Wednesday, February 28, 2007

Live Bloggin' The Mook

Thanks be to Mookie, for answering my half-serious, half-in jest post regarding tonight's game. I never really expected anyone to take my begging plea of desperation inquiry seriously. But the blogger group is a generous kind, and Mookie exemplified that by basically loaning $11 to a complete stranger, with only my word that I would pay him back. Who knows, maybe he's the type to drop $5 bills to vagrants on a daily basis, and this is just another in a long line of his acts of generosity. Regardless, I intend to use his money well and bust Fuel55 from the tourney take the whole thing down tonight have some fun tonight and surely donk my money away again.

Yes, I just learned looked up how to do a strikethrough with HTML today.

Anyways, to show my gratitude, I offered to give him a break and live blog the game tonight. It's a bit of pressure, as I definitely don't want to disrespect the great live bloggers of the past. You can't tell me there's not at least a bit of pressure when my live blog is prefaced with the words "with props to the original and the best....Dr. Pauly."

I'll try my best not to be a disgrace tonight...

Monday, February 26, 2007

Desperation Is A Stinky Cologne

Never thought it would come to this, but...

So I got an ePassporte account to work. The verification process was actually pretty quick. But, if I load any money today, it won't be available until NEXT Wednesday. That does me no good.

I was hoping to have it transferred in time to play the Mookie this week. This Wednesday is my girlfriend's Girls Night, and she's hosting it at our place. It's the season premiere of America's Next Top Model. I HAVE to find something to do this night, and I was hoping it would be the Mookie.

So, the question is: does anyone out there want to help a brotha out and help me take care of the buyin for the Mookie? I can immediately transfer the money over via Paypal if you like. Or if you want to wait until my ePassporte account is loaded, I can transfer the money back to you then.

Anyone? I'm willing to transfer the money to you first. I'm not worried about getting ripped off $11 if you're not. Leave a comment or email me at ralphwiggum4pres@yahoo.com if you're willing to help out.

Please help. Don't make me succumb to a night of America's Next Top Model.

Thanks,
Matt

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

So This Is What It's Come To...

Man, I was so excited last night! I got this email from Full Tilt that said if I made a $20 donation to the PPA that I would get a $50 bonus on Full Tilt! Woohoo, free money! Of course, I still don't know if I'd ever be able to cash out if I were to win anything, but at least it would be money to play. Although I am comfortable with not playing online poker right now, I still wish I was playing, and I regret taking my entire bankroll to the PLO8 table. I should have just saved it, if for anything, to play in a couple more Mookies.

Anyways, once I read the fine print, I discovered that it was a $50 playing bonus, meaning I would have to continue playing and accrue 1000 FPP before my bonus would be released. C'est la vie.

So as for now, here's what my poker playing options are:

1. Full Tilt FPP tournaments. I have abour 300 points or so, and I'll try to play some of these tournaments to see if I'm lucky enough to score a token or too. Of course, the size of these things ends up growing to be a pretty significant size, larger than any tournament I've final-tabled. So it's kind of sad that, if I were to take one of these down, it would be the biggest field I've ever conquered, only to score a $26 or a $75 token. The other problem is that most of these start at 11:45am my time, so I would only be able to play these on weekend mornings.

Or I can just play this:
I’m registered in the free BloggerPods poker tournament.
Poker Mac


2. Seattle Poker Open. At the advice of my brother, I'm looking into these free bar-sponsored tournaments. I've never been a big advocate of these because they tend to be bigger donkaments than anything you'll see online. But what makes this appealing is two things. One, I'll have an opportunity to meet other poker players in Seattle, maybe make new friends, discover some good home games. Two, each week the SPO sends the weekly points leader to a Saturday tournament at the biggest casino up here, Tulalip, with the $90 buyin fully covered. I have no doubt that I'd be able to do well at these, and two of the three bars that sponsor the tournaments are very close by, the other within driving distance. To qualify for the chance at a buyin there's a $45 fee per season, and although I think that's a ripoff it's totally doable, and right now it's probably my best option.

3. Local card rooms. The problem with this is the expense. The cheapest tournaments around here are $35, and playing more than one of those a month is not something I can afford right now. There's a nice $40 double stack tournament at the aforementioned Tulalip casino, but the problem about any tournament there is that the casino is about an hour's drive away.

4. Home Games. I probably won't have another home game until next month. My home games will have to be outside on our patio from now on since we just go a new dining table. But it's still pretty chilly and wet at night, and I'll have to secure some lighting for the patio before I plan another game. Once the summer hits and the sun's out until 10pm I'll be able to host more games. Until then, I'm sure I can find other home games in the area; I always see a couple posted on Craigslist each week, but I'm skeptical about going to some random dude's house to play poker.

5. Gift2Go. I am considering purchasing one of these Gift2Go cards to deposit some money back on Full Tilt. I don't plan on risking my bankroll again anytime soon. But I would like to have some money on there again, mostly just to play the Mookie. The three times I've played in blogger tournaments I've had a lot of fun, more so than most other tournaments. I don't intend to start my hardcore donkey ways again, but I wouldn't mind playing a couple more of these.

Now that I've had some time away from online poker I've become more comfortable with stepping away from it. Of course I still have the itch to play every day, but it hasn't bothered me as much as I thought it would. I think it's best for me to start looking at different options for live poker and start getting back into playing live.

Monday, February 12, 2007

Out Like Seacrest

My online poker days are officially over. I began today with about a $50 bankroll and a $26 token. I had a play-by-play recap posted earlier but took that down because, really, who cares to see how I finished 299\681 in a $26 tournament.

I blazed through a couple $11 tourneys after that and couldn't get anything going. Most of my wins were suckouts anyways.

Played some PLO8 concurrently as well, did ok, until I decided to say "fuck it" and took my entire bankroll up to the $.25\$.50 level. Was doing ok until I ran into the madman aka SimoneR. He raises it to $1.75. I'm sitting on Ah2sThJd. Not the best hand, but it's a short table at 5 players and I'm feeling a little bit of a gamble.

Flop comes AJ4 rainbow. The madman pushes. I don't need to make this call. I've got him covered but it's pretty much the end of the line for me. I win, I'm up to about $75. I know I'm ahead. Do I make the call with two cards to come?

Fuck it, let's roll.

He shows 9935. Sweet! I've got him dominated for the high, and he still needs to hit a card to make the low. I knew I had him!

Turn is 6h. Ugh, fine, we'll split the pot.

River is a 2. He makes the nut low and a 6 high straight.








Fuck fuck FUCK!








I was left with about $1.35 which I doubled up through that lucky fucker, and then like a pussy bitch he bounces after the next hand. Doubles up and then leaves. What a fucker. I ran my last couple of bucks up to about $4 before I ran into a set and IGHN. For good.

It's somewhat depressing to know that I might never play online poker again. It's been an amazing journey and at times successful, but also very time consuming and sometimes a strain on my personal life. But the bottom line is that I just love playing poker. I'm nowhere near the skill level I know I can be that, and online poker gave me the ability to constantly be learning (mostly through my own mistakes). And now it's gone.

I do realize that there are still ways to deposit, but I'm not going to look into those. I feel like it's time. I'm at a point where I'm essentially a losing player, and I don't have the time or the money right now to work on my game the way I want to. To some degree I'm upset I can't play anymore, but all in all this is a day that I knew would one day come and I'm fine with that.

So where does that leave me and my blog? I'll continue to post on occassion, maybe talk a little about the home games I'm trying to run. I'll probably hit up some Seattle card rooms on occassion. And I still have the desire to one day donk it up at the WSOP.

But as of today, online poker is just a thing of the past for me.

Thursday, February 08, 2007

Calling It Quits

Before you start to read this, make sure to catch my Hammer Day post right below.

I think the time has finally come to put my online poker playing on hiatus, or at least until the day arrives where I don't have to sacrifice my kidney or calculate Pi to 362 decimal points just to deposit or cash out.

I've been playing pretty steadily the past couple of weeks, mostly $5 SnGs. I've hit a rough spot the past couple of days and haven't cashed in 5 straight games, including the Hammer Day event. I got dealt KK in the BB on the second hand and raised it up 5x. All 4 limpers call, of course. The flop is all spades, 6J8. I bet out about 1\3 of the pot and get one caller. I check it down incase I'm up against a flush already and I lose when mister 57o catches his straight on the river. Judging the way he played the rest of the tourney, I don't think I was pushing him off this hand at any point.

Anyways, the point is this: cashing out for me will be extremely difficult. All my funds are on Full Tilt right now and it looks like it will be tough to get them out of there. Because of my limited bankroll, the most likely option will be paper check and that's gonna require jumping through some hoops, which will be difficult anyways because I'm a man of girth.

Right now I'm sitting on approximately $80 and a $26 token. I'll probably hold on to some money to play a couple of Mookie's before I bow out, but my emphasis is going to be playing MTTs until I dry up. I might try a couple satellites into the FTOPS just for the hell of it.

This decision isn't for sure but it's where my head is at right now. I've increasingly become resigned to the fact that online poker is fading pretty fast right now. I am working on starting some home games soon and will probably transition out to playing at some of the card rooms in the Seattle area on occasion, so I'll still be out there playing. But for right now I just don't see the point of continuing to play unless I've got some considerable funds to cash out. I'm just tired of donking around on $5 games to steadily build a weakass bankroll that I may or may not have access to at any given point in the near future.

I do intend to keep this blog updated with whatever content I can. I appreciate everyone who's stopped by here to see what I've read and I hope you continue to do so.

Wednesday, February 07, 2007

In Honor Of Hammer Day...

Talk about sweet...



Dealt to mclarich [2d 7c]
Flopless folds
Shhawny folds
ops folds
watermpi folds
daytona15 folds
mclarich raises to 300
urmad raises to 670, and is all in
bonzo the beast folds
makdidly folds
mclarich calls 370
urmad shows [As Ac]
mclarich shows [2d 7c]
*** FLOP *** [Th 2s Kc]
makdidly: lol
*** TURN *** [Th 2s Kc] [2h]
*** RIVER *** [Th 2s Kc 2h] [3d]
urmad shows two pair, Aces and Twos
makdidly: omg
mclarich shows three of a kind, Twos
mclarich wins the pot (1,490) with three of a kind, Twos
*** SUMMARY ***
Board: [Th 2s Kc 2h 3d]
Seat 1: urmad (button) showed [As Ac] and lost with two pair, Aces and Twos
Seat 9: mclarich showed [2d 7c] and won (1,490) with three of a kind, Twos
Shhawny: unreal
mclarich: hammer day
makdidly: thats hilarious