Weird how playing good poker can make you feel better. Went deep in two tournaments, a Full Tilt WSOP freeroll and a qualifier to the 200k guarantee. Made a whole $3.75. And feel really good about it.

I haven't done well in tournaments lately, usually going out very early. It felt good to play hard and tough for a couple of hours. Even though the monetary payout was basically nil, I felt good about my game.

Things were going good in the qualifier. I was the leader about 2 hours in. My good hands were holding up and my betting was respected. Still haven't found a cure for being card dead, but that didn't hurt me that bad. There were two hands that killed me. One being a bluff gone bad and the other a good bet by my opponent.

I had completed from the SB with J 8. Board came 9 10 x, two hearts. I bet it out and was called. Turn was a blank. It checked around. River was the 7 of hearts. I bet out a third of the pot and was raised. I thought about re-raising all in. Something told me he just had an 8, maybe A 8. But I didn't want to take a risk here and mucked. My opponent then showed J 8! I was a tad pissed there.

Later I would push with A J just to be called by the chip leader with K Q. A J kills me again when the Q flops. Ugh!

Played quite a bit of Omaha 8 this weekend as well. It is nice to have a game of hold em going with Omaha in the back. If I hadn't gone on tilt in one session and dropped the whole buy in, I would have had a good record for the weekend. As it is, I was down about $50 but made it up playing HE.

Omaha is testing my brain more. I am probably playing a very basic strategy and could expand some starting hands. That should come in due time. It seems a lot of people have trouble reading the board and figuring out what their opponents are playing. There were many times were I had a good low but not the nut, and knew right away what others had. The betting patterns are good reads. If someone was raising preflop, it was a guarantee they had AA2x. If they suddenly bet out, they had made the nut low. After watching this, I would even pop a bet in there to bluff people out. Not much but on occasion.

I understand the pain of being quartered and the joy of doing the quartering. In one session that was pretty much every pot that I won. It was 3/4 each time.

Of course scooping is great. I love the slight pause at the end of the hand, just before the player hits the MUCK button, that you feel the entire pot coming your way. I think I scared my cat a number of times yelling out SCOOP!

Thanks Buffalo for the reading links. They have been helpful.