You think someone is your friend until they do something that makes you wonder, “What kind of friend would do that?”
So the story goes, when we were teenagers Evelyn and I dated. We got along, we fought, we got along, we fought, and in the end we just seemed to make for better friends. Or so I thought…
Never did I expect her to do what she did to me recently. We don’t talk as much, she travels the world playing poker and I do the same from time to time in different parts of the world. We speak once and a while on MSN, she’s always been a good listener always willing to give me advice. She knows my strengths, she also knows my weaknesses, so when I have questions, she’s always been a good person for me to turn to. That was then…
I don’t think I’ll ever speak to her again. I’m just at a loss for words at this point. You think someone is your friend until they do something that makes you wonder, “What kind of friend would do that?” So I guess I should cut to the chase.
A while back she bought me a birthday present and I was too lazy to pick it up from her place. Eventually she gave my present to someone else. No big deal, my bad for not coming by to grab it. That’s not what destroyed me.
What destroyed me is that eventually, just this week, she did in fact have this “gift” sent to my house. This gift is just the end of me and I still don’t know why she would do this to me. She bought me Rock Band 2 for X-BOX 360. It’s over for me.
My life wasn’t all that exciting before I got this game, but now I’m just a total mess. Leaving the house is as unlikely as Michael Jackson fathering a baby without artificial insemination. I was instantly addicted, and I knew it from the very first drum beat.
I hate you Evelyn Ng. We WERE friends. I thought very good friends actually, but I see now that you really don’t care about me at all. All you care about is your personal agenda: to destroy the youth of America with addictive video games that will corrupt their souls.
I swear I thought I knew you… you are just dead to me now. No question about it- YOU KNEW! You totally knew that with my personality type I would lose all hope at a normal life once you got me this gift. Gift… it’s just wrong to even call it a gift. Evelyn bought me poison for the mind and I hate the fact that I love it so much! You suck Evelyn!
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Ok, so aside from me hanging on to a new pipe dream of being a drummer in a rock band, I am back in Vegas and haven’t slept for a while. If you read my last blog you might have guessed that I’m absolutely clueless as to what I’m really doing right now.
I went broke almost identically in San Jose as I did in LA, getting to about 60 remaining players, than smooth calling a button raise from the small blind with a big pair. In this tourney, I actually got crushed back to back hands, on button as well, with QQ both times.
In hindsight I should have re-raised the player on the button. Not because I think it was the optimal play in most situations, but the button was a special kind of player. Before I get in trouble here, I want to say that I really like the kid and think he is a super nice guy.
I just don’t like his approach to deep stacked tournaments. I think he has a shot to be GREAT eventually, but right now there is just stuff he just doesn’t get (he’s probably played less than a handful of live tournaments).
Anyway, point being, against him I SHOULD have re-raised because if he had a decent hand, with his limited chip stack, he would have gone all in with several hands that were weaker than QQ. He actually had a legit hand, AK, but got away cheap on the flop and I lost chips to the big blind.
The next hand I got QQ again and ran into the one player at the table most likely to overplay a mid pair. He ended up showing me aces which left me short stacked. I finally went all in with AK and couldn’t outrun 10-10 and J-J.
I could have played A LOT better in this tournament. I made it as far as I did because of sound fundamentals and not because of great reading ability. I made it deep strictly using the same strategy I teach at PokerVT.com.
As far as fundamentals go in deep stacked events, I have no doubt in my mind that the small ball approach, when applied properly is by far the best way to get consistent results in high buy in events with loads of play.
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So I’m up over 24 hours now. I ended up in a random bar with the most unlikely of people. Old school grinders most of you would never have heard of, one of which was feared at one point in his career. Today he can’t get into action, but I learned a lot from him, both good stuff and bad.
I was a degen tonight. Just kind of looking for trouble. Luckily I didn’t find it and I’m home now playing Rock Band with Patty and playing with Mushu and Foxy.