That Poker Thing

Being a woman at the poker table

2008-06-11T09:51:00.000-07:00

Linda Johnson wrote an article for CardPlayer on whether being a woman at the poker table is an advantage or disadvantage (read it here
Linda's article)

To add to my comments in her article, here are a few more thoughts. I think being a woman at a poker table can be both an advantage and a disadvantage, depending on the situation.

Advantages• If you can pick up on how you’re being perceived and adjust your play (within your comfort zone) to profit from that.
• Women (in general) do not have that big of an ego we need to feed. Intuition tells us when we’re losing and letting go of good cards in bad situations are relatively easy compare to how hard it is for our male counterparts to do.
• Emotionally we are stronger and (as in life) women wouldn’t let themselves go on tilt, I think being built to bear and raise children made us emotionally strong, and little things like Aces cracked by the donkey in seat 1 does not nearly have the same impact than it has on Billy BaddAss next to me.
• This is just a personal thought, don’t really have anything to back it up, but I think we can stay focused for longer amounts of time than men, in long tournaments, we are less likely to make mistakes by the end of the tournament.
• Instinct, intuition, etc – that’s just common sense that we’re much better at that than men. We pick up on tells even when we don’t know that we do. Environmental factors put us on alert without us realizing it, and really – 90% of women who gets cheated on by husbands/boyfriends, pick up on that before they get the facts – it’s no different at the poker table. We just know. Like my mom, she knew everything 
• Most men are easily distracted by boobs. Some even just by mentioning boobs.

Disadvantages• In general (and I want to stress this, IN GENERAL), women will always be perceived by men as the weaker sex. Our legacy is to be submissive to our man, and doesn’t matter how far we come in changing that belief, or how much progress is made, there still are women out there portraying just that and I do believe, in some sense men still feel superior to most women. And that cause them to be more aggressive towards us and make plays that they would not make against a male opponent.

To think…. or not to think

2008-06-05T11:30:00.001-07:00

When you start to play poker, it’s all about the cards. YOUR cards and the cards on the board. Other players in the hand ceased to exist once you hit top pair – a straight or a flush lights up your face like Vegas Boulevard on New Year’s Eve and when you push all in, even Gus Hanson knows to fold.
Then one day – after your top pair gets beat time after time – you start wondering “how did I not see that coming?” , you have a light bulb moment and realized that people don’t always call bets for no reason. They don’t always have the same pair with a worse kicker. Now you start paying attention to the cards your opponents might have.
Probably at this time you also are getting curious and start reading up on how to play against these people who call with draws. You learn from various sources about the different levels of thinking in poker. Oh no, now I have to think about not only what my opponent is holding, but also what he thinks I am holding?
Putting that into practice is a different animal. So you decide to give it a try. Two limpers in the pot, you raise from the button with two random cards. Both limpers call and the flop comes K-8-3 rainbow. OK, so you want them to think you have AK, so you bet a reasonable amount after they both checked. But the EP guy has read the book too, so now he wants you to think he has a set of 3’s or 8’s, so he called with the intention of leading out on the turn. Other limper just calls too.
Turn is a 2, first guy bets, and now you decide you want them to think you have a set of 8’s and you raised. First guy now is thinking that you thought he had a K and that you think he thought you had a medium pair and that you thought he thought you had AK. At this point, all this thinking is taking it’s toll and neither of you has a clue of what you’re really holding.
Lots of raising and re-raising going on and at showdown you have two people with crappy cards shouting at each other ‘how can you call with that, I was representing AK” followed by “I put you on AK and I was representing a set, you’re the donk!”, while the second limper (beginner player still on Level 1 thinking) who totally missed all the thinking that were going on, silently stacks the chips that he/she just won wit K2o.

I think it’s important that we stop overthinking every hand and sometimes just play them. Wait for the right opportunity against the right opponent to switch to the next level of thinking. Don’t get caught up and carried away.

Slow times

2008-05-29T15:43:00.001-07:00

I’m not sure how this happened, but I played only 4 live tournaments May! And to make it even worse, I didn’t cash in any of those. Actually for April and May I have cashed only once, thank goodness that was for a decent amount, otherwise I would have felt even worse!

I think I got used to the comfort on online playing and it’s just so much easier – you don’t have to get up and get dressed and drive the 10 minutes to the casino. Bah, that’s just no excuse, I should be happy I live here in the poker Mecca of the world, and should get my ass out to the casino’s and play! Especially now, with the WSOP and all the other series starting!

I’ve also started to run again, well, if you can call it running, probably look more like a brisk walk to others, but I’m on a mission to prepare to run the half-marathon in Vegas in December with one of my fellow chix-sters. But I’m still at a point where the exercise takes it toll and when I get home at night, the last thing I want to do, is get out and move again. That’s when online poker is such a blessing 

Online I’ve been doing OK, quite well some times and not so well other times, but at least I think I’m winning more than losing at this point, which is great, of course. I play a lot of other games, like PL 5-card Draw, Stud, Omaha, 2-7, etc. I’m doing pretty well in the 5-card draw games, but I can honestly say I suck at 2-7, I don’t think I’ve cashed ONCE in any of them. Staying away from them now!

OK, so it’s almost June, the WSOP is in town, let’s go play some poker!!!!

Some days are diamonds, some days are stone

2008-05-16T15:10:00.000-07:00

Slow month so far, I’ve played in only 3 live tournaments so far, and haven’t cashed in any. Ugh, I love to cash! But, I don’t feel too bad, I’m pretty happy with the way I played and don’t feel I’ve lost due to a stupid move I made. Most of the time I’ve managed to get my money in ahead and just got unlucky. Looking back, knowing what the cards were (mine, my opponents and the flop), I wouldn’t have played it any other way, and I guess that’s the important part.

Online, however, was another story this week. I play very low stakes on Pokerstars, nothing higher than a $5 buy-in. Since Sunday I’ve played about 8 (I think) of the $4.40 180 person SnG’s on Stars, and I’ve managed to make the final table on 4 of them! I got two 4th places, a 5th and a 6th! The only bad thing is that they normally last until way past my bedtime. Since I start working at 7pm in the morning, you can imagine that I wasn’t exactly a ray of sunshine at the office this week. Oh yeah and don’t forget my new commitment to running, my initial visits to the gym were quite tiresome! Thank goodness it’s Friday today!

Apart from the $4 tourneys, I’ve cashed in some others – even won a Stud Draw game, hehe - and manage to get my online bankroll up from $87 to just under $400 now. Finally according to Sharkscope - I’m not in the red anymore and haven’t been on ‘SuperTilt’ for a while now!!

Since I stopped trying so hard, I’m doing much better – I’m probably not a poster child for theoretical poker, but hey, whatever works. And this works for me. I know I still have a lot to learn, but show me a poker player who doesn’t....

Ouch and ouch again!

2008-04-30T15:47:00.000-07:00

I’ve been debating back and forth on whether I want to go play the WSOP Ladies Circuit Event at Caesars on Monday. The buy-in was $340, a little higher than what I’m normally playing, so that’s a big consideration for me. But since I’ve stopped trying to ‘fix’ my game, I’m much more comfortable playing the way I’m used to, and felt good and I really wanted to go. I guess the thought of being able to take a day off work to go play, was the deciding factor, and I convinced myself to go play. I think I was going to go regardless; it just took a while for me to come up with enough reasons to justify the buy-in.

So the tournament started with 160 players – which was way more than I expected, given the fact that it’s on a Monday. Apparently I’m the only one with a job!!!

My first table was very passive – I got a couple of good hands there, QQ flopped a set against AA, unfortunately the 3 spades on the board slowed down the betting significantly, but I still managed to get some chips. Then I got a straight flush with my 2s9s, when the board was KsQsJs, turn a blank, the river brought the 10s, not a very exciting straight flush given that the As was gonna make a royal – luckily no one else had the As and I won that one too.

Got moved – players were noticeably tight and there were not many showdowns. A pre-flop raise followed by a continuation bet in general won the pot. For a while, at least.
JJ Liu got seated on my right, she was short-stacked however, and after only a couple of hands she pushed with 99’s into a raiser, got called by a big Ace and got knocked out when the Ace hit.

I doubled up when Mel (pokerchix AskMelanie) raised UTG, I reraised with AK to isolate, but of course she knew it and pushed all in. I figured she has JJ or QQ, I thought with AA or KK she would just smooth-call the raise and now I was facing a dilemma. I have to hit my A or K and then even then I might not be good – on the other hand, I had only 2500 chips left if I fold and I convinced myself it was worth the gamble. I called, she had QQ, I hit a K and doubled up. Phew!!

Then the fun began. A short, seemingly confused Asian lady was seating next to me, to my right. Maybe she was just not fluent in English, but when she talked, she confused me more than when she played. She made some ridiculous calls and bets, and I couldn’t figure out if she was clueless or hyper-smart. A little while later it all became clear though. She min-raised in early position, I called with AK. Flop came K-J-x, she bet, I raised, she pushed all in. Based on her previous play, I was pretty convinced I had her beat and I called. She turned over QJ – YES!
The turn is another Jack – NO!!!!! That’s just not fair. Now I am short stack again!!!

Couple hands later Mel pushed all in, I called with all but 500 of my chips with 99. Mel had K3, and the flop is KK-x, turn is a 3 just to rub it in and I’m left with one 500 chip! I’m UTG, the blinds are 200/400 with 25 ante, I put my last 475 in with K7 and got two callers. On the turn, the one caller bet, other lady groaned and folded. Better had KQ, but I hit my 7 on the river and tripled up. Girl who folded, was disgusted and said she folded 88, figuring the better had her beat since she bet.
I went all in next two hands and doubled up and won some blinds and antes and I was up to around 4K again. Still in bad shape, but at least I had something to work with now.

OK, so at this point we have 50 people left out of the 160, payout is 18 places, so with a lot of patience I and a lot of luck I might just get lucky. They move me to a new table, I got seated in seat 9, next to a really great lady who shared her chocolate with me when I complained I was hungry (just for the record, I thought she was great before she shared her stuff with me!).

Now there were some dynamics at this table, apparently the two big stacks were gunning each other. Chips were flying back and forth between them, the younger Asian girl seemed tilting like crazy, and the older grey-haired woman just happily calling and raising, adding fuel to the fire. I’ve seen an all in push with an OESD, getting called by a gutshot straight draw – only to win a HUGE pot with a pair of 4’s. The trouble was, I was dead smack in the middle of the two ends of this battle.

I picked up AJ and pushed – collecting antes and blinds. Very next hand I have AJ again, this time I raised. Asian girl looked antsy after folding previous hand and she and the BB called. Flop came J high with two hearts, I pushed. The Asian girl insta-called with 5h3h – and my stomach turned. Turn is a black card, river is an Ace, but the Ace of hearts and I’m heading out in 44th place or so. I wanted to throw up a little. I don’t mind the calls from players when they’re behind, I really don’t – it just hurts when they get lucky – and in this tournament the two times that they got lucky, took me out of the tournament.

I headed over to the V to play a little Omaha H/L, made a little profit and decided to go play the 7pm at PH. Long story short, I got busted with Q-10 against 10-2 when he caught a 2 for second pair. Oh well.

Felt a little better when I took 4th out of 180 on Pokerstars last night in a $4 tournament, not a big win, but a win nevertheless, and sometimes I think the fields of the micro stakes tournaments are harder to beat!!!! Really really takes some patience to make it deep in those.

Tonight I think I’ll take a break and play some WoW. Maybe poker will miss me……

Fixing my game

2008-04-22T15:37:00.001-07:00

It’s been a while – but I’m still alive and by some miracle survived a poker depression and am still playing! Not that I ever wanted to give it up, but I’ve reached a point – well-known to many poker players, I assume – where I wondered whether I should give up on poker, because it sure as heck seemed to have given up on me!

I’ve been keeping track of my tournament playing since October 2007. At the end of February I’ve played in 50 tournaments (buy-ins between $60 and $200), and cashed in 21 out of the 50, which by my standards, are pretty decent.

So then I decided it’s time to ‘fix’ my game. Most of the time I make it to the money and/or get to the final table as short stack, on the odd occasion I’ll end there with a decent stack, and that bothered me. There must be a way that I could change my game to accumulate more chips along the way. I started reading – poker forums, book, strategy articles, basically anything poker I could lay my hands on. And along the way I tried to apply that to my game - of course with disastrous results. In March I played in 15 tournaments and cashed in only 2, which made March the first month I didn’t show a profit. April didn’t start out better – I was completely lost, and my game went down the drain. Clearly what I tried to apply, didn’t work with my playing style or my personality and I couldn’t pull it off. I felt like a complete idiot at times. I played online and suck-out after suck-out (which I believe most of them were because I put myself in unfavorable situations) just added to my despair.

I had to rethink it all as well as my approach to this game I’m so passionate about. I had to evaluate – why was I able to win before and not now? Obviously changes I tried to make, didn’t work for me.

I came to some realizations – I believe (now) that there is a place in the poker world for players like me – players that are not super-aggressive. I am not the kind of player that can pull off bluffs like it’s second nature, and now I also know that in order to be a winning player, I don’t have to be.
Selective aggressiveness works much better for me, and instead of looking for opportunities to pull off some creative plays, I need to wait for the opportunities to present themselves to me. And sometimes it doesn’t happen until late in the tournament, or at all. And that’s ok. There will always be a next time.
I have to play within my comfort zone, and as cliché as it sounds, I have to detach my emotions from my decision-making while playing. Trying to ‘get’ someone is most likely going to backfire. There’s a very dangerous gray area where ‘playing the player’ often turns into you being the one getting ‘played’ - by your own actions.

Bottom line - if it’s not broken, don’t try to fix it!

Annie Get Your Gun!

2008-03-26T08:55:00.000-07:00

Last night at the Caesars Ladies Tournament was interesting. I was a minute or two late, and when I approached the table looking at my seat card, the lady in seat 8 stretched her neck to see my card and asked ‘What seat?’. What, we have ushers at the poker table now, or does she think I can’t read my own darn card? Point being, first impression – not favorable! I ignored her and sat down on my seat which I found – all by myself, just by using the info on my seat card, whaddaya know!

There’s an saying that says something about keeping your mouth shut and people won’t notice you don’t know a thing, can’t remember it now, and evidently the usher lady didn’t either, or maybe she’s never heard it before.
After calling a bet on a flop of 677 and another bet when the turn was a 10, the river a K, she – very disgusted – turned over her 48 and say ‘Open-ended straight draw and can’t catch a thing’. My iPod failed to keep me busy enough not to point out to her that she did NOT have an open-ended straight draw, merely a gutshot or two. She said no, it’ was open-ended, any 5 and any 9 would have given me a straight. I immediately ordered a drink. (For me, that is. If she wasn’t numerous months pregnant, I would have had ordered one for her too).

The most precious moment came during the following hand. I am in the SB, lots of limpers; I looked at my cards (10d-8d) and completed the bet while saying ‘Great, my favorite hand’ as an incentive to the BB NOT to raise. Was hoping she assumed my favorite hand is a good one.
So, pregnant lady (who was nauseatingly nice to everyone, might I add) replied ‘wow, your favorite hand and under the gun too’. I glanced over to the button on my right and said ‘No, I’m the small blind; I’m not under the gun’. She insisted that I was under the gun. I insisted that I was not. She was not phased by my ignorance and patiently pointed at the button and said again ‘there, look – under the gun, you’re first to act under the gun’. I needed help. I looked around, the dealer was frantically shuffling cards, head bent down, Jo was happily bobbing along to the music on her iPod, staring at the ceiling and the rest of the table was admiring the tournament clock on the wall wayyyyy over there, pretending not to notice. I said ‘I don’t think we’re talking about the same gun here, dear’ and promptly ordered another drink...

Horsing around

2008-03-20T15:35:00.003-07:00

I went to play the HORSE tournament at Green Valley Ranch last night. I didn’t even make it to the first break, limit or not, 2000 chips are no match for my chasing capabilities. The one time I decided to lay down a hand, I would have won. So I continue my strategy of chasing. Just kidding, it wasn’t that bad, but I did chase a straight and a flush in Stud that failed me, and I gave away almost all my chips on that one.

So, I was out. Richard was playing a couple of tables away and looked quite content with a bunch of chips in front of him, so I do what any good wife would do – I told him that I’ll stay and play a little longer – not because I WANTED to, but just because I know he wanted to play longer. He pretended not to notice my fakeness and suggested that I tried the 3/6 HORSE game that just started.

I began my mission of folding, I still got caught up in a couple of pretty fatal draws, but I learn!!! I’ll get there. One day I’ll be able to fold my Omaha draws! I actually didn’t do too badly; I was up $68 when I cashed out.

But here’s the story that probably proved my inexperience at this game. First I am the first to admit that I totally suck at Stud and Omaha (but evidently that’s not holding me back). Big problem for me is to remember what four cards I’m holding, I mean, even in Hold’em I forget sometimes, how de heck am I supposed to remember the Omaha ones.

So, on this one hand, in the Omaha H/L round, I’m under the gun and I looked down at Ace, Ace, random very low card, random very high card, double suited (that’s how I tried to memorize it at the time). That felt good and of course I raised. Two people called, and the flop came down KKK. I’m very happy and a little scared, cause from what I‘ve learned so far about Omaha, is that if there’s a card out there that can beat me, somebody has it. At this point, I’m pretty happy with my Kings full, and I bet – I figured I’ll find out soon enough who has the King.
Alas, everyone folded, and I proudly showed them my Aces, everyone nodded and say ‘good hand’ (like us poker players do even if we never mean it) and when pushing my cards to the dealer, I accidentally flipped over my other ‘random high card’.

It was a King.

And I proved to everyone right there that I really was a novice at this HORSE thing.

My own worst enemy

2008-03-17T15:30:00.000-07:00

OK, so everyone’s been talking about the Venetian Deep Stack Extravaganza in the last half of the month. I was practically drooling, long blinds and lots of chips equals lots of poker playing, what more can a girl ask for? But I have yet to pay more than $200 to enter a tournament, the only times I’ve entered tournaments with bigger buy-ins; I’ve won my cheap ass into it. After about 5 min of pondering, I used my two recent decent cashes as permission to take a day of work to enter the $340 even (which is one of the cheap ones, mind you) at the Venetian.

I’ve heard about people being alternates for these events, so I decided to get there early enough so I don’t have to stand around waiting for someone to get knocked out. Lord knows, I’ll be nervous enough, let’s not add waiting for a seat to the mix!

Tournament started at noon, I got to Venetian at around 10:20. You gotta give it to me, if I say I’m going to be early, I mean it. So there I am, all dressed up and ready to play and about 90 minutes to kill. No way I’ll sit down at one of the cash tables, I’m in tournament mode and don’t want to kill that vibe. Quick call to Tammy, who indicated that she might be coming out to play as well - she’s stuck in traffic but on her way. Great – nice to have someone around who can listen to your bad beat stories.

In the mean time, my stomach had a mind of its own. Doesn’t matter if I play a $40 or $340 tourney, I can always count on numerous nerve-induced bathroom runs before play starts. I practically have my own stall in every casino I play. Yeah yeah TMI, I KNOW!

Tammy got there shortly before play started and we’re off to our seats. Now, this is about 3 weeks ago, I don’t remember many of the hands, but a few stood out. Early on I got a couple of good hands that held up and before long I’ve gain quite some chips. Had about 10K (after starting with 7K) when this hand came up. Young guy with iPod, sunglasses, baseball hat and a gum-chewing ability that would put Britney Spears to shame, came to our table a couple of minutes before and up to that point, he seemed to be have seen every flop. He limped in UTG, one more limper and I call on the button with Kd2d (yes, I do that some times, mixing it up is what I believe my excuse is). Flop came K-high, two diamonds – BINGO! Now if you know me, you’ll know that’s a dream flop for me. Top pair with flush draw (prefer nut flush draw, but I’ll take this one too). Check to me, I bet to get some money in the pot, because at that point I’m convinced my K is good too and my flush is probably on the way, right? Blinds folded and UTG guy sat back, thought about it for a sec and announced ‘ALL-IN’. Crap!! Now what? Other guy folded and I started debating with myself. Did this kid limp in UTG with the intention of re-raising if someone should raise? Did he flop two pair? I can’t remember the exact amounts, but I do remember that making the call was a significant amount of chips and if I would have lost the hand, I would have been back to around starting chips. But I just couldn’t convince myself that he had a big hand, I just couldn’t. And after all, I have top pair and a flush draw, it’s my dream come true!!!!!! Usually I will look for reasons to fold, on this hand I was definitely looking for reasons to call. And somehow I found some; I said “OK, I’ll gamble, I’ll call” and flipped over my hand. And I was right! He turned over K7o, but was quite happy to see my K2, not so happy when he noticed the flush draw. Turn – blank; at that moment I felt like using a life-line to call Jerry Yang and ask about the praying thing, and then BAM!! – most beautiful card, 7d – hit the river. Kid grabbed his iPod and stormed off while I raked in all his chips.

At the break I met up with Tammy, who just went out after being crippled by probably the donkiest(I just invented that word) call ever. She flopped a full house with pocket 9's, reraise the preflop raiser all in, he called with KJ. He had nothing but two overcards on a paired board. Perfect, right? Yeah right. Runner runner Kings and he got a bigger boat. Now if that's not a bad beat, then I don't know. That was just sick.

From there on I just couldn’t miss. Twice my pocket Jacks flopped a set and I got paid off both times, I had AA twice, once against KK which resulted in another tower of chips added to my stack.
By the time we were down to 65 players, I had probably one of the top stacks in the tournament and was playing well (by my standards, might I add). Once I laid down pockets 5’s to a suspicious raise – guy next to me with 10K in chips raised UTG to 4K, looked like he was trying to induce a raise. I decided to play safe and fold my 5’s and the other short stack called him. Of course a 5 hit on the flop, I would have won the hand, but instead of being out, he doubled up.
At that point this guy had about 20K in chips, and I had around 60K. He won a couple of hands, but somehow I failed to pay attention to his stack size. I’m usually pretty good of being aware of where I am related to the other stack sizes and making sure that I take that in consideration when making a decision. In my mind this guy was still short-stacked, and it still lingered in my mind that I could have taken in out, when this hand happened. I’m in the BB, he is in the SB. Everyone folded to us, I look down at JJ, and think YES- I’m going to take down this pot and hopefully take this guy out. When he said ‘ALL-IN”, I insta-called, because I wanted his chips in the middle, right? He turned over AK and off to the races we were. All was good until the holy river decided to flip me off with a stupid Ace. I was still not to worried until we started counting down the stacks. He had 40K now, and suddenly I went from big stack to short stack. I was devastated. I got moved to another table, our table broke – must have been 5 tables left at that point. I lost all focus and instead of get my head together and play my short-stacked game, which I KNOW I can, I pushed the moment I got a big Ace. I didn’t assess the situation and waited for the right moment like I usually would, I was UTG and had enough chips left to wait for the next round and found a spot. Ironically enough got called by JJ and I didn’t improve and I’m out. I missed the money by a couple of spots, and it was my own fault.

That’s the WORST part of losing in poker – when you lose because of a mistake YOU make and not because of a mistake your opponent makes. I beat myself up over this for days, but do you know what? Two weeks later, I did the SAME thing at a Venetian Sunday tournament. After fighting my way back when I was down to 1800 chips with 6 tables left, I did the same thing. I went out on the bubble, because I did the wrong thing at the wrong time instead of waiting for the right opportunity. You would have thought I’ve learned my lesson.

I hate this game I love so much!!!

Rollercoaster time!

2008-02-22T14:49:00.000-08:00

You just never know. It never ends the way it starts out - one moment it’s going well, then suddenly it slows down and it’s a little uphill, and before you know, down you go again! Just as you get used to it and enjoy it, it throws you for a loop, suddenly you’re upside down and twirling and you don’t know if you’re coming or going. That’s the rollercoaster called poker. The funny thing is, when you’re done with the ride, you head right back to the end of the line to experience the thrill again.

Last Friday I played the Headhunters tournament at Treasure Island, first mistake. That type of tournament doesn’t fit my playing style at all, which I proved a couple of months ago, when I ended up 2nd in that tournament, WITHOUT A SINGLE BOUNTY!! Evidently I’m better at staying alive than at dealing the killing blows. Friday was no different, everything went as expected, I didn’t knock anyone out, and I stayed alive. Well, for a bit. I got knocked out with AJ on a A-x-x board, when the guy with pocket 5’s hit runner-runner straight against me. Oh well.
So I tried the 10pm tournament. For some reason I played the worst poker ever and it was probably just justice when I – again, went all-in with AQ on an Ace high board, board goes runner-runner and put 4 hearts on the board, guy with K5o is holding the only heart and I’m out.

Saturday morning I tried again. The Lips tournament at Orleans, and it started out well. Really well when I got my JJ all-in against pocket 7’s. This, btw, was probably one of the worst calls I’ve seen all weekend! The girl raised about 8x the big blind from EP, which made me think she doesn’t like her hand THAT much. I got JJ in the BB, decided to call and push if the flop looks safe. Flop came 9-4-4, I pushed, she thought for quite a while, called and flipped over 77. Now I wondered – why? She can’t beat a 9 or a 4, any pair 8 or higher beats her – and did she really think I was doing it with only two high cards? And even so, the she might still lose three quarters of her stack if I hit – it was early in the tournament, I don’t think it was really worth it.
Anyway, once again the board came runner-runner spades, she’s holding the only spade and I’m out. And then she said she’s sorry – sorry for what? Sucking out? Really?? How else did you expect to win that hand??

Oh well, I was on full tilt then (the emotional state, not the site), and decided to get over it using the comforts of a Sephora shopping trip and a stuffed baked potato from The Café in Treasure Island. It worked. I felt much better and decided to go play the 2pm at TI, since Richard is still playing at Bellagio and we wanted to stay on the strip to play the Caesars tournament that night.
OK, this went much better, no suck outs (I got those out of the way), no interesting hands either and I made it to 3rd place, cashing $360.

Allrighty, I’m happy, now I could go play at Caesars, not feeling like a loser anymore. Big turnout at Caesars, 104 people to start with, WOW!
The poker gods were trying to apologize and gave me great cards early in the tournament. This is how my 2 Aces hands went down. Got a pair of Aces, raised, only one caller. Flop came all spades, I DON’T have one. Put a bet three quarters of the pot out there, he sighed, showed his 7s8s and said ‘I don’t want to call with a small flush’. I don’t know what he was hoping for when he called? Just a straight? Anyway, I got lucky and I scooped the pot before he changed his mind.
Couple of hands later, I got Aces again. Two limpers, I raised, BB called, one limper folded, and same guy re-raised me? WTF, now I’m confused. OK, so the blinds are 25/50, I raised to 150, he re-raised to 400. I don’t know what the BB was gonna do, and I want to go heads up with this guy, so I threw out another 1000. BOTH OF THEM CALLED! Flop came all low-cards, non-scary, and I pushed – if someone hit his set, I’m going to pay him off. Both folded – re-raise guy said he had AJ. Needless to say, he was out a couple of hands later.

The rush continued, I hit big hands and before long I had a decent-to-huge stack. I played really well, I think – and I made the final table with average stack. When we were down to 12 players, I decided that I made it that far; I HAD to make the money. Payout was 9 places, if I remember correctly. Anyway, I took out two guys and suddenly we were 4 left and I was second in chips. Once again, I got AA, KK, QQ and some great flops and before long, we were 3 left, one guy extremely short stack and the two of us about equal. We decided to do a chop by chip count, he had a whopping 7000 chips more than I had (less than one BB at that point), and he got around $100 more than I – my cash was $3151, which more than made up for the bad run earlier the weekend!!

And -- back to the end of the line for another ride……. my Venetian Deep Stack tourney on Wednesday, which I will write about in my next post.

WipHof - Part Four (The game)

2008-02-19T15:46:00.000-08:00

The Game

So, at 2pm, after the luncheon, 55 people sat down for the tournament. A handful of us have won our way in on satellites, but the majority has paid the entry fee of $500 – which made this the biggest buy-in tournament I’ve ever entered. So, I was pretty excited. There were a couple of well-known players, of course the 4 inductees, and then people like Chip and Karina Jett, JJ Lieu and some others that were known to many, but not to me.

Can’t remember much of early in the tournament, I remember I tried really hard not to do something stupid, and whaddayaknow, I managed to stay out of trouble.
When we got down to three tables, I was moved and was sitting at the table with Marsha Waggoner, Karina Jett and some of the ‘unknown-to-me’ well-known people. Example – I chatted with the Asian lady to my right, she was very nice and we had a great conversation about the difference between what is called ‘lemonade’ here and what ‘lemonade’ is in some other countries (for clarification – in countries like South Africa and Australia, Sprite is called lemonade). We discussed that and some other stuff and when she got knocked out and was about to leave, I asked her what her name was. After all, I liked her and that’s the polite thing to do – if I run into her again, I want to at least remember what her name is. She looked at me kinda funny, and said: ‘JJ’ . ‘JJ??”, I asked, thought I heard wrong. Probably due to the fact that the only JJ I know, is a guy and I wanted to make sure I got it right. She looked confused and politely confirmed. Only after the fact (like two days after) I realized that it was JJ Lieu and that she was more than well-known in the poker world. Sorry JJ!!

One big hand at that table – I got QQ in MP, with only one limper, I raised, everyone else folded, limper called. Flop came AQx, he bet, so I figured he had an Ace, I called. Turn is another blank, he bet, I pushed, and he called. I was amazed when he turned over Ace-rag, but at least he doubled me up and he was out.

At that table Marsha got knocked out when she got all her chips in with KK against QQ - a Q on the turn and no help on the river.
Then – before you know it, we were down to two tables. Now I was excited. Unlike my normal routine, I was NOT short-stacked at this point and had a decent amount of chips. I picked up a couple of pots and made it to the final table with a fair amount of chips.

At the final table were me and TWO other pokerchix gals – as well as Barbara Enright, Chip Jett, and a couple of others.
Memorable hands at this table – just a couple of hands after final table started, I raised on the button with Kc8c. Chip Jet, in the SB, smooth-called the raise – for about half his stack. I realized that he probably planned to push at some point before the river, there’s no way he’ll call half his stack and then fold. It scared me a little, sure looks like he was holding a big hand, or he certainly wanted me to think that. Flop came – two clubs and a J, so I have a flush draw. And that was where I wasn’t sure what to do. Do I bet - he’s probably going to push all in regardless of the bet, so do I bet big and let him make the decision? Or do I bet small for in case he’ll let me see a turn card for cheap? I decided to check – I have no clue why, this is where my own inexperience became evident to me. Of course he pushed, and now *I* had to make the decision. I decided to make the call, he had QJ (I think?), he had second pair on the board, if I remember correctly - no flush came but I caught a K on the river and knocked him out.

A while later - QQ again, I raised, two callers. Flop came Q high, I checked – everyone checked behind. The turn is a 3, so I bet, one person fold, but the woman to the right, who played her strong hands VERY aggressive, raised me – and quite a bit too. I looked at the board again, couldn’t figure out what she could have had, thought maybe she had AQ and was waiting for me to bet so she could raise. I remember her getting very attached to her hands and didn’t think she was going to fold, and I was sure I had the best hand at that point, so I pushed. She instantly called and turned over pocket 3’s for a lower set. Phew, what a relief. And now I had LOADS of chips.

I decided to lay low and see if I can outwait the short stacks before getting too creative and before long, we were down to 4 players. Alan Schulman, Barbara Enright, some guy called Lance (from Canada) and me.
Alan was slowly getting down to short-stack, and she probably smelled my fear - so about 99% of the time – whether I limped or raised from the SB, she pushed from the BB. I never had a hand I felt comfortable calling with – but I also decided that I want her to get used to me folding to her raises, maybe she’ll become reckless and I can trap her with a monster hand. Which worked out well, just a couple of hands later. I picked up KK, made my obligatory raise, and she pushed. I called, she turned over A5o, and I stood there frozen while the dealer put the flop out. I didn’t want to move, I did NOT want an Ace to hit! And it DIDN’T! She was out in 4th place.

One hand that I played totally wrong – with 4 of us left, I raised with AQ and Barbara called. Flop came Q-Q-10, I checked, she checked. Turn was something insignificant, I bet and she raised. Now there is where I made the mistake. When I replayed the hand in my hand hundreds of times after the tournament, I should have called. Instead, I decided that she is trying to get me off my hand and I wanted her to know that I’m not going to be pushed around and that I have a strong hand. Duh. Why would I want her to know that? I could have played it so many different, more sufficient ways, but I pushed, she pondered for a while and folded.
Couple of hands later, Alan asked me what I had that hand, I told her, and Barbara told me she had QJ and folded when I pushed.

Now the guy from Canada wanted to double up or get up, so he’ll either raise HUGE or push all-in when he decided to play a hand. I picked up 77 and called one of his raises. Flop came down 8-8-3, he bet, I figured it’s just a continuation bet and that he probably had only two high cards, so I pushed. He called with pocket 10’s and I’m down to short stack. Doubled up once when I hit a straight, then pushed with AJ, he called with AQ and knocked me out. I got paid $3675 for my effort, which I was extremely pleased with, seeing that it’s my biggest payout in a poker tournament so far!

What a great experience it was! It made me – once again – realize how inexperience I am and how much I have to learn. Watching Barbara play, was great – she just proved that there is no substitute for experience and I admire her tremendously.

After 11 hours of play I went home and 1am in the morning, so darn tired, but so excited about the day, I couldn’t fall asleep and probably re-played every hand thousands of times in my head before my body finally gave up and went to sleep.

What a day!

WipHoF- Part Three (The satellites)

2008-02-15T15:43:00.000-08:00

The satellites

OK, so the buy-in for the tournament after the ceremony was $500 + $60, and there’s no way I’m willing to pay that for a tournament (yet!). So, for people like me, there were a super-satellite as well as some single table satellites on Friday, the 1st. I’ve decided to give myself two changes ($75 x 2) to try and win a seat, and that’s it.
One little problem though - the super-satellite started at 5pm and Richard – who was out of town for the week – would be arriving at the airport at 7:30pm and expected his loving wife to pick him up. Oh, the choices one have to make – husband or poker??? He decided that it's safer not to put me to the test and offered to take a cab if I’m not done in time.
At the satellite I met a lovely older woman, her name is Kat and she loves animal print outfits. And by outfit, I meant every single thing she was wearing. Her watch, her earrings, her shoes, her purse, her little cushion to sit on, everything fit in with the leopard theme she had going on. I loved that! (She made me homesick; I missed the South African Bushveld every time I looked at her).
Poker-wise nothing spectacular happened, I stayed out of trouble, but didn’t get any big hands, and by the time we were down to two tables, I was pretty short-stack. After they combined the tables, I found myself at a table where one gentleman was just walking over the table. He had a huge chip stack and apparently an ego to go with it. Also, everyone seemed to be majorly impressed with him and his – not so funny – jokes and I wondered what the heck was going on. The flops were hitting him hard and he won huge pots with K9, K10, etc against better hands – there just didn’t seem a way he could lose.
At some point my irritation was showing and I muttered something about his silly jokes under my breath, and the guy next to me said “Do you KNOW who that is?” Uuuuhhh, no? He looked at me in disbelief “It’s Kenna James!!” Now thanks to the likes of Phill Hellmuth and Umberto Shark guy, I am not a fan of ‘famous’ poker players and their antics, the name rang a bell, but I had no idea who he was (he turned out to be married to Marsha Waggoner, one of the four inductees).
“Ok”, I said to the guy next to me “but he’s still not funny?”. He shook his head and to my disbelief uttered the following when Kenna won the next pot “Kenna, you’re the MAN!! I’m just the man sitting NEXT to the man”. Oh how painful it was to see a grown man act like a 10 year old at a Hannah Montanah concert!
Couple hands later I pushed my short stack to the middle with KhJh, hoping to pick up antes and blinds, but unfortunately the Kenna-groupie next to me woke up with Aces and knocked me out.

Now it was just after 7pm and almost time for me to get to the airport, but I SO wanted to try a single table satellite. I decided to hold Richard to his cab-promise and signed up for the next satellite. Luckily my dear husband understands the power of poker and he didn’t mind, he took a $20 cab-ride home and I could play in peace.

The satellite started and what do you know, Kat is at my table again! The game started well for me when I flopped a set and picked up some chips right at the start. I played semi-aggressive because it was evident that people didn’t want to part with their chips, so before long I had decent chip stack. I just stayed away from calling all-ins with mediocre hands, and before long, I found myself heads-up with Tonya – one of the pokerchix. I had a massive chip lead, probably close to 10-1, and offered her the cash ($90) so she can play the next satellite and I’ll take the seat. She accepted, I gave her $100 and I got my seat!

I called Richard and told him it was well worth the $20 cab ride!!

WiPHoF - Part Two (The WiPHoF women)

2008-02-13T08:32:00.000-08:00

The WiPHoF women:

The four women inducted into the WiPHoF, were Barbara Enright, Linda Johnson, Marsha Waggoner and Suzie Isaacs. It was one thing just knowing ABOUT them, and quite another to hear them speak. I guess that’s one drawback of being in the spotlight, people know and judge them by standards set and stories told by people who don’t always really know them. What I knew about them – before the induction – was - Linda is a sweetheart, Suzie is a terror, Marsha is a lady and Barbara, well, all I know, Barbara has been playing poker forever, so all I had, was that she had to be old. I was looking forward to their speeches to see if they live up to expectations.
Barbara was first to speak. She kind of confused me, I sat there with a tilted head and a confused look on my face, I didn’t really get what she was saying and where she was going with her speech. At some point I wondered if she hit the bar before her speech, one thing was certain, I gave her credit for not wasting time on practicing her speech. She cracked a joke about Jose Baseball player and his love for WOE’s, which the audience seemed to love. Personally I think it’s better to ignore Jose and his featuring the Women’s Events, and not add fuel to the fire by giving him more attention than what he deserves and more important, not giving him the attention he most definitely craves.
So, by the end of her speech – adding the combination of her delivery, her interesting hair-color combination as well as wearing her sunglasses throughout the ceremony, I thought she was a little weird.
Next was Suzie. I was ready to continue not to like her – given all the horror stories I’ve read and heard, and my main concern was how I am going to get through her 10 minutes of talking. However, she took me (and probably most other people too) by surprise by starting out admitting what a brat she used to be and how she has decided to change her attitude. She seemed humbled and genuinely and sincerely honored by her induction, and I liked that. I changed my mind. I like Suzie now.
Linda was next and no surprises there. She’s a great woman, down-to-earth and the audience loved her. I didn’t expect anything less.
Last but not least, Marsha. She was soft-spoken and seemed not to be used to speaking in public, but she delivered her well-prepared speech with class and style. I like her.

See more here Click here for Cardplayer’s coverage of the WiPHoF

WiPHoF weekend – Part One (The ceremony)

2008-02-11T13:56:00.001-08:00

The Ceremony
Even though I am not one for ceremonies and luncheons and all that, I've decided to attend the First Annual Women In Poker Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony and Luncheon on February 2, 2008 – I wanted to be part of history in the making.

Even though poker is an equal playing field for men and women, there are a lot of women who do not want to be part of Women Only Events for numerous reasons. And for the most part, I do agree with their sentiments, and having WOE’s might establish the idea that we’re not good enough to play with the men, and that we need special treatment.

But I think that the history of poker and more importantly, the history of WOMEN in poker, entitle us to be treated special, at least for now. It’s not as simple as many may think, in the poker world, until recently, women were treated as second class citizens, not only the players but all women in the industry. They were abused, not only mentally, but sometimes also physically. Women players were denied access to games, grumpy old men refused to play in games with female dealers and many many similar stories came to light during the presentations at the luncheon. Looking at the poker world today, as many have said – “We’ve come a long way, baby”. We have every reason in the world to celebrate that, and more importantly to honor and celebrate the women who paved the way for us to be where we are now. We also have an obligation to continue supporting the growth of women in poker, and one very important way to do that, is the continuation of Women Only Events.

I had the greatest feeling at the poker table the other day. Of the 10 seats, 5 were occupied by women, and – as you should expect from us – a lot of yakking was going on. The two guys to my left were visibly annoyed and the one whispered to his buddy “Is it going to be like this all the time?”
I smiled and thought “oh boy – you have no idea what you’re in for”. The face of poker has changed. For years the only woman at the poker table had to listen to all the male talk, we had to listen to football discussions, comments on the cocktail waitresses’ boobs, and all kinds of testosterone-driven drivel - all while being called ‘sweetie’ or ‘honey’. And look at us now…. “We’ve come a long way, baby!!”

… to be continued…

Hello 2008!

2008-01-25T14:25:00.000-08:00

Holidays are over and poker is back in full swing. I had a lovely time with daughter, mom and brother all visiting over the holidays and didn’t have much time for poker. However, we took full advantage of Showtickets4locals.com and saw a couple of shows for free, including Danny Gans. I guess he’s good, but some of his impressions were not THAT impressive, he really makes a lousy Anita Baker and Homer Simpson, but his Bill Clinton and Louis Armstrong are pretty good! But hey, it was free, so I don’t complain.

I ended my 2007 poker-year on a lovely note. I played in the LIPS tourney at The Orleans on Dec 29th, about 57 players and after a couple of initial mistakes, I managed to make the final table, doubled up once or twice and finally went out in 4th place. See the pics here

The new year is off to a slow start though, I’ve played in a couple of tourneys, but only managed to cash in one by winning the ladies tourney at TI – let’s not mention the fact that we had only 7 players that night! At least I got another lovely spa certificate!

OK, so I’m a woman, and for various reasons I like to compete in WOE’s. I play regularly in the TI and Caesars Ladies tourneys, and I’m also part of a home league for ladies (once a month for 6 months). One of the reasons for this was to meet people who live in Vegas. I’ve moved here a little more than a year ago, and apart from my co-workers, most people I meet at the poker tables are leaving within a day or two and building up friendships - not really a possibility.

But boy, I forgot one thing. Women can TALK. Now granted, I talk a lot too, but at the poker table I *try* not to talk too much, because it definitely has an impact on my game, but apparently that’s not a problem many women have!!! If you don’t believe in a woman’s ability to multi-task, you should come watch a table full of women playing poker. They look at their cards and follow the action (well, MOST of them) while they discuss menopause, shopping, birth, hair products, husbands, children, etc as WELL as order drinks, all without blinking or losing the beat.
“yes, I know, and have you seen the way they treat their customers, you won’t believe what I saw the other day **CALL** that one girl, you know the one with the spiky hair, no not that one, that’s her cousin, that’s the one with the baby with the receptionist’s ex-fiancé **RAISE** she said to me that her mother-in-law buys from that store regularly **HONEY, A BOTTLE OF WATER AND A HEINEKEN OVER HERE PLEASE**and she never had a problem **RERAISE** with any of their stuff except that one time….” And next thing you know, she’s scooping in a big pot without any one noticing.

And THAT ladies and gentlemen, is why women make great poker players. (That’s also why my main accessories when playing in a WOE, are - my iPod and a glass of wine)

What are the odds?

2007-11-30T14:12:00.000-08:00

I’ve mentioned before that in two previous ladies tournaments I’ve chopped with the same girl at TI – and I got to keep the Spa Certificate each time because she’s a TI employee. So I thought that was quite the coincidence, but probably not THAT rare. Then we played at Caesars and – you’ve guessed it, we both made the final table and final two and chopped again. And then two weeks later we played at Caesars, same thing!! What are the odds that out of 6 tourneys we’ve played in together, we chopped heads-up 4 out of the 6?

Though last week at Caesars the poker gods must have felt they owe me, twice I was dead in the water and got saved by the river!
First time – I raised with AK in late position. BB called, flop came 10-10-x, she checked I bet, she called. She did not look too comfortable calling, so I assumed (or hoped) she has a pocket pair. Turn is an Ace, I pushed she called with A-10 and a made full house. (Not sure why she looked so nervous though). But Acheolus (god of the river) came to my rescue with an Ace on the river for a chopped pot!

Little later at the final table, I was short-stack due to the dumping huge chunks of my chips to someone who I later realized, was playing in her first live tournament and had problems folding if her hand connected in any way shape or form with the board. Twice I was representing a hand that she obviously (but not obvious to me at the time) didn’t see let alone care about. She was playing her hands and that was it. So I stopped trying to bluff her and asked her if she has seen a hand she doesn’t like. She folded the next hand just to prove to me that she could.

Now the next hand – beginner girl limps in UTG, I’m next to act and looked down at pocket 77’s. Only way I can get her out of this hand, is to push – she doesn’t like to put all her chips in the middle if there are no cards out there. Everyone folded to my push, only one left is Danette (my chopping partner) on the button. I saw that she had a decision to make and I knew I was in trouble. She is as quick as lightning when it comes to folding crappy hands, so when she started thinking, red lights went off. Finally she said “I have to call”. She turned over AK; I thought I had a chance until the flop came K-K-x. I stood up and start gathering my stuff when a blank hit the turn, but as soon as I wanted to say ‘Nice hand’, Acheolus stepped in again with a 7 on the river and gave me another shot.

The fun started with the antes – most of the inexperienced players slowed down with pre-flop calling and there were some good opportunities to pick up pots and antes. I tried to stay out of trouble – didn’t want to push my river-luck!! One by one they went out until – once again – only the two of us were left and we did our chopping thing again.

Wonder how many times more we can do this??

Treasure Hunt

2007-11-08T13:57:00.000-08:00

The treasure hunting is paying off! For two weeks in a row now, I have been lucky and had chopped for first in the TI Ladies tournament, and both times with the same lady! She works at TI, so she isn’t eligible for the spa gift certificate that comes with first place, so I get that by default—which of course I don’t complain about!

On Tuesday I played in the Caesar’s Ladies tournament, got 3rd out of 15 players, and got lucky again – only two places paid, but we agreed on giving 3rd her money back, so at least I got that!
Also, I have met some really nice and interesting ladies, the bad thing about meeting nice people in Vegas, is that they are always leaving town soon!!!

I am experimenting with changing my game a little, I need to be able to change gears, play position and more aggressive in the right situations. I have a long way to go and need to learn a lot more about this, but I have decided to embark on this journey and take it slow and see where it takes me. It’s something I have to get used to, I still have to get over my “I don’t want to lose”- mentality and learn to take more risks. I still find myself backing down to other more aggressive players. Working on that!!!

Last Sunday Richard and I both played in the Venetian noon tournament. I doubled up early, but after the first break I went card AND flop dead and couldn’t catch a hand even with a baseball glove! I managed to stay alive until two tables left and finally went out 17th out of 93 players.
Richard on the other hand, was on a roll and accumulating chips like it’s going out of style. He made the final table with decent stack and things were looking good. Then this hand came up - somebody in late position raised, the lady on the button immediately pushed – Richard is in the BB and looked down at KK. Original raiser has him covered, but not by much. He’ll probably describe his thought process behind this more in detail in his blog, but eventually he just called. Flop came all low cards, he’s first to act and push. Original raiser folded (AJ, if I remember correctly) and the lady turned over pocket 99’s. GREAT. She called for a miracle 9 and whaddayouknow – turn is a 9!!! Unfortunately the poker gods didn’t play along and no K came and Richard was short stack. He finally went all in with a medium pocket pair, got called by A-10 and got knocked out in 8th place. At least he got in the money!

Last night I tried the tournament at Orleans – but I have to admit – those people scare and intimidate me. First of all, somebody is always yelling at the floor or complaining about their hours, I allowed the old guys to push me around and before I knew it, I was short-stacked and out. Duh.

I also decided to put some of my spa gift certificates to good use, so I tried out the TI spa yesterday. What bliss!!! It helps when you're not really used to the luxuries of life, it makes the experience so much more enjoyable. I love the whole spa-idea --where we all walked around in our bathrobes, eating snacks, drinking fizzy water and listening to soothing music.

It that’s the treasure of Treasure Island, I’ll be there every Monday --hunting for more!!!

Another great weekend!

2007-10-29T10:19:00.001-07:00

This weekend I played in the noon tourney at Venetian - great structure - 7500 in chips, 30 min levels - $150 buy-in. I made one bad decision - laying down JJ on a 10-high board when I got re-raised all in and the guy showed 22. I should have thought it over, it was a loose-aggressive guy and I should have shoved all my chips in then. But we were down to 27 people out of 83, and I didn't want to go out. I went out next hand when I pushed with a flush draw and got called by two pair. Flush never came and I was out. Oh well. My own darn fault!

ANYWAY - so I played the 7pm tourney at TI last night. Only sixteen players, I'm the only women amongst a sea full of annoying arrogant bunch of men. I let them get to me, and when we got to the final table, I was EXTREMELY short stack with only 3 BB left. They were kind of ignoring me - just waiting for me to bust out - and pride made me determined NOT to be the first one out at the final table.

I folded folded folded, picked my spots and got a little chips. Stayed short-stack until 5 left - payout is till three. Now I'm determined to make the money. Again, folded folded folded, pushing with the right hands in the right situation and got a little more chips. HUGE chip leader was super-aggressive and he doubled me up a couple of times.

FINALLY down to four, and me and other guy took turns being short-stack. Finally his ego got the better of him and he couldn't stand being pushed around by big stack, he snapped and got knocked out! GREAT, in the money!

So then I'm in the SM, big stack on BB, third guy on button raised. I looked down at AA - GREAT. I called, BB folded. Flop came QJx, I checked. Button raised, I pushed, and he insta-called with AQ. Hee-haw, then HE was short stack.

Couple of hands later I have J10 - flop is 9-10-J. Big stack pushed, I decided he doesn't have KQ, a push would be stupid then, so I called. He had QQ, turn is another J and now I am chip leader!!!

Third guy went out a couple of hands later, and heads up I had a 3-1 chip lead.
I had Q9s on a Q-high, two spades board, he pushed with AJ, I called, no spade, he got an Ace on the river, and now we're pretty much even stacked.
Couple hands later I had A-10 on a 10-high board, he pushed I called. He showed J-10 - GREAT. Then the dreaded J on the turn and I was knocked out in second place.

I got unlucky not to have won it, but I had a comeback from hell!!! Was doing pretty well in the NL games after an initial bad start, and I had another profitable weekend!!

ps. also won my FIRST football bet thanks to the LIONS!!!

Two out of three ain't bad, right?

2007-10-23T15:27:00.000-07:00

First thing on my weekend menu was the RWC final - we arrived at the pub at around 11:20 am (game starts at noon), only to find a Vin Diesel look-a-like at the parking entrance who told us there is no parking for cars, let alone standing room for bodies inside, and that we’re better off heading to the next pub. I was almost upset, but his size convinced me not to argue with him, and I trusted the rugby gods (and the Irish) for room in the next pub. McMullan’s didn’t disappoint and we got some really nice seats for the game. We ordered some sausage rolls and I’m not sure if they were really that great, or if I’m just homesick, but accompanied by some kind of mustard dip, a cider and some kick-ass Springbok rugby, life just couldn’t get better. Before you know it, the pub was packed, the English supporters belted out ‘God safe the Queen’ with their team, while the South Africans stood around nervously when it was our anthem’s turn, because apparently none of us know the correct combination of South-African official languages as they were made part of our national anthem. That didn’t stop me from shedding a tear or two when I watched our boys sang along.

As expected, we won the game – I really wanted to see some running and a great try or two by Habana, that didn’t happen, but apparently he did his thing on the defense and I’m just as happy as the rest of the country that the Rugby World Cup is back where it belongs – in SOUTH AFRICA!

From there I went to Binions to play in their Ladies Event, met with some of the chixters for coffee and chat before the tournament started, which is always a lot of fun. Tournament started, and after a while I noticed something. We had a dealer named ‘Tess’, and for a split-second I thought ‘hmm, short name’. Next dealer came -- name tag ‘Kat’, and I thought ‘wow, even shorter’. Imagine my surprise when the next dealer sat down and her name tag reads ‘La’. Did they run out of letters to print or something? I would have been intrigued – but not surprised – if a dealer named ‘O’ or ‘E’ sat down followed by a nameless dealer – I was totally prepared for it.

I doubled up early -- had pocket 7’s in the BB, flop came 3-4-5. I checked UTG bet, one caller, so I decide to raise to find out what’s going on. I raised three times her bet; she pondered a little and called. Other person fold, turn came a 10. I bet out – BB really thought about it for a long time, by now I am pretty sure she doesn’t have a straight (yet) and I sent ‘fold’ vibes her way. Didn’t want her to catch whatever she was looking for. River is another 10, now I’m scared and I check. BB went all in for her last 1100, and I made a very worried call. Couldn’t fold, since the pot was too big at that point, and I was 87.985% sure I had the best hand. I was very relieved when she turned over pocket 6’s.

Little while later I got crippled when my flush lost to a higher flush, and from there on it just went worse. I got to the point where I had to pick a hand to try and double up. With 13 people left, everyone decided to make a deal and chop the prize pool so that everyone left gets at least $300, and the rest gets divided by the first 6 places as in the original distribution.
Found my hand, pocket 8’s – pushed, got called by AQc which flopped a flush and I was out. Got the $300, which was double my buy-in - so I was happy.

Sunday morning off to play in the Caesar’s Classic Ladies Event at 11am. While playing, I once again realized the huge difference between really good women players vs. men. Men (please note that this is a generalization, I realize that there are some men who are different) feel the need to advertise how good they are. “I had to call, I had a 35.64:1 chance of pairing my kicker while holding bottom pair and catching a backdoor flush draw” or “how can you call that with only 4 outs against my 16 outs” and then go on in great detail how they came to that conclusion. Guess what – NO-ONE CARES. If you’re really that good, trust me, we’ll notice. And if we don’t, well – face it, maybe you’re just not that good.
Women poker players on the other hand, are more likely trying to hide how good they really are. No need to give the other players at the table that piece of valuable information. No need to educate the other players at the table on how they think or how they play, we prefer they find out the expensive way. And THAT, my friend, is why women will be kicking some macho-butt at the poker tables. Testosterone gets beat by ‘chestosterone’ every day, not just in poker.

I also observed the following – during long tournaments the nurturing side of women surface - they feed each other, hand out Tylenol and tissues, offer advice and info on fashion, make up, children and every other topic under the sun. Guess that’s why Jose Whatshisface baseball guy stuck to the other side of the room this time.

I was doing OK for the first couple of rounds, manage to stay little above average stack and not make any costly mistakes. Then I got pocket 9’s, raised, got re-raised by semi-short stack and all the chips went in pre-flop. She turned over pocket 6’s and a wave of relief washed over me. Flop came with a 6, wave of relief turned into a tsunami and I lost a bunch of chips when no 9 came to my rescue. Oh well.

Now I was short stack, and my main focus was to stay out of trouble. A couple of times I’ve seen opportunities to make some creative moves, but I didn’t have the guts to do it. I didn’t want to be the one making a decision for all my chips at that point of the tournament, so I decided not to create an opportunity for other players to put me to the test. Guess I am missing an aggressive gene or something. Have to work on that.

I stayed short stack, and was looking for an opportunity to get the blinds and antes. With about 30 people left, I had to do something. And then it happened – folded around to me on the button, I decided to push no matter what I have, so I pushed, holding 64c. Then I heard the dreaded words from the small blind – “I’m all in too”. BB folded and SB turned over A10o. I reluctantly turned over my two rags. Flop came 23x, I had hope! Turn is a 5, I am embarrassingly happy and Indian SB lady didn’t say a word, I’m pretty sure she was thinking of which scalping method will work best on me.

With 25 people left, I vowed to do my utter best to make the money (18th), and I folded the majority of my hands. When I was on the button, the lady in the BB was a very solid, really good player, and I was able to pick up a couple of blinds and antes when I pushed. I knew she wouldn’t call at that point of the tournament without a really premium hand, and I relied on the poker gods not to provide her with that at that point. (I can’t remember what her name is, she told me, but I didn’t register!! But I hope karma got her and that she made the final table and that did well!)

I reached the bubble not in great shape, raised once with AQc and got re-raised all in – I folded. I didn’t come this far and played this long to bubble out. I folded my way into the money – HALLELUJAH!

First hand of final two tables, I got QQ, raised, everyone folded and I picked up some chips. Couple of hands later I pushed with AK on the button, lady in SB really thought about it for a while (I thought she was going to use her life-line!) and she finally called with pocket 10’s. I didn’t improve and I’m out in 18th place and cashed $423.

It was such a great tournament; I enjoyed every aspect of it. Can’t wait for the next one!!!

Rest of the weekend – lost all my football parlay bets thanks to the Ravens, the Redskins who couldn’t cover the spread and the Jaguars who lost their QB early in the game.

I’m content, Springbokke won, I cashed in two tourneys (barely, but who cares), so losing the football bets I can deal with. Great weekend!

Weekend wishes: Aces, Springboks and Jaguars!

2007-10-19T14:10:00.000-07:00

Busy weekend lying ahead – starts out tomorrow at noon with the Rugby World Cup Final where South Africa will be playing England for the trophy. Now technically, just looking at the last couple of games against England, we should win, but you never know. I think England really, really wants to beat us, not only just because it’s the World Cup, but I think they’re also still pissed that South Africa is not an English colony anymore.
We’ll be watching the game in a local English pub here in Vegas; hopefully there will be a couple of Springbok-supporters and not just the English!! GO BOKKE!!

Tomorrow night I plan on playing in the Binions Ladies Event as a warm-up for the Caesar’s Ladies Event on Sunday. I’ll also meet up with a couple of chixters (i.e. members of www.pokerchix.com) who also will be playing the Saturday night event.
Sunday’s event is the one where I won the seat ($330 buy-in) at a weekly Caesar’s Ladies Tournament. I haven’t played much lately; I hope the break did me good; I’m really looking forward to both tourneys.

Amidst all this excitement I also have to watch football on Sunday, I placed some bets and my main goal is to win more than Richard does with his bets!

I made three parlay bets featuring the Ravens, Patriots, Steelers, Seahawks, Redskins, Eagles and Giants in various combinations. Then I went against all odds and placed a straight bet on the Jaguars to win. Even though the Colts are undefeated so far, who cares!! Since my offspring lives there, I have faith in the Jacksonville team.

Now I’ll also have you know that I don’t pick my football favorites based on the tightness of their pants anymore, I actually do some research and put a lot of thinking into it.
I have never in my life thought that I would ever know as much about football as I do today. Still don’t know much, but compare to what I know a month ago, it’s pretty impressive.

Hey, I live in the States now – it’s a football nation -- and more so, in Vegas – gambling capital of the world – so if you can’t beat them, join them!!!!

Good for you!

2007-10-16T08:30:00.000-07:00

OK, so who decided years and years ago that men are superior to women? Why is it that we had to fight to vote, and today in many ways still have to fight to be seen as equal to men? This caveman-like attitude towards women must have started somewhere. Somehow we won the cooking, sewing and cleaning part, and men got to go out and hunt. But apparently not every man and woman out there agreed; just ask Gordon Ramsey, Emeril, Ralph Lauren, Marie Curie, Pocahontas, Indira Ghandi and others!

But that wasn’t enough, we are still fighting that fight, and even more so when it comes to poker. Since a firm believe in yourself and your abilities (AKA inflated ego) is an integral part of pulling off some notable stunts at the poker table, it is not surprising that most poker games are full of testosterone-driven male chauvinists who need to be smarter, better and more prominent than their female counterparts.(However, things seem to be changing slowly. There is a new generation of male poker players; the skilled younger ones tend to give female players more respect when it comes to skill and ability.)

The following is a perfect example that summarizes the fight we as female poker players are fighting. Last weekend I was playing in the 7pm at Treasure Island. Twenty-one players, only two women. Early into the tournament the guy next to me talked to his buddy, and I overheard him saying: ‘I know how to win these kinds of tournaments’. I assumed he was talking about the size of the tournament, but I spotted a little arrogance and I’m-better-than-all-of-them attitude, which of course in itself, is not uncommon at a poker table. Then he turned to me and said: ‘So, is your husband playing in this tournament?’. I dug deep to find my most dumb-founded look, put it on, looked at him and said ‘Huh?? No???’ as if it was the stupidest question ever asked. Which in my mind of course it was.
His reply? ‘Good for you!!’

Good for you??? What on earth did he mean by that? Good for you that you’re out all by yourself? Good for you because you’re brave enough to play a tournament without your husband? I did not reply, but I was waiting for the pat on my back accompanied by ‘Good job!’ every time I won a hand. Fortunately for his own wellbeing, he didn’t do that. One comment more, and he would have left the room without the nuts. (Now I wonder if I was supposed to congratulate him on playing poker without his wife.)

This is the battle we’re fighting, there’s a mindset amongst male poker players that needs to be changed. However, I think the problem is bigger than poker. I think the problem is with women in life in general. Too many women are too easily manipulated into a submissive role when it comes to male-female relationships, not just personal, but work-related and everywhere else in life as well. As long as we LET them think they’re smarter/better than us, they will. It’s going to be a long hard fight. There's a small group of women – not only fighting the macho men; we’re also fighting the Stepford wives of this world.

Razz it up!

2007-10-10T10:59:00.000-07:00

I didn’t get out to play at all the past two weeks, main reason is that Richard is working full time swing shift at Imperial Palace now – as supervisor, that means no early nights for him, and since we have only one vehicle, it means no live poker in the week for me.

So, I’ve put my free time to good use, and my WOW pally is leveling fast now, if only I can find a stupid dark rune now to finish the quest for my lvl 60 epic mount!! It’s no fun riding around at lvl 63 with on my regular, slow (but very pretty!) warhorse, when everyone else is speeding past me.

Wednesday nights – Richard’s first free night – we usually go for dinner at our new favorite pizza place – Grimaldi’s, and for the rest of the evening we play Dragpitt and Drangelina, a powerful druid- and-priest-duo which kicks ass in instances!

Poker-wise I have discovered the joys of Razz on Fulltilt. So many poker players do not like Razz at all, and I think I’ve discovered why. There’s no place for poker-ego in Razz. You can start out with a great hand like A-2-3, so you complete/raise, but there’s no way you can convince your opponents the K-Q-J up cards are not really there, and there’s no bluffing, if your hand doesn’t improve, it doesn’t MATTER how low your starting hand was. I see so many ego’s getting crushed, and it usually ends with “this is a stupid game; I’m going back to Hold’em”. It's really hard for some people to lay down a good starting hand that went bad.

Razz definitely requires a different set of skills than other poker games, and though I’m still a rookie, I really enjoy it. I try to play the nightly freeroll on FT regularly, so far I ended in the 300’s out of 2400 a couple of times, once I got 61st, and my best was last night 35th out of 2400. As in any free tournament, there is some crazy stuff going on, but it’s a good place to practice patience and it pays off to make the right decisions and not get caught up in the craziness.

In little more than a week, it’s time for the Caesar’s Classic where I will be playing in the Ladies Only tournament on Sunday, Oct 21. That’s the seat I won a couple of weeks ago, really looking forward to it. Hope I can still remember how to play! Hopefully the little break will do me good.
Binions also has some ‘Classic’ tournaments in the same time frame as Caesar’s; I wanted to go play their Razz tourney, unfortunately on the same day as the Ladies tourney at Caesar’s. Don’t want to jinx myself and say I’ll go play the Razz tourney (at 5pm) if I bust out the Ladies tourney early, hah! But I might.

Women Only Events

2007-09-28T10:28:00.001-07:00

It all started with Annie Duke’s alleged negative views on WOE’s. Women poker players all over the place took a stand and there are some pretty good arguments out there. In general, there seem to be two viewpoints, on one side you get the women who argue that we (women) were fighting for equal rights so long, and given that all things are supposed to be equal, there is no need for segregation at the poker table. They also argue that male poker players are not superior to women poker players, and that we should not be treated like second class poker citizens. And I agree with all that.

But – on the other side we have the group that argue that WOE’s are necessary for beginners to get their feet wet, for women who like the socializing at the poker table and so forth. And that makes sense too.

I see the validity of both sides, however, when I actually sat down and thought about it, I realized that I play ladies only tournaments because of the fact that more beginners are playing those, and the games seem softer and they are easier to beat. Don’t misunderstand me, there are definitely really great players in WOE’s, but they are easy to spot and I can adjust my play accordingly when they are in a hand.

I was also wondering – where do beginner male players ‘get their feet wet’? Why do we (women) need a special place for that, especially if we want the guys to respect us as poker players, isn’t it kind of an acknowledgement that beginner women players are not ready to play with ‘real’ poker players, but beginner men are? Aren’t we just adding fuel to the fire when it comes to the thinking pattern of the old school male poker player? (You know - the kind who believes women are supposed to be in the kitchen in front of the stove, not at the kitchen table playing poker with the men)

If it’s about the social aspect, then I fully support the idea of membership-only tournaments. Because that takes out the ‘women only’ idea, because for the same price it can be a ‘red-head only’ tournament, if you don’t fit the requirements of the membership, then go find or start your own group. (Though I don’t think a ‘bald-head only’ tournament should be allowed, the glare might be too much for the cameras *grin*)

I don’t play WOE’s so much for socializing and I seek out the company of women poker players because I found that strong female players are so much better than their male counterparts, and I learn a lot from them. Probably because we don’t have testosterone-driven ego’s we need to feed constantly and we are able to channel that energy differently, where it really matters.

Now let’s get Hillary to be president. Or Oprah. Or Annette_15.

So long, Sahara!

2007-09-21T13:52:00.000-07:00

Two nights ago, I was playing in the 7pm Sahara tournament. A lady at the table announced that she was there to write a poker room review for LIPS and/or some online site. The men at the table didn’t really care; they were just glad she was there and brought the girls out for the night too. Women at the table didn’t seem to care, we were just wondering how long it would take before the casino AC is going to get the better of those two babies. (Was around 15 minutes before she brought out the sweater, much to the disappointment of the googled-eyed guy sitting next to her).

Anyway – the lack of playable hands gave me time to judge the room myself, and after evaluating all the things important to me, as a player, I realized that I don’t like the Sahara poker room at all. I can’t wait to read the formal review – now I wish I listened more carefully in order to know where to find it – to see what her view on the room was and how it compares to mine.

By my standards, the room has only two things going for it – free sandwiches and a decent tournament structure. First I thought it was just me, so I’ve put it to the test. I went to play there during various stages of emotional state – I went when I was happy without a care in the world, I went when I was mad at my husband, went before, during and after PMS, went when I was tired and grumpy, and even combinations of all the above. The results were the same. Sandwiches and tourneys were good, but not good enough to make up for all the things I didn’t like about the room.

The room itself – uncomfortable chairs and too many tables cramped in the space, getting out of your seat requires a two week notice to everyone around you and meetings have to be held to determine the most sufficient way to get out of your chair without knocking over chips and drinks or bumping into players behind you. The only thing you can be sure of is that you wouldn’t be bumping into, is the cocktail waitress, because she is rarely there.

This brings me to the second point – the cocktail service. First, I have nothing against the casino hiring older (and I mean older) ladies as cocktail waitresses, but please don’t make them dress the part. There’s nothing worse than seeing a 40+ year-old cocktail waitress having to flaunt all her saggy parts wearing a dress meant for somebody much younger. Please don’t misunderstand, once again, I have nothing against those saggy thingies, I have a couple myself, but I believe they should be kept out of public and safely tucked away in some of Victoria’s Secrets.
Also, hire MORE, please – you’re lucky if you get more than two drinks for the duration of the tournament. I walked over to my husband’s table – actually I maneuvered my way there, it wasn’t as easy as just walking over – and first thing he said was “I ordered my drink when the tournament started, by the time I got it, the blinds have gone up”. Now, he doesn’t even drink alcohol; imagine how frustrated the beer drinkers get!

Now the part that annoys me the most. First, let me say that I’ve met three of the Sahara dealers when we were in Mesquite, and I really like them, and I am happy to say I exclude them from the following comments.
• dealers chewing gum while dealing
• female dealers wearing so much make-up I almost thought I missed a couple of months and Halloween has arrived
• female dealers flirting blatantly and heavily with apparently regular male customers
• all three points above combined
• sitting at the table seconds before the tournament to start, the dealer’s cell phone rang. Imagine that. THEN SHE GOT UP, TOOK A COUPLE OF STEPS AWAY FROM THE TABLE AND ANSWERED THE PHONE. How nice of her to have the courtesy to not pick up the phone at the table. She came back, one of the players asked – ‘Did you just get out of the box to answer your phone?’. Her reply ‘Yes, but it wasn’t important, just my daughter’. While his jaw(and mine)dropped to floor, her phone rang again…..rinse and repeat
• dealers being rude to each other in front of customers
• dealers being rude to players
• dealers discussing their private lives with players (in great detail)
• dealers discussing player’s hands and plays when the hand is over (guess we should be happy they waited until the hand is over)

Next thing, the location of the room is such that the difference in temperature between the front and the back of the room differs probably around 10 degrees. In one area you’re freezing, in the other area you’re sweating like a pig. Not really the poker room’s fault, but it does add to the negative image I have.

Adding up all those factors, I decided that I won’t make an effort to play at Sahara anymore. Granted, they probably won’t miss their portion of my meager $62 a week tourney entry, but truth be told – I won’t be missing them either.

Tournaments galore

2007-09-20T08:14:00.000-07:00

This last week or so I played in a couple of live tournaments – first one being Caesar’s 7pm with a buy-in of $150. Nothing of interest happened there, only thing that bothered me (apart from busting out before the first break), was two guys to my left who didn’t like me raising their blinds. I don’t know if I have such obvious tells or if they were just dedicated blind-defenders, but every time I raised from the button with a mediocre hand, one of them would re-raise over the top – unfortunately I didn’t stay long enough to figure them out, and I lacked the aggressiveness needed to play back at them at the time to get the info immediately.

Second tourney was Friday night at Treasure Island. Thirty-three players and I played pretty well and got to the final table with medium stack. Two big stacks on my right, two smaller stacks on left, perfect actually. There was a constant battle between the two groups, I didn’t know when to make a move so I just sat back and let them do their thing. Which resulted in the blinds and antes dwindling down my stack and soon enough I found myself next to short-stack with 5 players left.
With 9-10 of diamonds in the BB, everyone folded to big stack SB who made a standard raise, so I pushed. He called with Q-7o and got a Q on the flop, my hand didn’t improve and I was out in 5th place. Payout was up to 6th place, so I was in the money!
(In the meantime, Richard was playing NL at Venetian where the poker gods were smiling down on him, he flopped back-to-back sets with pocket 10’s and were doing really well.)

I took my winnings from Treasure Island and went to play at Sahara. Now there’s a tournament I've never been able to make it further than 3 tables left, and it’s bothering me. I needed to get to the final table. (Turned out it wasn’t going to be that night either). Had a couple of UK players at my table, at least I got to make fun of them because SOUTH AFRICA SLAUGHTERED ENGLAND in the Rugby world cup the day before. Also had a biker-dude with an attitude busted by a mousey-looking girl with a diamond in her nose who firmly believed in the power of AK. I didn’t get the diamond in the nose - judging by her overall appearance, she was no fashionista, haven’t heard of make-up or the beauty of L’Oreal #27, why bother prettying up the nose then? Maybe she lost a bet.

Anyway – she took a bunch of my chips on a 6-6-J-2 board, I had pocket 2’s, she was going to town with her A-6, and of course, with the luck of the nose-diamond, the river brought an Ace and her boat’s bigger than mine…. Arrrrrrrr (it was Pirate Day yesterday - if you didn’t know). From there on I was hanging on by a thread for a couple of hands until someone helped me out of my misery. Highlight of the night was definitely the free sandwich the casino provided.

Monday night back to Treasure Island for the ladies tourney. Fourteen players and I managed to get a bunch of chips thanks to big draws coming in, and I was destined to win the darn thing (I’m running out of spa certificates, I needed to win). My big stack didn’t last long ( I really should study short-handed tournament strategy, I suck at this), and before long there were 3 of us left – in the money – and we were pretty even stacked. The other two were friends, and I knew I was going to be their main target, so I suggested a 3-way chop. Nope, they wanted to play. Surprise, surprise.

So one or two hands later, I got AQ in the SB. UTG folded, I raised 3x BB, girl thought about it for quite a bit, and called with a painful look. I put her on a baby Ace and felt pretty good when the flop came Ace high. I figure she’ll bet the flop if she has an Ace, so I checked. She checked behind. Now I’m confused. Turn is a 7 and I bet. She called. River is a 8, I pushed, she apologized and called – she had 7-8 and caught two pair on the river. Still think I made the right play to maximize my profit off that hand, she just got lucky on the river.

Of course as soon as I went out, they chopped. Go figure. I talked to them afterwards though and they turned out to be really nice and apologizing for chopping the moment I went out and explained that they were friends and on vacation, etc. I didn’t really mind, I probably would have done the same thing if it was me.

Next tourney, Caesar’s Ladies Tourney Tuesday night. Here’s where I won the Dazed Donut (thanks, Liz!) award. I got there, signed up and since it was only 6pm, I figured I’ll go wander around the casino until the tourney starts at 7pm. At 6:45 I aimed for my seat just to notice two tables full of women with play in full swing. DUH! The Ladies tourney started at 6pm, I was thinking about the nightly tournament which normally starts at 7pm.

So, I sat down, already one of the short stacks at the table and feeling like a complete idiot. Luckily it was a very passive table and I picked up a couple of pots to put me back to even.

I played REALLY well and built my chip stack to almost chip leader at my table. I have to admit, I still have no clue how to play players which look at every Ace as a winner, if it comes with a big card, they raise, regardless of position or prior action, if it comes with a rag, they’ll just call. Folding an Ace doesn’t seem like an option. Oh well, at least most of the time it’s easy to figure out where you’re at in the hand.

I made one mistake – thought she raised with two big cards and my pocket 6’s were good, and I built a pretty nice pot for her pocket 10’s. Lost more than half my stack there, but managed to get it back with a push when I have top pair and open-ended and same woman called with straight draw and my top pair held up.

I was in pretty good shape when final table started, unfortunately I had two big stacks to my left, one of them very tight, the other either folding or going all-in with decent hands, so I had to be very careful about getting creative.

Four people left – payout is up to third – and with second to short stack, I was definitely competing for the bubble position.
Next hand the short stack went all in with QQ, and got called by AA. GREAT – now the Aces can knock out the short stack and I can get in the money. Alas – a Q hits the flop, the Aces didn’t improve and now I am the short stack.

Very next hand it’s my turn for QQ. I pushed and got called by the girl who just doubled up, holding K-10. Flop is 10-10—x, turn a blank, and to add insult to injury, a K hits on the river and I’m out. I was SO disappointed; I worked so hard to work my way back and then bubbled out. But oh well, I’ve managed the art of accepting poker results like you wouldn’t believe, an hour later I was over it and went home and won a online Razz tournament just to feel like a winner again!

It's Mesquite!

2007-09-10T13:30:00.001-07:00

Two weekends ago, Richard and I packed all the white shirts and black pants we could find and headed to Mesquite to deal at the Oasis’s bi-annual (I think) weekend of poker tournaments.

While admiring a lovely green golf course to the right, we almost missed both exits to the little town. Fortunately just past the golf course, there was a huge sign that said: OASIS and we figured that must be it, a traditional oasis (even in Nevada) would probably not have helpful signs for thirsty travelers.

Before I get to the dealing part, let me quickly tell you about Mesquite. The town’s slogan seems to be “It’s Mesquite!”. Now, I am not sure if they feel they have to announce it given the size of the town, or maybe they didn’t have anything else to say, I’m not sure, but it’s on ads, on tv commercials and on souvenirs, everything yells “It’s Mesquite’. So if you ever plan to get so drunk that you don’t know where you are, don’t go to Mesquite, because everything tells you “IT’S MESQUITE!”
At least it cleared up one mystery for me – I know now where all the Orleans players are bussed in from! IT’S MESQUITE!!

Ok, let me cover the shortest poker dealing career in history. On Friday night we had to deal the first tournament. Now to say I was not nervous, was probably like saying Zimbabwe is not in trouble. Or that South Africa is going to win the RWC this year (KIDDING, I have hope!!!) Let me tell you, I think the last time I was that nervous, was when I realize I’m nine months pregnant and there is only one way to get the little monster out!! (Love ya, Clarese!!!) If only there was an epidural available this time.

So, add the combination of ceiling fans, sticky cards, tables that either let the cards stay right in front of you or slide all the way to under the rail, with my unbridled fear and nervousness, and you have a recipe for disaster. I was concentrating so hard not to make mistakes and to keep control of the game, that I made the mistake that got me ‘labeled’. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed one of the grumpy old men called the floor over, whispered something in his ear. I assumed he wasn’t asking him out on a date, and when the floor said ‘Ok, I’ll say something about it”, I definitely knew he wasn’t.

After the first down it went better, I didn’t make any major mistakes, couple of things that were easy to fix with no repercussions. THEN, after a couple of tournament downs I get more relaxed and actually started to enjoy it, then they put me down at a dead spread where an Omaha H/L live game was going to start. That was the point I was starting to pray to every god ever known to man or animal. I prayed that I was going to get pushed before the game started, but alas. All the gods out there teamed up and 5 min before I got pushed, I had to start the game. Now, if you know poker players, that’s one thing, OMAHA players - they are a different breed. (I think they should get their own planet, by the way). Now, when all is well, being a poker player, when I look at the flop, I can almost immediately tell you what the nuts are (also helps that I normally get beat by those, so I picked up on that pretty quick). Fortunately for this Omaha game, I had only time to deal two hands – and that was a good thing, because I looked at the cards, and I saw nothing. NOTHING. They didn’t make sense at all. Hearts, spades, Ace, King, - all looked the same to me. Ek het nie geweet of dit Dinsdag of Dingaansdag is nie. I guess the players smelled my fear and both times they announced their winning hands and I just made sure to push the pot to the one who made the winning noises and not the guy saying ‘Damn River!’.

So, Friday was much better, I made one big mistake (which may I add, most poker dealers make at some point or another), where I burned and turned too early and cost a player a huge pot which he had no problem pointing out to me. After work on Friday night, I was informed that players complained that I was ‘too slow’. OK, I know I was no lightning bolt on Friday, but give me a break, I play poker and I see dealers almost every day, I knew I wasn’t that slow. But – as in business, in poker the customer is always right. So, I was now labeled as the ‘slow dealer’.

I woke up Saturday morning and decide that’s it. I hate failing and I hate quitting, but I didn’t think this was fixable, especially with the tag team tournament coming up where half of the game is Omaha. Being nervous already, as well as labeled, there is no way with my limited experience, that I will ever be comfortable enough to deal Omaha, so I semi-resigned. I talked to the people in charge and told them that I was ok with not dealing at all. Unfortunately they still needed me, and I had to work on Saturday, both tournaments. I think the floor guy Saturday night missed the discussion and didn’t realize that I was supposed to suck, because even whey I TRIED to go home, I was routed back into the line-up. I stayed and dealt the tournament until only 3 tables where left (out of the original 16 or so). Now if I was THAT bad, why didn’t he send me home and kept one of the other dealers? I just realized I am a little disturbed by how this panned out. One thing is for sure, I’m done dealing.  And I’m ok with that.

Sunday I didn’t even go in for work (Omaha alert!) and on Sunday night I played in the tournament. Made it to 29 out of 135 people, got unlucky when I pushed with pocket 99’s, got called by 9-10c, and he managed to suck out a straight on the river. Oh well. That’s poker. We’ve all been there, more than once probably.

Monday morning I *tried* not to work, but still got a couple of tournament downs and one live – which was fun. At that point, I was pretty comfortable with the players, the cards, the rake and not nervous at all anymore. And I also knew by then that I wasn’t that slow. My career as a dealer can RIP. 

The fun thing about that weekend was that the same players played in every tournament (there are only SO many people in Mesquite), and we got to know most of them quite well. I have met some really lovely people and I definitely plan to go back there. As a player, not a dealer, of course.

After all, IT’S MESQUITE!

Small victory

2007-08-28T09:41:00.000-07:00

Last night I went to play the Ladies tournament at Treasure Island. Signed up 20 minutes before starting time and then went to watch the flair bartenders at Kahunaville doing their thing. Must have been a newbie I was watching, his bottles went all over the place and he was apologizing a couple of times. Pretty sure next time I get there, he'll be taking orders. Poor thing.
So, at 2min before 7 I wandered over to the poker room. I was sure I've signed up for a ladies tournament, and silly me, I expected a bunch of women standing/sitting around, but there was only one girl looking as if she was waiting for something to happen. Just as I was going to give up and ask, they announced that there were only 5 entries for the tournament and play is about to start.
YAY!! I immediately texted Richard and told him I'm at the final table with only 5 players left. That must have made me look real good (I was hoping).
So, it was me, an older woman (good player), a young scared-looking girl with a backup dancer (or coach, or maybe just a supporting boyfriend), a round woman with an even rounder husband watching over her (he scared me a little, he looked like an ex-bouncer), and another girl who left her husband home and brought tons of luck, cause in the first 30 minutes she got Aces FOUR times.
One of those times she decided to 'trap' us, and limped in from the button. I have 9-4o in the BB,and the flop was Q-4-2. Checked all around (duh, do you WANT me to catch up?), and of course the turn brought another 4. Now I am betting. She didn't look happy but called. River is nothing, I bet, she had a painful look on her face but called anyway. At least she admitted it was her own fault for not raising preflop.
Play was looong, very passive, and I managed to accumulate a lot of chips by taking pots when everyone else missed. The poor scared girl managed to hit a couple of flops, but went back into hiding when she hit the flop, but was outdrawn on the turn or river. She was basically blinded out of the tourney, I almost felt sorry for her.
Older lady got unlucky a couple of times and she went out first, scaredy cat next, then heads-up between me and the Ace-magnet.
Three hands in, I got pocket 10's, she raised, I pushed and she called with A-6c. Now - with my luck,I was ready to double her up, cause I was sure clubs were gonna be all over the board, probably an Ace as well just to rub it in. Board came J-10-10 and I told her I thought she was drawing dead (in a nice way,though). Always nice to end a tourney with quads. (I'm trying to pretend it happens all the time, did it work???)
So I won, not only the prize money, but also a spa gift certificate for the Wet Spa at TI. Now, I still have unused spa certificates (courtesy of my husband) for Red Rock Spa - his comment : 'keep on getting those and soon you're gonna be the prettiest poker player in town'. Now that's a keeper.

This is wrong!!

2007-08-27T10:05:00.000-07:00

I remember, as a child, back in South Africa, we always had jam and canned fruits at home, courtesy of grandma. And they all came in 'kenfroet' bottles, AKA canned fruit jars. Now I live in the States, where jam is known as jelly, for one thing, and everything is bigger and better. So, the other day we went to Memphis Barbeque for dinner. Just imagine my surprise and comments when they served my Coke in a CANNED FRUIT bottle!! Not a baby one, a BIG one, the one meant for big Northern Cape yellow peaches. Only they call it a mason jar, but for the live of me, I can't figure out why would they use it as a glass.
Next thing - on Friday night before poker, we decided to grab a sandwich at the delicatessen at Treasure Island. So I ordered a ridiculously expensive salami sandwich - of course in Vegas stuff is either free or over-priced - and almost flipped when I saw it. Just exactly how much salami is needed for a sandwich?? I'll tell you. Twenty-six slices. Not thin-sliced - medium to thick!!!! Are you freaking kidding me? I'm not exaggerating, I've counted them, one by one. TWENTY-SIX.
Between canned fruit bottles filled with Coke and salami sandwiches that could feed a village for a week,I should be able to sue somebody because I'm fat.

Duh poker at it's best

2007-08-24T15:39:00.000-07:00

Not much happening poker-wise this past week, or maybe I should rephrase that, not much WINNING going on. This of course is much less excited to write about than winning.
Last weekend I attempted the Sunday NL tourney with my baby-boomer+ friends at the Orleans and I can honestly admit that I have played the worst poker ever. What happened, was, playing so much online baby tournaments ($1 and $2) on Fulltilt, has taught me way too much. Now I know a lot of things, and I applied it all last weekend. Unfortunately all the right things at the wrong time and vice versa and managed to confuse myself to the point where I didn’t know whether I was coming or going.
Apparently I was going, because the friendly Asian with A-rag took all my chips. And I had such high hopes for K10c at that stage. Oh well. At least I managed to outlast 20 players, and only 70 out of the starting 90 were left when I left with my tail between my legs.
Biggest accomplishment this week is my 5th place out of 180 in a $2 Fulltilt tourney, but not without incident. For the most part of the last half of the very long tourney, I was chip leader - which of course resulted in total stage fright when we hit the final table. I didn’t want to lose my chips and I didn’t want to lose my chip lead and everyone and his uncle took advantage of it. They should have just let my distribute my chips without playing, and let me save face.
I have so much to learn when it comes to tournament strategy. At this point the only thing I (think) I have down is maximizing the profit of my winning hands.
Last night I played at Sahara, and thank goodness, there was a glimmer of hope. I made it to about 30 players left out of 10 starting tables, without making any major mistakes, but also without doing anything useful purely out of fear I think.
Tonight I’m going to try again. I’m not giving up. I love this game.

Happy Birthday to my baby!

2007-08-18T20:14:00.001-07:00

Today, 12 years ago, I was 30 pounds lighter and on my way to the hospital to give birth - that doesn't even sound true, but it is - I have the pics and the baby to prove it!
.....and today my baby is 12 years old.
I am so proud of her - not only is she beautiful and smart, she is also loving, caring, funny and everything a parent can ask for. I am so lucky to be her mother and she is my shining star.

Happy birthday Clarese, I love you more than anything!

Love is in the air

2007-08-15T11:23:00.000-07:00

Ladies Tournament at Caesars – I arrived 90 minutes ahead of time, with my borrowed $80 ($75 entry fee and $5 for drinks) tucked away in my bra - well – not really in my bra, but it just sounds more fun than saying ‘in my otherwise empty poker wallet’.

Richard signed up for the 3/6 game – and very politely pointed out to me that he would like to play for a bit and not get my ass busted out early. Oh, the pressure!! (added for effect)

I met up with two girls from an online women poker community which I recently joined (www.pokerchix.com), from this point forward referred to as the ‘chix’, both great ladies and great poker players too!

Tournament started with only 20 players, and this is where the difference comes in between women only and mixed events. We sat down, and nobody said a word. For a long long time. We stared each other down, mentally compared wrinkles, boob sizes and outfits, all while the only sounds you heard was chips clicking, only words uttered were ‘call’, ‘raise’ and the most scary of all ‘ALL IN’.

I think most of the ladies at my tables were beginner players, they played only their hands and they played it HARD!. If you dare to re-raise the initial better, just to see where you’re at, you better be prepared, there’s no smooth-calling re-raises, and trapping was a term unheard of. Perfect scenario – all you need is a draw to come in, and top pair is going down in flames, because there is not such a thing as folding top pair.

The game became the ultimate in testing one of the most important poker skills – making the right decision at the right time. The only tell you needed to pick up, is what they’re TELLING you – ALL IN! I had to lay down hands I would have loved to take a step further, and carefully picked spots to pick up blindes and antes.

After a woman dealer came over and told us we’re too quiet and need to loosen up and threatened to get us a stripper, the gargoyle women came alive. Never have I thought that the mention of a man taking off his clothes could do that to a table full of women. Suddenly we’re sitting in a living room, having drinks and chatting away.
The poor male dealers didn’t want to make too much noise (because of threats to rip their shirts off if an Ace hits the board), but at the same time had to keep the game going, which was quite a challenge, believe me.

Long story short – took forever to get to the final table, one lady (self-confessed beginner player) had mountains of chips and whenever she sees a face card, she does the old ‘ALL IN’. What worked in her favor was that she didn’t care if she wins or loses; she was just having a great time. With five people left, she did her thing with Q9 offsuit, got two players to call, flop hit her hard, and she took both out in one hand. Which left three of us IN THE MONEY.

We played a couple of hands and somebody suggested that we split the prize money 3-ways, which I couldn’t agree to fast enough, since I was short-stacked! So, we all got $400 and that left us with another problem. The winner also gets a seat to the Caesar Classic Ladies NL event on Oct 21, 2007 (buy-in $300), and since the chipleader lady didn’t want that (she is from out of town and wouldn’t be able to play), and she didn’t want to play anymore after the chop, we (one of the chix and I) decided to draw high card for the seat.
I got the Ace of Spades and save her the trouble of drawing.

This relationship might just work out. Poker decided that it loves me after all.

Until next time.

The ups and downs of love

2007-08-14T10:05:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I’m having this love affair (with poker, doh, if you haven’t read my first post), and every day I realize that it’s very much like the real thing. Just like a lover in real life, this one is playing games – one day he’ll do everything for me, and the next day ignores me and pours out buckets of attention - not only to other pretty ladies, but even grumpy old men. He doesn’t buy them drinks or take them out to dinner – he gives them runner-runner flushes and straights to beat my two pair and sets.

Weekend poker started out pretty good. By putting in hours and hours (not kidding, ask my better half) of online poker, I’m trying to find my niche in poker. So far I’ve realized that I don’t have the killer instinct for NL ring games, but I’m definitely the one waking up the killer instinct, so – stay away from those for now.

I’m pretty decent at Limit Hold’em games, playing on instinct and feelings, no mathematics involved – which results in pretty interesting explanations and discussions when I try to justify some of my plays to Richard.

So, with that information on hand, I decided to play the limit tournament at Orleans on Saturday. In the hour waiting for the tourney to start, I did pretty well at the 4/8 game, it helped that I flopped a set on my first hand, and nobody thought I was serious when I kept on raising and betting.

Tournament started with 61 players and my first thought that it was senior’s day somewhere. Average age = Doyle Brunson. **note to self – play at Orleans on days I feel old. They all seem to know each other too, I’m pretty sure they’re getting bussed in from some old age home somewhere.

Apart from youngish arrogant player to my right (he was the only other person in the room under 60, I think), players were pretty solid and everyone seemed to have a good time too. Almost felt like playing a home game.

I wasn’t getting any cards, missed all draws and was getting pretty short-stacked when we got down to 3 tables. Got lucky once or twice and when the final table started, I was in pretty decent shape and very excited.
First hand at final table I flopped a straight, but couldn’t manage to shake off the nut-flush-draw Asian guy with the sunglasses (honestly, do you really need those at a limit game??), he got his flush and I got 10th place. Not too shabby, although I hate being first in the money, just getting double your entry fee back almost feels like a consolation prize.

Rest of the weekend my lover let me down – same night at Venetian I managed to lose my first buy-in within an hour or so, but managed to stay off tilt, playing disciplined like I should, and I got it all back plus another 20. Sunday was another story. The summary of the day is that my AQ clubs on a top pair, flush draw board, lost to bottom pair who hit his second pair on the river. What can I say, lost all my winnings of the previous day and some.

Tonight I’m going to test my lover’s commitment at the ladies tournament at Caesars. (For which I have to borrow the entry fee from Richard, who did much better over the weekend than I did)

How it all started...

2007-08-10T13:23:00.000-07:00

There's only one person to blame for this. A couple of years ago, I was dating this guy, and I started playing poker because of him. Just wanted to see what the fuss was all about and what was this thing that was the reason for not getting to movies on time, rescheduled dates and endless stories that started with "Well, I was in the big blind and.....”
I had only one choice. Like some wise person once said - if you can't beat them, join them. So I joined them …….. but the beating didn’t stop. Only difference now it’s called bad beats and totally acceptable.
And so a new love affair in my life started.

As for the guy I was dating, well, there’s a whole different story which deserves a blog of its own, so I’ll just give you the end result. Since he started this madness, I thought he should pay for it for the rest of his life, so I followed him to Vegas and married him. His story is at www.baldeaglepoker.com.

We’ve been living poker in Vegas for little more than a year now and I’m happy to say that the journey has just begun.