Thursday, March 31, 2005

Oh no, not again!

Once again it's our biweekly NL Texas Hold'em homegame. Two news this time:

  • We started with 3000 in chips instead of 2000 as earlier, but with the same blinds structure. Starting at 25/50 and then incrementing with 50 on the big blind. This made a significant change in play style, when players can afford to play the stack, not just the cards. Earlier it was mostly calling or just raising the minimum (the amount of the big blind). More "proper" play, room for re-raises and large raises. Also, earlier, when someone had more chips and could do that, well, then the blinds had gone up so you were still gambling a large portion of your stack.
  • A female player! The girlfriend of one of the regulars partook. She finished last but played well, no insecurity, no mistakes, just not good cards. Other girlfriends are also welcome.

I came in third (out of six). Had a large stack but took a huge blow when I had pair of aces (A3 clubs on hand) and fought it out with one other player who had AQ on hand. Only room for one or two mistakes in No Limit, remember that. He later finished first (for the first time). Next time it has to be my turn to win, I've never won one of these homegames, mostly second or third place. I made a very unscientific summation of our homegames, awarding three points for first place, two for second and one for third and disregarding how many times you had played. Then I was third total with nine points, leader had eleven and second total ten.

Oh well, I can console myself with my performance in yesterday's $1000 freeroll. 136th place out of 11192 entrants which gave me a whopping two dollars. These I can then take to a cheap Sit-n-go table and hopefully increase more and more and more.

Or finish fourth.

Tuesday, March 29, 2005

Defensive mechanisms

Went south to visit the kinfolk over Easter.

I made an interesting biological observation. In what other people would you tolerate screaming, drooling/spitting, nose-pinching, stinking, headbutting

than five-months-old nieces and such?

Just one toothless smile and it's all OK.

Some minor techwork: Installing broadband for dad and setting lots of clocks to daylight savings time for mom (there was a reason I gave her a few radio controlled clocks last Christmas).

Friday, March 18, 2005

Black Beauty

For/from/at work I today arranged to get a cellphone. And what a beaut it is. A Samsung D500. Really cool, with MP3 player, camera, Java, Bluetooth, WAP/GPRS, infrared, all in a slick black package with configurable doodads and gewgaws. And you can use it for voice communication too!

An amusing thing, sort of. You can tell it's Korean from the software I installed on my computer to communicate with the phone (transfer files, synchronize phonebook &c.). I installed it and then used a built-in menu choice to check for software updates. The message:

There is a no more lastest file in server

Especially asians have a very enthusiastic approach to English.

Sometimes a
very
e.e. cummings

style

Thursday, March 17, 2005

Tighter than a tight thing

Yes, yes, yet another of our biweekly homegames of No Limit Texas Hold'em.

There's always something. This time we had two new players and this was our most populated tournament. Seven players, lots of action.

They've really tightened up, aren't calling just to satisfy their curiosity. As always, there's something special at every event. This time it was the twos. The deuces. The ducks. One hand was won by a pair of deuces on the river and there were one or two full houses with deuces in them and probably some trips too.

I came in fourth (out of seven) and as all the others had substantial swings. Some all-ins worked but my final one (All-in works all the time except for the last time. Funny that.) with a short-stacked JA off-suit was beat by a pair of sixes. No rebuys for me this time.

I've never won one of these homegames. Quite a few second places but never paid substantially. I'd like to win once or twice and then use the winnings to supplement my equipment. I've got a nice chipset, proper decks, a green felt but would really really like one of those foldable octagonal thingumajigs with trays.

Sunday, March 13, 2005

Bleep!

Nope, the Jeopardy tryout didn't go as planned. There were quite a few there, and only fifty would go on to subsequent questionnaires. I didn't get enough points in the first round of questions to qualify, so it was back to home for me. No poker questions, quite a few food and cooking questions.

Oh well, time for another poker homegame on Tuesday, as usual.

Tuesday, March 01, 2005

Outdrawn

Time for another installment of our regular biweekly Tuesday homegame, no-limit Texas Hold'em. The guys (we were only five today, I'll address that later) are getting tougher, everybody lasted long and there was only one rebuy. Tight play by everyone but playing top pair usually brought in the pot, unless there were straight or flush draws.

There's always one or more "legendary" hands, ones that are brought up in subsequent games "Do you remember when...". Today's was when MA went all-in after the flop and TS called, with more chips. The cards are turned over, MA has flopped a pair of Aces, TS trips Jacks. Turn gives nothing and I point out that the only thing that can save MA now is an Ace on the river. Of course it comes. Ph34r my v00d00 skillz!

I'm in the final, heads-up against TS who has never won at our homegames before and often finished last (sometimes blaming that he has to catch a bus home). We're about equal in stack size, but that's eaten up with heavy betting on top pair (Jacks) by me and he calls and rivers a higher pair. The last hand: I only have a few hundred left in chips and BB is 300. So to end the pain I go all-in since it's all or nothing, not worth waiting one more hand. "With what?!", you ask, dear reader. Why, Two Seven off-suit of course. The mother of all hands! The Hammer! I actually make a pair of deuces but no help against his Kings. We have a new winner, and I'm back at my customary second place after a short slump.

Now, one of the regulars didn't play today. Some mutterings were heard about this being because he'd never won and girlfriend didn't like that.

So I've tossed an idea out to some and will try to make it happen:

Girlfriends are allowed at Biweekly Poker Night. If they play.

Not impossible. One I've heard has mentioned an interest in being dealer. Another has mentioned finding WPT Hollywood Home Game fun to watch. And we're very civil, the only Guy Thing we do is drink beer, there's almost no farting and very little bad language.