Another Run of Luck

I haven't played poker that much since the Week of Triumph, during which, in four games, I garnered a fourth, two seconds and a first-place finish and won something like $240. That was three weeks ago. Last Saturday, though, I got in on what I call the doctor game. Not everyone who plays is a doctor, but there are a lot more doctors in on the action than in my regular game, also known as the stoner game. So I played the doctors on Saturday. After eight hours of struggle, an entire evening of bad cards and many close calls, I actually took first place. That was pretty sweet. I didn't get to bed till 3:00. Well, last night was the stoner game. There are many games during the week - sometimes up to six - but usually, the most people show up on Tuesday. Last night's game drew 16. I had this strong belief that I would do well before play began, but I've had those lots of times. When convinced of my own invincibility, I generally end up going out first. It looked like I was on that same path yesterday evening; I got crappy cards, had no luck and all the flop cards broke away from my hands (for example, when I had high cards in my hand, the flop comes in low and vice-versa). And so it went. When we were playing two tables, I didn't do a lot of betting. I might have taken down two small hands and folded the rest. My cards were very crummy. Once enough people were out, we combined tables. My cards/luck didn't pick up after that, but I was able to bluff my way through a few hands. I had managed to double my original stake of 5,000 chips when the hand of the night came my way. Initially, there was nothing spectacular about it, a queen/ten of diamonds. I limped in as usual - the blinds weren't too high at this point. I had about six opponents. The flop came. There was a jack/nine of diamonds and some inconsequential spade. I had 80% of a straight flush. The hand checked around to Sherry on my right who raised 2,000. I went all in with this straight flush draw, because, why not? Sherry was the chip leader; she could afford it. She called. Everybody else folded, except for John who went all in, too. But he only had a few thousand. Since two of us had all our chips on the table, we flipped cards. John had paired up with the jack on the board. Sherry had pocket aces, the strongest possible starting hand. I had my straight flush/regular flush draw. At this point, I'm running dead last with two more cards coming. The turn card comes. It's a five of diamonds. There's my flush. I took the hand, all of John's chips and most of Sherry's. My luck still lagged for the rest of the night, but I did manage to knock out three more people. I'm not sure how, but it happened. The final three were Jason, Simon and me. Thanks to a lot of folding, I let Jason take out Simon, then we split the pot. He was ahead on chips, so he got his name up on the wall. But hey, $80 for second place isn't bad, especially considering how awful my cards were. I had just three pocket pairs all evening. My secret? Patience. I wait till the right moment, win some chips, then retreat into the background and let the other guys make crazy bets. That has worked well for me. We'll probably play again tomorrow night. We'll see if that strategy holds up then.

And hey, now I can afford to drink at Spur sometime!

Last Night's Action

As I mentioned a few days ago, I've been very lucky at cards recently. I'm not sure why, but it's happening. After a disappointing seventh-place finish in trivia last evening (the bonus question was about Project Runway; nobody on my team watches that show; we missed it), I went down to the basement for a game. It seemed like the thing to do. The Olympics at the time were about women doing tricks on snowboards and falling. Yawn! I can do that! Where's my silver medal?? Anyhow, this is the fourth game we've had here at the Rivoli this week. The turnout was a healthy 15 people and we got down to it shortly after 10:00. For a long time, nobody except my soon-to-be-former-neighbor Josh was making any money. Stacks were getting shorter and people began making daft bets. I was there to call them. And I was lucky enough to win - again and again. I knocked out so many opponents that I lost count. It must have been at least 10. I'm not sure. All I know is that I knocked out three people in one hand and another two the very next hand. I wasn't like I felt that I couldn't be defeated. I had good hands and I thought that I could afford to call anybody's all-in bet. Luckily, the cards broke my way. It could have easily gone against me.

Meanwhile, Josh was also making money, though he wasn't knocking anyone out. With seven people still at the table, he started negotiating with me about how we were going to split the pot. That makes for some super-terrible luck. I didn't want to hear it. I've had games where I hold an insurmountable chip lead and see it all evaporate in minutes. The reason? I start thinking about how I'm gonna spend all that money I haven't yet won. So yeah, negotiating before the table is down to the final two is poisonous.

I managed to knock a few more people out and then it was Josh, Danelle (another neighbor who is relatively new to poker) and me. Josh kept chiding me to knock Danelle out, so we could split the pot and he could hit the bars. It was about 12:30 by now. As things were, I started getting really lousy cards. I couldn't do squat. Finally, Danelle knocked Josh out in two hands. We split the $150 and I got my name on the wall, which is how we keep track of past champions. After two second places and a fourth just this week, I won. Praise Allah! My winnings for the week are $235. By the way, Josh holds the record for most consecutive wins with four. I'm pretty sure that it will be a long time before anybody breaks that streak, as luck is a very fickle thing.

OK, so I didn't mean to turn this blog into a poker symposium. I also didn't intend to feature French and Russian pop music, but here we are. Don't worry, though, my luck will soon turn and I'll go back to my dependable, losing ways and I will write nothing about that. I promise.

The Poker Report

I don't write about it much, but I play a lot of poker. I started playing about two and a half years ago in the Rivoli's basement with my neighbors and their friends and their friends and so on. At the beginning, I was fantastically lucky (because I didn't know any better), then terrible for a long time (once I'd learned all the rules). Over the last three or four months, I've done really well. There are up to five games a week (usually only about three) and I've ended up either winning or splitting the pot almost each week. If I recall correctly, I've only been out of the money two weeks in the last four months. Since Saturday, I've done quite well: I took second on Saturday, fourth on Sunday (I knocked out five people and lost to some freakish luck) and second again last night. There were 19 players and the take for that was $95 - half of $190. What made it special is that there was one hand where I landed four aces. It's the first time I've ever done that. What's even better is that I knocked somebody out with it. Usually, when you have these really good hands, it's tough to get anyone to play. Earlier in the evening, I scared everybody away from my full house with a tiny bet. But my opponent took the bait and soon she was sitting on the sidelines, watching the action. I knocked out three others over the course of the evening. There are some people who are good table company. They have funny stories or weird things to say or whatnot. If you take their money and knock them out, you feel just a little bit bad. There was a guy at the table last night who wasn't one of those people. He was either quite dumb or mildly retarded or both. He seemed to have no short-term memory. He would ask what the blinds were every single hand. I'm not kidding. Every. Single. Hand. It was like playing cards with a goldfish. He also never knew when it was his turn, so he'd just drop chips on the table whenever he felt like it. After more than an hour of this nonsense, I started to get a little cranky at his dumbness. I tried to figure out a way to get rid of him. His style was completely reckless, but he managed to win big over the course of the evening. He also lost big, too. His biggest hit came when he walked into my pocket tens. I won the hand, 15,000 of his chips and knocked out the Rivoli's manager. But this guy was still in the game and he recovered somewhat over the next half hour or so. Yet he never knew what or where the blinds were or when it was his turn to bet. When guys annoy me like that, I try like hell to knock them out. In the past, this has always resulted in disaster. I generally lose everything. But I didn't rush things along and finally chose the right moment and knocked him out with three kings. It was really sweet. After that, all I had to do was wait for Angelique to knock out Kevin Bucket and then split the pot with her. She knocked me out on Sunday with some impressive luck. Last night, she was just as lucky, winning a series of really daft all-in bets. I could have continued on and tried for an undisputed win, but I've tried that as well once or twice and lived to regret it. I'm just fine with second place. Since the beginning of the year, I've had one first and about six second place finishes. I'm starting to feel like I can play the game reasonably well, so I just thought I'd mention it.