Thursday, February 20, 2014

Vegas Time!

My bags are packed and I'm ready to go.  I have my coupons, rewards cards, cash, cloths, phone charger, and a few other things all packed up.  Usually I'm a last minute packer, but I have been so anxious for this trip I packed ahead of time.

We drive to Wichita tonight and stay the night with a friend.  Tomorrow morning we will fly out. 

Last night I woke up nervous that I was getting sick.  It has been going around and does not sound pleasant.  My concern was that I would get sick right after I check in for our flights and would not be able to change them if I ended up with the crud.

I was awake from 2:00 to 3:45 worried about my churning belly.  I finally fell back asleep after reading for a while.  When I got up this morning I felt fine.  That's when I realized I forgot to eat supper last night.  No wonder my stomach was churning.  A big guy like me has to eat.

With it being the last day before the trip I am super anxious to get there.  I have looked up information over and over again.  It doesn't matter.  Once we get there we will do whatever we are in the mood to do.  I don't like planning out what we will do and when.  I would rather just go with the flow.

We do have a few things planned.  Eat a lot.  Drink a lot.  Play some poker.  Have fun.  I figured we will drop our things off at the hotel tomorrow and take off exploring the strip.  Maybe hit a buffet for lunch, maybe play some poker games afterwards, then wander around some more checking out some of the free things the strip has to offer.  That may all change between now and when we arrive, but I want to have some plan of attack so we don't get there and sit around. 

Vegas Baby!

Tuesday, February 18, 2014

Monday Night Muck Em

With only 3 days left until I start my adventur to Vegas, I wanted to make a showing at the poker tables Monday night.  We had 10 players for the game. 

When I arrived, I carefully chose my seat so that I would have the best shot at making the money by playing tight aggressive.  There are a couple players that have figured out how to destroy that style of play so I made sure I didn't sit near either of them.

Once the game started I was dead in the water.  I couldn't catch anything for the first few blind levels.  Not a great start.  Then I was dealt a 72.  It was time to win a pot.  I doubled the BB preflop, flop and the turn.  I was called all the way to the river.  The board ran out A K J 8 10.  With the scary river card, I led out 6 times the BB.  The other guy thought about it for a while before mucking and saying he didn't have that big of a hand.  I turned over my 72 and the crowd went wild.  O.K. one other player said I can't believe you did that. 

A couple hands later I actually had a hand and gathered another good pot with AQ. 

From then on, I was bet out of pots or couldn't find a playable hand.  Before I knew it we were playing for the bubble and then for top 3.  I was in desperate need of a few double ups to have a chance, but couldn't even get a face card to go all in.  I would be put all in by the blind and double up, then no cards, all in by the blind, double up.  I did that 3 or 4 times.  Finally I got 2 face cards and went all in with the biggest stack I had all night, which at this time was only 2 BB's.  I was called right away.  He had an ace and spiked an ace on the flop.  I also flopped a pair but I could not pull a second card on the turn or river.

Third place will give me more money to take to Vegas and may move me up to the top of the leaderboard for the year.

Friday, February 14, 2014

Drinking Vegas

With less than a week to go until we leave for Vegas, I am more anxious than ever.  I scheduled the trip perfectly for a break after such a hectic work schedule.

The last month has aged me a couple years with all of the stress from work.  I finished up a system conversion, had auditors, had a system update, got W2's and taxes out the door, got benefit enrollment going, on top of countless other smaller projects that popped up along the way.  I'm ready for a break.  I would have been a lot more stressed out if I didn't have something to look forward to afterwards.

On top of it all we have had sickness, birthdays, ball games, a weekly poker game, study time with the kids, and some where in there time to sleep.

I had been on medications for sinus's and getting my wisdom teeth pulled then sinus's again, so I have not drank much in the past 8 weeks.  I usually try to consume several alcoholic beverages a week in order to ward off my allergic reactions to alcohol.  With the long break I have been breaking out in hives the last few times I have drank the last week.  They don't last long, and the burning, itching usually goes away after I have a couple of drinks.  I was worried it would be worse.  I didn't want to wait until we got to Vegas to figure out how bad it would be.

My goal this week is to drink several different drinks to continue to get ready for Vegas.  I haven't spent a lot of time completely sober out there and don't plan on spending this whole trip that way. 

On the plus side I am going to be a very cheap drunk.  Two drinks is about my limit right now.  That's a far cry from where I used to be in college, when I used to stand on a step stool, open my throat and pour down a pitcher of beer every half hour to entertain the crowd.  Maybe I didn't know my limit back then, because I remember crawling on my hands and knees back to the house a few times.  One time I waved to some girls on a porchswing with one of my hands and fell over.  A three point stance was not enough. 

Mizike can hold his liquor and puts me to the test each time we get together.  This is going to be a rough trip if I'm not able to build some type of tolerance.  I'll have to keep him on the move checking out different places so we can't drink a whole lot.

I used to watch Mizike chug rum just like I did beer.  We're both older now but I bet we can still put a few back when we get there.

Friday, February 7, 2014

Super Bowl Prop Bet

Early in the day Sunday I saw that I had 20.00 bonus money to use at a sports bet page.  I haven't been paying attention to football at all this year since we don't have cable.  Since Denver is close I thought I would cheer for them and make a bet that they would win. 

The site said I would get 16.70 if they won.  Since I'm not a sports bettor I didn't know if that included the 20.00 I spent on the bet or not.  16.70 for 20.00, or 0.00 for 20.00 sounded like a poor bet so I decided to look at other options.

I noticed the super bowl prop bets.  One of them was how many times Peyton Manning would say Omaha.  Another was what type and color of drink would be poured on the winning coach.  This seemed like something I would have a good shot at winning even though there were a ton of colors of Gatorade as well as water and some other liquids including the long shot chicken broth.

I was initially going to put all 20.00 on yellow Gatorade as that is a very popular color and had a nice payout.  At the time I was thirsty and could have went for an orange Gatorade.  I decided to do 10.00 on orange and 10.00 on yellow.  Either way I would come out a winner if either color was poured on the coach.

All game long the camera would show the Gatorade table.  You couldn't see into the cups.  As the game got out of control it became evident the Seahawks were going to win.  Would they drink orange Gatorade since they were playing an orange team?  They had lime green on their jerseys, were they drinking lime green Gatorade?  Maybe I should have put 1.00 on the chicken broth!  The payout would be astronomical and I would regret not having a small bet on it if they dump chicken broth.  Surely they'll still be excited enough to dump liquid on the coach, even though it's a blowout, it is the Super Bowl.  All kinds of thoughts were going through my head.

Then as the time was clicking down, the camera showed players approaching the coach with a Gatorade jug.  Sploosh!  Orange Gatorade dumped all over the coach.  I jumped up and started cheering!  The most exciting part of the whole Super Bowl and I won.  Had it been yellow Gatorade I would have won more but I still made money.

I checked after a while and the money was in my account.

A couple days ago I got online to play around a little bit before bed.  My account had more money in it than it should.  I pulled up the account history and there it showed that I won the 2nd bet.  Apparently they dumped yellow Gatorade on the coach after dumping orange Gatorade on him. 

I did find out that I would have gotten the 16.70 + my 20.00 bet if the Broncos would have won.  Lucky for me I didn't know that at the time and found the prop bets.

Tuesday, February 4, 2014

Getting Ready For Vegas, Monday Night Muck Em and 750 SNG Month Recap

Apparently it's been a while since my last post.  I failed getting in 750 SNG's as I had to put in 15 hour days at work the last 2 days of the month.  I was still able to get about 740 games in for a profit of 1.00.  That is including the 10.00 from VIPs's and 15.00 from the SNG leaderboard.  Not very impressive.

The time it took to take on this challenge was too much for me to try it again anytime soon.  It was fun for a month.  It was just the wrong month to try it with so much going on at work. 

Last night was our local tournament that I have termed Monday Night Muck Em.  There were 15 runners.  I wanted to make the money to give me some more spending money for Vegas.  The previous week I started out hot and in one round lost all of my chips. 

This week turned out a little bit different.  There was a lot of gambling going on at my table so I sat back and waited on cards and then waited on my cards to hit, then collected chips.  Right as we were getting ready to merge tables I was able to take a person out at my table that had slightly less chips than I had.  He was fishing for a flush.  I had top pair with a flush draw.  Luckily the flush didn't come.

At the other table a guy had just taken out 3 other players in 1 hand, so I needed those chips to have a chance to make it to the money.

At the final table, my hole cards turned to crap.  I thought about playing suited connectors a couple of times but the blinds were too high to risk that kind of play.  Once I saw the flops I regretted my decision.  It got down to 5 players pretty quick with 4 getting paid.  I painfully lost a big pot to a small stack in a blind vs blind play when I caught top pair on the flop.  He checked, I bet slightly over pot and he goes all in for double of what my bet was.  I called to see that he had gotten a set of 2's on the flop.  Bummer. 

At that point 3 of us were now short stacked.  I really didn't want to be bubble boy but couldn't find a hand to play.  Then as the blinds are going up and I'm next to be BB.  Two players go all in and the big stack calls.  I'm hoping that the big stack can beat at least 1 of them.  As the cards finished flying the big stacks hand held and we were in the money. 

I got a walk on my BB but didn't feel an all in moment that round.  The BB had me all in again.  This time the other shorter stack called.  I had J8 to his J7 and won.  The other short stack won on his BB against the big stack and I was back in the BB again.  This time I had 10 6d.  I only had slightly over 1 BB so I called big stack's raise.  He had 10 7o.  The cards ran him out a flush and ended my night.  The next hand the other player won against big stack, but that didn't last long as big stack called his all in the very next hand and took him out. 

I was happy to finish in the money again.  With only 2 more weeks until Vegas I can use any extra winnings I can get.