Poker Weekend

I actually didn't play any poker on Saturday night this weekend. I drank a little and ended up falling asleep before the time I'm usually getting on, while waiting for Mrs. HP to the pc to do some on-line shopping for the family. However, in typical Sunday night fasion, I'm going to sleep pissed off over here thanks to pokerstars and the "random" badbeatage that occurs there. Tonight I played in a 180 sng, amazingly now my 13th such tournament without ANY cashes, as well as a 500 fpp satellite to the Sunday 750k guaranteed tournament. Both of them ended the identical way. First, after withstanding the first 200+ entrants into the satellite tourney, I slow played an A-10o in early position, got two limpers, and saw a flop of As10c5h. I checked my obvious leading hand, and a loose flop bettor moved allin on me. The other guy folded quick, and I had to call what I was SURE was just a reasonably big ace. We flip, and he has AJ of hearts. I'm going to win unless he spikes a jack on me. The turn comes the 6 of hearts. I'm so busy focusing on "no jack no jack no jack no jack" that I don't even notice the heart draw my too-loose opponent has picked up. When the river comes the 2 of hearts, I look down to watch my stack swell, and instead I am informed via popup window that I am out of the tourney. The dreaded runner runner flush.

As the perfect complement to THAT beat, in the 180 sng, I manage to double up on the second hand of the game when my inside straight hits on the turn, and I play weak and induce a movein on the river from some poor sap. So I was in good shape right from the get-go. However, 42 hands and 12% of flops later, I was down to around 2500 chips, good enough for around 43rd out of 88 remaining, when I was dealt QQ in last position. Got just one limper, in middle position, so I decided to move in and try to double up heading into the first break. The guy calls my QQ and shows me AcKh. Much like my beat in the satellite tournament, I am focusing on praying for no ace and no king (a virtual impossibility, I know), but miraculously I receive just that. UNfortunately, the 2nd and 3rd cards of the flop are both clubs, as is the turn, AND the river. And I lose with my overpair to not a runner flush, not a runner-runner flush, not even a runner-runner-runner flush, but a Fucking RUNNERRUNNERRUNNERRUNNER flush. How the fug am I supposed to compete with that?!

So that will be it for me with the big tourneys tonight, I'm not playing again and again when ps is obviously feeling raggy towards me. I am really focusing on trying to get better about not playing on ps when everything seems against me. I played AWESOMELY in both of these tournaments tonight, once AGAIN in both cases getting in with the best hand, and still taking it in the chin. Eff that.

On a somewhat bright note, I played my first 6x12 sng on ps today in ages, where I placed second after ALSO getting beat on a runnerrunnerrunnerrunner flush over my favored hand. So another horrific beat, but at least I cashed in my first tourney back at that structure.

I also headed over the party late tonight for a quick 1-tabler sng for $20. Doubled up early when Fishy McGee called my allin with JKo on a board of J93o. Nemo had 55. What D. Fug possesses these people to actually put up actual money to actually play actual poker, with skillz this terrible? On the strength of that early stake, I managed to win the tournament outright, pocketing a cool $100 cash money while knocking out 7 of the other 9 players along the way. I was basically even with the 2nd place guy heads-up at the end, I called the preflop bet, he raised to 3x, and I reraised allin with AQo. He called me and flipped...are you ready? Q7o. That hand absolutely crippled him, and I had the game in the bag. It's fun to get back to the 1 table sng's. It's like getting back to my roots. These 1 table sng are actually what got me to start playing on party in the first place, they were so easy to beat.