Sunday Horribilis

Overall, an excellent weekend. Poker-wise, not so much.

Friday - The plan WAS to stay in, donk around in the Donkament and Fiddy. Instead, a buddy of mine was down the road for some work reunion thing and asked if he could swing by after. Since he was some 50km from home, I wasn't going to say no.

Saturday - I drive out to work's backup site for testing. I gorged myself on the provided breakfast, and set records for how quickly I get through testing our workstations. Why? Because it's easy when you keep writing "not installed" or "no connection" or "old version" and move on. Not my job to fix that, just to report it.

I get home with plenty of time to spare before the TOC. I'm wiped though, so I take a nap and am up with an hour to go. Let me say - Bloggers are donkeys. I know! Shocking news! With the structure as it was, and the prizes what they were, there is no excuse for how quickly people were being eliminated. The game was over in just under 4 hours. Myself, I was out 15th at 7:30. I'd made one bad call, and one unfortunate move with a short stack to get crippled.

On the plus side, it meant I didn't have to skip out or be late for the Leonard Cohen concert I had tickets for. In fact, I was knocked out at the perfect time to make it just before the start. One of the most amazing concerts I've ever been to. Nobody will accuse Leonard of being high-energy, but the man has charisma to spare, even at 73. Even his backup singers weren't annoying... and in fact the Webb Sisters did a brilliant version of "If It Be Your Will". "Hallelujah" caused goosebumps. Spontaneous standing ovations from the crowd, witty rejoinders from the man, and a fantastic array of musicians backing him up. Yup, getting knocked out 15th was definitely +EV.

Followed by a late snack (spicy Kobe beef tacos) at The Beer Bistro on King St.. I've never been there before (although I've meant to), but I'll definitely be back. Some fantastic beers had too - Koningshoeven Quadrupel (Trappist 10% draft) and McAuslan's Scotch beer (7.5% Quebecois beer. Damn do they make good beer in Quebec, my two favouritre brewerys are McAuslan's and Unibroue). Honestly, how Coors Light is so popular is beyond me when it's like drinking piss from someone who drank beer an hour earlier, especially compared to the quality microbrews out there.

Sunday - Up and out to the home game. In my bid to defend my championship, I reached 6th place. Top 4 paid. Damn. I was in decent, but not phenomenal shape at the final table. I ramped the aggression with decent hands. My downfall was a re-raise all-in with AQo vs a standard raise preflop. I got called by AJh. 3rd heart fell on the turn (Q on the flop) and it crippled me. Nothing of note happened after that. I'm still the best player in that game though... yah, I know how scary that is.

But it got me home in time for the freeroll. I think I went out 19th or something. Now THAT was a series of fast-and-furious oustings. Then again, it was completely expected.

I decided to play the 750k as well with my MATH winnings from last week. J9s gets in cheap and flops the open-ended straight flush draw. Up against TP who wouldn't let go on the flop did me in before the first break.

So I walked away, watched some TV, made a tuna melt for dinner, and then wandered back. 50-50 = no good. Stars 5000 entrant 50 seat freeroll satellite = no good. SnG's = no good. But unlike a little while ago where I was getting creamed when I had the best going in, these were all TERRIBLE calls by me. Knowing I was beat, and in fact reading my opponent's hands exactly, and STILL calling like a moron. I have no idea why. Finally I shut it all down and called it a night.

Oh, and during that later run of games, I was also watching Sunshine. I can see why it got diametrically opposed reviews. It's a fantastic piece of psychological examination and tension with an intriguing enough premise... at first. It owes a great deal to 2001 for its first 3/4. Then it takes a hackneyed and unnecessary left turn and becomes a completely different movie. Eventually it becomes really hard to follow with the change in directorial style and story. It seemed almost lazy... like the script needed to be made more exciting to keep the studios happy or something. Regardless, a beautiful movie with some great ideas, derailed by a ridiculous closing act. I'll probably still buy it though.

Anyway, that's a lot of chaff around the point of this - I need to stop making terrible calls. The snap call of QQ vs PirateLawyer's flopped set was bad. I put him on possibly overs or a flush draw with that board, but his stall seemed tricky to me... still not sure I could get away there. It's strange, I had this hole mostly plugged, but the dike seemed to break on Sunday. Time to get out the mortar again, and hope it sets before I land on Friday.

Speaking of Vegas, if you're there for the Mulligan weekend, check out VinNay for some scant details. Contact him for more in-depth info. I'll be there Friday afternoon until Sunday morning, and will try to cram in as much as possible in that time.