Rake 0
Board: [6d Qd Qs 5h 7c]
Seat 1: INTHEZONE2 (big blind) folded before the Flop
Seat 2: Emakers1015 didn't bet (folded)
Seat 3: Scotty0617 didn't bet (folded)
Seat 4: pvanharibo showed [Ah As] and lost with two pair, Aces and Queens
Seat 5: Cmoney3 didn't bet (folded)
Seat 6: HiWayPatrol didn't bet (folded)
Seat 7: Junior976 didn't bet (folded)
Seat 8: tycoonish (button) didn't bet (folded)
Seat 9: JockinJayZ (small blind) showed [Qh Qc] and won (4,470) with four of a kind, Queens

worst poker ever

maybe hyperbole, but i've been playing very badly. basically, if there is a right decision and a wrong decision, i make the wrong one. i say to myself, i will cbet, but fold to a shove. and then someone shoves and i think, meh, i should call. i'm also still not running great (AK < AQ for 45 bb pot in sunday stars million, KK < A8o for sweet stack late in 32k, etc. etc.) but that is no excuse. despite playing like a drunk retard (half true?) almost all of yesterday, i luckboxed my way into 2nd place (out of 1083) in the ftp $3r. i hovered around 10 bbs for a large part of the tournament, then doubled a couple times, and then had my best suckout of the weekend (i run good in $3 tournaments) when 77 beat AA, QQ and Arag suited for a quadruple up. it was only an 8k guarantee so 2nd paid ~ $1200 but given my shitty day i am not complaining.

on the bright side the giants won, so i'm still in my dead pool. 1 entry left out of the 5 i started with, though. i need welker to have a decent game tonight and cutler to have a shitty one, and then i will knock off the only undefeated team in one of my ff leagues. i've already lost my other two matches. :( of course the guy i'm playing in one league has jackson and chicago d go nuts the week he plays me.

i am going to keep plugging away at poker. i will keep trying to make good decisions, no matter how much my brain tries to get me to make bad ones. i saw stoner's recent post about blogger tournaments, and i agree with him: a weekly turbo would be awesome! with mon/lpr, tues/skillz, wed/mookie, thurs/chasers, fri/donkament there is not a lot of open room in the schedule, but would there be interest in a weekly turbo? i wonder if we could take the turbo fiddy structure (2k starting, 5 min blinds) and try one for $26, that way people could token in? just throwing it out there, i def miss the slightly higher buy in. what about sunday night? i haven't seen a big game in awhile, but the turbo could cede to big game whenever that happens. i don't know, the blogger landscape is crowded, i'm mostly thinking as i type.

tyty rakebrain

>schaubs sent me info about the >rakebrain freeroll last week, and i quickly signed up. it was def a good call as i finished first. thanks to the guys over at rakebrain, it was a blast!

still trying to hit my groove in mtts. i missed one hand last night in the 28k when i had about 15 bbs left, and came back to find that A8 had shoved and been called by 99. i def woulda called there (i missed AQ) and even though i mighta been out, it was a great spot, and nothing even came close through the rest of the tournament as i nursed my short stack. i lost KK < QQ for the chip lead and a massive stack in the 40k on stars with about 150 left last night, that was a huge bummer. hopefully this w/e will go better for me. see you at the tables!

more matrix and cash donkey

i have been doing pretty well in the matrix tournaments since i posted two nights ago. i switched to turbos and am positive so far. i made a retarded call w/ the As on a three flush board that fucked me in an early one, and then played badly in my last one of the night, but overall have finished first in a couple and won a few matches.

after donking out of the mookie i decided to play some cash. it was only .10/.25, but i played terribly and got owned by bayne. i broke my no cash w/ bayne rule figuring the low stakes wouldn't matter, but i just cannot play cash v. him (hu sngs are a different story). he hits everything, and i cannot connect w/ flops. after losing two buy ins i called it a night.

prob play some tournaments tonight.

matrix sngs

full tilt is offering these new sngs where you play four simultaneous matches. they give you points for outlasting other people and kos, and then the leaderboard gets cash. even if you don't make top three on leaderboard you still get money for where you finish in the sng (top 3). i sucked it up big time in a $20 one, so i think i'll drop down in levels. it was super fun, though, i'm definitely gonna play a few more. it's perfect if you get bored w/ one sng too, cause the multi-tabling is built in.

back to poker

i played a lot of tournaments the end of last week and all weekend. while it wasn't a great weekend monetarily, i went really deep in a bunch of tournaments, and feel like if i can keep myself from making some costly mistakes i will be able to final table/win more tournaments. i was most proud of going out of the 30k ($10) on stars sunday in 23/4995. 23rd paid shit, and i was definitely disappointed in how i went out (restole from bb w/ gappers v. co raiser who snapped w/ A2hh). it was obv a +ev call for him since i was shoving that wide, and i need to be more careful about the spots i pick. the best part of sunday was playing on lucko's new dual monitor set up. it makes me so sad to fire up my little laptop. i could def play more tables and do my usual [s]stalking[/s] railing.

all weekend i had this retarded penchant for restealing in marginal spots, and that took me out of a few tournaments, including going from cl to out about 3 from the money in dd b. i also made some retarded calls, which goes toward the old leak of not wanting to fold hands that are pretty (99, QJ sooooooooted) rather than waiting for better spots.

i cashed in a 20r, a few satellites to the 750k and the 28k again. i made the final table saturday night (barely) finishing 9th w/ not even 1 bb, having run 99 into TT the hand before the bubble broke, and then i cashed around 70th last night. my bustout hand was a great example of times when i know i'm making a mistake but somehow talk myself into making a play. i had 33 utg w/ 13 bbs, an EASY fold, but got greedy and shoved. i ran into JJ and went out, when i had a decent number of hands to wait for a better spot, and at the least better position. total brain fart, but all it takes is one to be out of a tournament that can potentially be won.

i am tweaking my game a little -- incorporating more limping, min raising, and a few other things, so i'm going to try and play some lower buy ins for awhile while i practice implementing new strat. i don't want to change a lot about my game, but i see myself making some mistakes consistently, and there are certain situations i'm unsure of how to play. not that i haven't made donktastic plays in $200 tournaments, but i certainly feel more comfortable trying newer things in lower buy ins first. we'll see how it goes.

i played a little more cash this weekend w/ a decent amount of success. the worst hand was the last before i was getting up from my last table. i raised JJ utg, a guy in mp called, and bb called behind. flop KJx two spades. bb checks, i bet out 3/4 pot, fold, call. turn blank, i again bet 3/4 pot, call. river completed the spade draw, and he checked again. i prob shoulda checked behind, b/c i can't call a re-raise shove, but i pulled a fuel and bet out 5 bucks. he called w/ an 8 high flush (86 soooooooooted aka the bayne). oh well, it's definitely fun to mix it up.

i watched the season premiere of csi and realized i'm pretty over the show. i'll still dvr and watch while playing, but it definitely can't sustain my full attention. i've been having that problem w/ house this season also. i'm just not that jazzed to watch it. i've got some entourage and lots of true bloods on my dvr, hoping to pound through some of those later this week. i'll be playing the moooooooooooookie on wed and watching the pres debate. as for tonight, gooooooooooooo giants!!!

blame it on waffles

had a blast last night playing .10/.25 cash w/ some bloggers. one of them was waffles, who sent me this.

You are The Sun

Happiness, Content, Joy.

The meanings for the Sun are fairly simple and consistent.

Young, healthy, new, fresh. The brain is working, things that were muddled come clear, everything falls into place, and everything seems to go your way.

The Sun is ruled by the Sun, of course. This is the light that comes after the long dark night, Apollo to the Moon's Diana. A positive card, it promises you your day in the sun. Glory, gain, triumph, pleasure, truth, success. As the moon symbolized inspiration from the unconscious, from dreams, this card symbolizes discoveries made fully consciousness and wide awake. You have an understanding and enjoyment of science and math, beautifully constructed music, carefully reasoned philosophy. It is a card of intellect, clarity of mind, and feelings of youthful energy.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

atonement part II

lost this gem all in pre for the chip lead to finish fifth. thx to mclarich once again for the rail.

finally

i guess atonement works.



i've been running so bad lately and this is a much-needed confidence boost. i played horribly hu, he was super weak but i couldn't capitalize and got owned. i lost w/ two pair to a better two pair on a fairly standard hand, but i was playing like crap. thanks to matt and bayne for the rail.

i am still sick but it's mostly a lingering cough and congestion. hoping it vacates my body by the weekend so i can enjoy sunday football w/ some drinks.

sf recap, since i know of at least one reader who cares. it was a blast, although we ended up bailing on gary danko, the one sure thing i thought we had planned. no poker content, it's kind of longish, read at your own risk of boredom.

we arrived thursday night and hit up a restaurant near our hotel called scala's to hang out at the bar and have a few drinks. i was hungry since the airplane food was miserable. i hadn't realized it was a four star kind of place, but the tuna tartare was all right by me. we also had a shrimp/calamari appetizer thing but i was not as enamored.

friday was hit up zuni cafe when it opened for what sf friend dave had told me was one of the best burgers in sf (you'll notice a recurring theme of food, b/c i <3 the food in sf and it was definitely a focal point for me). we walked around hayes valley (my favorite shopping area, poor lucko) where i picked up a new pair of black sneakers from y3 (yohji yamamoto's line for adidas).

we walked by my old apartment (772 oak st) which after peering in the front bay window looked empty, so we tried the door and it was open! my old landlord happened to be in there renovating it, so we chatted it up for a bit, i grabbed some mail that i promised to pass along to one of my old roommates, and i got to see how much nicer the apartment will be for future tenants.

after that we took the bus up to haight/ashbury, walked through golden gate park a bit, and grabbed a few beers at kezar pub. after a quick shower we headed to slanted door, one of my fave restaurants, where i drank copious amounts of alcohol. i wish i'd taken some pics of the food. appetizers were yellowtail, scallops and rice cakes. dinner was shaking beef and stir fried chicken. we followed that up with a trip to mauna loa, a fun bar in the marina (off of union st on fillmore) where we met up w/ aforementioned dave and his gfriend. we played pop a shot, foosball (omg they owned us) and buck hunter. by the end of the night i was um, quite trashed.

saturday we started w/ breakfast at ella's, then took the bus to the golden gate bridge. we walked around, took a few touristy pics, then headed to fisherman's wharf. we walked around until i got claustrophobic (god i hate tourists, even when i'm technically one of them -- i felt like i was in times square) and then headed to a random bar to watch some college football and play funky monkey. some barely out of college kids invited us to play a drinking game i'd never heard of, but we only had time for one round of flip cup before dinner at my favorite chinese place, dragonwell.

after dinner we met up w/ my friend jayme to hear her boyfriend's band play (they're called the american economy which made for the oxymoronic cheer "american economy rules") and then we headed to the mission for my friend katy's party. we had fun chatting w/ the drunky girl on her bed who perked up when i played some old school oaktown 357 and jj fad vids on youtube, but we headed out ~ early (def before 2) so we could be up for 10am football on sunday morning.

sunday we cabbed it to the 21st amendment where we took over one tv for the mets game and as bayne reported i compulsively checked my ff team scores. jayme and justin met up w/ us, as did bayne, wife and daughter. good times. we headed over to pacbell/at&t or whatever it's called these days. giants game was fun, and considering the game didn't matter the fans were pretty into it. we walked to another bar after the game, where it was decided that we would all continue to hang out and kevin and i bagged gary danko. bayne and family headed to north beach while we all continued to the mission. i did get to hit up tokyo gogo for dinner, an old sushi fave, and after that it was back to the hotel. a quick breakfast monday and it was off to sfo.

overall it was a fantastic trip and possibly the best bday gift ever. thanks lucko. :-)

being sick

i've been sick for the past few days, which has led to some poker. not much to speak of, my game seems to have digressed. i'm still working on my tilting, which occurs way too often. i've been watching lucko play some cash, which as usual inspired me, but i quickly learned (again) that i have no six max game, even at .10/.25. i was going to watch some vids on cash, but decided i'm better off trying to continue improving my tournament game. i'll prob still donk around a bit at the cash tables.

ff has been a roller coaster. the league i thought i drafted best i'm 3-2, while the league i thought i had the worst draft (and i still cringe every time i set my lineup) is 4-1. i was almost 5-0 but lost by 4 points to the best team in the league.

mostly i've been watching tv and movies, since my concentration while sick has been minimal in between naps. jury is still out on fringe for me. i watched the second and third episode and was intrigued, and the story has gotten better, but i'm not sure how sustainable the show is. does the world really need another x files ripoff?

i agree w/ astin's post from last week on heroes, less mohinder = better heroes. i liked this past week's episode and it just shows how much potential there is. i'm definitely still hooked. i have had several tv posts brewing but can't find the energy. one of these days. i will say gossip girl has been great this season.

lucko started me watching a show i'd barely heard of, the biggest loser. it's retarded that they made it a two hour show, b/c half of the episode is repeating stuff from before the commercial break, but i am admittedly intrigued. they take a bunch of fat people and stick them in a ranch to lose weight and compete survivor style (kinda). apparently they really do get healthier and lose weight, plus i won a prop bet the first week for a dinner at il mulino -- go orange team (heba ftw!) my favorite part so far is last week's ep where they take them on a trip to the grand canyon and they all come back and tell the trainers they couldn't work out cause they didn't have the gym. the trainers responded as i did, like wtf is wrong w/ you people, you're outside in nature and you couldn't figure out how to exercise?!?

i hadn't realized that the office was already back, somehow my dvr didn't record it a few weeks ago, but luckily it was on lucko's. that show is genius. i never thought they could top the british version, and didn't watch the first two seasons of the us version, but omfg. amy ryan has been a hilarious addition, and pam's "what up two one two" complete w/ rocking hand motion had me rofl.

i watched the vp debate and last night's debate, and how anyone can consider more of the same after 8 years of bush baffles me, but not as much as his choice of vp. damn that mainstream media asking her questions!

if you haven't been watching the daily show, start immediately. his election coverage is always top notch.

a belated congrats to sprstoner, for taking down the $150r on ftp for 58k. he sure runs well for someone who runs bad. :-)