Burger Off...

As anyone who read the comments on my last post can probably guess my date with the girl I was engaged to 18 years ago went quite well last Tuesday night.Well apart from the fact I thought I'd ordered a burger with mushrooms,asked the waiter for some Tommy K when it arrived, and then discovered it was some veggy option which consisted of a bloody big bun with a couple of large mushrooms where the burger should have been!

We originally split up after we were looking round a house together near where she stayed. ( about 20 miles from where I lived at the time) I pointed out it was near the motorway and that would make it easier for my friends to visit.I remember her saying something about how "It'll just be you and me" and that being enough to give me second thoughts.I mentioned that over dinner and when she said "No wonder,all your friends at the time were hashhead wasters" I could kind of see her point! Funny how one misinterpreted comment can change the course of two lives.

Anyway we ended up in the pub until it closed and then sat chatting in her car ( she'd given me a run from one part of the town to another) before errrr checking out the back seat of my car! We were both pretty straight with each other though.I'd already told her I really liked my downstairs neighbour and she said she was in an open relationship after her marriage had broken down last year.We're still exchanging text messages, but I'm not sure if we'll ever see each other again.

My hot neighbour did pop up to clean my flat yesterday and brought some amazing homemade sausage rolls with Parmesan cheese.I was so tempted to finally ask her out ( the sausage rolls being the clincher obviously) but I was completely exhausted from Sat night ( when I had just fired up a new set of sngs before realising it was actually 3am and the clocks had gone forward) and I suppose, in truth, I chickened out.Part of me doesn't want to make things awkward if she's not interested and part of me thinks life is too short for regrets and if she's not interested at least I can move on and try and be more enthusiastic about internet dating.

This is still a poker blog ( the "and life" bit gives me the excuse to post all the other crap) and I have played more poker online this month than I have for ages.The fact that I'm getting a little bored of Black Ops probably helps but I've also been enjoying the game more recently despite the robotic nature of sngs.At a guess I'm about even on Stars ( where I've played most of my sngs this month) and down a bit on Party but I'll do a stats post on Thursday to confirm.( I've swapped $150 on Stars for $150 on Party to add to the confusion)

Sng play is quite robotic and obviously from a profits point of view I'd rather play a table full of fish, but the fact that the $16's do have a lot of winning/break even regular players in them does mean more scope for having to adjust my calling/shove ranges depending on the individual villain.As I play more games I've noticed some of them adjusting to my game and ( for example) defending their big blind more because they feel I'm shoving very light from the small blind.( at high blind levels obviously) Not all regs are the same though and I really do need to start taking better notes to help me narrow down their ranges during the crucial late stages of the game.

Ok,that's enough wittering for one post.Back soon...

Fastest Tea in the West....

It may be Tuesday, but I'm still getting my voice back after being at Hampden for Rangers fine 2-1 League Cup Final win over our rivals.It was well deserved and hopefully can give the team the lift they need to go on and retain our league title.

On the poker front I've played a few sets of six sngs since my last post and I'm just slightly ahead of breaking even despite Ace rag beating every premium hand when all in.

Away from the poker I had decided to take it easy this week and get back into the online dating thing when I'm back at work.I do still really like my neighbour but I don't even know if she still has a boyfriend ( she hasn't mentioned him for months)and I think it's time to get real and move on.

I suppose I'm lucky enough to get quite a few emails every week from women on the dating site and at the weekend one lady emailed me via the site and gave me her personal email address as her site membership was running out.I emailed her back the answers to her "quiz" and being an honest sort of bloke I replied "no" to the "Do you think people who take recreational drugs are losers?" question.I didn't get a reply and to be honest I'm exchanging emails with another couple of ladies so I wasn't too bothered.I checked my emails yesterday and there's one from quiz girl saying she doesn't drink or smoke but it's spooky because she was engaged to a guy with the same name as me when she was 19 and he was a weed smoker.

I checked and spookily enough I happened to have been engaged at 21 to someone with her first name.She'd sent another email a minute after that first one and that was the OMG moment! She had zoomed in on my pic and realised that we were indeed once nearly married about 20 years ago! She lives about 15 miles from Glasgow and I haven't seen her since we split all those years ago.We've arranged to meet up for a drink tonight to catch up so that should be interesting!

One funny story from that time was when the s-man and the Miami Trout spiked my tea with a load of speed before I went to visit my dear fiancee.I remember my hair almost standing on end as I arrived at her place and chatting to her Dad with a manic enthusiasm for a few hours before thoroughly rogering his daughter!( with the same manic enthusiasm obviously!)

Other than that shenanigans it's been a quiet week so far.I was out with my Mum,Dad and wee nephew yesterday and I'm now taking Step A out for a Mc'ds on Thus night as she can't make it tonight.I've started watching the second series of "The Wire" and although the first episode was a little slow the pace seems to be picking up again.

Thanks for reading.Back soon...

Stinky Jigsaw

I made it to the Alea casino in Glasgow just in time to register for the £33+£3+£10 bounty tourney along with 28 other donkeys.The starting stack was 8k in chips and the blinds went up every 45 mins for the first two levels before being reduced to just 20 mins.( which I didn't realise until after the break) In the end it wasn't a very eventful game for me and the action was so slow I actually played some Rush poker on my mobile at the table.

One interesting hand I wasn't involved in occurred when a guy flipped over Aces thinking it was showdown time but there was still one player left to act in the hand.That player bet about 1/2 the pot on the river having seen the other guys Aces and Mr Aces still called the river bet and still looked surprised when he didn't win the hand!

No real characters at my table other than the old guy on my right who was a slightly chubbier,stinky breathed version of Jigsaw ( from the SAW films).Thankfully he didn't last too long!

My tourney ended when a young guy shoved just over 10bb from late position and I called with 1010.We were six handed at that point and I just felt Tens were too strong to fold.I also had it in my mind to call a bit lighter and shove a bit tighter due to the bounties on offer.Sadly he had QQ and there was no miracle two outer for me.I had 200chips left and called with A2s on the next hand only to fall to 1010.Overall I did enjoy the live game experience but the action did seem a little on the slow side.

Rosie mentioned that she was glad I'm enjoying "The Wire" and although that's true it's not always easy to avoid spoilers.I don't generally do Facebook or twitter, but I did follow the links from a certain persons blog to their twitter thing and lets just say I don't expect Omar to be getting a girlfriend anytime soon!

I'm not on Facebook etc partly because I like my privacy, but I did get a shock this week when I got an email from my Dad with the subject header "Questions about LittleAcorn poker blog".Not that there are any great secrets on these pages but I was happy to discover someone sharing my Dads name ( and using the same shortened version of his first name) works for Poker Junkie and my thoughts can remain between me and my millions of readers!

I deleted a comment on my last post from someone promoting a poker cheating site.The "best ways to cheat your friends at poker" section was quite amusing although it does warn that "If you have friends prone to violence you may not want to apply what you read here".Perhaps the warning should also read that you may not want to apply the tips on this site if you have friends you're prone to actually treating as friends!

The "Get your friends wasted" section may have worked for me at home games but as I usually like to get wasted myself I'm not sure it's the optimal ev+ play!I do realise now that Juice has probably read the website advice as one of the tips was to "Make them think that you are a bumbling idiot", although to be fair Juice saved that routine for the pool games which came after the poker as I recall.( just kidding mate)

Online I've only played one set of four sngs since my last post.I managed to take down an 18 player turbo and cash in a 45 player $12 game.Rather than focus on the results of a few games I'm trying to focus on volume and make myself feel happier about playing 16 games and losing the other night than I was only playing four and winning.Easier said than done.

Tonight I'm off to Ibrox for the Europa League 2nd leg against PSV and I'm looking forward to the weekend when I'm hopefully going to catch up with the S-man at some point and I'll also be going to the worlds greatest football derby game on Sunday at Hampden when we take on our rivals in the League Cup final.We finally have a couple of players back from injury but with such a small squad it's going to be a tough couple of games ahead.

Back soon...

Volume Up,Profits...Down!

I've managed to ramp up my poker volume a bit since my last post and as a change of pace I've also played a couple of sets of 180 player $12 turbos and some 18 player $16's too.I made two 180 turbo final tables and both times I lost to three outers when the world was at stake.At one point I was running so badly that when I auto-folded KK due to running for a toilet break ( yeah,my poker catheter wasn't plugged in!)I wasn't too upset and sure enough I would have lost to AJ hitting an Ace on the flop.It does feel a bit churlish to be complaining about bad luck and sick beats when all I've watched all week on the news is clips of peoples homes being swept away in Japan.

The weird thing was that although I'm down a couple of hundred on Stars since my last stats post I actually quite enjoyed six tabling the multi-table turbo games and as they stay as full tables until the final table I could probably start 8-10 at a time without finding it hard to keep up.Although I usually pause the tv shows when the blinds get really high, I've also now caught up a bit with the rest of the world and nearly finished watching the first series of "The Wire" and the first five brilliant episodes of series 7 of "Peep Show"."The Wire" has been excellent so far and I've already splashed out on the 2nd series.

Not much else going on.I'm still enjoying my time off work with late nights and long sleep ins and I plan on hitting the casino tomorrow night for some live tourney action.On Thus night I'll be at Ibrox for the return leg against PSV and the Gers are still in with a shout of qualifying after a fine 0-0 result in Eindhoven last week.The footballing highlight for me last week though has to be Barcelona's win over Arsenal.

Barca's pass and move football was an absolute joy to watch and although I've seen some great club sides through the years ( the Ajax and AC Milan teams from the late 80's/early 90's come to mind) this current Barcelona time are the best I've ever seen.When Arsenal had a player wrongly sent off I wanted to see them come back and get some justice from the game but in the end I was willing Barca to hit the net after wave after wave of pass and move football which made it all look so simple.

Ok,thanks for reading.Back soon...

How is that even possible?

After nearly a week of feeling well out of sorts I'm finally getting my appetite back and feel able to do more than just gouch out in front of the tv.( When I'm too weak for even poker or Black Ops there's something not right!) I did spend a few $$ trying to qualify for the Sunday Million this week but a couple of lost flips and a nasty river put paid to that dream and it was probably for the best as I'm not sure the Lambo Gallardo on offer for first place would fit into the car space I rent near my workplace...



My cousin Two Pies ( he always ordered two pies when we used to go and watch future superstars like Charlie Adam in the Rangers home reserve games about 10 years ago)was over at the weekend and after watching a painfully poor Rangers team beat St Mirren 1-0 we watched the Liverpool v Man Utd and a couple of other games after that.I didn't really care who won as the only teams in England I have a soft spot for are Chelsea and the mighty Burnley but it was a good game and Liverpool were well worth their 3-1 win.

I do wish there was a website available during the game where a fan from each side playing would clarify exactly what was being sung by the supporters ( regardless of how pc the songs are) as it's hard to make out the words from the tv coverage.In fact the only one I caught really was the Man Utd fans singing their "We're Man Utd,We do what we want" after their late consolation goal and the Liverpool fans replying "You're Man Utd,You'll do what you're told" which was class.No doubt the United fans will probably have the last laugh again this season though.

I'm looking forward to the Barca v Arsenal game tonight and hoping the Gers can somehow ( we're now missing nine first team players due to injury) get a result against PSV in Eindhoven on Thursday evening.

Back to the poker and after a couple of breakeven-ish sets of four sngs at the weekend I crashed out of eight in a row last night ( four on Party,four on Stars) before finishing with a couple of wins,a second and a third in my last set.I was only playing four at a time as I was also watching that touching movie "The Human Centipede" that I'd recorded from the scy-fi channel last week.

When I say touching I mean in the "some warped old Nazi stitches three people together joining them from mouth to anus and somehow gives all three one digestive system" kinda way.When he fed the guy at the front and started shouting "Feeeed her" at him I almost switched off despite the dreadful acting making it not very scary at all.( If I've not explained that well enough just be grateful and move on!)

Back to the poker and the post title came from something someone typed in the chatbox after this lovely beat.Made me laugh anyway.( the preflop action was pretty standard)



If I saw the second hand posted on a forum I'd be wondering why the original poster hadn't just folded preflop or at least just completed the small blind and check/folded after that as trying to play too much poker early in a sit and go is almost always a huge error as getting involved in coin flips or marginal situations simply gives the rest of the table a better chance of cashing.( it spews equity to them as the forum kiddies say)

Anyway I was only four tabling and decided open folding 66 from the small blind after it had been folded round to me was too weak and as 66 isn't easy to play postflop I felt a raise was a better option.The villain called and I bet out on the flop as it was probably one of the best flops possible for my hand with no real straight or flush draws out there and only one overcard.It was also unlikely the villain had the 7 and I'd have been happy to take it down with my large-ish flop bet.

I checked when the King fell on the turn as I thought it was a scare card for both of us.When the villain bet out 240 into a 320 pot on such a ragged rainbow board his line just didn't make much sense if he did have a King and as I'd discounted a seven from his hand I check/called.His Vpip was 24% over 200 hands and on checking today he was 24% over 30 hands at 10/20 and 38% vpip over 26 hands at 15/30 so he was obviously a spewy fish.I check/called his turn and eventual river push and although this time I was ahead, I'm still guilty of overplaying/fancy play syndrome and would like to think I won't get involved again in similar future hands.Still,sometimes it's nice to be right and be results orientated!




Ok,thanks for reading.Back soon...

Monthly Stats

Party $1079 ( +$207) 12 sngs ,Stars $1235 ( - $14) 60 sngs

Total $2314 ( + $193)

I do feel like a bit of a fraud doing a stats post when I only played 72 sngs throughout the whole of Feb.It's almost funny that it's taken me until the last few months to be able to six table with no problems and yet my motivation to hit the felt isn't anywhere near as strong as it used to be.Running way over expectation is the only way to make any money with such low volume and I think the reality of variance hit last year when I hit a long breakeven spell and lost my desire to keep grinding after a hard day at work.I was reading about a 9 man STT grinder who played 2000 games for a $150 profit and it's not very inspiring!

Away from the poker I've been ill this week with a stomach bug and have only eaten half a piece of toast over the last two days.At first I thought it was the weed as I was completely smoke free over Sunday and Monday and only had a few late on Tues night as I'd booked Wed off work.It felt like my throat/stomach were burning and I didn't sleep at all on Tues night and couldn't even keep down a cup of tea yesterday.After watching Rangers lose to our rivals ( nice friendly game with 3 sendings off,a ton of bookings and our assistant manager and their coach squaring up at the end) I kicked Two Pies out and went straight to bed.( only to lie awake all night again)

Still,it's not all bad news as I did receive an email from a wonderfully named Nigerian called "Jah Jah Bongo" promising me a share of millions! A weed smoking Star Wars fan maybe?

When I haven't been sleeping or puking today I've been trying to download the new Black Ops map pack with no success.I'll probably watch "10 O'Clock Live " later on Ch4, although despite it's clever humour it's just not laugh out loud funny which is a shame as I like Charlie Brooker and David Mitchell is great in Peep Show.

Righty,time to try and muster up enough energy to take Nacho out.Back soon...