Twice the fun, at 1/2 the price....

Since Pebbles and I had already had all of our Anniversary type celebrations taken care of for the night and she was extremely tired from a pretty busy day, I figured I’d jump on-line and see if I could catch the Riverchasers game in time to play. Turn’s out, I had plenty of time. So just like a little green Jedi, register I did!

Well, last night’s Riverchasers game offered up so many challenges, it was just hilarious. To start with, what a starting table! Joining me to start the game were, Al, Waffles, Miami Don, Corron, Katitude, Bayne, LJ, and swimmom. I couldn’t have asked for a better chat group, I can tell you that. As expected, the one, two, three and even four liners, (Waffles!) were rolling like crazy. To add to the fun, Donkette, Zeem and CK were constantly dropping over to add their two cents worth as well. What a hoot!

I had Miami Don to my immediate right, Waffles to my left and Kat to my left +1. When we actually started playing some cards, there was a short run where MD would lead out into my made hands. This was actually kind of funny because I was running into some fairly solid hole cards so I could call or raise at will. Every time we were in a hand together, the flop would just come out so pretty for what I was holding it was sick. (not Astin sick, but sick just the same) On my first BB, I was holding the As-6s and there had only been MD interested by offering up a min. raise. I figured it was well worth seeing the flop with him for that price, so I just called. A flop of 10s-3s-5s was a beautiful sight. MD leads out after a decent pause and I sweated it for a bit before making the call. The turn brought a blank and this time MD just checked. Of course I was going to check here as well! I was hoping for an additional spade on the river so that MD could take a shot at representing the flush and it came. But he didn’t bet out at me as expected. Now I had to figure out a way to get a few more chips into the pot and needed to figure out the right amount to entice a call or even better, a raise from him. The pot was at around 370, so I tossed out 300 hoping for some kind of action. Unfortunately, so began the Bam-Bam bets out and MD folds out part of the evening. Waffles was having fun explaining how “Bam’s training Don,” by the end of the run, when Don released his SB to me for the walk. It was a bit of a sick mini-run with Q-Q x2, K-K x2 and free ride A-rag 2x that just managed to connect to the board somehow. But that was it as far as having Waffles on my side.

We played a couple of hands together, (maybe 5 or 6) and as I reflect back on them, there were certainly no dominant hands or giant stacks of chips, taken off of or by either one of us. We had one hand where something just didn’t feel right in the bet pattern or the cards on board. Right or wrong, (yes Waffles! I know it was wrong) I called the hand down, all the way to the river. This was a case of just wanting to see what he was holding. My cards were crap, but the price was right to get a look at his hand and compare it to how it was played. At first, I couldn’t figure out why the chips were sliding my way. The river hit the 9 high hand I was holding and then Waffles didn’t show. He ranted, (NAT!) he dissected the hand and bets in chat, he mentioned something about my slightly less than equidae and long-eared heritage, but he didn’t show. I found that very interesting. And thus began the ‘slam-Bam-Bam’ campaign that put me in a great mood. There is no one out there that can even come close to Waffles, when it comes to making me laugh at chat comments. Nothing against anyone of my other invisible friends, but when Waffles can make me howl that much and that loud, all while fighting off “the Plague” and a cup of two mixed medicines, come on! It’s not even close. Good lord there was some funny shit typed in that chat box. I consider myself pretty quick, at both the wit and the typing skills. But when Waffles got on a roll last night, so did I. (on the floor that is) All the banter coming in from every direction during that first hour was just hilarious and worth every penny of my $11 as is. Hell, it cost’s me $20 to get into Yuk-Yuk’s and half the times, I don’t even enjoy the comedy! But during the hour, I also took down a few pots and had a slightly better than average stack by break time. I think I was sitting around 9th. or 10th position out of the 39 or 40 that were left.

Apparently the tapes were all reviewed and a flag needed to be thrown on the play! Holy crap did things change fast as far as my choices of starting hands. In that first hour, I played an average of two hands an orbit and we were down to 8 full seats halfway through. I find being able to play 25% of the hands will give you a fair chance to build up your stack if you play it out correctly and hit a card or two when needed. The start to the second hour of play? Well let’s just say I proudly took down a pot and showed my sooted “hammer” pre-flop, because they were the prettiest looking cards I’d seen in the first two orbits. If you can believe it, it only got worse! I was 2-6 off, 3-8 off, 2-9 off’d to death for about 53 minutes straight. I played the crap three times and took down two more pre-flop small pots. I was trying to out-wait RNG and more importantly, SURVIVE! Out-waiting those three clowns while your chips dwindle away, is like watching paint dry on growing grass, while your ex-lover gets to drag their fingernails along a blackboard right beside your ear, while wearing a thong!
(yeah! That’s exactly how it feels as I re-read that)

As we were approaching the final 20-player level, play went on steroids for a bit. There were pushes with A-6 being called by A-J, 3x raises with J-Koff being come over the top of by Acey-Duecey and so on. I was watching in a fair amount of disbelief, as it seemed to become a “push and pray” system being employed all of a sudden. Had this been between a couple of shortys down on their chips as I was, I could have understood the thought process of trying to double up. But it wasn’t! These were stacks of $9,000 to $16,000 going at it pre-flop with those cards! I have no words. Absolutely NO WORDS for what was going on. All I knew was the next half-assed hand I held, I was getting my stack into the mix. Any hand had a chance against these monster stacks willing to double, triple and yes! they quadrupled a short stack up at one point. My best hand in that second hour came in the form of the Kc-Jc with me in the BB and at the 25/400/800 level. I was holding $2445 in chips at the time. I get two limpers and decide to try a raise to $1600 to pot commit myself and hopefully, eliminate one limper so I’m only racing against one other player in the pot. I got the raise from the player I expected it from but not the fold I wanted from the other. I’m all-in anyhow. I did not improve against the A-Qoff but killed the 7-8off from the raiser I was looking for. I go out in 15th. spot and say my good nights.

With the exception of running a little light on the hands for a bit, I had a great night and played some pretty good poker. (don’t listen to Waffles!) It was a mixed bag of fun, drudgery and good friends, (including Waffles!) that was worth the coin and the effort. I don’t really think I can say too much bad about that.

Now I’m off to the 10,000 player free-rolls on both Tilt and Stars! I’ll be multi-tabling up to six tables at a time if I can. I need my practice. Pebbles say’s it’s my turn to play in Kat’s Donkament tonight. It’s been two weeks and I’m obviously going to be out of practice. Hope to see you all there.

My sincerest thanks for dropping by….