The night I found out why Ace-King is known as "Anna Kournikova"...

...because they're nice to look at, but they never win.

I went with my golfing buddy Brandon out to the Horse Shoe Casino tonight and entered another World Series of Poker Circuit tournament.  As with the last one, this was a No-Limit Texas Hold'em tournament.  Tonight's event had 48 participants, and I ended up outlasting 37 of them.  While I was pleased with my performance, I thought I'd jot down a couple of observations while they were still fresh in my mind.

• I should have known it would be a long night when a drunk idiot was seated between Brandon and me at the opening table.  The guy was deaf, drunk, and dumb, which is a lethal combination for the flow of the table.  He never knew when it was his turn, he never knew what the bet was, and he never fully grasped the chip values.  And no one could knock him out.  He went all in at least twice before we moved tables, and each time, the entire table was rooting against him, but to no avail.  He doubled up numerous times.  About an hour into the night, he was asked to leave behind a substancial chip stack and was evicted from the poker room for his drunken behavior.  He was never mean/beligerent/angry drunk, just not cognicant enough to finish the round.

• I spent the entire night with about 5x the big blinds (which increased every half hour).  Using the strategy of only playing quality cards (which were few and far between), I was able to keep a chip and a chair.  

• One hand was particularly interesting.  As the cards were being dealt, the dealer accidentally turned over a Jack.  When I looked down at my hole cards I had pocket Jacks.  I was the big blind, but I couldn't get too aggressive with the best hand I had all night because I knew one of my Jacks was out of play.  I limped in.  The turn revealed a couple of low clubs and the fourth Jack.  I over bet the pot, in an attempt to thwart off any flush draws.  Everyone folded, and I had to turn over the pocket Jacks, just to show how funny my hand was.

• I doubled up a couple of times when my chips got too low and I knew I'd be blinded out of the game.  I'm pretty sure that my set of Jacks was the best hand of the night for me, but I did witness a guy go all in with AQ against AK after a flop and turn of AAQ8.  The turn was a King, so after going all in with the best hand and against only two outs, he lost the hand.

• Which leads me to my final hand.  I can't complain about it.  I was about to be blinded out, with blinds at 600-1200, and I only had 4400, I knew I needed to catch some good cards to stay in the game.  I looked down at an AK (off suit) and pushed all in.  A guy called with a J8 (off suit), which according to an online odds calculator is a 2 to 1 favorite to win.  When the flop came out Q-9-4 rainbow, I was still a 2 to 1 favorite (according to the calculator).  A 2 on the turn made me almost a 4:1 favorite going into the river, which, of course, was a 10, giving my opponent a Queen high straight.  I played the hand perfectly, got all my chips into the pot when I had the best hand, which is all I could have asked.  (Well, I wouldn't have complained had "Big Slick" held up.)

• I ended up missing the final table by one spot.  Had I won that final hand, I would have entered the final table a couple thousand under the chip average, but I would have had some room to gamble a bit, which would have been great.  I ended up getting 11th place, which is irrelevant in a poker tournament, but it was my highest placing so far (out of the four casino poker events I've been in).  I stuck with my strategy going into the event and did not make any dumb mistakes.  All in all, a great night.

• There are a handful of $40 satellites left this week, and I may sneak over and play in one more, but I'm pretty sure that my dream to work my way into the World Series of Poker Main Event for 2010 has been put to rest.  Until next year, I'll keep practicing online and in the occasional Friday night cash game at my friend Andy's house.

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Favorite Song on the iPod shuffle:  "Dead and Gone" by T.I. (featuring Justin Timberlake)
Looking forward to:  Warmer weather.
Thinking back on:  The wife and I were looking through some old photos of when we lived in Pueblo and were reminded of what an ornery kitty we had and how young and skinny Brodie was when we got him.  Also, I miss working outside in the summer, which allowed me to burn off winter fat and get a nice tan while riding a tractor.

Pants (not on the ground, but on sale), WSOP, no super powers, & the Grammys

The wife and I found out we'll be getting a decent chunk of money (which had been stolen from us over the past year) returned to us in a few weeks.  Yup, it's tax season.  Not only is my mom-in-law willing to smuggle 6 Pass Key sandwiches into her carry-on when she comes to visit us, she's also our personal accountant, and she said we'll get a nice return this year.

This news led us to go out shopping for some new pants for me to wear during the work week.  We ended up hitting the jackpot at Old Navy.  They had men's pants on sale, down from $30 to $18, and the entire store was 30% off.  After paying $12 each for three pairs of nice fitting pants (which are harder to find than one might think) at the mall, we headed to the other big mall in town and bought four more pair of pants.  I can now Goodwill half-a-dozen ill fitting pants that I've been wearing for way too long.

Speaking of Goodwill, we stopped by a local thrift store and found three really nice golf-logo polos (and one not so nice shirt that I bought anyway because it was a buck).  I have started accumulating a nice collection of golf course logo polos, and all at thrift store prices.

Earlier this week, my wife informed me that the Horse Shoe Casino in neighboring Council Bluffs, IA, is hosting the World Series of Poker (WSOP) Circuit tour during the last half of February, culminating in a $5000 buy-in Hold'em tourney on March 1st.  The winner of the March 1st event earns a seat in the Main Event in Las Vegas this summer.  But a $5000 buy-in tournament prices out most poker players, so the casino hosts dozens of "satellite" tournaments before hand.  A satellite tournament is a way for the average Joe to buy in for a modest price ($40-$65) and, should they do well and make it to the final table, make enough money to buy-in at a higher price.  Should a fellow get on a roll, he might parlay a $40-tournament into a $235-tournament into a $5000-tournament into the Main Event in Vegas (not probable but possible).

Needless to say, the thought of the WSOP in Vegas got my poker playing juices flowing.  I found the poker room at the Horse Shoe's February calendar and began plotting my schedule.  I found that there would be over a half dozen $40 tourneys over the next few weekends.  The first available $40 tourney was today (Sunday) at 2:00.  I called the poker room and they explained that the event would not be held in the Poker Room (which only has about 20 tables) and that they would accept entries up to 40 minutes after the event started.  The person I spoke with also said that it wouldn't sell out, so I figured I'd show up at around 2:00 and play some cards.  My friend Ron and I showed up to find that everything I'd been told about today's event was false.  The event was in the poker room and it was sold out.  Bummer.

We ventured over to the table games and settled on the "Let it Ride" game.  Ron explained the rules of the game to me and we sat down.  I got $50 in chips and 30 minutes later I colored out my chips after he lost his.  I cashed out with $65 in profit, so it looks like I'll be playing on house money this weekend.  Score one for the little guy.

Also poker related, on Friday, I went to one of my co-worker's fiance's bachelor party, where we played poker.  It was a $10 buy-in Hold'em tournament, with unlimited re-buys the first two hours.  I made it to the final three (and without re-buying) before being knocked out.  Very fun.

Last Friday, my wife did her iodine treatment to fix her hyperactive thyroid, and I'm happy to report that she's on the mend.  She's still taking beta-blockers to help slow her heart rate, which she's been able to decrease her dosage over the past few days, which is a great sign.  Also, I'm sad to report, no super-powers resulted from the iodine radiation.  Bummer.

Tonight I watched the Grammys and wrote down some thoughts that I had, which I recorded on Twitter.  (Yeah, I use Twitter.  Jealous?)  During the live-tweeting, I responded to SarahK47's question about who was singing with Taylor Swift with the following tweet:  "I believe she's singing with either David Crosby or Stevie Nicks. I can never tell the difference."  That tweet resulted in a re-Tweet and a "haha" reply from SarahK, of which I will forever be proud.  (It should be noted that SarahK has about 1400 followers, so, yeah, it was awesome.)

Other tweets from my live-tweeting:

• New Rule: Drummers for rock bands are not allowed to wear eye-liner. Let the lead singer/guitarist get glammed up, but not drummers. (regarding the drummer for Green Day)
• "Imma Be" putting on the mute until the Black Eyed Peas finish this song.  
• Wow, Stevie Wonder is reading off the teleprompter. Impressive for a blind guy. Wait, what? That's not Stevie? Who is it? Lionel who? Oh.
• Apparently Hudson, Celine, Smokie, Usher & Carrie are such bright stars, the audience has to wear sunglasses.
• Holy crap, Micheal Jackson's kids look like they are 30 yrs old. It seemed like just yesterday they were being dangled over a balcony.  (Too soon?  Sorry.)
• If I promise to buy a concert ticket will Bon Jovi promise not to do the "everyone-sings-into-the-microphone-at-the-same-time" move. I hate that move. 
• "You & Me" + choir and orchestra + wacky Dave dancing = best performance of the Grammys.
• I love that "Honey Boy" Edwards is wearing a hat with his name on the front. I could learn a thing or two from him about self-promotion.
• Quintin Tarintino thinks hes cooler than he really is.
• As much as I hate baggy jeans on rappers, I hate skinny jeans more. Did Lil' Wayne borrow a pair of jeans from a fan in jr high school?
• Do Eminem and Lil Wayne understand that each curse causes CBS to cut out 7 seconds of performance, including the music? Horrible.
• How much more attention does Lady GaGa need before she'll go away?
• Taylor Swift just slayed some musical giants: Beyonce, DMB, Lady GaGa, Black Eyed Peas. Impressive and well deserved.