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Monday, November 12, 2012

Insane In the Brain!!!

The last three days have been a mental challenge. How much can one person take? Why does Venetian give me so many horrendous beats? Why does Venetian seem to house some of the absolute worst poker players on the planet? Where do they come from? How do they find this place? Where do they stay when they aren't at the poker table? Why do they wrap the concrete pillars that support the overpasses in Vegas with wooden pickets? Why is it called risoto when all it is, is rice?

I have very little time today. Being late for this event is not an option. Three days ago...I showed up on time. On the third hand, I limped with Ac9s. An OMRGwTP (new classification...Old Man Run Good with Tooth Pick) made it 300 (at 50/100) I called. Flop came all clubs...with a board of 9-4-5. Lovely. I checked. OMRGwTP bet 750. I raised to 1850. Welcome to Venetian. Four-bets are an endangered species. Despite having 12,000 chips....his next move as SHHHHHOOOVVVEEE. I called. He turned over two red aces. Nice hand sir. Turned a club. Bye Bye. Three hands later, I raise to 250 with AA. I get re-raised to 750, by a guy I know...a guy who is pretty aggressive and who takes photographs of constellations for entertainment. Back to me. I re-raise...to 2200. Boom. SHHHHOOOOVVVEEEEE. I call (duh). He has QQ. He loses. I now have 36k. In the 20 minutes of the event.

I knew this was trouble. It always is when I start like that at a Venetian event. This time, it was 'The Ukranian.' Can someone please tell me what the deal is with 'Russians' taking such offense at being called Russian when they are from one of the former Soviet republics? Last month, it was our friend from Belarus. Hell, it even has part of the word RUSSIA in that country. Well this guy...he was from Ukraine, and took great exception at being called Russian. Well...anyway, this fucker was my nemesis all day. He had no ability to fold. I'm not even going to bore you...I will just tell you I didn't even make the dinner break. I got down to 10 BB's...and this putz raised my BB...like he'd been doing ALL DAY. I called with A5. Flop comes A-4-7. Rainbow. I know he will c-bet, so I check. He does. He bets 2700 into a 4500 pot. I shove all in for 8800...or 6100 more. He calls....with KJ. Yep. KJ. Turn brings a ten...and I start that uneasy squirming in my seat before seeing the Q on the river. You.....gotta.....be.....fucking.....kidding.....me!!!! I didn't say anything. I got the glance of disgust from a few of the players...and that idiot with his embarrassed smirk.

I lost JUST in time to get into the 3pm $200 Big Bounty tourney. Literally was the last one let in. Got in at 200/400. Arrive at my table to find 'The World's Oldest Teenager' carrying on like a complete jackass. I have no idea what this guy's deal was...but he had a ton of chips. He was raising just about every hand...to amounts like 3000...and 5000. If there was a raise...to say 1200...and one or two callers...he would just move all in. It was ridiculous. So you had a lot of people simply flatting him for those huge amounts. Wasn't sure how the hell I end up at these tables. Any woman at the table, player, dealer, or massage girl...or cocktail waitress...was subject to his painful flirting. If you ever watched the sitcom 'Three's Company' then you may recall that bar they hung out at...'The Regal Beagle.?' This is the guy you might see hanging out there hitting on Janet and Chrissy.

I chose not to engage this guy...just observing...and praying for him to go down in flames. He would. I would help him with that...taking a stand with 99...in all in against him and another guy with QJc. Oh he was in great shape against my 99 with 7c8c...but after the flop brought a 7 and two clubs...he and the other guy somehow missed. I now had a massive stack. I would take the chiplead with 4 tables left (paying 13) and Mr. Smarmy would bust...well short of the money. I kept the chiplead til we got to 14 and were on the bubble. This is when...oh screw the description...we'll just call him, the 'Guy With No Brain'...who, let me just tell you...he thought 'Case Ace' was the name for AK. So a guy raises UTG...I re-raise with 10-10...and he decides, at bubble time...that 6-6 is the best hand. He shoves all in. I call....clean flop, clean turn...fucking 6 on the river.

cont.....

That is where I left off two or three days ago. This blog has been sitting there unfinished. And I have been on a sleep marathon fueled by depression, the depression supplied by the gut-wrenching run of bad luck I'm having out here.  Mix in the game on Saturday where Alabama fell to Texas A&M, which spawned every Crimson Tide-hating football jerkoff to let loose with their venomous rants as their wet dreams were realized, the mighty elephant had been defeated by Johnny Football. How I fall asleep at 9pm on Sunday night....at the conclusion of the most unbelievably lousy game I've ever watched between two 7-1 teams...and sleep until 11am the following day is beyond me. 

While I was sleeping I had the most bizarre dream of all time. Well, one of the most bizarre dreams. I was in Seattle for some reason. I took my dog, Jasper...my father...and friend who now I can't remember, to the water front. I guess we were there the day before...because now there was a current, requiring an anchor for the row boat  was taking just 20 feet off shore so I could fish. I didn't stay at the water long. But I left my friend and Dad and Jasper as I went for a walk. I end up at a mall. Working in that mall, is my ex-girlfriend, who was now a lawyer. There was a three-office collection of lawyer's offices, and one of them was hers. I stuck my head in the door and said 'Hi.' She dropped everything...got up...went and grabbed something, and came out into the open area of the mall area...carrying about 8 or 9 records, one of them being Prince's 'Purple Rain' album. What the?

I guess the last time we saw each other she had borrowed (or just taken?) a bunch of my records? Does anyone still own a record player? We barely talked. She was pleasant. All grown up. It was a very awkward conversation. What do you say when you are happily married and have nothing but bad memories of her? I sat there or awhile...on the bench. Not sure what I was doing. But I was slowly forgetting that I had left my father and friend (and dog) down at the water. I wander around the mall..and find a poker game. Huh? Yeah. I poker game.

It was my worst nightmare. I would sit down at a table with 6 players...and suddenly it would fill up...and up and up and up. They didn't play 9-handed. It was more like...11, then 12...and then 14-handed. People were like, on top of me. I was losing my fucking mind. One black guy sat on my left..with one of those big puffy jackets on...and he takes 50 chips out of my stack. "What are you doing? You just took 50 of my chips?"  Yeah! I'm buying some chips from you. Huh? Where is your $50? How do you want it? Huh? What do you mean 'how do I want it?' I mean how do you want me to pay you? "How bout giving me fifty fucking dollars?" Never mind...just give me my $50 in chips back. Then I got up..and moved to another table...one with only 5 players. "Anyone want to make it a 2/5 game?" Two players try to explain it to the others...then they agree. Suddenly there was a crowd of 40 watching the game....and every seat filled again. Crowding me. I moved to the other side of the table...sitting next to a girl who looked like Elisha Cuthbert. Who turned out to be an undercover cop (I think) trying to entrap me for inappropriate behavior. 

I get into a hand that is raised to $10 and called by 4 players. I look down at QQ and make it $65 to go. I get called by the whole table. The flop comes A-Q-4. I can barely see the flop though because there are so many people standing around the table, and I'm being pushed and shoved out of my seat. The betting never even gets to me...and I see a turn card of K...I try to protest, telling the dealer I never even got a chance to bet...when the second player goes all in...and after TWO players say fold...she pushes him the pot...and takes everyone's cards...except mine...which are still in my hand. I freak out. The dealer goes to the next table. What the hell!??? I call for the floor. Their is no floor. Its just a three-table mall game that is managed by the 3 or 4 dealers. And they don't care. Every time I try to complain to someone they just keep telling me I need to calm down.

It happens again, this time with A5 after I flop a wheel and try to slow play it. The dealer pushes the pot to the player on the turn...after I finally bet and the other player goes all in. I'm sitting there holding my cards. I try to plead my case. Sorry. You lose. I decide to take a walk. Elisha-look-a-like follows me. I find my stuff sitting on a bench, and suddenly realize I forgot about my friend and father. But its now 7. Holy shit. I try to call them, get no answer. And now when I get back to the table...they are doing a drag net...literally a net-dragging arrest of people...I thought it was a joke. Two undercover cops and a really hot looking blonde in fishnet stockings and high heels. Then when she tried to drop the net over me, I playfully laughed and told her I was flattered but was happily married. She told me she was arresting me for placing my hands on another woman. What?

I ripped the net off of me...and started to run away...grabbing all my shit...with Elisha Cuthbert girl telling me I better not try to run...that they would get me. What are you talking about? Fuck this place...and fuck you..and fuck this poker room. You people are all fucking nuts! I get away...running through the streets of Seattle (I think). I make it back to my house. Where my Dad and Dog are...and I see my friend across the street, taking stuff out of an SUV that he had obviously called to come get him and my dog and father. He wouldn't talk to me. I understood. Then I woke up. And on the TV...was...OMG...Elisha Cuthbert, in some movie on TBS.

Weird shit man...weird. And now...I have to go play the nooner at Venetian. It's safe to say I'm well rested. I don't even have time to tell you about the hour upon hour of poker tourneys I've played in the past 3 or 4 days only to go down in defeat at the hands of....'THAT PERSON.' Even played the Main Event at the Palms for the Heartland Poker Tour...at one of the toughest tables I've ever played at in my life...taking out Layne Flack and Sorrel Mizzi...while building my 25k stack up to 75k with only one level left in the night..before 'she' showed up.

'She' was described to me later, by one of the dealers of the tourney....as 'that' player who all the other players were trying to take out when she had dealt to her earlier. She looked like she could have been friends with Breeze Zuckerman. She looked every bit like Russ Hamilton had dressed in drag and snuck into the tourney, trying to get the flavor of big tournament poker back in his mouth. My table image was immaculate. I rarely got action after the flop. Most of my raises were met with folds. I even managed somehow to pull off a bluff for a 30k pot when I knew my 99 was no good on a board with an ace and a king. But now I was up against the female version of Jabba the Hut...and yes, I took her picture...but I won't put it on here. Text or email me...and I will send it to you.

I raise with pocket jacks under the gun. Jabba the Her calls on the button. Ugh. Already hate it. But the flop brings a fairly harmless 4s-2c-5s. I bet 11,000 into a pot of 15k. It calls. Flush draw? Likely. The turn brings the 4 of clubs. Two flush draws now. Two pair now. Could she have a set? Not likely. I have her firmly on something like A10s. So she is sitting on about 55k in her stack now. I bet 31k. She flats! And leaves 20 to 25k'ish in her stack. I now have just about the same...and the blinds at 1k/2k. Begging for a jack on the river. But no! The dealer lays a 3 out there. Fuck NO WAY!  Any shitty ace is now good. I check. And of course...she declares all in. I fold my jacks face up. The others at the table are like..."Oh wow...no way dude...that sucks." And I watch Fatzilla stack up all my chips...taking her to over 130k...and leaving me stuck on 10 bb's. I go card dead for two orbits...never getting one place to make a move...then with 5 minutes left in the night...I get Kc9c on the button and shove all in...getting a walk. Great. On the next hand...at cutoff, I get Qd10d and move in again...for 14k. I get called by the current chipleader...a guy named Terry who played like a maniac all day....with J8. Oh! He just flops J-8-J. And I'm out. 

That one hit me hard. I walk out of the dimly-lit room they were holding the tourney in, with the 1987-esque TV's that were hung about 30 feet in the air and gave everyone a sore neck and ruined their eyes while trying to watch it all day....and into the sportsbook area where their cash tables are. The first thing I hear is the asshole who spots my Alabama shirt and blurts out "Ohhh yeahhhh....hey hey...Roll Tide!!!!"  Why, sometimes, can't it be legal...to just pick up a two by four with nails coming out the other end of it, and just smack someone in the face when they really deserve it? Doesn't that seem fair?

This came on the heels of the previous day...while playing in the $1100 at Venetian...when...with only 24 players left, and my day going perfectly smooth (just like this one was) I call a small raise by the ultra-aggressive Asian guy who liked to celebrate each winning hand with a "that's what I'm talking about" expression...holding 55. The flop comes 4-6-7. Nice. He C-bets to an amount I can't remember now. I raise him about three times his bet. To which he hesitates, then calls. The turn is an annoying Q. He checks again. I bet very large again. He calls again...this time even faster. Shit. The river? A very satisfying (I thought) 8...giving me the straight. He checks to me. Damn (I think). I bet a pretty small amount now. He does what he's done several other times...goes all in. The move that is supposed to scare everyone off the pot. But I'm not folding. No way. I finally caught this prick. Didn't I? What? I didn't? He turns over....oh my fucking god...9-10. I literally threw up in my mouth. 

"You called my huge re-raise on the flop with a gut shot?" "Hell yeah! You bet I did!!! Yesssss!" I had nothing left to say. I just took my stuff over to an empty table, sat there for awhile and thought about how much I hate poker. Hate playing 11 hours only to lose like THAT! How I should have WON the Bounty tourney the day before that...going away...but couldn't beat 66 with my 10-10...couldn't hold with AQ vs. A4...getting wheeled...then losing with AK against 77...to end up finishing an annoying 6th for $900 when a win would have been good for $5000.

And now, I look at the clock and its noon. Damn. Which means I'm taking a cab. I guess. The one good thing about this trip is I am living on almost NO food, and drinking copious amounts of water, so I should have probably lost close to at least 10 lbs by now. I'm eating almost nothing but vegetables. The exercise had been nice...those 2.2 mile walks to the Venetian are definitely a workout. My Seahawks and Huskies...and even the Saints all won...taking the sting out of the Bama loss. And besides all that...Bama only fell to #4. A loss by ND to USC, a loss by Kansas State to the suddenly hot Texas Longhorns...and maybe Oregon falls to Stanford, Oregon St and either UCLA or USC in an upset...and guess who is back in the BCS title game? So all is not lost. And this damn poker trip isn't over yet either. And as I dialed up the Heartland website, and looked to see who made the money, and the final table...no where to be found was that giant lump of goo who took me out. I will look ANYWHERE to find joy in this thankless profession.

That's it. I'm finally leaving my room. Have a nice day everyone. 

MONKEY

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Russia conquered Ukraine (and lots of other lands) and forced them into their union. Remember Reagan slamming "the Soviet Empire" ? So why would they want to be called Russian? Would you call an Irish man English because they were once together?