Summer Daze

Happy first day of Summer to everyone! Yesterday was a beautiful day, and today looked like it would be the same - but it started just raining and there's even the occassional thunderclap!

I played during lunch, and the weather hadn't degraded to the point it's at now, so I think I was affected by some sort of Summer Daze. After a few losing hands (TPTK versus an overpair and having the butt-end of a straight); I was down to about $30 and only 15 minutes left in my lunch hour... totally getting ready to chalk this up as a losing session. I limp in UTG with pocket 4s and see a lovely flop of K42, but with two Hearts. I bet out and get raised by a solid player who I immediately put on a King; and an older lady calls the two bets cold - Heart or straight draw for sure. I only call, not wanting to necessarily scare away the solid player with his pair of Kings.

Turn is a black 9 - I bet out and get raised again, and the chaser still cold-calls the two bets. I make it three, and the solid player thinks out loud, "Pocket 9s???" Both call. The River brings the third Heart. I do my best not to let out an audible groan as I tap the felt to check. It gets checked around and I flip over my 4s and look up to the ceiling, not wanting to see the Flush. Instead, I hear dealer announce "Full House!" Huh? Who? Where???

As I suspected, the solid player had a King as well as a 9 for two pair; and the old lady had T9h for the Flush.

But the Rivered Heart was another Deuce. Damn the season for making me miss a bet!!!

That pot refills my rack, and I take the next hand as well (A7s flopping Trip 7s) for a little extra sugar. Man, I hate having to leave when the rush is just starting!

Anyways, in general news, the wife has been hard at work planning the summer vacation. We'll be packing up the Honda Odyssey and taking a little road-trip starting this Friday right after I get out of the office. We're working our way down into SoCal and taking the kids to DisneyLand. Last time we went, the youngest was only 2. She's 4 now and will be able to actually get on some of the rides! After a few days of pure Happiness saturation, we'll head back up the coast and stop at the beach for a swim. As we get closer to home and re-enter the Pac-NW, we'll find some campgrounds in Oregon and set up tent. I'm lobbying to stay in the van and watch DVDs while the kids enjoy Nature, but I'm sure that idea will get quickly vetoed and I'll be forced to re-evaluate my love for the outdoors.

And of course, there's been a mention or two by me about casinos we may pass along the way. Since this is mainly a trip for the kids, we'll only be stopping if it's not too far off the route and the time of day doesn't require leaving the kids to sleep in the van. Speaking of the little monkeys, here's a recent picture of my 4 and 7 year old.



There's only one caption I can think of: "BONUS CODE IGGY DAMMIT!"

Taking it Easy

Met up with WSOP Veteran EasyCure at the Silver Dollar after work yesterday. Well, actually, it was a little bit before my shift was up... the network was down for some reason and productivity grinded to halt so I left half an hour early. Things were powering back up just as I was leaving, but I told the boss I had already shut down and wrapped things up for the night. Besides, there were much more important matters to attend to!

I found the man sporting his red WSOP cap, dead center at table 2 (my favorite seat!). He'd been there for less than an hour, but already had pocket Aces cracked and was on his second rack. This place is either Easy Money or Bad Beat Central.

They opened a 3rd table and Easy asked to move down, joining me and my coworker at one end of the table. Nothing spectacular for me... the few decent hands I saw all missed, and if I had stayed in with 84o, I would have taken a big pot when the runner-runner 4's hit against someone who had flopped 2 pair.

I did, however, get to witness Easycure playing "in the zone." He made a call on the River with pocket 8's, with 2 overcards on the board, against a pre-flop raiser who led out the whole way. The PFR mucked. Nice read! Then he pulled the classic Limp-Reraise from UTG with AA. He got plenty of action and was even raised once on the flop. They held up and I think that pot got him back to even! I'm glad I never had to tangle with the beast!

I was there for only about an hour when they broke the table. Down $40 and it was time to hit the road anyways.

MP - looking forward to hanging out with you again soon, and definitely for a more extended period of time. Maybe we'll get to drop some Hammers too!

Crapshootin'

I wish I could attribute my absence to something wild like an alien abduction (I do have an unexplained scar on my shoulder) or being in the Witness Protection Program (my Grandpa did have ties to the Chinese mafia); or even better, some story about a room in Vegas, 4 strippers, and a whole gaggle of Poker bloggers. Alas, the truth is much more mundane.

Work, online classes, family... the occassional poker game: win some, lose some. Even made a trip to the Muckleshoot to take care of a dice-throwing jones. Ironically, my two times at the Craps table was less of a crapshoot than many of the 3/6 and 4/8 sessions!

Okay, I admit, the first time back at the rail, the table was ice-cold. All the way around the table, only three or four rolls, then seven-out and leave. I was down to $25 from $100, and it was just me and the wife left at the table. She said, c'mon let's go, but I told her to give the dice a shot since we were the only ones left. Amazingly, she hit her point, and a few more people joined the table when they saw the chips sliding my way. She continued to hit the numbers, the table filled up again, and when she finally did seven-out, I was up $50! My wife obviously warmed up the table, and I stuck around for another few shooters and took another $100 of the casino's money.

Of course, a good chunk of that went right back into the fishy's pockets in the poker room. No point in trying to berate someone who calls a pre-flop cap and catches their double-gut shot straight draw... it's a 3/6 game, what else would you expect?

But another trip to the Craps table last weekend and a power lunch at the Silver Dollar and I'm doing okay for the month. Now I just need to find some spare time to catch up on the many many blog posts I've missed reading over the last few weeks... see if I can't get back to thinking about the pot-odds rather than the pass line and come-bet odds. Yo-leven... errr, I mean, RAISE!!!