Intro

A first post warrants an intro, so here it comes.

While this is going to be primarily a semi-serious, analytical poker blog, I do have a shitload of irresistible anecdotes that are sure to make it on here and keep it fun and light at the same time. I'm looking forward to making fun of myself and all my friends and ranting about our hijinks. I've been reading a lot of good poker blogs for some time now and decided to start my own to sort of chronicle my poker career (yes, career, because I'm a bad-ass pro (not really)) and to help make sense of my thoughts on poker among other things. Writing seems to force that to happen. Plus it puts me in a good mood and exercises the brain. I also have shitheaps of downtime at work, and I need something more productive to do besides nap in the bathroom and deflect broken Spanglish all day.

I'm also gonna give Dr Pauly some cred really quick. His blog helped inspire me to blog it up, too. You can check him out here http://taopoker.blogspot.com/. I like his style.

I recently graduated from UGA (Go Dawgs!!) with an Economics degree, and I'm a serious Bulldog fan. College football is my favorite sport to follow, and I don't think anything puts me on uber-mega-tilt more than seeing the Dawgs lose--especially in Jacksonville when I'm at the game, stuck in the Gator section with the Dawgs getting schellacked, and I have a giddy eight year old constantly poking me in the side spouting off eight year old kiddy shit-talk about how he bets I wish I wasn't a Bulldog fan anymore--or when I'm in downtown Athens inhaling Jack & Gingers after Alabama crushes us 31-0 in the first half, and I watch a flock of Crimso-rostitutes pour into my favorite bar screamin "Go Aylabayama!" But more about that story later..it deserves its own post, and it's sure to be Zilch's favorite. I think he pisses himself laughing every time Justin brings it up. But moving on from that tilted rant, I now live in St. Marys, GA and work in Jax, FL for a shipping company called Trailer Bridge, which I think is a pretty cool name for our company since at any given time we have a barge in the sea somewhere between FL and Puerto Rico. We put so many trailers on those barges I bet they probably could bridge the gap between FL and Puerto Rico if we wanted them to. I always wonder if our Harvard-grad of a CEO came up with it. I also wonder if he or any of our executives ever play any poker. I can picture our cool-ass VP who's always vacationing in St. Simon's buying in to a secret high-stakes game somewhere smokin cigars and drinkin some Glenlivet. He's gotta be a Dawg fan. I can just tell. I bet I could beat that game...if I could afford it.

I drove down to Orange Park this morning to sit at a cash table at The Poker Room for a couple hours before work. The Poker Room sits on the second floor of a dog-racing establishment and looks over a dog track that's usually lined with all sorts of people--some not-so-normal-looking degenerates, some completely normal-looking degenerates, a shit-farm's worth of senior degenerates, and even some degenerate-to-be-children of degenerates--all betting on the quickness of racing canines that don't even know they're racing. All they know is that they can't resist chasing that fake rabbit. I'd love to see one of them catch it. I wonder if they'd take a bet on that. "Yes, ma'am, I'll put twenty on 6 to catch the rabbit, please." All I know is I'd better get some good odds. The poker room always fires up right at Noon, which is when I got there since I wanted to get a decent session in before work at 3. When I walk through the doors I immediately have to take a short detour around a protruding line of seniors waiting at a counter with a nearly-senior-looking woman behind it. I've never known what purpose that counter served, and I still don't, but I navigated around it and thought about how these retired guys probably come here every day and spend their pensions and social security checks. I'm sure they have a blast though and probably don't give a rat's ass about what anybody thinks about it.

The law here is that you can only buy in for $100 at the most at any of the tables. I always play the $2-2 NL game, but they also have a whopping $5-10 NL game which is pretty much like playing Bingo given the $100-max buy-in. So I got my hundred in reds ($5 chips) and barely made it into a newly-formed table, which I liked because there wouldn't be anyone with $500 in front of them to bully the newcomers. I played pretty tight for the first few orbits, like I usually do, trying to get a feel for everyone. I actually saw every flop from my blinds during this time because there were rarely any pre-flop raises, which seemed odd, but I didn't mind seeing some free flops. A lot of people there always seem to be trying to chase down one of the ongoing jackpots, so there's usually a pretty high percentage of players to the flop each hand-a lot of limpers. The senior to my left called it a "friendly" game.

I think it was on the third orbit or so that I got Qs8d on the BB. After 5 or 6 limpers I check, of course, and the flop comes 9s-Jd-2h. I check, and so does everyone else around to the Asian guy who min-bets $2, everyone calls around. There's about $20 in the pot. The turn comes the 10c, no flush draw out. I hit my gutshot! I'm a little less than pumped about my straight, though, with 5 people in the pot since KQ would have me crushed and that's a very playable hand, especially at this table, so I check, senior checks, short, dirty guy with a skater hat fires $15 into the pot, Asian guy folds, next guy folds, SB calls, I call. Three players to the river. Pot's about $65. My heart beats about 60 times, and then the river falls the Kd. While I felt my made straight was just counterfeited by the K (giving anybody with the 10 the same K-high straight), I was relieved that it also counterfeited anybody's already-made K-high straight. Nonetheless, I figured I'd check to the aggressor. Sure enough, short dirty guy who I decide looks about like my thumb with a hat fires $30 into the pot. SB insta-calls, and I tank for about 20 seconds. I figure at least one of these guys has a 10 with me, and I quickly rule out SB having A-Q because he would have surely raised the nuts, but I couldn't rule out short guy semi-bluffing the turn with A-Q, so I just call and turn over my Q-8. SB turns over Q-10 and thumb with a hat mucks and says "I had two pair!?" like he had been robbed or something. So SB and I chop the pot, but at least I showed a winner, which meant it was time to loosen up.

Two hands later I get As8s on the button. I insta-call thumb guy's pre-flop raise to $7. Four to the flop. 10h-8d-4s. All checks to me. I think I may have the best hand and fire $10 to see where I stand. I get 2 callers, one is thumb guy. At this point I'm a little unsure of where I stand, but I feel safe from a set. The turn comes the Jh. This is a pretty big scare card. Everyone checks to me again, though, and I cautiously check as well. River is a blank. All checks again! I was a little shocked, and thought I may have had the best hand. Expecting to fold to a bet on the river, I was happy to just table my pair of eights and see if they were good. They both turn over a pair of fours with a small kicker, and I rake the pot.

The next decent hand I get is A-Qos on the button again and I'm feeling confident and open-raise to $10 after a few limpers. I only get one caller, and it's thumb guy again who's obviously on tilt after a very Hellmuth-esque blow-up after someone called down his big bluff with a small pair after he missed a flush. He only has $19 in front of him after he calls my $10, and the flop comes 10-9-9, rainbow. I decided immediately that I was insta-shoving no matter what he did, so I did after he checked, and he insta-calls and tables K-9os. Great. Nice catch. Whatever. In retrospect, I think I might should have been more cautious, but I was thinking, "Attack! Attack!" and I thought I had him pre-flop since he was steaming, and I was right, but he outflopped me and took the pot. Oh well. I felt good about my play anyway. I ended the session at 2:15 up $43. I'll take it.

And that's my first post. Hope you enjoyed.