Let's see here.... Where to begin? How about with Friday. I had an ok day at work, money was a little weak though. But I had supreme confidence in my poker-playing skills, feeling like I'd make more in a tournament instead of working a short-handed 4/8 game, so I was totally cool with getting the boot early. I ran home, changed clothes, and got back on the road, heading for downtown. There was another one of those Binion's Poker Open tournaments going off at 2:00 pm, and I wanted to play in it.
There was no need to speed--I made it in plenty of time and paid my $160 registration. It turns out that there were 95 players total, so the prize pool was looking quite juicy.
I drew a decent table, and for the first two hours, aside from my blinds, I never lost a bet or a showdown. I was playing really well, keeping one eye on the tournament monitor screen overhead, watching the number of players dropping every few minutes.
There was one guy at the table who was an extremely solid player, but he was getting short-stacked after about an hour or so. He finally pushed all-in, and I looked down to see that I had a suited Ace-nine. I had the guy covered, easily, but there was another short stack behind me and I could see that he was going to push all-in also. I went in the tank and considered it for about a minute, but I finally let the hand go. As soon as it hit the muck, I felt like I'd made a mistake, and I was right. Both players had junk and I would've won the hand and knocked out two at once. Oh well, opportunity missed.
About three hours into the tournament, we got down to 40 players and they broke down our table, sending us to the four winds. My new seat was kinda sucky--I was in the number one seat, right next to the dealer, where you can't see shiat. And just to my left was a guy with a monster stack.
I played ok, but everyone seemed to be afraid of my raises--I couldn't get any action the few times I had good cards. But then the ugly card-deadedness happened, and it was a tough slog for about an hour. I couldn't get anything except blinded off.
We were joking around at the table that I had to stick around at least until after it got dark. Why, they asked? Well, I told them that I didn't have any trick or treat candy at the house and I park my truck in the driveway, and I didn't want it to get vandalized by the teenagers who came by looking for candy but came up empty.
Luckily, I was still playing well, and treading water, but my stack size was only about 75% of the average. The blinds and antes were getting up there, so it was looking like it was time to make a move. When we got down to 24 people, I was in the cut-off position and looked down to see pocket Jacks.
With everyone in front of me folding, and only three people behind me, I went all-in, hoping to pick up the blinds and antes. The monster stack on the button folded, but the gal in the big-blind, who also had a big stack, pushed her stack all in, and then the short stack in the big blind pushed all-in also, hoping to triple up.
We turned our cards up, and I knew I was in deep trouble. I had JJ, the small blind had QQ, and the big blind had AK. Good grief, talk about some shiatty luck. When the cards came out, the board had no mustaches, so I went home in 23rd place. Ugh.
I thought I played pretty well for the whole tournament, but just ran into some bad luck there at the end. Oh well, nothing I can do about that. So I came on home, tired, a little ticked off, and went straight to bed. I watched tv for a few hours, but forced myself to try and sleep by midnight.
I'm glad I did, because at 3:00 am my phone was ringing. Apparently there were some juicy no-limit games that looked like they were going to last all night long, so they needed me to come in at 4:30.
When I got there, there were still three games going--a short-handed 5/10 no limit game, a 4/8 limit game, and a full 1/2 no limit game. That was great, because I knew I'm make some good money for the first three hours of the day. It turned out that the 1/2 no limit game never broke down during my entire shift, and I had another really good day in the box. There was a kid with more money than sense who dropped about $1500 into the game, just playing like a complete dipshiat. I swear, had I not been working, I would've gladly taken a seat at the table to get my share of his bankroll. But I did a great job of pushing him the occasional big pot so that he didn't go broke, and it paid off well. The floorman and I both knew that once he went broke, the game would break up, so it worked out perfectly. The game was still going at 8:00 am when the old guys showed up for their morning limpfest.
I got sent home at 10:00 am, but it was another really good, and unexpected, day for me. I swear, I must worry too much about the job, but it always seems to work out for me. And when I got home, there was another unexpected surprise waiting for me. I had a little windfall come my way some time ago, but had no idea when I'd see the proceeds. I was hoping they would've showed up last month, but obviously it didn't. But when I got home, there was an envelope waiting for me on the entry table with a check inside. Score!
So I drove back down to the bank, deposited all my new-found cash, and breathed a sigh of relief. I thought that November was gonna be tougher than October, but all the bills are paid all the way through till December now. Anything I make from here on out belongs to me.
After figuring out where I was, as far as bankroll is concerned, I was extremely tempted to pack a bag and go down to Binion's again and play in today's $160 Open tournament, then just get a room down there tonight and play in the freeroll in the morning. That was my plan until I realized that I had absolutely no clean clothes at all. I hadn't done laundry since before last weekend's bender with Dougie, so I had nothing but old t-shirts and dirty shorts to wear. Hell, even my underwear stocks were down to the bachelor-style break-glass-in-case-of-emergency boxers. You know, the kind your wife would've thrown out long ago.
So the bottom line is, due to the fact that I had no clean laundry, I opted to just stay home and save the money. I turned on the TV to watch some college football, but the strain of a very busy workday and a short night's sleep caught up to me, and I fell asleep for the afternoon, waking up in the second quarter of the Texas/Texas Tech game. Luckily I had forgone the sports bets this weekend, because I would've gotten my ass handed to me. I guess you can't lose if you don't play, either.
Once I woke up, I started slaying the laundry monster while watching the tail-end of the day's games. I did a little bit of websurfing, and around 9 pm or so, I realized that I was starving--I hadn't eaten a thing all day. All I had was a cup of coffee during my break earlier in the morning. So I made a run for the border. But while I was sitting there at the stoplight at Eastern and Sunridge Heights Parkway, I noticed that Lee's Discount Liquor was still open. Having saved the money by not playing in another big tournament today and also not getting a hotel room for the night, yet still wanting to reward myself for a good day, I decided to go get myself another bottle or two.
The first thing I did was pick up a bottle of Tuaca. Lars has been drinking it quite a bit since I introduced him to it, so I figured I'd pick up a bottle for our next stay-at-home cigar night. But I also wanted to pick up a bottle of good rum, because some sort of palate-cleanser was needed after that Australian drain cleaner.
I browsed at
Right now, I'm sipping on some of that El Dorado rum mixed in a glass of Coke, and I have to say, it's pretty damn good. It's very sweet, not harsh at all. And when I first smelled the open bottle, it kinda reminded me more of whiskey than rum. But the cool thing, besides the good taste, is that the bottle comes with a real-live cork and the long skinny neck makes a satisfying glug-glug-glug sound when you pour it. It gets a place of honor on the booze shelf.
Anyhow... It's getting late and I have to get up in the morning and go back downtown, so I think I'm gonna wrap it up for now. Y'all have a good one.
Mikey
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