contentI think I've mentioned this before, but I'm not even sure why I play in the poker tournament exactly. I'm not very good at the game, that's for certain. I don't spend my time calculating pot odds and I usually grow frustrated at some point at which I begin throwing chips around in random pots. The best I had ever managed before was to place 5th and I always considered that to have been a fluke. I did passably well through the early part of the game. It was an incredibly aggressive table to start with and people were being knocked out left and right. I made it through the first table merge and then to the final table itself. I informed everyone that my goal was to fold my way to 3rd place if I could manage it. All I wanted was a piece of the money. I actually ended up knocking out the 4th person and was so happy about making it, I didn't care how the rest of the game finished. I even offered to just cut to the chase and flip a coin or have high card take it. I called someone's all-in knowing I was probably beat. I then proceeded to suck out in the form of runner-runner quads.
This is from a camera phone so the quality isn't the best:
That left just me and the chip leader. I again offered a coin flip which he, of course, turned down. He had a massive chip lead and I was more than happy to just have the game end at that point. I went all-in on a draw and sucked out again, amassing a chip lead. Just when it seemed that I had an improbable win on my hands, he managed to get lucky on the river on an all-in and that was more or less all she wrote.
Considering that all I wanted was third and frankly, I shouldn't even have gotten that far, I'm happy with the outcome. I'm $180 richer and that money will offset my poker tournament losses for at least a couple years.
After the poker game I stuck around and played a few other things. It would have been a far more enjoyable day if the basement we were in didn't have a humidity level high enough that I was expecting rain at any moment. It was like a sauna down there. I ended up not being able to handle the temperature and headed upstairs where it was cooler, and wandered around the back yard for a bit. It was just impossible to stay in the basement for any real length of time and some of us heat refugees gathered to play Bohnanza and then Volcano using Ice House pieces.
Overall, it was a pretty good day. There were problems and issues, but winning money compensates for a lot of things.
