When Your Wife Makes You Cry

Our home game was Friday night after the Big Guy's soccer game (10-0 and he had a sweet goal). This was pure suburbia poker, $1/2 LHE so really more social than poker. We had eight with two no-show's, and we're close to finding enough folks for a serious game. The cast of characters: 0s: cc (zero seat as in I dealt the whole time since it's my cards and my chips and my table); 1s Judd (played last time, used to play in a home game up to three times/week playing wild stuff, before holdem boom), 2s Greg (first time, father of one of my soccer players, loves to play, plays mainly low limit when he goes to Vegas), 3s Sweetie (my bride, says that she doesn't have to play if I have enough; I back her and take the profit), 4s Cathy 5s Andre (husband and wife, parents of one of my soccer players, like to party a bit, Andre hadn't played holdem, Cathy is pretty fun played blackjack alot it sounds like), 8s Rich (has played every time we've played, I also played with him the last time I was in Vegas, loves playing lower limit, serious player), 9s Russ (neighbor down the street, really really good guy, first time). Average age: 43 probably (Sweetie was the baby). Blinds were $0.50/$1, most of the time 5-7 to a flop, raises were meaningless. Rich was the loser, going through the $40 buy-in plus another $20. It absolutely killed him too as he's a player. Typical stuff for Rich: AK beaten by K2 with a 2 on the board, bluffs called down, etc, etc. Other brilliant plays: T3o from Andre called Judd's pre-flop KK raise than caught a 3 on flop and one on the turn. I called in the sb with 5s3s with 6 others in, flop comes 533, 8 on turn, 5 on river, and I've got five callers at the end. But it was these two consecutive hands that almost brought me to tears. There is a raise and four callers including Sweetie, flop comes 667 there is a bet and all call, 6 on turn and the same, 3 on river Sweetie checks, there is a bet, a raise, and Sweetie three-bets, two callers watch her flip over AA. Next hand seven players are in. Flop is T9x with two spades, bet and five callers; 9 on the turn there is a bet and four callers, A on river Sweetie again checks, there is a bet, call, fold, Sweetie raises, call/call. JJ and AKs get taken down by Sweetie's 99. It was like watching your son throw a touchdown in the Super Bowl or something. She has a BS in Chemistry from Furman and a BS in Chemical Engineering from Georgia Tech, so she's got the goods. I ended up $60 and she was up $45. She doesn't have much interest in playing ever, but she is absolutely solid. I think the cash would get to her if she really played, but it would be interesting to see how good she could get.

Played a little NLHE Saturday, and had a nice triple up with 66 twice, catching my set on the flop once vs. JJ then catching a set on the river after a T224 board where the bb min check-raised my 1/2 pot turn bet. I called it, caught my 6 on the river, bb bet $20 into a $97 pot, I came over the top for another $110 and he ended up calling. In the middle of that was donking off $80 or so, so I'll take the triple-up in a ring game that I need to improve in.

Go down and grab a book if you haven't yet. Also, I need addresses from FJ Delgado, Miami Don, Jordan, seattlejohn, pokerenthusiast, bloodyP, and willwonka (I know I have yours and will dig it up, but email me again if you can). Da Vinci cards for best comments go to sean and dave. Fire your addresses as well and you'll get two decks of great plastic cards (used them at our home game, and they are great). By the way, Dave at Donkey Hunter as an absolute rock. Solid to the core. Just so you know...

David Williams, aka Long Duk Dong, is the chip leader after the first day of the Mirage Poker Showdown. And Joe Sebok AK crushed by AA. Just a brutal run. I can imagine a bad MTT run as most of the time you don't cash. I hadn't worked on my simulator in quite a while, so Sunday I did some MTT's on PokerAcademy. I got to the final table once and cashed only that time in five tourneys of 386, getting my 66 sent to the rail with 6 players left vs. 55 pre-flop. I admire those who are tackling MTT's. I'd like to do more of it if I can find the time, but man is it tough.

I gave Sweetie a Bose iPod speaker deal from Best Buy plus an iTunes $50 gift card. It is really, really sweet. All-In was sick again yesterday morning, so I stayed home from church with All-In and the Little Guy. All-In had me up at 6:00 to say Happy Mother's Day to Sweetie, so we were dragging a bit yesterday. Omelettes for Sweetie, hoagies for lunch, then the Q for free Mother's Day supper. I picked up In Search of Willie Morris by Larry L. King at Border's yesterday. The late Willie Morris was a Mississippi author, best known now probably for My Dog Skip. I met him once when I was a bartender in college at a hotel bar. He sat at the bar with me alone for probably an hour, went to his room, got a copy of his acclaimed North Toward Home, wrote a couple paragraphs to me in it, then signed it. For all you Austin bloggers, you should pick this book up as he was the editor of the Daily Texan when he attended UT.

Some good stuff to check in from the G-Vegas guys. NY Times has an article on Building a Brand with a Blog which may be of interest. From yesterday, What Happened to the Fortune Michael Jackson Made. Sweetie wants me to get a vasectomy. I've looked into do-it-yourself kits, but they seem to be -EV. Wrote a review at PokerWorks for the Ultimate Dealer Button, which looks like a good addition to the arsenal if you host tourneys. ESPN's Poker Club has an article by Bernard Lee on his experience last year at the WSOP. He's the guy who kept kissing the photo of his kids.

Finally, Monday's Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, where I see where the connections from the Closet take us.

• sheverb: Gracie looks like a great lady to get to know from all the nice things that folks have to say to her. Hope our paths cross sometime.
• Life as a Vegas Poker Dealer: Linda's my buddy, so I'll be interested to follow him. He's suffering physically and working hard with his wife to make a go of it after an IT career. Good luck.
• A Pirate's Life for Me: West Columbia, SC. I'll let the G-Vegas crew comment on Columbia vs. G-Vegas. His profile said that he won money on Jeopardy, lost it, now trying to win it back. Looks like most folks know him, so I'm glad to have a chance to learn more about him.
• Ship It Poker: This is a defunct blog, out in November 2005. Had four contributors including Matt Dean (7th in 2004 WSOP Main Event) and Taylor Caby aka Green Plastic, one of the best online players around.
  
• 4 Flush: Chronicles of a poker player with a wife, two kids, and a dog. OK, I've got you outchipped buddy (another kid and a rotten cat). Grinding away, now trying to make a move to NLHE. Good luck, and I'll investigate how it's going. Need to clean up your links though (lots are defunct as I tried to search for a new 6th degree).
  
• Royal Poker: Last post is interesting: nine tourneys trying to qualify for the Main Event, five final tables plus a 10th place, no seats. Go encourage him to make a run.
  

Have a good Monday. I'll be cranking away with a busy week, in Orlando with a client Sunday and Monday then a big, big sales meeting on Tuesday. I'm also working on a few interviews to have here as well as at Linda's: Liz Lieu, Steve Brown, and possibly Mr. Doyle Brunson, which would be incredible. But there's only one poker babe for me, and that's Sweetie. Just so I stay out of hands with her.