Human Achievement Hour 2010

At 8:30 tonight, turn on your lights, stereo, and celebrate Human Achievement Hour. The myth of man made global warming us unraveling before us. It is time to get behind everything man has accomplished. Why live your life in the dark when you can go online and play poker? If you are not in the mood for chip slinging, why not take that hour to turn on the lights and do a bulb inspection. Celebrate what the human race has accomplished!

I'll be watching the Wisconsin Badger hockey team in game 2 of the men's NCAA hockey tournament.

Have we got a video?

I usually don't watch videos of poker games on the internet. Seeing footage of hand histories is not something I am usually interested in. I surprised myself when I was enthralled by Pauly's post Videos: OMGClayAiken Beats the Piss Out of Isildur1. I think it was two things that had me wasting time at work, catching the ire of my boss. First it highlighted some PLO play and second, it was like a tutorial on how to play crazy aggressive players.

I continue to play a lot of PLO8 online. Having a bonus to clear on Full Tilt I find the PLO8 tables, including the one on Rush Poker, to be the ticket to collecting that extra loot. In the past I would avoid the table that was averaging any pot over $15. That meant a bunch of push monkeys and I didn't want to lose a stack on tilting chasing a low and getting quartered or sucked out on.

But then something clicked in my head after watching some of these maniacs play. There was more method to the madness than playing their cards. I have seen people raise every single pot in position and show down some crap cards. Even if they get called they will bet pot on the flop unless the board is easy trouble (nut flops). They get lots of people to fold and collect these small pots. Sometimes they get lucky and hit the ugly flop and collect a huge pot.

But there is one constant to these players. They quickly stack up before spewing it all back. They can be trapped. They are also susceptible to the bluff. Check raise one of them on the flop and they will usually fold. Of course you have to be prepared for them to pot it right back. And be prepared to rebuy when that suckout occurs or you don't hit 40 outs you had.

Playing these aggros takes the game to a different plateau. It forced me to adjust my game. Watching the OMGClayAiken video only confirmed what I thinking. I may have just changed my mind on those videos.

For Anna

Lifted from Bloody P who copied from Al. Show up and help raise some money for a good cause.

This post was originally posted over at Poker From The Rail on Full Tilt Poker. Big thanks go to AlCantHang for making all of this happen. He is truly one of the good guys.
For Anna
So, there’s this really cool 7th grade kid that I know that goes to my kids school. Her name is Anna.A year ago, she was busy being…well…a kid. She was on the junior high basketball team and on the track team. She was a good student and was full of life, laughter, and a ton of potential. She was very popular, but kind to everyone. My 8 year old daughter adored her.Fast forward to today. She’s now lying in a bed at Children’s Hospital in Milwaukee, being fed from a tube.What happened?Anna was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy. It’s a terrible, debilitating disease that can be best described as this: her damaged heart does not effectively pump her blood anymore. She was recently transplanted with a temporary device to assist her heart pump blood.Now, this is the part of this post where I’m supposed to make you cry. I’m supposed to wring enough tears from your eyes to get you open up your wallet and get you to sign up for the charity tournament I’ve set up to help Anna’s family raise money to help offset their mounting medical bills. I’m supposed to talk about how Anna is in constant, agonizing pain. How a week and a half ago she suffered a stroke that paralyzed the left half of her body. How she has been so weak that she can’t even feed herself, let alone try to stand up and take a step across her hospital room. How at age twelve, she’s endured more surgeries and medical procedures than most people will have to endure in a lifetime.I could go into greater detail on all of the above, because it’s all horribly sad and all horribly true. But I won’t, because here’s the bottom line:If Anna doesn’t find a new heart, she will die.For someone so young and once so full of life to now be facing death is incomprehensible to me.I look at my own kids differently now, knowing that I don’t know (and can’t control) what the future holds for them, and one day it could be one of them lying in a cold, sterile hospital bed praying for a heart to be donated in order to live. And that’s why I’m holding this tournament for Anna and her family.I implore you to sign up for the “Anna Benefit Tournament” on March 15th at 22:00 ET. It’s a $5 + $5 tournament under the “Private” tab here on Full Tilt. Password is “ForAnna”. Every dollar of the “+5” will go directly to Anna and her family.For more information, please visit Anna’s Caring Bridge page here:http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/annaschmidt
Thanks for taking the time to read this, and hopefully I’ll see you at my table on Monday night.

A sportcasters view of the EPT heist

So, you call this place G-Vegas, huh?

G-Vegas. Anyone who is in the know knows what G-Vegas is. If not then you have been missing out on some of the better poker post of the past years. But I always wondered if it truly lived up to its name.

Like a call up to the big leagues, I made my plans when I got the invite to Mastodon Weekend. It was my chance to see if G-Vegas was truly the Vegas of the east.

Gambling- No way this place can have Vegas in its name if there isn't some gambling going on. There was a poker tournament held by, as Pauly called him, the Mayer. Held in a beautiful restaurant with a bar right near by and ladies serving cocktails. But that wouldn't be all. The game du jour was Big Deuce, a frustrating game that would have you cursing within 3 hands. Add in some NLHE and PLO and sure there was gambling. And that was just during the pokering. These degenerates live for the prop bet. Whether it be Drizz donning a purple ladies shirt for $40 or BG gobbling down 13 jalapenos for $20, there were prop bets being slung around. Score this as a YES for G-Vegas.

Booze- Plenty of booze around this town. In fact, each place seemed to have a good selection of beers. None of these bars that just had the mass produced Miller, Bud, or Coors only. No place that considered Blue Moon to be their only craft beer. The Barley Room had 72 beers on tap. 72! Each time we went into a new place there was at least 5 beers that caught my eye. Place after place was like this. Amazing. Plus they had SoCo. Score this as a YES for G-Vegas.

Friends- Brad estimated 30 degenerates from around the country were coming into town. People from Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Chicago, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, Columbia, St. Louis, and Toronto to just name a couple. Do I need to say how great it was to see everyone again? I always know how great it is when I begin to already miss everyone in the last couple of hours before it is over. That was the feeling late Saturday night. Score this as a YES for G-Vegas.

Dive bar- I don't know how to describe the affinity people have for the Geisha Bar at the IP. There is something about that dumpy little bar in that dumpy casino that just feels like home. Is it the sometimes surly bartenders? No. I think it was because it was close to your hotel room and you could always pour yourself into the elevator and get up to the room. I think it is like that old pair of shoes that you still have. You use to wear them either when out playing sport or walking about. They then became a work around the house shoe. Now they are green because you use them to cut the grass. But it is still comfortable. That is the Geisha Bar. That comfortable shoe that has the strange smell. Or maybe it is the hookers. The comparable G-Vegas bar would have to be Connollys. Connollys Irish Pub was the comfortable shoe. The amenities were nothing to brag about. On Friday we walk in and some guy is on stage playing guitar singing away with a bongo player crouched down to his right. Yes, that is right. A friggin' bongo player! Good service and another good beer selection made this place good. Score this as a YES for G-Vegas.

Hookers- I know what you are thinking. You saw that I mentioned the hookers at the Geisha Bar but stopped there. I know what you are thinking now. Did Connollys have hookers? Let me start by saying I was amazed by the beautiful women I saw in G-Vegas. Cheap Trick says it correctly. Southern Girls you got nothing to lose. It makes me wonder what a G-Vegas hooker would look like because I did not see any hookers at Connollys. I think that normally would be marked a YES but hooker watching is a spectator sport for this crew. Score this as a NO for G-Vegas.

Dry air- This isn't a good thing. I don't know about many of you but after 2 days in Vegas I can feel my skin drying out. My lips are chapped. My nasal passages are messed up and I feel like drinking a gallon of water. That is how I felt in G-Vegas as well. Two days and I using the skin lotion in the hotel. Score this as a YES for G-Vegas.

Good food- Ribs, steak, chicken club, sushi, bacon waffles. All were great. About the only thing that sucked were some wings that didn't agree with me. I think they tried to kill me. I only wished I could have ate at the Waffle House or maybe Beef O'Bradys. Beef O'Bradys. Say it. It screams goodness doesn't it? Score this as a YES for G-Vegas even though Sharkeys tried to kill me

So there you have it. The scorecard screams that G-Vegas lives up to its name. Now I try have to wait 359 days until Mastodon Weekend comes around again. Believe me, if you get the call, answer the phone.

Yesterday I thought a nagging foot injury had healed. Hurting again today. Turns out it was all the alcohol consumed during Mastodon Weekend. Booze does indeed numb the pain.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

It's not just another game

"So, what are you doing this Friday?"
"I think I am going to get together with some friends and drink and play some poker."
"Oh yeah, who you playing with?"
"Let's see...BadBlood, Otis, Chilly, Drizz, Al, Iggy, Special K, John, BG, the Bracelet and the Doc among others. You know, the usual gang. Oh yeah, and her."

Bustout Poker.