New Year restart

well a couple of things to update you all on.... first off since poker has not been able to provide me with a full time income I have accepted a new job so that I can pay my bills. The good news is, it will be very compatible with my continuing to play poker and hopefully if i am making enough money to pay my bills it will allow me to loosen up a little at the poker table. I may be playing a bit sporatically for the next week or so but as soon as training is complete, my schedule is my own and I will make time for poker. By the way my new positon is Area Scout for a company called The National Scouting Report. Basically we help high school student athletes get athletic scholarships. So if you know a high school underclassman (male or female) that excels in a sport (all NCAA eligible sports are considered) and is interested in competing in college, please let me know. For a fairly small investment parents can save ten of thousands of dollars on college tuition as well as room and board.... a very sound investment.

Now back to poker... I played the 2 for 1 at Pechanga with my brother. I didn't make the money but had some interesting hands including going all in blind just before the break figuring I didn't want go through the break with minimal chips. As it turns out I had K3 and chopped the pot with the big blind who also had K3. So I had to sit through the break and when we came back, the second or third hand was pocket 4's that actually held up to triple me up. Unfortunately the next hand I had pocket 5's and figured I couldn't get that lucky twice so I laid it down. Wouldn't you know a five came on the flop and would have set me up for a deep run. As it was I lasted about another 20 minutes and went out with about 5 tables left (240 started). Am looking forward to the new job and getting back to playing more poker!!!!

Severe Weather Update

I was reminded yesterday that I have not done any updates this week. Mostly because I haven't been playing... I did go to Palomar on Tuesday but not a lot to talk about... the game is getting worse all the time with fewer players and smaller pots. I made it a point not to rebuy figuring it was not financially a good bet. Ended up going out in 12th place. Meanwhile have been hesitant to travel great distances (Pechanga, Oceans) or into the desert or mountains (Viejas, Barona) do to the wild weather we have been having. Fortunately it looks like it is all winding up this weekend so hopefully I will be out on the trail early next week, maybe even run up to barona on Saturday. I have a job interview on Monday but the great thing is that I will be running my own athlete scouting service so there will be plenty of time to play poker. The other nice thing is since I will be traveling locally for work I will be in proximity to most of the card rooms and will be able to write of some of the travel expenses on the new business instead of out of poker money. Stayed tuned for more details

New week similar results

Funny how much more fun blogging is when you are winning... thus the less than daily updates...LOL I went up to Palomar yesterday... never had to rebuy which is good since there were only 29 players. I was rolling along pretty well when we got down to 12 players... I promised myself to not play anything but premium hands at this point until we got down to final table... blind were 100/200 and I was in the big blind and looked down at AQ... the player to my left went all in for his last $200 and the small blind who had a huge stack called the extra $200. I thought about going all in and trying to get it down to me and the guy to my left but then i thought if the huge stack has any kind of hand he would probably call me anyway... so I checked and figured if i hit either and Ace or a Queen on the flop I would move all in.... sure enough the flop was QJ4 and i pushed all in... the big stack called and turned over Q10 against my QA... it worked perfectly... until the turn was a 10 giving him 2 pairs and knocking me out in 11th place... aggghhh. Today I went to Pechanga and like the last couple of times there, I collected a lot of chips early including making some great continuation plays and was really feeling good when the cards just went dead. Normally that wouldn't be all that bad except with their new structure the blinds and then the antes kicked in and my stack slowly started to diminish. I was moved to another table and won a couple of hands but not enough with the blinds and antes going up. Finally with blinds 1000/2000 and having only $6900 i went all in with an A4 and when I got three callers including 2 all ins I new I was in trouble. The flop brought a 4 which temporarily had me in front but I quickly fell behind and was gone with 4 tables left. I am considering going back to more cash games because in most of the tournaments lately I have collected a lot of chips early but have been unable to finish strongly... if I can do the same thing in a cash game I can walk away while I am ahead which might not be a bad idea :) Will let you know more later.

The New Year begins

I hope you all had a good New Years. I finally got through all the holidays and the personal issues like moving my mom to her new place, so it's time to get back in gear. I did play once or twice over the holidays but nothing interesting to report. This morning I went with my brother to 2 for 1 day at Pechanga. I was like a house a fire the first few blinds. Every time I played to show down, I won. I made a few good moves to win other pots. I should say at this point that they changed their format... we got 4000 in chips and they started taking antes at 200-400. After my great beginning I had about 12-13000 in chips. Things of course started to go cold and with the blinds rising an the antes coming into play, my stack was starting to come back to the pack. At one point I hit pocket 3's two hands in a row and one hand a few hands later. The first one I gave serious consideration to calling... if I had gone over the top all in and not let a third player get involved my 3's would have held up. As it was I folded and a 3rd guy called an won the hand. The second time I laid them down to a raiser and would have lost if i had played. The third time blinds were 500/1000 and I was in first or second position (all the other times I was in late position making my read easier) and decided to raise to 3000 (about a third of my stack)and hopefully get no callers or maybe just one. Unfortunately, three players went all in and I was getting 4 to 1 on my money... I had to call and hope it held or I could catch another three. Well of course that didn't happen and it was just a couple of hands before I went out. But it felt good to be back in the saddle and hopefully we'll start making the money again this week.