How Much to Staple Your Arm?
Blogging from 30,000 feet
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
As I write this I am flying north to Seattle. I’m super excited for the next twelve days. Rick Fuller is hosting me there this weekend and next weekend, before and after our hunting trip to Alaska for all of next week. I’m sure there will be much fun on the weekends, but the purpose of the trip is definitely the hunting.
There is a bear, right now, foraging around Prince of Wales Island, trying desperately to catch him self a fish. In two weeks that bear is going to be my rug, and in four weeks that same bear is going to be the main course of a party at my house: bear burgers.
We also have tags for blacktail deer and will be doing a bunch of fishing for the big Alaskan freshwater species.
So, in preparation for that, I’ve had the pleasure of spending mad monies at Bass Pro Shops and my local automatic weapons (legal in NV) depot.
Weatherby Mark V 7mm magnum: $2k
Ruger Super Redhawk 44 magnum revolver: $700
Leupold Scope: $900
Nikon Binoculars: $300
Gore-tex camoflague: $300
Ammunition: $300
Guide and lodging: $800
Flights: $750
And a ton of other miscellaneous stuff. If women get as much pleasure out of shopping for shoes as I got shopping at those two stores in the past few months, then I finally understand (but still - they’re shoes).
I’m going to do my best to blog while I’m up there, but there’s a big part of me that wants to leave all electronic devices in Seattle. I probably will end up doing just that and keep it with pen and paper and transcribe when I get back next weekend. I guarantee pics and posts eventually!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
So, I won a poker tournament this week. That was fun. First time I’ve won one outright since November. Sounds about right with how many (or few comparing to some of these guys) I play. I made a significant change in my tournament game between all the tourneys on Sunday and the ones I played on Monday. I had to go back to the old school selective aggression rather than playing like a LAGtard like I like to in live tournaments. I believe that the specific reason that my lagginess has not worked online is that I do not know the online environment well, am not known (thus can’t get as much respect as I can live), am not able to use my physical reading abilities, and I do not know the players as well. I think in the tournament I won I only played like 18% of my hands going into the final table with a pre-flop raise percentage of something like 12% overall. These numbers were obviously much higher as I got deeper, but you get the idea.
I want to point out the key mistake that my opponents made at the end that were the key to my victory. Read that again, it was not my brilliant play deep that won me the tournament, it was the mistakes that they made and the ones that I did not make.
First one: five left, I’m third in chips w/360k, 1.4mil in play. UTG is the chip leader with a little over 500k. Blinds are 5k-10k/2k. UTG opens for 120,000!!!! ?!?!?!?!?!?!? Yeah, I was confused too. I had AKo in the small blind though and shipped my 360k in the middle gleefully. HE FOLDED! I literally laughed out loud, cracking up. Five players left of a major tournament and the guy plays that bad. For the record, when blinds are that big of a percentage relative to the average stack, you should never, ever, ever, ever, ever open raise for more than 3x the big blind. If my opponent didn’t do this it is exponentially more difficult for me to win the tournament.
Second hand, same flavor. Heads up, previous 2nd in chips is now the leader and I’ve lost some back (why it would’ve been much more difficult to win. He has 1.1mil I have 300k. Blinds are 10k-20k/4k. The guy open shoves the button! So retarded! I have TT, gladly call, and he has J8. Why? Why?!? Why??????? Any hand that I’m shoving on him I’m also calling his shove with, and ALL of those hands have J8 crushed to very crushed. I’m not calling there with 77. Ever. Super dumb play, I got doubled up, and the rest was history.
So, learn from my opponents, and don’t make stupid pre-flop raises (amounts, not cards. You’re allowed to have any two cards when raising pre-flop in a tournament!).
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sunday Jared let me do the stupidest thing ever to him for $200: staple his arm twice, anywhere between the wrist and the shoulder in any place that’s not obvious bone or joint as hard as I can with a standard Swingline. How the heck could I pass up this offer? Fifty years from now we’re going to be sitting on a 2007 pontoon boat on some lake drinking a PBR, and I’m going to make fun of him for the time that he let me slam two staples into his arm. Neither of us were drunk either, which was the most retarded thing. So, I nailed his tricep for the first one, and then right into the top of his forearm for the second one. I would have felt bad on the soft part of the fore arm. These things went straight in, rested flush against his skin, and when he finally peeled them out of his skin the tabs were both bent in (like staples do) about 60 degrees (almost the whole way - definitely curved though!) I would have had to pay a fortune ($5k+) to do something like that to one of the poker fellas that I hang out with, but Jared let me have this lifelong gem of a story for three tanks of gasoline.
Unfortunately, Jared got his gem earlier this summer on me for free. 4am, at the same bar, and this time we’re all very much under the influence (as if you couldn’t gather that from the beginning of the story - “So, we’re at a bar at 4am…”). I’m playing video poker and a pretty little friend of mine starts scratching my back. Nails. Woman’s touch. Back scratch. Me likey. Ughhhhh… it feels soooooooo good. I stop gambling and put my head down resting on my hands but still sitting up. She moves up to my neck (sensitive…) and starts playing with my ear (not fair) and I say, “ohhhhhhh, that’s not fair…. That’s my spot.” She then moves all the way down my face and at this point funny things are going to phase two and I’m putty. She puts her fingers on my lips and I start kissin em and suckin on em and getting all into it. After about 10-15 seconds I feel my head get jerked, pulled by the hand in my mouth, AWAY from the side that the pretty little girlie was sitting and right into the bosom of my brother Jared, at which point he asks me, with his hand still in my mouth, “What are you doing?!?” Worst part: it was at the gaming bar that they all work at, and they have access to the surveillance tapes.
Cheers! If you’re in Seattle and will be at the Bumper Shoot Saturday, gimme a holler!
Peace and good luck,
Devo
Legends of Poker Main Event: My End of Day One
I felt like I was playing while treading water with cement shoes. So, yeah. I played the 10k WPT Legends of Poker main event, day 1a yesterday. After the first level (and even during the first level), there simply wasn't a damn thing I could do. I had somewhere in the neighborhood of fifteen pocket pairs, all 77 or lower except one pair of tens that I had to push all-in on the turn as a bluff to win the pot. Know what I mean? Everything was super pain in the ass.
The biggest pot I played was in the first level, blinds 50-100, starting stack of $20k. I started in the 8 seat on a nine handed table, and the player in the one seat was literally the worst player I had ever seen in any major event. I limp UTG with Q J, really bad player min raises, and we see a flop five ways. Flop 8 9 T . Uhhh... Ok. SB donks for 150, I make it 1k, really bad player calls, SB folds, turn is heads up, 6 . Best card ever, cause this is the type of guy to call with a naked 7 drawing for the straight. I bet 1500, actually hoping to get raised, cause I know this guy doesn't have two hearts in his hand. He just calls after making some speech about me having two hearts and blah, blah, blah, and now I'm sure this guy has at least two pair, and most likely a naked seven. LOL. I really hope the river bricks out so I can overbet the pot and let him incinerate his dollars on behalf of me (thanks Poker Bob for that beautiful imagery). River, 2 . AYA. I check, hoping he'll make some desperate bluff, and REALLY hoping that whatever he bets isn't with the 3 T cause then I think I'll incinerate myself. He fires out 3k and I instantly call. He says, "I don't have a heart." I say, "That's good. Whatcha got?" I must see this guy's hand, and he shows me A7o. Drawing dead on the flop. Sweet.
After that though I flopped trips once in a limped pot out of the SB and won the pot with my initial bet and top pair once and lost a big pot. Every single other chip I won after that pot was by outplaying people, and even that didn't work one time whe a guy called me on the river with 33 on a T94T5 three heart board on the river. Naturally I had one of two possible hands he could beat.
The hand I finally went bust with I got all my money in the worst possible (normal) spot, the ol AK vs. AA but again, by that point I was short enough that I had to put it all into the middle. Oh well.
I'm happy with the way I played. I'm especially happy with how patient I was even though my cards sucked and my flops sucked. I didn't try and outplay people when the opportunity was not there, I didn't try and push the action when I shouldn't, and did as well as I could have with the spots I found myself in.
Speaking of outplaying people, I just bluffed off all my chips in the $500 Sunday Million with 55 vs. KK, knowing that I was against either AA or KK. The pre-flop action went like this - 50/100, he opens for 300 in the cutoff, I make it 1k from the SB, and he re-raises to 2k. I instantly know he has AA or KK. Flop, QJ8, I hope the guy is good enough to realize that I flopped a set and lay down his hand, and he wasn't.
I've been thinking about that a lot lately. The true art of poker comes into play when you are thinking about what they have, they're thinking about what you have, and y'all are thinking about what each other thinks each other has. When you're able to put your opponent on a hand and figure out what they think you have, if what they think you might have beats them and then you represent that, you can often get them to lay down big hands.
The problem often though is that with so many unknowns running around you can't know if they are thinkers or stinkers without some history of play. I need to stop trying to outplay people unless I know that they can lay down a hand.
I'll be playing online tourneys all day on stars and tilt. Badbeatninja is the name.
Peace and good luck,
Devo
Chaos Theory: Life and Poker
Laundry by the pound baby! Today I have been experiencing first hand the Chaos Theory. It states that, "The universe moves from a state of order to a state of disorder unless outside energy is put in." My house, bedroom, and truck are in states of disorder.
However, a little nugget of beauty has been discovered through this bit of craziness called my house. My friend Travis told me that I can take my laundry to the cleaners and pay them to do it. He said, "It's great man! They charge you by the pound and it comes back to you all folded like Mama did it!" So, I rolled into the cleaners with five full size black trash bags full of un-sorted, un-insided-outed, and all sorts of smelliness going on. Eighty pounds, $112, I pick it up on Friday evening. It don't get much sweeter than that!
As far as the world of poker goes, I'm really trying to get back to a place of grinding a lot more and putting in a lot more hours than I have, well... this summer I guess. This summer during the series I pretty much worked five or six days a week, but would be done after I busted out of an event. Then I took a bunch of time off after the series which I had planned on doing for a while, and officially got back on the horse in the beginning of August. Then I got my nuts kicked in while in LA and had to play whiffle ball instead of hard ball back here in Vegas.
Damnit, I'm bored playing whiffle ball unless I'm playing with my buddies, and then I don't take it seriously.
I really gotta get my iPod fixed or something, cause this is how I went broke for the first and only time back in Feb of 04. I had run good early in my career, kept a short bankroll, and didn't put in the hours thinking that I'd be able to make $100 playing poker for one hour every day and then that it'd be enough to live on. I was completely unmotivated to put in the hours that I should have put in. I enjoyed the freedoms of this job way more liberally than I should have. Looking back, bummer for me too - because that was the golden age for internet poker when money was being given away by the tens of thousands by horrible play.
At the same time though, I don't regret not working as much, as I thoroughly enjoyed all the time I played in the wilderness and traveling and hanging out with friends, just the same as I thoroughly am enjoying the ability to travel right now and goof off as much as I am. My bankroll is still plenty healthy, but I have to be a little more responsible with work and life.
Thinking of all those things lead me down to the strip by 11am yesterday where I headed to the Apple store determined to fix my melted iPod, and that didn't happen. I was pretty disappointed by the customer service to say the least. The guy I was dealing with was dumb as a stump, finally took down the information for my order and said I'd get a call by 5pm. Well, its 26 hours after that time and I haven't even gotten a phone call yet. Grr.
I made it into the Bellagio by 1pm, tortured a 20-40 stud game while waiting for a seat, and ended up sitting in the 40-80 mix game. I've been playing that game exclusively lately and it's been sick hella good. I'm guessing that all the local studs are in LA. Actually, I know that's where most of em are. I ended up winning $1k in the 3 hours that the game survived.
Sooooooooo... Speaking of traveling, I have a bunch of that coming up. Lake day tomorrow, head to LA sometime by the weekend, and then fly to Seattle on the 30th. I leave Seattle on the 2nd heading norther to Kechikan (or however you spell it), Alaska to spend a week on Prince of Wales Island hunting, hiking, and fishing. I've never gone hunting for anything bigger than squirrel before so it should be an interesting experience. Following that I'm planning on heading to Atlantic City for the Open, Minnesota for the Fall Classic mid October, and then to Dublin, Ireland for the EPT event there and general gallivanting across the Gaelic countryside. Halloween with a bunch of Irishmen? I can't wait. I'm super excited for that trip.
Peace and good luck,
Devo
Back to the Practice Field...
Man, these guys suck at poker So after getting owned all day online yesterday, Travis and I drove back to Vegas nast night after he took 8th in the Sunday million. Today I woke up, had breakfast/lunch/whatever you call first meal at 2pm at the Miracle Mile shops at Planet Hollywood. I felt like I earned five metrosexual points with my meal consisting of a caesar salad and water with lemon.
After that I headed across the street to the Bellagio, AKA the practice field. The plan: play some 30-60 limit whiffle-ball and get a little bit of confidence back while hopefully trying to make some monies.
I sit down at a table with only one person that I recognize and immediately witness these two hands.
First one: final board reads 567J9r. Dude bets, woman calls, dude turns over K9, woman looks intently at the hand, then tables T8 and says, "I have the nuts."
I LOLed.
Next hand: Flop Q33 7 ways with a raise. Same guy donks into the next woman to his left who was the pfr. She calls as does one other player. Turn A, guy bets, woman raises, guy 3 bets, she calls. River x, bet/call. She says, "A3?" He says, "No, do you have A3?" as he tables 43o. She says, ahhhhh... and tables QQ.
This time I really laughed out loud. Man, those girls play like girls!
I ran pretty bad, but still managed to win a monster pot when they (KK and QQ) let my 88 in cheap and I proceeded to flop a set and then they went ape shit on the flop and turn because they played so sneakily pre-flop.
Note: KK and QQ are only one pair! Never slow-play em pre-flop (or anytime for that matter...)
Today was really good for me though because I realized that no matter what happens with my adventure to make it to the top top levels and stay there full time, I will always be able to make 150k/year at 30-60, cause the games are just that good.
So, it feels good to be back in the land of Vegas, and I'm ready to get onto the lake!
Peace and good luck,
Devo
Man, am I discouraged.
Just getting tortured. In another one of those funks. I've officially posted a new longest streak w/o cashing in a tournament at 20 live ones since my wsop cash. I'm catching up with that number online, just getting tortured in every single way. I'm seriously something in the neighborhood of 15% on races and 40% on 3-1's. I haven't won a single 1-3 dog. It's been a rough week as far as poker goes, that's for sure. Usually I'd be fixin to get the hell out of dodge by now as I can only take LA in short spurts, but I'm actually really enjoying my trip.
Oops. Just busted out of another online tourney. 11 outer all in on flop three ways.
But, yeah. Poker's killing me. Yesterday I played a hand with Mike (O'Malley I believe) in a 10-20 NL cash game where he check-called the flop and turn against me with Q9o on an A K J , 8 board. Of course, this time I was bluffing, but it's the first time I've ever bluffed on a board like that. WTF. I knew he had QT at best too, but after he called the turn (big bets here too... I raised pf, bet flop, bet turn in a straddled pot) I gave up and decided my read was off. Nope. Pair of queens good.
Okay. Rant over. I hate poker. Now it's over.
I've spent a lot of time on this trip hanging out with people that have always been good friends of mine, but now they're way gooder friends of mine. I love people, and I love spending quality time with quality people in this poker world. Somehow if I get a hold of a car and a sofa to crash on I may stick around, but I'm running out of cash rapidly (obv) and need to get some more in Vegas. I'm stuck somewhere in the neighborhood of $6k live and $4k online. Gross.
Not really sure what I should do. I probably should drop back down to 40 and book some winners and work on my menta state. I think something's broken with my reads as they've been off way more than they should have been lately.
Oops. Just decided to play a hand. Made the 2nd nuts on turn, same on river, no good.
Maybe I'll just take some time off and go surfing.
Peace and more better luck,
Devo
Intersting dialogue in my comments
This all started back around the end of the series when I was getting deeper with these blogs and realizing that I need to adjust some attitude of mine...
Anon: Yes loser you need to make a lot of life changes. 1) Get a job; 2) Stop being such an arrogant ...
07.22.07 - 12:50 pm
Bryan Devonshire »LOLOLOLOL. Thank you for that insight.
07.22.07 - 3:08 pm
Anon: your welcome i am sure your dad would be proud of your productive lifestyle, hanging around other po ker junkies.
07.24.07 - 7:21 am
Anon: Bryan, That comment was low so my apologies. I feel slightly ashamed of myself I know how persona l tragedy feels, my mother died in an accident. I am going to put my thoughts more eloquantly. You are clearly an intellegent person, you writing shows that. Poker really isnt meant to be someones life work, the only people who will say otherwise are fellow poker players. The poker players have an interest in encouraging each other to play since it gives reassuarance to themselves their path must be correct. Poker is a very fun game, but it would be a very sad existence if it takes over you life (as it seems to have done). Ultimately you will find much more satisfaction from other things in life. You clearly have a talent at poker but this isnt the only thing in life you could be good at. I dont believe anyone will really find happiness constantly sweating the turn of a card.
07.24.07 - 8:26 am
Bryan Devonshire »First two comments deserve some F You's, but since you've already apologized for the really bad one in the middle I wasn't able to get pissed at you. I think there's a good life lesson for both of us here because I completely agree with you one hundred percent. The problem is that you think you know what I'm thinking and intend and that bias has influenced your attitude towards me. First off, poker is a way to make money. What difference is there really between working in poker to make some monies and working in any other pointless job to make monies? Second, poker is not only a game, but it is a community around the felt, around town, and around the country. I have met some incredible people in my several years of poker involvement. I have also met some not good people. But if you as a person can affect good in the lives of those you are around, then you are doing something good for the world, even if it's sitting around a poker table. Is this what I want to do forever? No. Is it he best thing for me right now? I think so.
07.24.07 - 5:54 pm
Anon: Bryan, I agree with you when you say "What difference is there really between working in poker to make some monies and working in any other pointless job to make monies?" The point has to be not to find a pointless a job. Sure playing poker for a living beats working at Burger King, but it far less fulfilling than many occupations. I love my job earn over 200k US a year (with excellent prospects of a salary increase) and work for myself all at the age of 29. Would I swap this for a life on the green felt? No way. It took me a lot of hard work and studying to get where I am, dont let time slip you by. I do play poker and am quite good at it (won a major tourn), but there is no way I would ever consider making it my life work. I once went to Vegas for a couple of weeks and finished up 10k, it was unhealthy towards the end of it that I was showing disdain for money.
07.25.07 - 5:43 am
(Personal edit: I didn't respond to this. Absolutely us poker players have a disdain for money. Is that a bad thing?)
New Anon: I guess we all have dreams. I wonder what Jesus would say about you wanting to make a career out of encouraging people to gamble but I'm not judging you. Still...
08.08.07 - 9:46 pm
Bryan Devonshire »Dear anon: A) If you think this is what I want to make my career, then you obviously haven't rea d any of this blog. I'm assuming you linked from wherever that was that said I am a player with a dream, etc, etc... B) How in the world am I encouraging people to gamble? I mean seriously. The games are going very strong downstairs here at the commerce with or without me. Actually in the long run, the games go longer WITHOUT me because I take (usually) money from the gambling economy! Christ calls us to be all things to all people and to be an example of him no matter where we find ourselves. This is the situation that I have found myself in, and I like it. The battle for me that I am wrestling very much with right now is how to be Christlike in an environment such as this one that I am in. Anon, I do not believe you at all that you are not judging me. It is judgment like this that pushed me and many others like me away from the church in the first place. You challenge me like you actually know my heart and my dreams but you don't care about me enough to learn the whole story, and you challenge me from behind a veil of anonymity. Please, please, please - stop believing that you are better than other people that you know nothing about simply because you feel that you lead a more Christian lifestyle than that person. That is the worst, most counter-productive evangelism that you could possibly perform. Devo
08.09.07 - 2:18 pm
Anyways, off to play the $500 LHE tourney at the bike today.
Peace and good luck,
Devo
Legends of Poker Events 2 & 3, $545 NLHE & $335r NLHE
Sorry it's been a while... ... but I wrote a long blog on the way here that disappeared into cyberspace and I went on blog tilt and decided I wasn't going to write about what I was writing about anymore.
6:47 am in bed at the Commerce Casino. Let's work backwards:
Played shorthanded 100-200 LHE from 3:30 am to 5:30 am, made $1700, was never up until last twenty minutes. Sick hand here:
Aggressive button raises, I 3 bet 3 3 , weak-tight BTN caps, we both call.
Flop A 6 3 . i check, BB checks, BTN bets, I raise, BB 3 bets, BTN caps, both call.
Turn: 7 . I bet, BB raises, BTN 3 bets, I call (pair the board one damn time!), BB folds (told you weak-tight).
River 3 . Zing! I bet, he calls. $4400 pot.
Before that I went to dinner at C&O Trattoria (best Italian joint in LA), partied at the hermosa pier, and waded in the Pacific ocean.
Before that I played some 40-80 at the bike, winning $1760. I played an interesting hand where for the first time ever I felt that my articles could be used against me. My opponent of interest in this hand was a super nice gentleman who I had a great time sitting next to and is a reader of this blog. Big pot, i had nut straight on turn, and had him on the heart draw. Heart on river, I bet anyways, and thought for a moment, "Boy, I sure hope he hasn't read the Scare Card article." So, I asked him if he's read my articles before he had a chance to do anything and he said no. Phew. Othewise I would have been forced to call his raise!
Before that I went off in the rebuy tourney. Eight of em, good for $2735 down the tubes in a $300 tourney. I had such a great table and got it in so good almost every time, got snapped a bunch, missed 3 12+ out draws all-in, set cracked, top pair cracked, trips cracked, ace high cracked (yes, shoved with A high post and got called by K high)... got felted on last hand of rebuys, did the double/double (rebuy/add-on) for $1200, and never won another pot. I hate poker.
Friday was our first full day in town and Travis took 5th in the $500 event. Atta boy! I naturally blew my brains again in a disappointing fashion, tripleing up in the first level only to slowly dwindle into nothingness. From there I decided to make my first donation in five years to the cash games at the Bike and blew $3k.
So, stuck $2500ish after two days, planning on being here through next weekend.
Peace and good luck y'all and sorry for the crappy content.
Devo
Bored in Vegas? Go Somewhere Else!
Detroit, Monroe, Adrian, Jackson, Lake Mead, and Laughlin Sorry I haven't written in a while, but I've simply been pretty busy traveling around goofing off. Last Thursday I flew to Detroit for a random and spontaneous trip to visit a friend of mine that is a professional pool player. Now, pool is something that is played in bars and my buddies and I gamble on it for way too much money. I was exposed to the underworld of pool this weekend, and I got hooked. My friend and I chased around the tournament circuit in Michigan and I was exposed to some professional pool players, I played in my first two pool tournaments, I bought a stick, and just want to play pool these days. I played one guy named Adam Smith who is one of the top male players in the midwest, and some would even call him the best. He destroyed me. Watching him play was truly like watching an artist. I actually got him in two games in a race to seven, but one was because he made a mistake on the 8 scratching and giving me ball in hand for an easy run-out on the eight-nine. The other game was when I had a one-nine combo off the break that was definately a makeable shot. It was still a very challenging shot and I was very proud to pull it off, but the point is that I didn't exactly "beat" Adam in two games, I just happened to win two of them. Those two games are like a bad player winning a couple of hands against a better player - it doesn't mean that the bad player beat the good player, it means that they won a couple of hands. Big deal. There are so many similarities between the pool world and the poker world. I had a blast hanging with those guys.
So I came back Sunday night, and us roomies went to play pool!
Monday, I woke up and was planning on getting some good work done. Then, I got tortured in every effing screen open on my desktop for the first half an hour. In the one tourney I played ($162 FTP) I got it all in pre with KK and ended up being against AA... and KK! Grrrrr... It was an interesting spot actually because I definately could have laid those kings down pre. I've been in the school of thought that says never lay kings down unless you absolutely know your opponent or it's on the bubble of a super satellite, etc, etc..., but in this case it went UTG raise to 90, BTN raise to 300, I raise to 900 BB, UTG call, BTN shove, I cover both but it's like twelve minutes into the tourney and they're both around the starting stack. But, people do stupid things too much and I just can't do it against unknowns and esp. online. That was when I decided I had enough and I was off to do something.
I ended up at the pool hall.
Tuesday was a lake day all day. We finally got the trailer bearings fixed and got the Piece of Ship back on the water. A little piece of me is actually disappointed that we don't have a crappy looking blue pontoon boat with a 3x5 foot pirate flag on mast sitting on a crappy trailer sitting on cinder blocks in front of our house anymore. Now it's on tires again. Disappointing.
Anyways, on the way back from the lake we were discussing what we were going to eat when Jared said, "Lets go to Laughlin." Two hours later we were checking into a free room at the Edgewater. We then went to Loser's Lounge and honestly thought that everybody there was playing some joke on us. It's really hard to describe the sceen in the club without offending 90% of society in some way or another. I'll just leave it at that - it was a very eclectic, diverse, and odd crowd. The "we gotta get out of here moment" was when the lead singer chick for the cover band pulled out a cowbell and played it like it was going out of style for the final song of the night. Not as a joke, not as a small addidition, but as a "hey, this song is better with cowbell, so I'm gonna bang away on it with a drumstick for most of the entire song so the crowd will like us more." From there we went to the poker room and played drunken 2-6 spread limit poker. The game got turned upside down on hand one where I sit down, raise blind (over two limpers - 80 and 60 year old ladies... :-), say, "Y'all should call. I probably don't have anything." Everybody folds and I table my 92o. Good times. Once the table realized that we were just three kids there for good times and gambooooling everybody got along and it was a very fun table.
From there we headed back on the boardwalk, stopped into our favorite little bar in Laughlin, the Regency. Danny and I played a death match of pool for $50 a rack, and I edged him 2-1. Back to the Edgewater, to McDonalds for breakfast, and Jared did one of the silliest drunken things ever. He asks the lady behind the counter, who happenes to be the same one who denied my $100 bribe for 20 chicken nuggets last March when they were serving breakfast at a similar moment in the day, for "The biggest and best breakfast you have." Then, for some weird reason the guy orders FIVE large orange juices. Total bill: $21.56. Just for him! McDonalds breakfast! LOL! The best part though that is when we got to the room and the three of us were preparing to eat, Danny and Jared got into a wrestling match, Jared laid down in bed post wrestling, and FORGOT to eat his breakfast that he was so excited about! We are still laughing about that as I write this.
After I finished breakfast I decided to play some 5-10 NL online cause the 15-30 games weren't going (bad idea). I managed to get a guy all-in on the flop when he started the hand with $1100 pre holding the A K on a 9 5 3 flop. He was drawing stone dead vs. my A K , and I nailed my freeroll on the river. Sweet :-).
Then watcing the hand histories this morning, I saw this one and it was evidence of reasons to not play drunken high stakes poker. Button opens for $35, I make it $110 on BB with A8o, he calls. Flop T7x two spades, I bet $120, he makes it $330, I shove for all the monies about $700 more, he folds. Lucky me, retarded play all around!
Anyways, off to breakfast.
Peace and good luck!
Devo
Bored in Vegas? Go Somewhere Else!
Detroit, Monroe, Adrian, Jackson, Lake Mead, and Laughlin Sorry I haven't written in a while, but I've simply been pretty busy traveling around goofing off. Last Thursday I flew to Detroit for a random and spontaneous trip to visit a friend of mine that is a professional pool player. Now, pool is something that is played in bars and my buddies and I gamble on it for way too much money. I was exposed to the underworld of pool this weekend, and I got hooked. My friend and I chased around the tournament circuit in Michigan and I was exposed to some professional pool players, I played in my first two pool tournaments, I bought a stick, and just want to play pool these days. I played one guy named Adam Smith who is one of the top male players in the midwest, and some would even call him the best. He destroyed me. Watching him play was truly like watching an artist. I actually got him in two games in a race to seven, but one was because he made a mistake on the 8 scratching and giving me ball in hand for an easy run-out on the eight-nine. The other game was when I had a one-nine combo off the break that was definately a makeable shot. It was still a very challenging shot and I was very proud to pull it off, but the point is that I didn't exactly "beat" Adam in two games, I just happened to win two of them. Those two games are like a bad player winning a couple of hands against a better player - it doesn't mean that the bad player beat the good player, it means that they won a couple of hands. Big deal. There are so many similarities between the pool world and the poker world. I had a blast hanging with those guys.
So I came back Sunday night, and us roomies went to play pool!
Monday, I woke up and was planning on getting some good work done. Then, I got tortured in every effing screen open on my desktop for the first half an hour. In the one tourney I played ($162 FTP) I got it all in pre with KK and ended up being against AA... and KK! Grrrrr... It was an interesting spot actually because I definately could have laid those kings down pre. I've been in the school of thought that says never lay kings down unless you absolutely know your opponent or it's on the bubble of a super satellite, etc, etc..., but in this case it went UTG raise to 90, BTN raise to 300, I raise to 900 BB, UTG call, BTN shove, I cover both but it's like twelve minutes into the tourney and they're both around the starting stack. But, people do stupid things too much and I just can't do it against unknowns and esp. online. That was when I decided I had enough and I was off to do something.
I ended up at the pool hall.
Tuesday was a lake day all day. We finally got the trailer bearings fixed and got the Piece of Ship back on the water. A little piece of me is actually disappointed that we don't have a crappy looking blue pontoon boat with a 3x5 foot pirate flag on mast sitting on a crappy trailer sitting on cinder blocks in front of our house anymore. Now it's on tires again. Disappointing.
Anyways, on the way back from the lake we were discussing what we were going to eat when Jared said, "Lets go to Laughlin." Two hours later we were checking into a free room at the Edgewater. We then went to Loser's Lounge and honestly thought that everybody there was playing some joke on us. It's really hard to describe the sceen in the club without offending 90% of society in some way or another. I'll just leave it at that - it was a very eclectic, diverse, and odd crowd. The "we gotta get out of here moment" was when the lead singer chick for the cover band pulled out a cowbell and played it like it was going out of style for the final song of the night. Not as a joke, not as a small addidition, but as a "hey, this song is better with cowbell, so I'm gonna bang away on it with a drumstick for most of the entire song so the crowd will like us more." From there we went to the poker room and played drunken 2-6 spread limit poker. The game got turned upside down on hand one where I sit down, raise blind (over two limpers - 80 and 60 year old ladies... :-), say, "Y'all should call. I probably don't have anything." Everybody folds and I table my 92o. Good times. Once the table realized that we were just three kids there for good times and gambooooling everybody got along and it was a very fun table.
From there we headed back on the boardwalk, stopped into our favorite little bar in Laughlin, the Regency. Danny and I played a death match of pool for $50 a rack, and I edged him 2-1. Back to the Edgewater, to McDonalds for breakfast, and Jared did one of the silliest drunken things ever. He asks the lady behind the counter, who happenes to be the same one who denied my $100 bribe for 20 chicken nuggets last March when they were serving breakfast at a similar moment in the day, for "The biggest and best breakfast you have." Then, for some weird reason the guy orders FIVE large orange juices. Total bill: $21.56. Just for him! McDonalds breakfast! LOL! The best part though that is when we got to the room and the three of us were preparing to eat, Danny and Jared got into a wrestling match, Jared laid down in bed post wrestling, and FORGOT to eat his breakfast that he was so excited about! We are still laughing about that as I write this.
After I finished breakfast I decided to play some 5-10 NL online cause the 15-30 games weren't going (bad idea). I managed to get a guy all-in on the flop when he started the hand with $1100 pre holding the A K on a 9 5 3 flop. He was drawing stone dead vs. my A K , and I nailed my freeroll on the river. Sweet :-).
Then watcing the hand histories this morning, I saw this one and it was evidence of reasons to not play drunken high stakes poker. Button opens for $35, I make it $110 on BB with A8o, he calls. Flop T7x two spades, I bet $120, he makes it $330, I shove for all the monies about $700 more, he folds. Lucky me, retarded play all around!
Anyways, off to breakfast.
Peace and good luck!
Devo
|
