2 New Blogs

I have been working, slowly as you can expect, on two new blogs as this one has started to bore me a bit.

The first one is Rants and Raves in the Motor City. This is a blog that deals with my personal views of what is going on in the Detroit sports scene.

The other blog is Singular Ineptitude. This will be just short snippets of the idiots I deal with on a daily basis. Still playing around with layout and such and for some reason the stupid people around here stopped calling or coming in so I have no new material. But it won't take them long before they hook me up.

So I hope you head on over from time to time and check them out. And as always, please visit and enjoy my wife's site, The Park Bench

$1.58 Challenge Day 5

Starting BR: $8.40

Not going to great. I was playing .01/.02 6-Max NLHE but I think I am going to switch today and play some .05/.10 LHE 6 max and see where I can go.


This is a good example of how this session is going...PokerStars Game #15803837321: Hold'em Limit ($0.05/$0.10) - 2008/03/07 - 11:15:19 (ET)
Table 'Signe' 6-max Seat #5 is the button
Seat 1: SBriand ($7.59 in chips)
Seat 2: donkeygod ($1.55 in chips)
Seat 3: delphos54 ($3.03 in chips)
Seat 4: 8monkeys ($6.59 in chips)
Seat 5: BraveSociety ($0.77 in chips)
Seat 6: hardleft75 ($3.10 in chips)
hardleft75: posts small blind $0.02
SBriand: posts big blind $0.05
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to SBriand [Qc 6c]
donkeygod: calls $0.05
delphos54: folds
8monkeys: folds
BraveSociety: raises $0.05 to $0.10
hardleft75: calls $0.08
SBriand: calls $0.05
donkeygod: calls $0.05
*** FLOP *** [4c Kc Tc]
hardleft75: checks
SBriand: checks
donkeygod: checks
BraveSociety: bets $0.05
hardleft75: folds
SBriand: raises $0.05 to $0.10
donkeygod: folds
BraveSociety: raises $0.05 to $0.15
SBriand: raises $0.05 to $0.20
Betting is capped
BraveSociety: calls $0.05
*** TURN *** [4c Kc Tc] [4s]
SBriand: bets $0.10
BraveSociety: raises $0.10 to $0.20
SBriand: raises $0.10 to $0.30
BraveSociety: raises $0.10 to $0.40
Betting is capped
SBriand: calls $0.10
*** RIVER *** [4c Kc Tc 4s] [7c]
SBriand: bets $0.10
BraveSociety: calls $0.07 and is all-in
*** SHOW DOWN ***
SBriand: shows [Qc 6c] (a flush, King high)
BraveSociety: shows [Js Ac] (a flush, Ace high)
BraveSociety collected $1.66 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $1.74 | Rake $0.08
Board [4c Kc Tc 4s 7c]
Seat 1: SBriand (big blind) showed [Qc 6c] and lost with a flush, King high
Seat 2: donkeygod folded on the Flop
Seat 3: delphos54 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: 8monkeys folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 5: BraveSociety (button) showed [Js Ac] and won ($1.66) with a flush, Ace high
Seat 6: hardleft75 (small blind) folded on the Flop

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 132 hands and saw flop:
- 25 out of 28 times while in big blind (89%)
- 16 out of 29 times while in small blind (55%)
- 26 out of 75 times in other positions (34%)
- a total of 67 out of 132 (50%)
Pots won at showdown - 20 of 39 (51%)
Pots won without showdown - 10

BR: $7.45

$1.58 Challenge Day 4

Starting BR: $10.52

$1.10 45 Man SNG
Finish: 23rd
-$1.10

BR: $9.42

oiejwoiewjfpaowiefmn

Was up $4 but second to last hand with AA on a Q43r board we get it all in and he has QT and hits on the river...

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 154 hands and saw flop:
- 25 out of 31 times while in big blind (80%)
- 17 out of 33 times while in small blind (51%)
- 28 out of 90 times in other positions (31%)
- a total of 70 out of 154 (45%)
Pots won at showdown - 15 of 26 (57%)
Pots won without showdown - 13

BR: $8.40

$1.58 Challenge Day 3

Starting BR: $6.99

Blah

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 75 hands and saw flop:
- 9 out of 16 times while in big blind (56%)
- 6 out of 17 times while in small blind (35%)
- 10 out of 42 times in other positions (23%)
- a total of 25 out of 75 (33%)
Pots won at showdown - 2 of 5 (40%)
Pots won without showdown - 4

BR: $7.36

eh...

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 121 hands and saw flop:
- 18 out of 23 times while in big blind (78%)
- 9 out of 24 times while in small blind (37%)
- 17 out of 74 times in other positions (22%)
- a total of 44 out of 121 (36%)
Pots won at showdown - 9 of 16 (56%)
Pots won without showdown - 6

BR: $10.04

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 26 hands and saw flop:
- 2 out of 7 times while in big blind (28%)
- 2 out of 5 times while in small blind (40%)
- 5 out of 14 times in other positions (35%)
- a total of 9 out of 26 (34%)
Pots won at showdown - 2 of 3 (66%)
Pots won without showdown - 3

Br:$11.12

yuck

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 71 hands and saw flop:
- 14 out of 18 times while in big blind (77%)
- 8 out of 17 times while in small blind (47%)
- 7 out of 36 times in other positions (19%)
- a total of 29 out of 71 (40%)
Pots won at showdown - 5 of 8 (62%)
Pots won without showdown - 9

BR $10.52

$1.58 Challenge Day 2

Starting BR: $4.93

Ugh...nothing hitting at all...

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 51 hands and saw flop:
- 2 out of 11 times while in big blind (18%)
- 7 out of 11 times while in small blind (63%)
- 17 out of 29 times in other positions (58%)
- a total of 26 out of 51 (50%)
Pots won at showdown - 3 of 9 (33%)
Pots won without showdown - 2

BR: $3.86


Eh, made some ground but not as much as I hoped...

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 125 hands and saw flop:
- 12 out of 22 times while in big blind (54%)
- 13 out of 23 times while in small blind (56%)
- 19 out of 80 times in other positions (23%)
- a total of 44 out of 125 (35%)
Pots won at showdown - 13 of 19 (68%)
Pots won without showdown - 5

BR: $6.99

$1.58 Challenge

Little challenge going on where I post to see if you can take $1.58 and turn it into $500 by the end of March. Pretty close to impossible I think unless you go on a sick run of cards but I thought I would try it and see what happens. If I go bust then that is that. So I will update this as the challenge is going so you can see my progress but hell, it could be done by noon today. Enjoy.


Starting BR: $1.58

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 55 hands and saw flop:
- 7 out of 10 times while in big blind (70%)
- 9 out of 10 times while in small blind (90%)
- 5 out of 35 times in other positions (14%)
- a total of 21 out of 55 (38%)
Pots won at showdown - 4 of 5 (80%)
Pots won without showdown - 5

Had to quit for a bit.

BR: $3.07

Played some more...

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 116 hands and saw flop:
- 17 out of 22 times while in big blind (77%)
- 12 out of 22 times while in small blind (54%)
- 15 out of 72 times in other positions (20%)
- a total of 44 out of 116 (37%)
Pots won at showdown - 11 of 15 (73%)
Pots won without showdown - 9

BR: $3.72

and some more

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 55 hands and saw flop:
- 7 out of 11 times while in big blind (63%)
- 6 out of 11 times while in small blind (54%)
- 10 out of 33 times in other positions (30%)
- a total of 23 out of 55 (41%)
Pots won at showdown - 4 of 5 (80%)
Pots won without showdown - 9

BR $4.93

All this action made me want to post something.

I really need to update this more and I keep saying that but it never really happens.

Poker is going okay. Currently in a couple of challenges. First challenge is the King of the 45 man SNG's. This starts tonight at midnight. We have to midnight 2/27 to complete 20 45 man turbo sng's. You get points based on your finish and the top 3 scores with the prize pool.

The next challenge I am in is the Feb. $4.40 challenge. We are on teams, $50 a team. We have to play 30 $4.40 180 man SNG's on Stars between 2/1 and midnight 2/29. Drop the lowest 5 scores. We have about $1200 in the prize pool right now, tomorrow is the last day to register but so far so good. My team is in 6th after 8 games. I won one this past Sunday which helped. Looks like my partner had a bad day today but we have a long way to go and the early leaders have played a lot more games than we have so if we can keep it going we should have a good shot at a top three finish.

Other than that it's been the same old same old. Working, taking law courses, reading up on Buddhism, and playing Rock Band and Call of Duty 4.

I Was a GameFAQs Moderator for 5 yrs.

It was an interesting experience that I have wanted to share from time to time but GameFAQs has changed so much that I almost feel a little worried that anything I write here will cause secret CNet/GameFAQs agents to kidnap my wife and kill my cat because some people over there get a little crazy when people tell their "secrets". Not that I plan to post screenshots of the inner workings of the place but I might say something that would freak one of them out and all hell will break loose somewhere in the world over something pretty stupid.

Let me makes some quick comments in case someone actually does read this and wants to start some sort of e-fight. GameFAQs is a great place for what it is intended to be. That is a place that people can go to to get info and help in a almost any video game created on a ton of different systems. The message boards are secondary to that. There are some great boards on GameFAQs and sometimes you may get some help on a game board but don't get your hopes up. As the days, weeks, months, and years go by, the level of help you receive has diminished. Some people will disagree but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see it.

I would also like to state that some of the things I will write could easily be hypocritical. I can admit that, unlike most other people. Some of the things that have lessened the greatness that GameFAQs once was were things that I myself used to do. It wasn't until last year that I realized it and did my part not to be that person.

GameFAQs for me was a place to waste time. When I had nothing to do or when I was playing poker online it was a nice place to mess about. When I first started going there back in 2000 it was quite small compared to today. I spent most of my time on the Final Fantasy 9 board getting help and helping others. Shortly there after I decided to take a shot at FAQ writing for the site and started to spend time on the FAQ Contributors board. That was the place to be. All the prolific writers and the moderators would hang there. Everyone was very nice and helpful and through that I made some cool e-friends. I started getting interested in the inner workings of the site and the rules. I was not a big internet person at the time and GameFAQs was the first message board I had ever participated in. I found it all quite fascinating.

Things were much simpler then. You had levels based on your time there and when you got modded you either got a deletion or you were suspended and then banned. No karma, no varying degrees of punishment, no purgatory, no contesting your deletions, etc. Delete or good bye. Maybe you would get warned. I can't remember but I bet you could, either way, it was much simpler. I started hanging out at Questions and Suggestions. That was the early Message Board Help (MBH). We had fun there, a small group of us. Things were not as volatile as they have been the last few years. Very little complaining and a lot of general questions.

As time went on I became quite knowledgeable of the Terms of Service and decided to apply to be a moderator. I got selected on the first attempt I took and that is where the fun began. It was a small group back then. Not many people knew the inner workings since there weren't all the leaks and screenshots and mod hackings there have been since. It was a pretty stressful job at first. At GameFAQs, if you are not aware, the sites users mark messages that they feel violate the ToS/ToU and that sends them into this queue. As a mod you have access to this queue and you go in there and can look at the marked posts and decide the punishment. I remember when I first started it took me forever to moderate. I would read the post, read the topic it was from, read the mod guidelines to get an idea on the rule it was marked for, check the users moderations history, read the post again, read the guidelines, etc because I didn't want to unfairly mod someone. It got easier. I would skip ones I wasn't sure of and then quickly mod through easy ones. Basically modding loses it's luster rather quickly and it just becomes a duty in which you want to clear the queue so you don't have to bother with the banner on the top of your page telling you there are posts to moderate. Some will disagree but none of them can honestly say they take the time to mod a post they way they did their first month. If they did they wouldn't mod as much as they do these days.

Early on the group was small and tight. We all got along and we all worked for the good of the site. Very little cliques going on and very little jockeying for positions. We were all moderators of this great site and we enjoyed it. It wasn't till I believe the next batch where things started to turn. A couple mods from the next batch were not the best choices. One being CronoGamer and the other being crimsonassasin. Crono was okay but after awhile he got sick of it I guess and decided to use his powers and go out with a bang and mod the living day lights out of a not so popular user on the boards. Did it really hurt anyone? No. Was it stupid? Maybe, but really, it is just an internet message board. If he did something like that in real life and at his real job he would have to suffer some consequences, but on the internet you just log off and be done with it.

Crimson was a different story. I didn't quite understand his game and what he was trying to accomplish but he was the first mod to attack other mods through moderation or just by posting violations on the mod boards at other mods. I won't go into great detail as this seems to be one of the "secrets" that could result in loss of life in my family, but CA was known to flame, troll, use SPI's against mods and even admins. For a long time he was left alone for some reason. One reason would be that mods had an unwritten rule back then that you could not mod a mod on the mod boards because then people using metamod would see it and OMG all hell would break loose. So CA's SPI towards me on Mod Social got to stay and truth be known, Ceej wasn't very active on the mod boards as many people might have expected so nothing much was done about it. I think the straw that finally broke the camel's back was when he posted some troll/flame towards a Gamespot Admin on the GS Mod/GF Mod board. After he got booted he knew the mods were not allowed to talk about the actions that got him booted so that gave him free reign to troll and cause problems on the board. Another by product of GameFAQs staff wanting to remain so mysterious.

Around that time is when things seemed to start changing for the worse in my opinion. By then the site had really grown to the point of Jeff selling the site to CNet, the need for more mods meant a larger group and the lack of any admin support resulted in chaos on the mod side of things. The level of consistency was ridiculous. I remember making topics on the mod boards that some of us worked on to try and get an idea on where people's heads were and it was amazing to see the complete mess it was. Some people would NKL one thing while some would warn for the same thing, a couple would suspend, and a couple would notify, and then about 50 mods would never even bother to read or participate on the mod boards. It was a mess. And I have no doubt that it still is but not as bad as I suspect that SBAllen contributes a lot more support than Ceej did.

I don't post much anymore on GameFAQs. I still visit every now and then and it is either to get help on a game I am playing, check reviews of a game I might want to get, or check out my private board, KGB. I no longer bother with the side of GameFAQs that I used to. The moderation/MBH side. Having gone on to other forums I can honestly say I have never ran into the oddness that is GameFAQs and it's users preoccupation of mods, moderations, and the rules. I have also not run into a site that allows it's users to contest deleted posts even once whereas you can contest a deleted post 3 times at GameFAQs. It amazes me how much hand holding goes on at that site. I was a cranky person when I was a mod. Not because I am cranky by nature, but because of all the ridiculous crap I had to endure. Moderate this, answer this stupid question, get flamed, get nasty emails, go into the contest queue and read how this one guy thinks that saying he wants to rape his cat and then cut it's head off should not have been deleted because this is America and the Constitution gives him the right too post that without penalty. Deal with that everyday and you can get an idea of why most mods who post a lot are complete fucking assholes. I was. But then I grew up a bit and realized how utterly lame and foolish I looked. Some people need to step back and look through their posting history to see they too might need to do the same thing.

Being a GameFAQs mod was fun at times, boring and annoying the rest of the time. The first 2 years were great. We were doing something, but after that it became this odd little society where people were backstabbing each other and trying to gain more power and control.

The rules are just odd as well. Some make perfect sense and back in the day they seemed to fit but as the world and internet changes I think some of the rules make GameFAQs...bad? How many sites out there use the ignore function? Many do, all of the sites I go to have it. Well GameFAQs got it not too long ago and since the site likes to try and control so may aspects of a users posts, you can get modded for telling someone you are going to ignore them. That is the perfect example of how uttely ridiculous that site's rules are. Fine, nude pics, swearing, graphic sex discussions, and hardcore insults are deleted, but modding people because they want to tell a troll they are ignoring him because that will annoy the user and he may respond in a flame? Give me a break, it is like elementary school, not a video game site on the internet. Does this mean the mods are at fault? Not all of them. Talking to some I know they disagree with that rule and many others, but they are instructed to moderate these posts so they are just doing what they should do.

The site does not allow you to post a hyperlink. Why? Because someone might post porn. ????

The site does not have a Private Message system. Why? Because the mods would have a hard time monitoring what is being sent through the PM system. ???

The site does not allow people to edit their posts? Why? Because people will post a flame, or a link to ROMs/Porn, etc and then quickly edit it to not get in trouble. ???

So the basic theme is that they think all their users are a bunch of retarded monkey children who will do anything they can to break a rule so may as well live in the old ages of internet forums. I understand no avatars and pics for speed and simplicity but the examples I posted show what the staff is all about.

Quotas were a sore subject on the mod boards. Basically Jeff always said that he would not set a quota since it was a volunteer position. That makes perfect sense. There were weeks were I would touch 200 marked posts/contests, and then there were weeks where I would mod thousands of posts and handle many contests. Whatever I had time for. Some mods would do thousands in a day. Those mods begged for quotas because some felt that it was not fair they would do so much and others would do so little. People wanted Ceej to set up a quota and boot anyone who didn't meet it or had not done anything at all in years, which sadly there were many people with mod titles that did nothing at all. They posted everyday but had not handles even 50 marked posts in over 2 years. Is it a big deal. I didn't think so for the reasons many said. I think you boot them because why not, they don't do anything. The reasons other people wanted them booted was because they might be leaking the big ol' secrets. The moderations staff love their secrets. Oooh, let's not let them know MMA still exists. Let's not let them know that there is another queue full of marks that during my time were left untouched for weeks and months until someone group decided to tackle them. If anyone is reading this, there was a day a couple years ago where MBH and the site when crazy when people started getting modded like crazy for old stuff. That was the time some mods decided to spend a weekend going through the queue filled with marks that had low MMA and the mods just let the ranting and raving go one without just simply telling people the truth. For some reason telling people that marks from low MMA users go into a different queue because 80% of them are bad marks and take time away from handling the marks where 80% of them are good marks is going to do something bad. As a smart person it makes sense. What doesn't make sense is the fact that we had to hide it. Stuff like that just made me start to think how utterly ridiculous things have gotten. OMG, don't tell the peeon users that we get stars based on how many messages we handle a day. That might cause some sort of rift in the time space continuum. The reason people get mad and frustrated is that keeping such ridiculous secrets does make it look as if the mods are vastly superior to the regs. Like the regs are too stupid to handle it. Excuse me while I take this time to make some phone calls to make sure my wife and family are still safe.

When I left the mod staff last year things were ugly. Quotas were imposed somewhat, some people thought it was wrong to set them on volunteers, others could care less, and others thought that the quotas were too lenient. Mods were urged to spend free time in the queues and not posting socially. Fights ensued and me being a blunt person never hid behind my feelings of what was going on. I rubbed a certain group the wrong way during the quota discussions and some consistency type topics but big deal. I still have emails from mods thanking me for saying what some were not in a position to say. Most mods just hide in the corner and just do a good job and doing their best to get rid of the crap that actually does get posted on that site, while others act as if it was their actual career. One mod told me that we owed it to CJayC to be on the site every time we had nothing to do and dig through the queue. I disagree. Help out when you can and when you want too. If you want to go hang out on Current Events and shoot the shit about some new movie or what someone did over the weekend, go ahead.

Overall it was a great experience and I had fun for the most part. When it stopped being fun and became more serious than the job I do for money is when I realized how it wasn't for me. If some want to sit there and moderate 2000+ posts a day then more power to them, it was no longer for me. I am sure this post will ruffle some feathers and create some controversy if it ever gets to GameFAQs but I don't care. My blog, my experience, my right to post about it. I never signed anything that said I could not talk about it. But maybe they make them do that now. It would not surprise me. At least I left out a lot of juicy secrets that should remain secrets. Or maybe that is just me creating more conspiracy theories for the pure hilarity of it.

Back in the Game

Well things worked out and I won a little contest on FCP that got me $50 put on my Full Tilt account. That was good because I was missing poker a lot.

I had money on Stars but it was the money I was holding for the Sickie Threads Fantasy Football pool. Pat said he would be forwarding my money last Monday so I was home sick and decided to jump in a $4.40. It went well...




That helps. That night Pat put $50 over at Full Tilt and I let it sit there and I played a bit at Stars with the $216 I won. I played a couple more $4.40's and finished near the bubble. I was feeling good, playing smart, confident, etc.

So this weekend I decided to jump back on Tilt and see if I can build that up.Played in a $3.30 Knockout. Some 800+ players, knocked out 3 to get $1.50 back and then finished somewhere in the money for another $6 or something pathetic. Then I played a couple low limit SNG's and won some more money. Played a Sat into the Midnight Madness. Finished 76th for $32. Not bad. Was doing really well for awhile. 1600+ started but I really wanted to get deeper.

Sunday I played a few $750 and Sunday Million Sats with no success. That is fine since a fellow FCPer took down the Sunday Million last night. I jumped in a $5.50 MTT with 450 players and sadly again finished 44th for like $8.xx. just can't seem to finish these things.

Jumped into 2 $2.25 180 person SNG's. Finished one in 50th and won the other for $97.50. So that brough up my FT account to $166. So in one week I turned the $50 into close to $400. So that means I get to play some more.

Tonight I played a $7 Sat. Won that for a seat in FT's $55 $50K Guaranteed. That didn't go well. Got it all in early with a very aggressive Bruce Buffer (Ringmaster of the UFC) with AK vs his 66. Tough spot. I raised in EP to 90 (4xbb) and I got two MP callers and he repopped on the Button for 680. He had been doing this and either folding to more aggression or taking the pot down there with no showdown. So I reraised all in, the others folded and that was that. He is a "pro" so if i beat him I would get the buy-in back and have a decent stack early. Figured it was the right play. Left with about 355 after that. Doubled up with KK two hands later. Then doubled again later with 66 and then lost it again with AK<66.

Jumped into a Midnight Madness Sat and took that down and jumped into another $2.25 180. MM was a mess and I finished 17th in the 180 for some little stupid amount.

I am getting deep and playing pretty well I think. Some missteps here and there but nothing I can't work on. Good to have a roll again as I love this game.

Busto!

Yup. It happened. Busto. Terrible but oh well. I just don't get it. Was running great. Making strides in my game, winning by playing good more than getting lucky and then boom, the hammer fell and it has just been a sick long ride to $0. Yesterday was pretty much the end of it. KK lost to 45 when I got all in on the flop of 24Q. A on turn, 3 on river. All in preflop near the money of an MTT with 66 all in preflop against 98o. Board was QJQ4J. Last week I lost 4 times with KK and the best hand I was up against was JTo. Yeah, bad beats, blah blah, we all deal with them. Yes we do, trouble is that is all I have experienced the last month and a half is bad beat after bad beat.

I realized when it started sometime last week. I was at my monthly home game and it struck me...I was in the BB short on chips. SB was aggressive and playing at me all game long with his nice large stack. It folds to him and he raises 3xBB. I look down and see 66. I call. Flop comes 556. He immediately pushes all in. He flips over 77 and I flip over 66. Turn, 7. GG me. 2 outs and he hits and knocks me out. Since then I have gone busto.

Oh well. I will be back. Still an overall winner the last 4 years but I need a nice long break. Guess I go back to playing WoW and my new Xbox360. I still have a $26 token sitting on Full Tilt. Have not decided what to use it for yet but I will use it soon.

Bubble Boy

I swear to go I am tired of finishing on the bubble or short of the bug prize. Played 2 $5.50 MTT's at Full Tilt. 29th and 57th. 27th and 54th paid. The first one was the killer though. I was top 9 stack for over 2 hours. Playing great, picking my spots well, etc. Then I get half my stack all in against another who has TT to my JJ. He spikes his ten. I then get AT suited and lost half my stack to A8o who hits his flush. 2 hands I go from top 9 with 30 left to 28th. And soon after I was out. Sometimes it is just better to bust on the first hand.

Then yesterday I played a $3.50 Triple Shootout for the Sunday Million. Top 2 get a seat. Crush the first two tables and as expected finish 3rd. Sure it was for $70 but I want the $215T! Gah!

So Saturday was the final month of the Grand Prix at my monthly home game. I have explained this before but quickly, we play 2 games 1 Saturday out of a month for 6 months. We gets points based on our finish. Buy in is $25. $22.50 goes into that tourney and then $2.50 from each player goes to the Grand Prix. We have anywhere from 7 to 16 players that play. Going into Saturday night I had about a 3 point lead.

The first game had 12 players. Lots of points to be had. We have a guy that comes that plays the big games like the Belaggio Cup and such. He finshed well last year and got a big head over it. We were on two tables and he was on mine and he was just killing our table which is opposite of how he usually runs at this game. I got into a big hand with him with JJ on a T high board and he played it well just letting me do all the betting then showing me his KK at the end to take 60% of my stack. I was pissed. I was on tilt. Next hand I get Qs9s. I limp and see the flop which comes 942 one spade. John bets, Danny (who is 2nd in points) thinks and makes the call and I push for 420. All fold to Danny who quickly calls and flips over 22 for a set of ducks. I hit runner runner spades to win the hand. I would have been out 12th at that point. Not good for the points!

I tighten up and slowly build my stack. With 5 left I look down at AA. I raise it 3xBB and get 3 callers. Flop comes 672. Gary leads out for about half the pot leaving him with just about 400 behind. It folds to me and I take some time and then push all in. He goes into the tank for awhile and eventually says there is only two hands he thinks can beat me as he believes I don't have a set. So that means obviously, he has QQ. He finally gives in and calls I show the AA and they hold. Eventually I get heads up with Ray who has the monster stack and lose with 75s vs AK. I finish 2nd for 7 points and $81.

So the start of game 2 has only 7 players. For Danny to win he needs to win this game and I need to end up last. Well without going into much boring detail, I finish last and Danny wins. I end up losing the Grand Prix by .39 points. .39!!!! Ugh.

I hate this game.

Just more Poker ramblings

So let's see. What poker adventures have I gone on since last posting?

$4.40 and came in 6th. I wished I finished higher but I was card dead once I hit the final table.

Full Tilt just started some 180 mans and I tried one out at the $2.25 level. Little tighter than Stars' $4.40's but they get the job done. I finished 11th for something weak. Need to make the Final Table to make any real money.

Played a $6.60 Super Sat to FTOPS $1,000,000 Tourney. Was doing well early on. Doubled up on the very first hand and was good to go and was down to 3 out of the starting 20 or so. The chipleader was pretty aggressive and I got QQ on the button, decided to limp hoping one or the other would push or raise. SB folded and on cue the BB raised and I repopped him for my remaining chips. If I win we would be close and the SB was really short. He showed A5o and hit his wheel straight on the river. So I won something like $14.xx. Bah!

Played a $1.25 90 person Deepstack SNG. Finished 10th i beleive for a whopping $1.80 or something. lawl

Played in a $5.50 MTT. 534 players and I finished 143rd I think? Somewhere around there. Was doing good and just played on hand stupid and that killed me.

Played a $3R to the Sunday Million. Finished 9th. Top 8 got a seat. *sigh*

Played a $2.25 18 person tourney. Was sitting 2nd out of 12 when I got it all in after an A high flop with AK vs AQ. Q hit on the river. Then I got it all in preflop 10 hands later with AK vs AQ who hit runner runner runner for the flush. Yup.

Big home game this weekend. Last month of the Grand Prix and I am holding onto a slim lead. I will let you know the results when I can.

My sad weekend of poker

Right off the bat I will say that I played pretty well this weekend. Sadly though I got nothing much out of it.

Friday night I played a $5.50 90 man deepstack SNG on Tilt and played well and finished 19th. 18 get paid. JJ < QQ.

I played a whopping 281 hands in one session of .01/.02 NLHE while nursing a huge headache on Saturday evening. I started with the usual $3 and got it up to $5.65 then all the way down to .56 and then finished off at $3. So no lose no win, just even. Oh well.

Yesterday I felt adventurous and jumped into a $500K sat on Full Tilt where the winner wins a seat to the $50+5 qualifier that was giving away some 200+ seats. I of course did what I do in every sat I play well in, finish 2nd.

Then I jumped into a $24+2 $17.5K Deepstack. Got nowhere fast and finished somewhere around 62x out of 1199. That was just bad cards IMO.

Then I was upset and jumped into a $4.40 where I promptly got knocked out 15xish when my flopped set of J's got runner runnered by a dude chasing a Q high backdoor flush draw. *sigh*

Finally I jumped into the FT $5.50 at 8pm and played wonderfully till it got close to the money. I raised with 99 and had the SB push all in on me. If I fold I was going to lose 60% of my stack in the next two blind rounds so I called. He had KK and I was done even though I flopped an OESD. Oh well. 67th out of 576, top 54 get paid. I played well I think so I am fine with it but it just sucks being on the bubble so much this weekend.

Taking a few days off I think and then get back in it. Maybe.

Poker Poker Poker!

Really that is all that I have to talk about these days as it has been pretty much sleep, little World of Warcraft, sleep, headaches, sleep, GTA, and poker. The most exciting bit of news I guess would be the fact that I one a tourney. Not anything monumental, just a small one. It was the Full Tilt $3.30 HOSE tourney. What is HOSE some of you may ask? Well it's a mixed game tourney, after each 10 minute blind level you change games. In HOSE you play:

Limit hold em = H
Omaha Hi/Lo = O
7 Stud = S
7 Stud Eights or Better (Hi/Lo) = E

Now I thought I was in a HORSE tourney where Razz is played after the O and before the S! I was quite surprised when that didn't happen as I can honestly say Razz and hold em are my two strong games. But 3 hours later I finished the winner out of 68 person field. I started heads up with 22K in chips and my opponent had 80K and I quickly widdled him down to 0. It was quite impressive I believe. I don't really remember. He was easy to push around actually.

It was good to get this win. Add it to a final table earlier in a MTT and I seem to be on a good run. Let's hope it holds for a bit.

Haven't played much of the .01/.02 NLHE. There is only one new session of 85 hands and only a .18 profit so I am up $7.18. Blah!

I think I am going to play a couple semi-big tourney's this weekend and will post my outcomes. Wish me luck!

Weekend of Poker

Got a little poker in. In regards to the .01/.02 Challenge, I only played one session. 147 hands and lost the $3 buy in. So I am up $7.

At FCP TB17 started a fun thing to do to go along with Star's in $11 100K Tourney on Sunday. He got 10 people to become captains of a team and pay $50. They would hold a draft, send out stakes, and then the team with the most money won at the end of the tourney wins $400 and 2nd gets $100. Ten captains quickly signed up and they held the draft Thursday evening.

I was drafted 29th by Zsta's Flying Assholes. I decided to keep the stake instead of buying myself in and seeing if I could do better on someone else's dime. 17500 people start this tourney, 2625 is when the payouts begin. I had finished about 10K the first two weeks of this tourney.

Started off slow. Played tight. 10 minute levels are fast but you start with 3000 in chips so I think I have time to find good spots. I finally got dealt a decent hand, 99 UTG. I decided to limp as someone in MP just got donked and I want him to make a move. A few callers and my guy on tilt wasn't and folded. The SB raised it 3x the BB and three of us went to the flop. Flop came A9K two diamonds. SB bet 300 and I raised to 900 and the other guy folded. SB pushed. Please don't have AA or KK. Whew. HE had AQ, no diamonds. Shortly after I raised with KQ suited and a low stack pushed, one called and I called. Flop came KJx. I bet, the other guy called. Blank on the turn and I put him all in and he called with J7. The other guy had J9 and I knocked them both out and was sitting nicely with about 10K in chips. Then the cards went cold. I got through the second break, already into the payouts when I was UTG with KQs and an M of about 2. I pushed and got one called by one player who had KTo. Of course as the you would expect it was all good till the river when he spiked his T and I was out in 2150th.

By that point there was only 2 of my team left. Seacucumber dropped out around 1850th and it was left up to Donkmeister.

Well the wife jumped on the computer and I did something else and I came back an hour or so later to find Donk looking good. About 300 left and he was in the top 50. Make a long story short, we are down to 18 players. Donk is still playing and tobeytobey who plays for Naismith's Unmentionables is left. Donk has to finish one payout higher if we want to win. A deal is made between both captains to chop the payout. Each team gets $200 and $100 is left for the winning team instead of $400 for 1st and $100 for second. Soon after, tobey exits in 18th. Donk needs a final table to win it for his team and he does so in impressive fashion. He ends us sadly though finishing 7th after his QQ runs into AA. Still a great achievement to finish 7th out of 17,500. He as kind enough to send $250 of his winnings to our captain to be split amongst us. Class act. Sadly we redraft this week. :(

$2.67 to $?????

I like poker still, just don't play it as much or study it as much as I did. Actually I have been much more successful since not thinking and reading it all day at FCP and TK. So I have some money in my Stars account and decided to take $2.67 ( I think I did that because it made my BR an even number lol) of it and sit at a $.01/$.02 NLHE table and start playing to see how much I could run it up to. I have tried this before but got bored and played that Smash style and it got boring. This might too but we will see what happens. I started on the 18th and I am keeping a spreadsheet of the action. Here are my current stats:

7/18 103 hands +3.58
7/19 239 hands +5.26
7/19 115 hands +0.84
7/20 114 hands +0.32



571 hands +$10.00

So from this point on I will update and discuss anything interesting as I play.

Praying for Money

That is what the new WSOP Main Event Champion did early this morning. Everytime Jerry Yang had to make a big decision at the table, he would pray. He would pray to the Lord that certain cards show up and that he wins. He would pray for $8.25 million.

Isn't that a bit selfish? Okay, so he is going to donate $825,000 to three charities. Ok. So that makes it ok? I don't see it. What about the other 6,000+ players. Don't some of them need the money? Did God decide he hated everyone else and only like Jerry and gave him the bracelet and the cash?

Well from things I have read around the web it seems like a hot topic. Some are saying the guy is a tool for doing it. I agree. It's no different than a super bowl champion saying god was on their side that day. Does God really hate the Bears and loves the Colts? You would think if he really liked a team enough to help them win the Super Bowl we would see that one team win year after year. If the devil liked another team than maybe the Super Bowl would always just be the same two teams each year.

Others say we have it all wrong. Supposedly he was saying..."God let me win and I will glorify you." Oh, so I can just tell the big man I will glorify him if he puts an Audi RS4 in my driveway and in the trunk $3,000,000. I will get a "I love GOD" license plate holder and a GOD money clip! Sweet. If this is all you had to do I would have done it long ago.

I don't mind praying. I don't do much of it, but I do think seeing grown men pray to god asking for such things to be quite telling. I am not a Christian, I am not a religious man, I believe in God, but maybe I missed the part in my church days where God will heed the prayers of selfish individuals if they promise to glorify him. I will see if it works. You will be able to tell if all of sudden the entire Bush administration disappears and I am driving a brand new Black Audi RS4.

National Don't Use Mirrors Day

I don't know if you knew this or not but it seems today is the day where people, especially rednecks driving big 18 wheelers.

The wife and I were driving back from the rental car place and this large North American Van Lines Van simultaneously puts on his blinker and turns onto our lane and we were beside him.

I was driving to work this morning and a car changed lanes on me and I had to go into the center turn lane to keep my car in good condition and then late on another big rig decided to turn on his turn signal and enter the lane at the exact same time. At least this time he saw me and swerved back before he hit me because I had nowhere to go. One guy on my ass, another guy beside me. Would have been a fun ride I suspect.

So all you readers, head on out on the highway and do whatever you want. It's a free-for-all out there!

You know what I find completely lame?

People who claim to be drunk when they are posting in a message board. They do all the cute things like leave out letters and transpose letters and such to give the full effect...but it's just plain BS. If you are one of these people, stop it. You are lame.

Hahahahahahaha...hahahahahahaha!

Don't go ganking people in WoW



WoW player harrasses woman in-game, gets beat up by woman's husband IRL

Bronco Carson, a World of Warcraft player from Mexico, reported to police on Saturday that three men broke into his home and beat his arms with clubs and totalled his computer. The reason? Carson had been repeatedly ganking the WoW character of the wife of one of his assailants.

Carson reportedly told police that he had been "making it hard for her to get far in the game." The woman had already threatened Carson online, and Carson said that he had already been constantly harassed in-game two weeks prior to the attack.

And then Carson made the mistake of giving the woman his address, telling the woman that "if her husband was man enough to just come meet me to settle this."

The result? Carson got two broken fingers and a fractured wrist during the assault. His computer and entertainment center were also totalled by his three attackers before they left. "I knew that I might be messed with in the game but I didn't really expect her husband to come looking for me," said Carson. "I couldn't have been more wrong."

Now let this be a lesson to everybody. Taunting people behind the relative safety of the Internet may be fun, but don't be stupid enough to give out your real home address. If you do, then it's a whole new ballgame.