About time I update this...

So it's been about 6 weeks since I updated this little blog thing here...guess not much exciting to report the last few weeks, but let's do a recap of the last month, poker-wise:

- Made a whopping 1 final table in Dino's game (4th place), plus two bubbles. Hard to play your best when you are not terrribly motivated most weeks, however. There was this Saturday night poker game that kinda dominated conversations for a couple of nights....Oh, but hey, sometimes a social game is just that, a social game, right?

- Transitioning into cash games (esp. NLHE) a little bit more every month. Starting out at the micro levels, and grinding my way up. There will always be a good portion of any online time allocated to sit-n-gos, however.

- 2 cash game appearances in live venues - Netted a little more than 1 buy-in profit, in total.

So I had this strange thought last night while watching this hand play out about how beautiful it would have looked to tape this tourney and air it on some crappy public access channel...complete with commentator (probably me, when I'm not playing) and some comedian playing the analyst role. Maybe we can bring PJ Butland back to Dino's for this occasion...

Flop is A-K-Q, and Harry bets out after flopping the nut straight. 3 callers. Ace pairs board on turn, and after Harry bets out, Wendy and Mike call. After a King pairs board on river, Harry checks, Wendy makes a huge bet, Mike folds, Harry goes in the tank and folds, then a crowd goes bonkers when Wendy flips over 8-8, and legitimately thought her hand was the best hand. Oh, those crazy kids....but well-done getting the pot!

Anyways, Dino's last night was a solid run for about an hour, then went quickly downhill until I finally bluffed off my last 1200 chips post-flop to Kid Dave holding 2 pair....oops! Side game would soon start, with Bernie, Volcano Ron, Farmer Tim, and Fred joining me to start. Patrick, Merlot, and Andy would join us by the end of the night.

Was down half my buy-in until I hit a set of 9's, and got paid off on my post-flop all-in by both Bernie and Volcano Ron...and never looked back after this.

What was working last night was simple - being able to outbluff the bluffers. Didn't hurt, either, that I picked up a tell on Farmer...can't believe I never picked up on earlier, but need another night of play for confirmation. For example, soon after that triple-up, I pushed out both Farmer and Fred post-flop with a check-raise with 9-high. A few hands later, I pushed both Farmer and Bernie out with a Q-high check-raise post-turn, with what turned out to be the best hand out of the 3 of us - those 2 hands allowed to take down quite a few small pots all night without much opposition.

Hit a set of 7s to bust Bernie out of his second buy-in, and we were rolling at this point. Lost a couple of small pots, then Andy joined the madness, when this hand occured:

K-2 in the small blind, Andy and 3 others limp-in. Flop comes K-K-7 - checked around, Andy bets 5 or 6, everyone folds except me, who calls. Check-call 8 units the next round when a K hits turn to give me quads. Sucks to get a monster hand and know you're not getting paid on the river. Unfortunately for me, an ace hits on the river, and even my 1/2 pot-sized value bet warranted an insta-fold of 5-5 from Andy. I think at this point I was my hi-water mark for the night, up 5 buy-ins.

I stuck around for another hour or so, stayed out of big pots, and left at midnight cashing out for just under $50 (up 4 buy-ins), solid! Farmer was working on his 6th buy-in when I left, Bernie blew through 4, and Andy had made a great comeback after making his 3rd buy-in - whattanight!

Oh yeah, congrats to Rachel for knocking out Kid Dave to win the tournament - and to Dan for showing that the "chip and a chair" theory works once in a while...one chip, and fights way to 3rd.