A New Drug

Well I played in a new home game this past weekend. It’s the home game of JLBSox and Blazman from the Ante Up Nation. It was a fun home game. And despite being a BIG loser I plan on attending again. The rules are easy. Tourney first. $10 buyin, with unlimited $10 rebuys for the first 3 levels (first 45 mins).
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And crap did I use it. There were 9 players and they split it up between 2 tables. I drew the Kitchen with PokerBrian322 (aka Slappy), who I brought with me, and 2 other people. The skill level of the players was mixed, and one person at my table knew very little about the game. Well early on, this player but was having some neck pain so they wanted to quit. They started moving in with anything hoping to get callers. And it worked. The problem is that they were getting extremely lucky and busted the other 3 at the table at least once. In the end Slappy re-bought once (total $20). Neck Injury only had their original buy-in. The 4th person at our table AND myself, bought in a total of four times ($40). The final hand before the last rebuy, I had KJs. And flopped a flush draw and gutshot (and straight flush draw). I got all my chips in (slightly less than the rebuy amount) against Neck Pain and Slappy. My draw didn’t get there, and Slappy won the pot and finally relieved Neck Pain of all their chips. So I rebought the final time and moved to the main table (Neck Pain didn’t rebuy). Of course, Slappy had to make 3 trips (or was it 4?) to move all his chips (a total of 11 buy-ins worth of chips). I felt so bad for him… all that walking.. poor baby.. HA!

Slappy had a huge chipstack going in. I managed to double up, and outlast two or 3 more people. But in the end, top two got paid, and I ended up busting. I think I had QJ on the button. It folded around, I pushed (had less than 5 BB). Both SB and BB call. Both had an Ace. And I didn’t improve.

In the end, Blazman went heads up against Slappy. I don’t know the chipstacks at various times, as I was in the cash game. But Slappy ended up taking the whole thing down. With all the re-buys it was a nice pot.

The cash game is a nice touch. Something I wanted to add to Slappy’s home game for quite some time, but no one else was really interested. .25/.50 blinds, NLHE. Max Buy-in of $20. You can’t reload unless you’re felted. After a set time, the game switches to dealers choice; NLHE, Omaha, Stud, Razz, Pineapple and Crazy Pineapple (no hi/lo though- which is fine by me). Apparently this was only their second time adding the mixed games, so there are still some quirks to work out. We ended up playing NLHE, Omaha, Pineapple and Stud. I ended up reloading 1 ½ times (after my 1st reload, I only had $10 left). I played one Omaha hand pretty bad. QQT9 in the BB. Two limpers. I raise it up and both players call. The flop comes T high. I think, “Yes, two pair. Not great, but probably best right now.” I bet at it. As soon as the first guy calls I realize my mistake. CRAP. Only have one pair, and it’s more than likely beat. 2nd Player raises, and I have to let go, losing an additional $5 bucks that (which at that point was about 1/3 of my stack). I would have checked and folded had I realized my T did not play with my 2 Queens.
I did play another Omaha hand well. Forgot what I had, but they were all related straight cards (sorry I don’t know my Omaha lingo, might have been 89TJ or something). I flop two pair and a straight draw. Get my remaining $10 in and get one caller. My opponent is behind and stays that way. In the end, I lost about $15 total in the cash game.

It was a lot of fun and I plan on being at the next one. I like Slappy’s home game because I’m friends with most of them, but Slappy’s game ends up being an all-day thing and pretty much kills half a weekend (time I can’t spend w/ my family or working around the house). I’ll still play his occasionally, but as long as I continue to get invited to JLBSox’s game, I’ll probably play that one more.

Anyway, that’s it for now. I’ve played very little online; only when I get some affiliate cash, which is about $15.00 a month. This month I blew most of it on bluffs. Then when I had 4 bucks left, I quit caring.

Right now I’m checking out Navarro’s Read ‘Em and Reap. VERY GOOD book. I’ll probably read it twice.