Tale of two games

It was the best of nights, it was the worst of nights. There's not much better of a feeling than taking your third buy-in of the night all the way up to a four buy-in profit in one night.

There's not a much worse feeling than giving it all away 24 hours later to the same people.

The running joke among some of us in our home game is that we've been swapping the same $100 back and forth between each other for the past two years. As silly as it sounds, it's pretty close to true. There have been a few people who come in once or twice, donate and never return, or swoop in once or twice, make decent scores and never return, but for the most part, it's a typical home game. The guy that wins this weekend will be down next weekend, and so on.

I was both those guys this weekend. Saturday night started off rough, with my typical inability to get anything cranking early on, and dropping two buy-ins pretty early. Then I ran my third buy-in up pretty hard, thanks in large part to this hand.

Blinds are $.25/.50, and I straddle, because, well, it was my turn, and that's what I do. About fourteen people come in off the street to call my straddle, because that's what happens when I straddle.

Brian raises pot (we switched the home game to pot limit a couple weeks ago to cool the jets of Captain Overbet, and it's making the playing field a little more level), which is $6 at that point. I think this might be a good time to look at my cards.

Hiltons. In. My. Straddle.

Nice.

"Pot."

So I pop it up another $18.

Tresa calls, which puts her all in.

Fuck. She doesn't invest much into a pot unless she's got a decent hand. I may have just run my straddled bitches into KK. And yes, she has been known to limp with Kings, so it was possible.

NewGuyDon calls. NewGuyDon always calls, so this just means that he has an ace. This also puts him all-in, and creates a second side pot. Nate folds, which may be the first time on record Nate has folded preflop when there was a significant pot going. His usual MO is to call pretty much any stupid-ass raise preflop if there's a decent sized pot and hope to hit with his trash.

He usually does, which is why we hate him. But he sometimes doesn't, which is why we love him.

Brian looks at me like "WTF did you start?"

I shrug, trying to hide the fact that my nuts have shrivelled up to subatomic particles when my $24 bet has gotten two callers.

Brian folds, and my rectum de-puckers a little.

Flop comes Ace high. Nobody has turned their shit up yet. I'm sure I'm behind here.

I.Have.No.Idea.

Turn is a Q, and I table my ladies.

River is a blank. Don and Tresa both look like I just took a dump in their Cheerios. Don mucks, Tresa shows me pocket dueces and mucks.

I'm pretty sure Don had an ace, but Tresa had hit her two-outer on the flop, since the flop was Ace high, but duece-low.

Then I hit my two-outer on the turn. A little sick, but she's used to it, because I cracked her Aces with KK two weeks ago. Basically, if Tresa and I have all the money in preflop, I'm probably going to come from behind at some point to win. No matter how far ahead I was when the money went in, like this time.

That gave me ammunition and I was able to pick up a few big hands and build a pretty ridiculous stack by the time the night was over.

Then last night I gave it all to Warbucks.

All of it.

Again and again.

And then again some more.

My whole night could be summed up with the last hand. Jim straddles, and I call the straddle with 89o. I know it's trash, but I can easily get away from trash if I miss.

I didn't miss. I flop T9Q, Jim checks (still without looking at his cards), I bet about $5, pretty much the size of the pot.

Fold. Fold. Fold. Jim decides this is a good time to look at his cards. He peeks at the first one and calls.

Okay, Jim has at worst a nine. If he didn't at least have second pair, he would have looked at the other one before calling.

Turn is a J. Gin! I know Jim's only looked at one, and I know I'm ahead of what he knows he has.
Jim checks, I push all in for about $50. If I win, I'm less in the hole, if I lose, it's really easy to count my chips.

Jim turn his hand face up, showing the 10, and says "Let's see if I can call you." Then he slides the second card out from under then 10 (this is the first time he's looked at his second hole card) revealing the King.

I push my stack across the table. I wait for the blank on the river to not be a King and make a chop, then push my stack across the table.

That was my night in a nutshell. Cramped and dark is my night in a nutshell, but that's irrelevant. I got more action than I wanted on my medium hands, and no action on my big hands. There may be a two-week hiatus in the home game as I'm in production for the NC Dance Festival this weekend and the UNCC Opera production of Dido and Anaeas next weekend, so I can lick my wounds in peace for a bit.

Tags: home poker game