In praise of good decisions...aka I got jobbed, but at least made some dough...aka my life as a $4/hr MTT playah...

To start: as most of you know, Eric aka Bone-Daddy deleted his blog. I miss it. It was my first link. You are mentioned in my first post. I was stunned to find you had started one at exactly the same time I did. So yeah, it's gone, but he ain't dead. And we'll always have Mel to bind us togethah. soon...soon. Is that why you deleted it? To punish me? Overkill, overkill...

On with the show:

Let me be clear.

O Mighty Universal Power That Made This Happy, Somewhat Useful Dab of Clay:
Me humble idiot. Me know that. Take pity and do not punish me for screenshot or recap of largely mediocre poker results. Me no worth the time.

Where was I?

Oh yeah. For those at my table at WWdN, I apologize to Jules. Not more than 5 minutes after she sweetly complimented my play by observing I am many days removed from playing like the imbecile I used to be, I played like the imbecile I used to be. $11 bucks down the drain.

Weak overbet pushed, but we had spent the morning just girly chatting, and I thought he might be looking to pull a hammer at my expense. So I call him and his ATo with A4s. This is 12 hours after Weak analysed my tracker numbers that he had and begged me to stop dumping dead money into the pot. VP$IP = 31% bad? Now I know. And knowing is half the battle presumably.

I don't know how I even got to the point where I thought A4s would be a decent sword to do the Hammer in. So fucking dumb. Okay if you're off on your own in some nameless MTT, I guess. But not in front of your friends. It was my intent to win that thing. I think I truly despise playing on Stars now, mostly my own fault and is likely related to my hideous play there in the very recent past. I keep money on Stars solely to play our blogger tourneys. I can't even stand the look of the Stars login screen - the color scheme is as Wes noted, nastificerous in extremis [not Real Latin]. I have 6k VPP's so I guess I ain't done with it's river voodoo just yet, but FT has been the home I always wanted as a kid, so there I stay for now.

Next, to anyone who might have seen my play in the FT 20k... I know I looked like a tool. I couldn't get anything going, so I tried to be Joe Clevah. Went out pushing with A9. Not my A game. I can go deep in that tourney, I truly believe that. It's just going to take longer than I thought. $26 bucks down the drain.

But here is what redeemed the night. I was wide awake after bouncing from the 20k and feeling pretty clear headed. [Aside: I may stop looking for tokens all together, they seem to jinx whatever tourney I use them for - all my cashes to date have been direct buy-ins. It's almost as though I play better because I want my money back first! ] So I checked FT's weirdo kaleidoscope that passes for an intro screen and looked for my kinda game. But there wasn't one. Except the $109 buy-in 15k. Out of my league? Er... Crack'nAces was already enrolled. Chad came within a hair of a WSOP bracelet this year, if that gives you some perspective.

But I felt good. Smart, even. Like I could compete or at least use it as a learning experience to see where my current limits are. So in I went, with $109 bucks out of my beloved and much cherished bankroll. Want to hear something odd? This seemed less of a gamble than the 100 I post when I sit down at 100NL.

First surprise? 3k chips. Sweet. If I was the bad beat relating type I might mention my near final table performance in the deepstack 9k yesterday. But that ain't my style. Besides, if you use the mouse scrolly thing you can read that post right after this one. It's the magic of the computah, Lisa....

Second surprise? longer levels - 12 instead of 10 minutes.

Third surprise? 6 handed. Now you'd think I would have at least read all these things before spending 109 bucks. I would do it anywhere else in my life. But not on FTP. I just trust the rivah and it always makes it good. Never played a 6handed MTT before. Turns out, I like 'em a lot.

In fact, the tournament was truly fun. No other way to describe it. You had time and chips to make plays. Plus short-handed, aggression was given a hell of a lot more respect that it usualy is. Each level I nearly doubled my previous chip count. I flopped no sets the entire time, but that was counteracted by having kings hold up 3 times. AA once but no action. Other than that, just a day at the beach, where I sat in the top 20 nearly from start to finish. Stacked someone using 68s and hitting two pair to kill their TPTK. Talk about unhappy. You think Waffles tilts? This guy had to be asked by the entire table to fuck off. I laughed out loud the whole time.

Closing in on the endgame I was fourth after I made the Big Call, on a guy I was sure had at most a mid pair to my paired J with watchdog A but a very coordinated board. The plot was thickened by a murky Kc that I kept trying to represent was mine, while he stubbornly insisted was his. Long story short, I felt the whole way along I might be able to final table this thing too. That confidence to take chances and get creative came back and I built a stack that was gonna get me there, one day after I posted about it!

Right on schedule, I got a very desirable 9k pushed in by someone I felt sure I was WAY ahead of (I held AT and flopped AAx but two diamonds). She pushed to my BIG flop bet, but it had the ring of desperation. I also had her covered with 11k behind me. I make Big Call number two, and find I am 75/25 to take this whole thing down and cruise into first just when the blinds are getting nuts.

Later, after my face had been washed several times and obscenities had been uttered and typed to both peaker and slb, after I had taken a brief walk to put the broken Wiggles nightlight in the garbage...I decided that my 11k mini-stack was not going to go via tilt into some idiots purse without a fight.

I changed goals midstream, forsaking the idea of winning and focused my plans on just making it up the hill into 27th, where the greenbacks were. There were many half-assed steals and one race I probably should have let go, but I made it. The race I could have done without was on the actual bubble. I as SB find 66 just as the button, a shorter stack, pushes - so many ways to lose that hand and be left with just 3k! I still decide to call and he types, WHY?! He has AKo and doesn't find a friend. He is fucking pissed at me and I can see his point. Ah well. I moneyed, got my buy-in back and had i not gotten disconnected by SBC or ATT or whatever the fuck they call it now, I might have improved even farther for more bucks. Instead, when I frantically reconnected I was so frazzled I pushed with JQo into the big stack, who called with KQo and dispatched me with glee. If I had just waited, one of the superministacks would have been done in and I would have made 50 bucks more.

Dummy.

Still. I am very happy with this result as well as a lot if not all of my decisions. Added up it made for a meager profit, but a profit nonetheless. Two days in a row I have made the last 20 of 400+ tournaments. Unlike Waffles, that size is the biggest I can go deep in. Deep stacks suit my game too it seems, though it may be soon to say.

Thus my game (for anyone odd enough to care) is in an acceptable place and I am getting close to where I want to be. I have to say, at $109 I got good cards (though Aces only once in 4 hours of play and no action), but the play itself felt manageable. I may look for this tournament every once in a blue moon. First paid 7k, and you know I was already spending it...

As I might have mentioned: Dummy.

Laytah.