Robbing Peter...

Another week, another post. My cubicle-mate is still out of the office, and another co-worker is down in LA on a business seminar... guess who his back-up is? My wife is out of town as well, across the country in NY. Her producer-boss is working on an off-broadway show, and having been what basically amounts to his PA for more years than she's known even me, he flew her out there to help out with songs and casting, etc. Every few years or so he's got a project he's working on and my wife gets whisked away for days at a time. He trusts her opinion, and she has a way of getting things done that need to get done, allowing him to keep his own hands clean. I'm okay with it, especially as she always comes home with a nice wad of cash!

Of course, being out in NY, I had to get some card-club recommendations for her from Pauly and asphnxma. Coming from WA state where there's a damn cardroom around every block, she's excited to be playing on the fringes of the law, and that there'll be the possibility of her game getting raided!

But just because I'm doing triple-duty at the office and playing Mr. Mom at home, doesn't mean I haven't gotten out to play some Poker myself! But hey, I'm not addicted or anything!

Ever since I discovered PJ Pockets and their $25 buy-in tourneys on Sunday afternoon and midnights Monday and Tuesday, I've been able to get in a lot more tournament play. Everyone knows limit ring-games and NL Tournaments are two completely different beasts, and I find myself in the unfortunate pattern of robbing Peter just to pay off Paul. A few weeks ago I money'd in 2 tourneys to profit about $150, then promptly gave it all back to the River chasing monkeys at the 3/6 table. The next week, I follow Paul around at another 3/6 table and manage to sneak away with $100. Enough to pay back Peter and get myself into 3 tournaments... where I didn't even last into the 2nd round.

How's this for some bad play: I open-raise w/ QJs in LP and the BB calls. Flop comes AKx. Checked to me and I fire at the pot. He reluctantly calls. Turn brings me four to the flush to add to my gut-shot, and I bet enough to put him all-in. He does a "What the hell, I'm ready to leave," call and shows JJ. None of my outs hit and I don't last much longer after that. I'm still trying to figure out if he was the idiot for calling, or if I'm the idiot for giving him too much credit to actually lay down a pocket pair with a pre-flop raise and overcards on the board. I'm sure his buddies gave him "Good read!" praises.

Next day, new tourney, we're only in the 2nd orbit and I get KK in EP so I raise to T200 (4xBB). The guy to my left, whose friend told the rest of us to just call Napoleon Dynamite cause he had the same look and mannerisms, re-raised me to 400. This was immediately followed by two short-stack all-in raises to 700 and 900. I push the rest of my stack to make it 1400. It would cost Napoleon another thousand to call, leaving him with only about 500. "Wow, that's a big pot," he says, sounding an awful lot like the movie character. He makes the call, I flip over my hand and say, "I want to see Aces everywhere!" and I do... AQs, AKs, and Napoleon completely dominated with the worst of all: AJo.

Jack on the flop, and the case Ace on the turn. First to worst, worst to first. Someone who knows the math - did he have the odds to call? Obviously, like Waffle's recent beat of the Geek, it turned out to be the right decision; but I think I would have easily laid down AJo to 3 all-ins.

The last tournament of that week, I get TT in the SB and call the button's min-raise. Nine high flop, I bet and get raised. At this point, I know he's got a bigger pocket pair, I just know it. But my mind is numbed from the previous beats and I reraise all-in. He shows QQ.

I took a few days off from playing, and even skipped this last Sunday's tourney and spent the day with the kids (aka sleeping in the theater through the movie Robots). Finally, on Monday, I made my first lunch trip in awhile back to the Silver Dollar. They changed their comp policy - no free lunch until you've played for at least an hour. So I couldn't get my chicken wings, but I went back to work $80 richer!

On the way home, I stopped at PJ's and put in my $25 for the midnight tourney. I wasn't expecting much of it... I had a good live session so I figured my tourney chances were pretty slim. But something was different that day. My mad ninja skillz were at full blast as I not only robbed Peter at lunchtime, but I was kicking Paul's ass that night as well! I made all the right decisions, and minimized my losses on the beats. I had perfect reads on everyone, laid down two pair when necessary and bluffed with 92o when the opportunity arose. Got heads-up and played back and forth for 15 minutes before agreeing to split it for $200 each. I made it home about 3:00 am, but was on such a Poker high I couldn't get to sleep for another hour.

Tuesday was a repeat of Monday... had a profitable lunch and placed in the money in the midnight tourney! It feels good to be playing well and having it pay off. I'm going to ride out my rush and will be signing up for the WSOP qualifier... it'll be my first time playing against other bloggers and I hope to get Hammered!

And congrats to our Poker Blogging Idol for surviving yet another week!