I got plenty of nuthin’

R called late this afternoon to say that he wasn’t having his scheduled home game this evening. The last one attracted a mere ten players, which included his girlfriend. Instead, he was opting to go into Salem to play in a game he knew about and invited me along.

R explained, “They start with a cash game, then play a tourney and then there’s another cash game. It’s easy money.” I was out the door as fast as I could go, after chores, of course, and kissing the DW.

I arrived just as the first cash game was wrapping up, and just in time to watch R stack off. The only other person I knew in the room was the guy to R’s left, a very soft player, who had amassed quite a few chips. He called out to me. “Hey, are you here to clean me out again like you did at R’s?” Everyone looked up from the table to see who he was talking to. Great. So much for anonymity being a possible edge.

There were a lot of young guns at this game, some who clearly weren’t old enough for the casino, but certainly old enough to be sporting their online logowear. I commented about it to R. “Last time I was here, a guy had brought his two kids with him and they both played the cash game.” Then he added, “There’s usually two guys here who are calling stations, They’re not here tonight.”

The tourney was cheap enough, $30 with a $20 rebuy. Oops, make that unlimited rebuys for the first three rounds. We started with 4000 in chips and blinds started at 50/100 and skyrocketed from there every 20 minutes. It was basically an all-in fest, and I did not fare well. My M was under ten almost all of the time. I called a short-stacked BB all in with 5 limpers, all who folded except me. I had Jd9d, he had Ah5h. Ace took it. I was short with A-10 and jammed, ran into AJ and rebought. I could have called a raise/reraise with my pocket nines, committing half of my stack. I could have flopped a boat. Oh, that’s right, I folded those nines. Finally, AQ was no good against AK and I decided to call it a night.

I suppose I could have hung around for the cash game to start. R tried to talk me into it, yet I knew that my patience had already been tested. It was time to kiss the DW hello. Maybe I’ll try again at some point in the future…the cash game, that is. As for tournaments, I can do without.