Wild Poker Night at the Boat
My new home poker game has been continuing to meet on Tuesday evenings. It alternates weeks between meeting in someone's first floor apartment (nice temperature, satellite television) and the basement in an older house (cold, subdued atmosphere). Last week's game was in the apartment and a very pleasant affair except for the outcome. I had to scratch back at the end to get to where I was down only $50 -- not bad for a night when I got no cards and everything seemed to go wrong.
The cold and snow this weekend seemed to dictate staying inside, but the poker player in me wanted to play. After my last session at the Par-A-Dice river boat casino, I was tempted to remind my wife to tell me "Remember how you said you hated playing on that effing boat?" Indeed, the results at the boat are often uneven. The last trip, which I don't recall blogging about due to being busy with work, I took a thrashing, losing around two buy-ins, thus the "effing boat." However, it is the only legal place I have to play that isn't at least two plus hours away. Also, I had a slot promo offered: 12 times points, so I had something to do if my wait was long.
Unfortunately, I had forgotten that the last Sunday of the month was reserved for the monthly big bounty tournament. When I got to the boat, there were four tournament tables running and no cash tables. I headed down to the slots area and looked to find the new version of the Willy Wonka slots. Unfortunately, the players card reader was bad and would not read the info from my card, meaning that I could not get my bonus points. I decided to try some other games and had success. Unfortunately, the total time I had to wait to play poker was 2 1/2 hours.
I immediately went up about $35, then went down that same amount and stayed there for quite some time. I was not getting any premium hands and none of my small pocket pairs were improving to sets. It was very frustrating. Then, when I did get the dreaded pocket Kings, the short stack re-pop of my raise told me that I was likely against pocket Aces. Unfortunately, I was correct. The only redeeming part was that a third person came along for the ride and I extracted a side pocket from him to lessen the blow of the Kings going down. It could have been much worse.
I never seemed to get on track and do not think I ever approached being even again as the evening wore on. And then it happened: the chance to win back some money. Two new guys sat at the table, and one said he had little experience playing poker. Based on his play, I believe him. He started out with some black chips, but eventually grabbed in his pocket for some purple chips. Before the night was over, all his black and purple chips were gone. As you might guess, everyone at the table was salivating, hoping to get some kind of hand to get into with this guy. Once you were in, the key was to call light.
I got caught calling some hands just to have a chance to double up. I did get my double up, though, and stayed about even. At some point I saw that I was about $250 down and knew I needed to make a move. It came when I got in a hand with A-7 clubs and saw a flop with two clubs. The wild guys started raising and I monkey-shoved my nut flush draw for $200+. As expected, both other players went all in (one was kind of a shorty) and I had my chance, for we all know that clubs (or crubs!) get there every time. As expected, the turn was a club. Shazam! I was in the black for the first time since the first hour I was there.
Poker carried on for awhile, but once the crazy spewer left, almost everyone called it a night. At three handed I decided to go home, up about $150. I was left to wonder how sweet it might have been if I had only caught a few cards when the spewer was really giving all his money away.
I in no way expected to be at the boat that long, but there was no way that anyone was going to leave when the wild guys appeared. Just another crazy poker night at Par-A-Dice. I had told cokeboy99 that I was going to be leaving relatively early, so he did not come. Maybe we'll get a chance to fling some chips together in the coming weeks.
The cold and snow this weekend seemed to dictate staying inside, but the poker player in me wanted to play. After my last session at the Par-A-Dice river boat casino, I was tempted to remind my wife to tell me "Remember how you said you hated playing on that effing boat?" Indeed, the results at the boat are often uneven. The last trip, which I don't recall blogging about due to being busy with work, I took a thrashing, losing around two buy-ins, thus the "effing boat." However, it is the only legal place I have to play that isn't at least two plus hours away. Also, I had a slot promo offered: 12 times points, so I had something to do if my wait was long.
Unfortunately, I had forgotten that the last Sunday of the month was reserved for the monthly big bounty tournament. When I got to the boat, there were four tournament tables running and no cash tables. I headed down to the slots area and looked to find the new version of the Willy Wonka slots. Unfortunately, the players card reader was bad and would not read the info from my card, meaning that I could not get my bonus points. I decided to try some other games and had success. Unfortunately, the total time I had to wait to play poker was 2 1/2 hours.
I immediately went up about $35, then went down that same amount and stayed there for quite some time. I was not getting any premium hands and none of my small pocket pairs were improving to sets. It was very frustrating. Then, when I did get the dreaded pocket Kings, the short stack re-pop of my raise told me that I was likely against pocket Aces. Unfortunately, I was correct. The only redeeming part was that a third person came along for the ride and I extracted a side pocket from him to lessen the blow of the Kings going down. It could have been much worse.
I never seemed to get on track and do not think I ever approached being even again as the evening wore on. And then it happened: the chance to win back some money. Two new guys sat at the table, and one said he had little experience playing poker. Based on his play, I believe him. He started out with some black chips, but eventually grabbed in his pocket for some purple chips. Before the night was over, all his black and purple chips were gone. As you might guess, everyone at the table was salivating, hoping to get some kind of hand to get into with this guy. Once you were in, the key was to call light.
I got caught calling some hands just to have a chance to double up. I did get my double up, though, and stayed about even. At some point I saw that I was about $250 down and knew I needed to make a move. It came when I got in a hand with A-7 clubs and saw a flop with two clubs. The wild guys started raising and I monkey-shoved my nut flush draw for $200+. As expected, both other players went all in (one was kind of a shorty) and I had my chance, for we all know that clubs (or crubs!) get there every time. As expected, the turn was a club. Shazam! I was in the black for the first time since the first hour I was there.
Poker carried on for awhile, but once the crazy spewer left, almost everyone called it a night. At three handed I decided to go home, up about $150. I was left to wonder how sweet it might have been if I had only caught a few cards when the spewer was really giving all his money away.
I in no way expected to be at the boat that long, but there was no way that anyone was going to leave when the wild guys appeared. Just another crazy poker night at Par-A-Dice. I had told cokeboy99 that I was going to be leaving relatively early, so he did not come. Maybe we'll get a chance to fling some chips together in the coming weeks.
posted by lightning36 at 1:00 PM
4 Comments:
Awesome! When are you going to make it out here so we can go & play some poker?!?!?!? The best kind of player is the brand new player at the table. You can extract value like crazy. I'll never forget the player who should have stacked me with a flopped boat, but instead folded believing that trip 7's beat trip 3's (which was actually a set of 3's full of 7's): http://lowstakeshands.blogspot.com/2013/12/getting-fold-from-fish.html
I didn't know that clubs always come... :) Nice outing - I never get anything when the obvious fish joins the table.
I'm glad it ended up well for you. Hopefully we do get a chance soon, maybe we can both get a good run of cards for a change!!
We've learned a lot from other bloggers. Crubs (not clubs) always get there (courtesy of BWOP) and 2-4 is the strongest starting hand (The Grump).
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