Am I interesting in playing with whales? Hmm... Survey says, yes. Can you get me in those games, though?

Yeah that's kind of the early plan, depending on what other suggestions arise along the way. Make my way down the east coast, chill in Florida a bit, head to New Orleans, chill a bit, shoot through the key Texas cities, maybe down toward the border somewhere, then westward.

I'll check that out... And what kind of shadiness and filth are you talking? The whales part sounds good... Especially if we're talking home games that aren't raked.

Thanks! Seeing different areas definitely appeals, but I'm not sure if it'll fit into this trip - we'll see! Lots of time to plan...

I can't tell if this is a joke or not - is there a casino there?

The rake is epic-bad, not epic-good, like 10% uncapped or worse. Shadiness = unsafe. A few years ago two armed robbers barged into an underground room--a random building in a strip mall where I had played before--and brandished their pistols, demanding money from the bank. A guy sitting at the table whipped out his own gun and shot them both!

I'm sure there must be safe, unraked, juicy home games in Houston. But I haven't found any and haven't really looked. It's who you know yo.

Might be worth it (as much for the visiting aspect as the pokerz) to check out Seattle/outer coast WA/Vancouver. Do not know how the action is, but Seattle, Victoria, and Vancouver all have pretty good night life, and outer coast of WA is some of the best hiking and rocky shore in the world.

I can't tell if this is a joke or not - is there a casino there?[/QUOTE]

Yes it is a 1 table casino.

September 20 – “And I heard em’ say, nothin’s ever promised tomorrow today.”

In my Saturday session last week, I never got much going and only played one truly interesting hand. The villain was opening really wide in late position, so I decided to try a limp-raise bluff and trap a couple of callers in between.

Hand No. 1

I limp 89 UTG and there are a few limps to the button, who raises to $25. The SB calls. I make it $100. It folds to the pre-flop raiser who grabs calling chips, contemplates a re-raise, then just calls. We now have about $750 behind.

Flop ($240): A87

I bet $140 and he tanks and raises to $320. I tank and see how much will be behind on the turn. I decide I think he’s making a move a pretty high percentage of the time, so I call. Obviously there are also a lot of turn cards that can improve my equity.

Turn ($880): K

And that’s not one of them. I check, he moves all-in for my last $417. I tank for a long time. He looks uncomfortable. Only a couple of hands really make sense, and most of his range is just air at this point. I tank some more and call.

River ($1,714): Q

“Good call,” he says. I wait. “I have nothing,” he says. I table my hand to the oohs and ahhs of the table. A friendly old guy a couple of seats over hits me with a good question.

“Can I have your autograph?”

I laugh and he goes on about my play and how awesome it was, and I thank him.

My table gets pretty bad, so I table change. I can’t get much going there, either, despite a couple of guys just spewing away about $1,500. I simply can’t get in the way of much of it. I decide to take a break with Sequel and go eat. We hit up Metropolitan.





We split some quesadillas, I had a non-photo worthy salad, then a chocolate cake dessert that looked better than it tasted, if I’m being honest. I was pretty tired after eating, so I decided to go back to the room and watch the FSU/Clemson game with Sequel and play some online poker. NJ online poker >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Delaware online poker.

Results: -$55 in 4 hours, 45 minutes ($18 in tips)

Yikes, I've seen guns pulled in underground games, but not shots fired. Duke, I need you to get me into the safe, unraked, juicy home games in Houston, Dallas, Austin, etc. I'll settle for unraked and juicy, or semi-safe and reasonably raked and juicy.

I've always wanted to see some rocky shoreline, so that's on the list for someday. I was thinking of possibly doing a San Francisco trip after the WSOP. There's some rocky shores in California near there, right? Is there a casino near Seattle?

That call just looks so marginal from here because even some of his ******ed bluffs beat you and his equity with any 2 cards isn't terrible but what do I know. I guess you saw something I couldn't see in the hand history.

I was at the Borgata and played a little 1-2 there on Saturday. God those games are awesome and the energy in the room is just so far superior to Harrahs and Parx. You can just feel all the fish flocking in drinking their vodka pineapples and bloody marys. I wish I felt like driving down there more often. Might have to if I start playing 2-5.

A lot of it was the physical read and feel, sometimes you just sense someone about to make a move.

Sometimes the 1/2 is awesome there, sometimes it's pretty bad. I never played much 1/2 at Parx but people insist it's better. The 1/2 is awful at Harrahs Philly, the 1/3 is so-so. Only their 2/5 is worth playing IMO.

September 26 – “So we parted ways like Ben and J-Lo. / I should’ve been did it, but I been in a daze though.”

Today was about as short of a session as I’ll ever play. I was at a pretty good table, couldn’t get anything going, and wasn’t feeling well. They painted the studio at the radio station yesterday, and I’m allergic to paint fumes and could not escape them, so I’m in a sinus/medicine kind of daze. I figured I was okay to play until I got to the turn on a hand and had a hell of a time figuring out how much money was in the pot. That was when I decided to call it a night.

I made one nice fold on the flop with top pair and it went to showdown with two other villains and the guy I folded to had an overpair. I lost a big pot with A7 vs. QT and 8T on a J547 board. I bet, both called. The river was the Q and I checked, the guy with 8T bet and I was planning on heroing and then the other guy called so I folded correctly.

Results: -$757 in 1 hour, 31 minutes ($2 in tips)

The highlight of the day was probably the pre-session meal with Sequel. I corrected my prior ordering mistake at Metropolitan and got the Seafood Fra Diavolo… Mussels, clams, shrimp and lump crab meat over linguine with spicy marinara… Yum!



Work Stuff

Long story short, my direct boss didn’t tell his boss that I put in notice until this Tuesday, so four days had passed. Also my boss is leaving, so that’s a more important hire for them to make. Thus they asked me to work an extra week to week and a half, which sucks. Reading between the lines I couldn’t say no and expect good references or future opportunities to be a lock, so I felt like I had to do it. Either 10/10 or 10/13 will likely be my last day.

This sucks on a lot of levels since I was going light on poker and trying to start resting up to catch up on sleep this week, thinking next week was my last and I could be feeling 100% to hit the felt hard starting on 10/6, but now that's bumped back and I guess I'll just fight through the fatigue as best I can like I used to. If the fumes are still bad the next couple of weeks I may not be able to grind much at all. Not much I can do about it, so we'll see...

I'm feeling a little better today so the plan is to grind out a long session as long as I don't start feeling any worse.

Watched a little bit of the Ryder Cup too, but our boys are struggling... which was to be expected with the matchup this year.

Glad you're feeling better.

Looking forward to your updates when you're full time grinding! 5star IMO

Thanks! Not 100% yet but able to grind through it at least.

Thanks... I am looking forward to it too! And thanks we're definitely bound for 5 stars in here.

I didn't feel well for much longer, so I only played a few hours today. Dizzy/light headed again... Can't tell if it's the sinuses or the meds, but either way, it's not conducive to poker success... Hopefully back at it by Tuesday.

Light headedness and poker is a horrible combo.

Hopefully it didn't impact your game too much!

Not too much, I just ran awful anyway. It impacted me online when I went to play there instead, and I blatantly misread a board... Never done that before!

I'm still not feeling 100% but I'm improving. Since I've always had asthma, any time I get sick and get a cough it's a concern that it doesn't get worse, which could sideline me for weeks instead of days, so I'm taking it very easy. I'm watching House of Cards, Blacklist, and old High Stakes Poker. I'm working on some side projects too. Lots of vegetable juice, some asthma meds, and good old fashioned rest.

Meanwhile, not playing much in my last trip killed off some of my Borgata comp offers. Plus, I'm craving poker action. When I return to the felt it will be with a vengeance and the hours will be long. I won't be stopped!

Be careful with that vegetable juice, lots of calories doesn't make up for it is somewhat weak nutritional value compared to real fruits and veggies.

Feel better

I assume you're referring to stuff like V8?

I'm literally juicing it, not drinking pre packaged stuff, so there shouldn't be many calories and the nutritional value is high. Kale, celery, cucumber, ginger, lemon and apple.

Oh yea my bad I meant like v8

Oh ok good... I've never tried that stuff and don't plan to. I actually enjoy the stuff I juice, and I hate most vegetables any other way, so it's the best way for me to get them...

Naked mango and green machine are the nuts

Those taste really good but they have a ton of sugar in them.

Bolthouse Farms Green Goodness ftw. Might not be widely available outside of the Cuse but its great.

Oh and good job on your recent success at 2/5. Your style is perfect for the games at borgata and parx and I'm sure you will be able to play for a living with no problem. Careful going on an extended road trip tho, expenses add up and the 2/5 games really arent good enough to offset the extra expenses. Seeing the country is amazing but after a few weeks on the road I always miss home and realize its not everything it's cracked up to be. This is coming from someone who took a road trip from Cuse to Vegas 2 years ago for 6 weeks. I suggest you grind parx/mdlive/borgata for the rest of the fall then maybe schedule a flight to LA and/or Miami for a week or 2 at a time and see how you like it.

I've never had Green Machine but Naked Mango is pretty good. Those aren't overly healthy though... They're kind of a compromise between healthy and tasty, but in my opinion neither is truly achieved. They aren't terrible as a meal replacement, though.

Exactly...

I don't even recognize those from my time in Cuse actually...

The plan is actually to grind regionally until the Spring, I wouldn't be setting out until at least April due to my final significant broadcasting gig that has about 24 nights between November and early April. Then the trip... I've traveled a lot for work over the years, at least relative to the average person, so I know a lot of the drawbacks all too well...

At the same time, the initial trip would sandwich the WSOP, which I'd be away for anyway, so it's not as much time away as it might seem on the surface. I plan on breaking up the grinding with some time off, too. The other key is that I don't plan to ever live week to week or month to month financially, so I'll just be trying to keep my living expenses under my annual allotment while earning enough in 2015 for 2016, and so on... Thus I don't think the travels will put me under any financial pressure. I also don't anticipate that I'll be paying rent anywhere while traveling, so that's huge too. This may be my last chance to travel extensively without paying rent/mortgage/etc anywhere, so I think that'll make it a lot less expensive by comparison.

What route did you take out to Vegas? Any stops you really enjoyed?

Also, I'm curious why you think my style is good for Parx and Borgata... The 2/5 games are actually pretty different between the two places IMO. If anything, I'm probably better suited for Parx 2/5.