Non Vegas Poker:local Foxwoods, Turning Stone, Four Winds, Tampa, Chicago Horseshoe others

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2019-08-20T15:45:00.000-07:00

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Second trip to Tampa Hard Rock

2012-01-29T08:23:00.000-08:00

I did not find the loose and crazy players in such abundance this time in Tampa. I played about 12 hours with time off for the buffet, and Until the last hours I played with players who were fairly reasonable
I started at 2-4, moved tables to see if I could get easier opponents, and finally decided to give the Omaha game a try. This is very hard poker for me. I manage to get the high fairly well defined, but the lows still confuse me. This was a 3-6 game with a kill that kicked in for the next hand on any pot that was of a certain size, $40 if I remember right. That is fairly high stakes for me, but I enjoyed it.
The players at this table knew one another and the game was reasonable. There was another table that was crazy aggressive with pots being capped before the flop. Many of those players had come from and Omaha pot limit game, and players came to our table complaining that the game was too loose/aggessive.
For me the game is fine because it reduces all thoughts of deciding how people play. Luck overcomes all style here. Those who play single dimensioned hands will lose int he long run. What is needed are 4 cards with lots of possibilities, and then it is just seeing how the game goes. Rarely does anyone fold who has any chance of a win.
I did see that I overvalued two pair. So I had A-J when the flop gave me A-J and I bet it. That is probably a mistake. It certainly would be for smaller two pair hands. Trip is probably the minimum for betting. High two pair make calling a good idea, but it is a better idea if there are other possibilities.
The players were patient with me as I got confused by the betting. One dealer was especially confusing and gumbling all the time that he was confused. I rely on the the dealer to call these hands and divide the pot. I can't think through much of that as I do in Hold em" Other dealers were wonderfully confident and accurate, but I almost got up and just waited for a new dealer.
One fine thing is that the bathrooms are right there in the poker room. No long hike. I hope Imperial Palace in Vegas arranges that when they remodel this year.
This is important because I drink a lot. The orange juice is good and service is good. The V8 is good as well. So I make many trips.
Overall the room is very nice. I have not waited long for a table. I would like to see more limit games, but generally there are at least 2 in the 2-4 variety.
A bunch came in from the first night of the local pirate celebration, all in costume and party mode. Many of those were at that difficult Omaha table.
I think this may become my next favorite game. The pots are huge, but since they are often split in half or in thirds, they look bigger than they are.
At any rate I had a fine day gambling even if I left with a loss of $45.

The buffet was better than my first trip too. All the food was fresh and hot and not dried out. I ate at 2:30 while the price was still $15 and this was a good choice. I was surprised the price was still so low on Saturday. The Sunday brunch runs all day at $30. That day I'll eat somewhere else.
I particulary liked the New England clam chowder and do did many others since after my first bowl it was gone and waiting for another batch. There is a raw bar where clams and oysters can be had raw or steamed for a few extra bucks. This may well be the reason that the chowder is so good. Clams that were not eaten in a night may be tossed in the chowder for the next day. I'll get a few bowls the next time I go early in my appetite. There was also some bacon pieces to add to it.

Service was good. I got the right drinks. Perhaps they did have orange juice the other time, and I had not heard that right. It was good. I tried lots of food and it was all good except the waldorf salad. They had few nuts in it and made it with grapes as well as apples. Perhaps Florida is not a place to come for apples as these were lackluster. The fried chicken was excellent. I added Cholula hot sauce. One fine thing about this buffet is every table has a rack that includes assorted hot sauce: Tabasco red and green, Cholula, Texas Pete's, Tapa Tio. I love it.
My comps did not show up when I swiped my card. It may be that I have to get them right there in the poker room. Sometimes it is like that. However, the same player's club card is used. I can see how yesterday's comps would not be posted, but I don't understand how those from last Thursday would not post by Saturday. Well, eventually I'll go and have a cheap buffet.

Again the ride up and back was simple. About an hour and a half door to door. The key is having good radio. I listened to cartalk on the way out, and to my own CDs on the way back, expecially some live Billie Holiday. The ride goes quickly then There is no traffic on these roads the GPS picks for me on the way home. Most are well lighted with these road reflectors. Amazing really!

Tampa Hard Rock 2-4

2012-01-27T07:08:00.000-08:00

Well, after all these sessions of hard games like Omaha and no limit, I knew I would be much more comfortable to be back at a 2-4 game where there is never much chance of losing much money.
However, I did not expect to be at a table with the worst players of any I have encountered ever anywhere. It was an amazing day and night. I had really very poor cards and I still walked away with $103 profit playing about 7 hours in all from 4PM until 12 midnight with an hour off for supper.
I encountered the worst player in my entire life. He bet or raised every hand and showed on the river. Sometimes he had bet on cards that did not beat the board. He did get lucky in some cases and had everyone fold to him. But in the end he could not win.
I was not in too many hands with him because I went through a period where I was dealt a 5 for most of my hands and often it had a nine or eight with it, so for a long, long while I played nothing including folding blinds. The guy to my right looked over at me and said, " You sure are tight!" and I talked about my bad cards. However, this guy really was a pot builder. There was no question of overcoming the rake. And others helped as well. The only unbet hand I saw resulted in six players turning over cards that for the most part matched nothing. A pair of 3's won the preflop dollars. Most other hands were bet liberally so all one had to do was wait, play decent poker, and hope the river did not take the win away.
Soon after my long dry spell, I held QQ and raised in middle position. The dealer and three other players were amazed to see me bet, and I did limit the field as four of the five behind me folded. The queens held up.
I was amazed at how many AA help up in this environment, but many did, including one that I held. My KK won a huge pot when the guy just after me flopped Q-7 two pair and I caught a runner runner pair of eights. He still bet and was surprised that his counterfited sevens did not win. I had raised preflop. He was my only opponent and I was pretty sure I was beat on the turn, but the money in these pots by the turn usually meant calling to the river. l
Another great paying hand was 3-5 in the blind that flopped open ended draw. I caught the nut on the river. I bet. That guy who raised everything raised. A good playing woman to my right called the raise with two pair and I went to $12. It was the one time I saw wild guy fold, but she grumbled and called me.
It was delightful to be in a real casino. During my dry spell I lost all my attention to poker watching a beautiful blond give a guy a massage at the next table. She was really attractive. However, it is ironic that attractive girls generally offer the massages, but the fellow who pays for one never sees her during the entire time she is loosening him up. So big, ugly guys might be as good a choice. No casino ever has that.
I also liked when late at night half the table was Black and they were all young folks, not too much older than the students I taught. I miss that community and delighted in having it. It was not very verbal, not much banter, but two young guys interacted with me, teasing me in a very respectful way, and I loved it. There are too many old people in Florida. I get tired of that. One guy was one of the better players at the table and he moved twice to get to the left of me. And that worked for his game, except when I raised my pocket kings and he lost his two pair on the river.
There were plenty of beautiful women around as waitresses and players and some on the floor. None dealt. Only men dealt and they were for most part very good. The dealer was important in this game, because half the players did not know when it wasn't their turn or how much to bet. They needed to be reminded. One dealer got a bit testy after so many reminders that were ignored. "It's 4 dollars. It won't change." and then " Look, this is a 2-4 game so the bet is always going to be 2 or 4. After 4 cards it is 4. It won't change." He was not obnoxious, but his attitude was a surprise to some.
One dealer late in the night was so animated and such a character as he called the game that it was excellent theater. He was a big, husky guy with a gravelly voice and some Southern or Western accent I could not place and he called every detail of the game and speeded it up a bit. I did not win much during his stay. Probably a good thing as I could see myself overtipping this guy.
Generally, all the people playing and dealing and working the floor were friendly and helpful. No gasconade here. No grumbling. None of that. Defeat was met with laughter or stoic quiet. There was one guy who was totally quiet and played like it was no limit. Otherwise, it was just fun.
Normally, I would have been disappointed to have picked this day because it was the last day in a promotion that gave $150 in gas to any player who played 20 hours between Sunday and this Thursday. So there were lots of no limit players there just to make up the time they needed for the gas cards. I had to stay out of their way. But generally they did not play anything at all except blinds. They were not there to play, but to get hours. They told us that. However, casinos need to think about their promotions. Here they cut their profit by giving seats to tight players, and did not attract folks who come rarely to the casino. One dealer did say they were thinking of a new promotion, probably involving high hands. That would be great!
Already they are so far ahead of Turning Stone which offers only one bad beat. Here there were two, a major where quad tens needed to be beat and a mini where quad deuces needed to be beat. And there was the same $500 for a royal that I encountered at Ocala. And, of course no $2 charge just to play. They had a full room and every game anyone could want including some 7 card stud if there was interest.
I went to supper about 9. The buffet was expensive by Vegas standards and not that good. Perhaps late in the day the food has just been there too long. I had to be selective, and I just stopped eating some things that were too dry or tasteless. The drinks were terrible. They had no juices. The tea was a powder. I sent it back. The lemonade was fine. The water they brought me was carbonated. Either it was a soda or was club soda. The coffee was good and I needed that because I was running on little sleep.
I best liked the skirt steak done on the grill and the hard iced cream with plenty of toppings.
Some of the buffet choices cost extra, a pattern hard to follow when the base price is $27. However, with the Player's-Club discount and $5 in points for giving them my email I managed $18. Not bad. I got enough to eat. I went to eat when the table changed to all pretty good players and came back to find new faces, almost all of them terrrible players.
My early 5 hour play with bad cards and a couple bad rivers had cost me $36, so I liked not having to grind the profit back.
At the table there is no free alcohol. I read that is illegal in Florida. Probably a good thing since so many people come in cars. However, they would put four olives in a spicy tomato or V8 mix so I was well hydrated. Ocala charged me $2.25 for orange juice. After that I just filled my Ocala cup at the water fountain.
Outside drinks are allowed in Tampa. I brought in my dollar McDonald's coffee. In Ocala they have a sign that no outside beverages are allowed. I saved my orange juice cup so no one gives me any grief there. But I like the free drinks being part of the EV.
Other hands I remember:

I had AK twice. Once I raised and saw AK on the flop, but had few callers and all folded before the river. Once I had it in the small blind, did not raise, and folded after the flop.

My toughest opponent was an Asian guy who had lived in Vegas and played at the Orleans and at Red Rock. He stacked up a huge profit just getting good cards. He was the only fellow who played a bit tricky and he gave me respect, waiting to see he had the nuts before betting. He had them one too many times for my pleasure.

I really was going on very little sleep the night before. We were in Tampa because we picked up Ann Marie at the airport. She rented a car and that will free me up to go anywhere I want in my van. So that made the Tampa trip a "free" one.

The trip home following the GPS was complicated, but there was no traffic. The roads in the early morning hours were empty. Nothing was open along the way. I got home in about an hour and a half. Actually it is shorter than my drives to Turning Stone.
I also had the number wrong on what it costs me to drive there. It costs me about $24 round trip. It is just 83 miles. That makes it a great spot to go. I may go again tomorrow.

Ocala $500 loss

2012-01-26T02:17:00.000-08:00

Letter to my Poker buddies

Well, I dont' know how you boys did yesterday, but I got creamed. I played no limit all day and lost $500. It makes me think I don't want to play this game.
I had the money to lose because 5 hands into a 1-3 spread limit game I caught a royal flush on the river and earned a $500 bonus. There needed to be $10 in the pot and there was nine. I was first to act. Luckily in spread limit I could bet just a dollar. As soon as the woman to my left called, I was golden. Then the fellow to her left raised and I reraised. He did not have the diamond flush, but was representing that he did. Not the time to do that.
So I tipped $40 and at the end of the day was down $38.
But I got a fine Ocala hat.

I'd feel better if I could idnetify how I played badly. Once or twice I put people on possible bluffs, and that adds up to may $50 of the losses, but I can't figure the rest of it. I guess I just don't get this game. Players were much better than I experienced on my last visit.

Well, today I play at Tampa Hard Rock and expect to play more often for the next couple weeks somewhere as Elizabeth's friend comes in and we will have two cars which frees me up without meaning Elizabeth is stuck in the house.

One thing I save on here is the tolls I pay to head to Turning Stone. That along with the poker card adds up to about $12 in expense for each trip. Here I pay no tolls and need no card to play. It is 59.4 miles. I get 22.3 MPG and pay $3.50 per gallon at the pump. So my calculation is the trip costs about $9.32 total each way or $19 round trip.
Turning Stone is 125 miles from home and using the same figures would cost over twice as much in gas and then the $12 in tolls on top of that.
Meanwhile Tampa Hard Rock is 83 miles from here and would cost $24 round trip. I get to play today because we are going to pick up Ann Marie at the airport and I'll pay it to see Bill. There is a bus somewhere near here. I think I'll do the research, as it pays more than the poker. However, if I go without paying tolls to Tampa Hard Rock, that is not an unreasonable expense. It is shorter than Turning Stone.

Great weather here now. Hot and as fine as New York summer.

Second visit to Ocala Jai-Alai

2012-01-18T17:01:00.000-08:00

I played a 2-4 Omaha game and had just a great time. I am really bad at this game, making mistake after mistake. But it was fun to try to learn it and play well.
I am happy that in this particular limit version I did not have to do more than pay attention to my cards. There were no tricks at this table and no one played anything more than cards. Watching people made absolutely no difference, except I probably got called more often because I made so many nutty mistakes that they never knew if I had anything when I bet.
I got pretty lucky, especially on the rivers.
After five hours I has lost $7. That too was on the last hand I played when I just got confused. I saw my trip nines and then a 3 came on the turn and for some reason I thought that my 3 would play as well as my pocket nines. Stupid.
The people were easy and friendly and very helpful. I learned more about the poker room. It did fill up with bused in people and the folks at my game told me that would make for some soft tables, but I elected to keep playing the Omaha. There is certainly no time to get bored. It is like playing six hands of Texas Holdem at the same time.
I lucked into one high hand for the hour. They pay $25 each hour. I had quad sixes with an Ace. I only needed one six in my hand for it to count. Odd for a bonus.

Ocala Poker at the Jai-Alai

2012-01-13T05:36:00.000-08:00

The drive from Inverness up to this poker room was supposed to take me about an hour, but it took an extra fifteen minutes because I went in the afternoon and the roads were pretty busy. I take mostly good highway I 75 and FL 200 E, and if there is no traffic coming out of the stores and crossroads it is a faster journey. Coming home at nine PM it was an entirely different road. I rarely had to stop at a red light.
I don't like driving after dark, but on some of these Florida roads they have installed reflectors for lane markers and it really looks like they have lit up the road, like a runway at an airport, marking all the lanes. It makes the driving very easy. I suppose such reflectors would not do well up North.

Everything is very downscale in this poker spot. There is no glitz. In one section gamblers bet the horses and in a large room others play poker. There is a place that must sell food when there are more people. The whole place felt like the areas around sports stadiums, and that makes sense because this is a sports stadium for Jai-Alai.
I watched a couple guys playing for practice.
There is very little signage. I had to ask where the poker room was located. I suppose that they just assume all the players know where they are going. Even getting out of the parking lot was a bit difficult because there was no clearly marked exit sign and I kept getting into corners of the lot where it looked like there should be an exit, but there was only more parking.
There also are no slot machines. What Florida did here is devise a way to offer gambling that is gambler friendly. Smart gamblers, whether they be good handicappers or good poker players, have a chance at making money and are not simply at the mercy of negative EV slot machine games.
Here the gambling establishment does the gambler a service rather than exploiting them with a high house advantage that grinds down most bankrolls over time. They are paid for the service, but somehow it just seems less like the government is setting up a system to trick its citizens when the government takes a piece of the profit here.
I suspect he profits are less, so it does mean less glitz, but in my mind it is a better route to take than having government take a large taste as casinos redistribute the wealth using the slot machine.
In New York. by contrast, it is even against the law to have a machine pay over 100% as do many of the Vegas VP machines. There the government wants to make absolutely sure that their taste is protected. The advantage player has no chance.
Today at Olcala there was only No Limit games. I usually play limit in casinos. But there was no free booze either, so I just decided to play. The only open seat was at a 2-5 NL game with $200 minimum buy-in.
I have never played that high stakes. But here was a good place to try.
I expected I'd lose my buy-in quickly and be heading home with my tail between my new stow and go Dodge seats, but it really was not a bad game.
Most of the players waited for good hands. Some of the players were poor. Others were good. I did not see anyone doing anything tricky. or making bets I could not understand. One guy was a bit aggressive, and he did what my poker buddy Gregg does, make a bet on almost any hand he was playing just to see what the playing field was like.
So, if he was in a hand, it was most likely a twelve dollar hand.
This made it hard to judge what to bet. In a hand where I flopped a nice straight and was on the big blind, I checked, let him bet his after flop twelve dollars, and then raised to thirty. He folded. I don't know if he was betting to see if he could steal or if I had been so tight that even this reasonable raise was too much after all my bad cards and tight play. Clearly here I should have slow played my straight, but I was figuring that if his hand was worth twelve, it was worth thirty.

I do remember getting pocket Aces when I was in early position and seeing them hold up. I did not bet them freeflop and under the gun. I had been so tight for so long that I knew if I bet under the gun, I would be left with no one. Had anyone bet, I'd have gone all-in, and I expected to get twelve dollars from the one guy, and do it then, but everyone just limped in this time.
I did bet heavy after the flop when there was mild action from the guy who always bet into weakness. The flop was a rainbow of unconnectors, and I bet a hundred dollars, really representing trips now, and took down the small pot.

At one point after a long stretch of playing nothing, I held some junk. I won with my 8-10 of clubs that caught an open ended straight, but then caught runner-runner for the flush. I had outs for the straight as well.
A few at the table told him he made a bad call, but he explained that he put me on the river Ace and had held two pair. The table knew I had caught the flush. But a runner-runner flush on this table was hard to figure so I guess the guy figured on the Ace. I liked showing those low cards because it made me a bit harder to put on hands I might choose to play.

I moved to a 1-2 NL game where my $200 was the maximum bet allowed. That felt much better to me. I had some luck, but not with pocket aces. A king came on the flop and again on the turn. My Aces were cracked. I had played so tight that the guy with trip kings just made value bets.
I had some other wonderful hands, but few people to call me.
In one hand I held A-7 suited in hearts. No hearts came but the Ace and 7 hit the flop. I bet, and ended with one caller, a guy who had flopped trip 8's.
Another Ace came on the river, I was called on my all-in bet; my full house the winner over his.
He did not have much money to call my all-in bet, but I made a little profit. Too bad he did not have $200 in front of him.
I had a better sense of how the betting should go in the smaller NL game. The players here were just average. No one was terrible, but they played all sorts of stuff. There were no aggressive players. That is an easier game for me. I can't play comfortably when there are maniacs going all-in often.
Around six the table was thinning because of folks going home for supper and others playing the tournament, so I played the tournament. $35.
I did well in the beginning, but then my stack drained.
My worst loss was holding A-K of hearts, with nothing of value on the flop, but still calling an all-in bet. It was strange because my opponent with his pocket tens all but told me he had them. He said, "Well, I am supposed to go all in here," but it was clear that he did not want to. He did make the bet and because it was a tournament, I really had to call him and hope to get lucky because my stack was dwindling.
My best hand was holding pocket 4's and flopping trips but three spades. I bet, but watched to see if there was any real spade action. None happened but I had callers. I decided to hope to catch a bigger pot rather than to push out chasers. One guy kept betting decent amounts and I called. On the river I had a full house. I checked as I had done and then went all-in over his healthy bet. I never saw his cards. I was not afraid of the spades but I was afraid of trip jacks.
The all-in added about a third to the pot, so if he had enough to really bet what he had, he should have called me, but if he lost, it would put him out of the tournament. He took a long time.
He was very puzzled. He could not understand my betting. He folded, but he kept chewing on and on about what could I have had. He put me on a flush draw that busted, and so thought I had bluffed.
I never showed and I never corrected him.
Others told him they did not think I had a flush draw.
I stayed quiet.

I did bluff one good player when I held K-4 of hearts and the king but no hearts came on the flop. The turn came and I put the guy on a King with a bigger kicker, so I went all in. Well, this was one of the better players at the table and he took a long, long while trying to read me. So, I looked away mostly and then I let my right hand shake a bit, a tell that says I have good cards. Meanwhile, he stacked and restacked and looked ready to call, but I could tell that was all just to see how I looked when he did it. Finally he folded. I think at that point I might have had a tell that I had bluffed when I collected my chips. It was a good pot and kept me in the tournament for a good while longer.

So I did very well on that hand, but it all drained when the blinds went up and when the time came for everyone to ante each hand.

So, I had a good bit of fun, ended up $37 which must have covered my gas to get there and discovered a good place for me to play some no limit.

The players were more friendly here, more like limit players. There were a few who never said anything and just listened to music in their ears, and never responded to any hand. They were the better players. But there were others who told a few stories or made a few comments. And there were plenty who just told everything about how they played, what they held, why they played the way they played. Information was just easy. I did not have to look for tells. The players told.
I think what happens in a poker room where only no limit is offered is that there is a real mix of players and folks who would play Limit, were it offered, are playing No Limit, but not with poker faces.

I ordered one drink, an orange juice. I thought it would be free, but it cost $2.25. Players cannot bring outside food or beverage in to the poker room. Well, next time I'm just taking that styrofoam cup with me and filling it at the water fountain.

Overall, I liked this place, but I still missed Vegas.
The culture of the people was such that it was easy to play with them.
No grumps. No whining. No temper tantrums. No macho bravado. No gasconade.
Friendly chuckles. Folks who laugh when randomness does not go their way.
We were not testing our manhood here. We were just playing a little cards.

And folks were not chewed out if they played junk as I was in Niagara Falls. They played junk often.
I remember at the 2-5 table seeing a pot split by two guys who held K-7 off suit and not one of them was in the blind. It was not a huge pot, as they were shy of betting much on their low kickers, but it had some money in it.
Unlike Niagara Falls, I did not get chewed out for winning with a hand of junk.

I never understand the need to point out to a player that they were stupid for playing junk. When that happens I know the game is more about proving who is the smartest than it is about playing cards. If a player is playing junk, it seems ill advised to embarrass him. He will either leave or stop playing junk. Either way he is a more formidable opponent.
Light teasing between friends is a different thing.
Or helping newbies at the 2-4 table, so they learn a bit of the game.
At No Limit, it is best to just say, "good hand" when the guy catches his junk on the river. And I heard that said when junk was played here when I took it to mean, "Keep playing that junk to the river, and I'll get you eventually."

It was nice to play no limit and not feel much out of place. Many of the players at my weekly game Gregg's game up North are much better than many of those I faced at the tables here. However, there were fewer pots with multiple all-in bets and fewer went to the river here because the stakes are higher, and up North I know how each guy plays because I play with them every week. That makes a huge difference in No Limit.

One really funny thing was that I read the rules before I went. There were very detailed rules and I even thought about copying them and sending them to my poker buddies, since at our local games there are often rule confusions and sometimes rules are made or altered as we go and I get frustrated with the lack of consistency. Well, rule 15 said,

The splitting of pots among players will not be allowed in any game. All hands must be played to completion (no chopping of blinds are permitted).

So I never gave chopping a thought while playing. In one hand, with a fast dealer, the chips were in and the flop visible before my opponent ( a regular) said, "Oh, we should have chopped" So I told about reading the rules on line, and the dealer said, "In the beginning players were not allowed to chop, but that has changed." Just like the home game I thought.

I'll certainly go back. I may go on a Wednesday when they told me that the old folks buses come in and the place fills up with players. Then they will have a 2-4 game as well. And then I expect there will be stories and I will be able to talk a bit. I just don't have much time to visit at a NL game. There is too much to study and watch. It takes a good while to see how the others play, especially since we see what they play much less often than at limit.

Green Tomato lobby poker

2011-10-06T04:05:00.000-07:00

Click the pointer to see the green tomatoes fry to the tune of Eddie Condon

(recipe is at bottom)

Gregg's game has built now so that we pack the table every week. This week we had: Ed, Jim, Peter, Bill, Slink, Ezzy, Gregg, Ron, Phil, Bruce, Dewey.
Chuckmonk was out harvesting before the frost. It takes him a while to harvest accompanied with his full growler of home brew.
Blowers was out making his movie, now called Pirates on Full Tilt.
Karp and Rice were still invisible.

Elbow to Elbow poker.

Having so many at the table changes the nature of the game. It is not the five person game we once played, but something more like what is played in a casino, only looser. It is a hard game to beat with most big wins decided on the river, and all that action makes for a good deal of fun.

Win or lose, these games are great practice for my coming 22 nights in Vegas. Except for the loose part.

I came early. Having worked hard over the past weeks to organize a PAC and lobby the Congress of Millett for green tomatoes, I was determined to arrive in time to pick some if my Green
Tomato bill passed. Bobbie Court is really no different than Congress. The strong lobbies control the outcome of all decisions. It was once nearly a dictatorship when Silver was still in office, but he is hiding out with the rebel forces in the South so there is ruleless chaos and hardly any time to go to the bathroom.

My tomatoe bill passes. Good things too as it is just before the frost. Gregg, against all habitual practice, has work to do on the computer and would just as soon not start the head to head early. Unbelievable!! What are the odds.

So I'm a winner before we start. Just like the big banks who are still as unregulated as they ever were, I am sent out on my own to gather in the tomatoes.
Gregg never sees what I then put in my car: his shed by the water, his gazebo, most of the water in the Lisha Kill, all the garden top soil and finally a bag of green tomatoes to fry up like they do in the South. On the way up the hill I also waved my flag because I'm proud to be an Greggorian.

Then Gregg and I play some head to head and this week. I get some cards and oddly I win. I feel like I am Greek and just figured out how to balance a budget.

Bruce arrives next and brings me another Dewey cartoon. He looks great, and the word is the cancer is clear. Nice! I almost can't wait to get my nuts seeded too. It is sort of what old guys do, the way the young get tattoos.

I am up $14 when we cash and rebuy to begin the real game.

Pots builds quickly.
These games are always aggressive in the beginning.

I get sucked into one huge hand with J-Q of clubs. Preflop the betting is pretty good. I get two clubs on the flop and if I remember right, my cards are over cards. Then it is one of those hands where there is a bet, a few callers, me, a raise, more callers, me, an all-in, and I'm pot committed. It is early in the session and most of us have under $30. I don't expect to win. I am thinking there are lots of trips out there and maybe even an Ace of clubs.
Slink has been pushing the betting because he has pocket kings.
On the river he gets his third king.
Unfortunately for him, it is a club.
Ron shows his straight.

I take in a $127 pot. My score when I leave will be the $14 head to head win from Gregg, this $127 pot and just $12 more of winnings over the entire afternoon of play. That shows how volatile one hand can be. And it was not well played. My overcards were already beat. I just caught a lucky river.

Unbelievable!!!
What.............. I say............... WHAT ARE the ODDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Over the course of the afternoon I lost two other river draw hands in which I had many more outs. In an earlier one I had J-J, Peter had A-Q, Bruce had 8-8 and we were all-in on a rainbow flop, giving me a good advantage. Bruce drew one of his two outs, one 8 on the turn for a win. In another, I had flush and straight draws and Gregg beat me with a pair of sevens.

Bill had a similar draw to the river, club flush, and I took him down and sent him home with my trip 8's, (after he missed his read of me and bluffed all-in to me on the river to try to steal the pot.)

Those who chase flushes are condemned to ride buses. Well, unless they are me with J-Q.

Peter was the shortest lived this week. He came late and left early. He seemed perplexed. It may be that his style of play is better for smaller numbers at the table.

Gregg used to be the one who was hard to beat, but he is off his game. This week neighbor Ron and I combined strategies against which Gregg has no defense. Ron brought Gentleman Jack and I brought Harwood Canadian . Just a bit in small flasks, but it was enough. That and Gregg's love of the blind straddle is enough to beat him as long as he will not bet and sometimes will fold the winning hand just to be a pleasant poker comrade.

For me I brought coffee.
And I drank it.
Well, I drank what I did not spill on the floor.
(I don't know what that is about. In every other way I am gracefully poised.)
It perked me up for the second half of the game, and I slept a great 8 hours last night as well. Go figure that!

Playing three handed at the end, Gregg did have that 10-7 and flopped two pair. Slink rivered a ten of diamonds, bet, was called on the river and announced his diamond flush. Gregg turned over his cards to show what he thought was two pair, and quickly started to mix the cards to pick them up, when I stopped him, moved the cards back into position , and said, "Just look at your hand one more time."
Gregg was very happy with his back from the dead full house, and thanked me.
Well, Gregg, without the green tomatoes that would never have happened. It is amazing what we can accomplish when we cooperate across the table.

Slink waited for me outside, so he could kick my ass to the Lisa Kill and back. I avoided him, but I think that as I write, the entire Slingerlands nuclear arsenal is being redirected toward Burden Lake.

Another time early in the game Gregg held quads. It was the only quads I saw all afternoon. As last to act, some would say that Gregg could raised on the river.
He refused to raise on principle. He did not want to be greedy.
"I've taken enough off this table over the years. Time to give some back, " he remarked, "Now, where is the rest of that Harwood Canadian?"

So it was a tough game for the old Poker Master and a great game for me. As well as my winnings, I got the green tomatoes, a new Dewey cartoon from Bruce, and a whole set of Dixieland CD's from Jim, who like me enjoys that old jazz from our parents' generation when actual music was popular. Thanks so much Bruce and Jim and Gregg and everyone who was in that $127 dollar pot and Bill, "Thanks for the bet, buddy."

And last week's new rule for buy-ins seems to be very comfortable for everyone.

Which means it is time to change it.

The new buy-in rule Gregg suggests for next week will work well too. The first time someone tries to double up by giving a bribe to the house, most of the table will cash out and go home and the game will end.
I'll get to eat supper.
See how much poker at Gregg's is like politics at Congress?

Green tomatoes follow

See you all next week.

Ingredients

4 large green tomatoes
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup cornmeal
1/2 cup bread crumbs
2 teaspoons coarse kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 quart vegetable oil for frying

Directions

Slice tomatoes 1/2 inch thick. Discard the ends.
Whisk eggs and milk together in a medium-size bowl. Scoop flour onto a plate. Mix cornmeal, bread crumbs and salt and pepper on another plate. Dip tomatoes into flour to coat. Then dip the tomatoes into milk and egg mixture. Dredge in breadcrumbs to completely coat.
In a large skillet, pour vegetable oil (enough so that there is 1/2 inch of oil in the pan) and heat over a medium heat. Place tomatoes into the frying pan in batches of 4 or 5, depending on the size of your skillet. Do not crowd the tomatoes, they should not touch each other. When the tomatoes are browned, flip and fry them on the other side. Drain them on paper towels.

Canola works just great. Olive is hard to use.

The trick to this cooking is not to have the oil too hot. You want to brown and not burn the coating yet leave time for the tomatoes to cook soft. Elizabeth actually likes them a bit crunchy, but they are sweeter when cooked soft inside and crunchy outside. I add Frank's hot sauce and some fresh grated parmigiana.

Poker at Seneca Niagara

2011-09-27T12:58:00.001-07:00

I dropped Elizabeth at her friend's house in Rochester and went up to Seneca Niagara to play some poker. I have so many relatives and friends in Buffalo that I had not seen the Falls in many years. This time I was determined to gamble there for longer than a few hours. My nephew Chris said he could meet me and play as well. That was just great.

I had played there before and liked it, so I know I would like it this time.
It had taken me a while to find a hotel that was not reviewed with great negatives and talk of grime, bed bugs, unwashed sheets, naked women found waiting in the room after returning from supper. No kidding. I discuss the details of that booking here:
http://foxwoodspokertr.blogspot.com/2011/09/niagara-falls-swiss-cottage-inn.html
Settled in at the Swiss cottage Inn it was an easy drive to the casino, just under 4 miles. the only odd thing was that the GPS took me there via the Robert Moses highway, a major highway, but back on a winding path through Niagara Falls that might be a bit sketchy early in the morning but proved no problem.
On one of those rides home, I stopped at a Dairy Queen for a late night treat. We have no DQ at home, so I like to enjoy a blizzard when I am in any DQ neighborhood. I missed the drive through and went into the parking lot, so I parked, thinking I might go inside. That was closed. Only the drive-thru was open. I walked up to the window where I saw another fellow get food and asked if I could walk thru the drive- thru. The fellow said he would have to ask the manager. I thought that was pretty funny as I had mostly been joking. When the manager came back, he told me that some of the girls were a bit unsure of serving people at that window and I realized I had missed the ordering window. He apologized. I just thought it was funny. However, it did clue me into the fact that as quiet as this neighborhood was at ten thirty at night, it too might be a bit sketchy.
The girl asked me if I wanted a bag, but I said no, that I was just going to eat it here. She gave me a look that was the second clue this might not be a bad idea. Still, it was an absolutely pleasant evening and there were little tables and I did not want to get ice cream in Elizabeth's car. So I was weighing all that against the neighborhood when I glanced across the street in a school parking lot and saw two police cars pulled up the way they do when they don't want to work but just want to visit a while, and then I knew I was fine eating right with my own protective force there across the street.
It was good too. French silk with bits of heath bar crunch.

But on to the gambling.
I loved this room. I only had one odd experience when both folks on the floor insisted that the they had not broken a 3-6 game that night when I had just come from a broken game. I was trying to lobby them to put me first in a 2-4 seat, but they said that since I moved from a 3-6, I had to go on the list. Of course, there was no 3-6 at 2 AM. It did not take long and I was seated.
Everyone else was just great. Some remembered my name after my first visit.

I played with my nephew on Friday into Saturday morning(4am) and Saturday into Friday morning(5:30 am). Games went all night. On Sunday the 2-4 broke early. There was still a 3-6 but one of the girls on that table was snotty to me, and I was just to tired to deal with her attitude, so I moved to the 2-4.

That 3-6 table had filled with all 30 somethings who were regulars and friends, so it was not a great game for me to be in anyway. One woman, Ophelia, I had played with at the Flamingo in Vegas. They were all very friendly except the smart mouth.

The 3-6 is played with a kill that pushes it to a 5-10. The kill is triggered by any hand that is $60 or more. The winner of the $60 plus hand puts $5 on the red kill button, but acts in normal position.
I liked it. At no time would I be pushing money from a small pot I won into a large pot I would not win. That happens in the Golden Nugget kill which is triggered by someone winning two in a row. Also, many of the players who sat down to play were not ready for this game. They would join thinking it was 3-6 and not much different than 2-4. They would get killed. At a 5-10 the players know what they are about to play. Here it was a surprise. So they were at a disadvantage and often playing the 5-10 with scared money.
I had a fine time playing the game. I played some on the 2-4 and did not do as well there. Also, I did not like that 2-4 game because a $3 rake is taken after the flop, no matter how much money is in the pot. If the players are tight and the pots are small, then the house wins. No one can overcome a 33% rake.
My nephew Chris, however, did very well on this 2-4 game. He did not do well on the 3-6. He tried it when his bankroll was up, partly at my urging, but he did not do well, and I was sorry I encouraged him.

Chris and I took one walk through the casino; however, I find that I am less interested in being in the slots and the smoke now and just like finding the poker room. I did check a few VP pay tables and they were unplayable 7-5 Bonus Poker. 9-6 Double Bonus poker.
Added to the low pay tables is the lack of the kind of comps Vegas offers me. Why would I play DEB 9-6 DB when in a few weeks I can play DB 10-7 at the Four Queens in downtown Vegas? The Four Queens has given me three free nights, $50 in food, and $60 in freeplay on top of cashback. So playing there is good odds and an investment.
It was a mistake for us to make this casino business a monopoly of government and reduce competition. The Russians and East Germany taught us that products produced by companies with a special dispensation from the government do not allow for competition to sort out the better product. We follow that path in casinos. When the government gets its Tony Soprano taste of the action, there is no need to give the gambler an even break.

In the end I lost big. Most of it was trying no-limit for a few hours when I first arrived and just getting bled of my bankroll. I am not doing that again. I just can't play that game in casinos.
At home I can win against the regulars. I did two days after my Niagara Falls trip. I won $144.
And I don't like the often abrasive and even abusive talk in no limit. I go to engage strangers in a pleasant interaction, not to listen to the arrogance of small minded and emotionally unstable people who act out in ways that would put them in a principal's office were they in high school, or perhaps more appropriately would put them in time out were they children.
I played a hand or two of junk after a long time of tossing. One was 5-8 of hearts, and I even foolishly saw a raise to play it.
It rivered a flush.
I felt my opponent was not very strong, so I just bet $25 on the river. Well, he hemmed and hawed and talked and wondered and watched me. Finally, in his arrogant way, he announced he knew I had the pair of Aces, but he would, "Pay me off."
I never saw his cards.
I showed the flush, and I could see he was surprised it was even an option, and he stood up to see the hearts were really there.

Then he went ballistic. I suppose that he did not have much money to play with, and he'd lost a good bit of it with my playing junk. I suppose that he was also embarrassed that his reading of the situation was so far off the mark.
Three hands later I had K-10 (two pair) and he called me with 9-6 diamonds until the river gave him a flush.
Rather than having a bit of chagrin for playing parallel junk to mine, he yelled at and about me again, justifying his choice by my earlier choice.
Having said nothing the first time, I had had enough and I went right back in his face, and not in a friendly way.
"What I think you are doing is trying to manipulate my play, so I don't play junk. I can tell you that ain't gonna happen."
"And while I understood your surprise and upset at losing to me, I don't understand how you can yell at me when I play junk, and then yell at me again when you play junk."
"And I'm tired of you being in my face about all of it."
And it toned him down a bit.

Soon he was out of money and left.
The rest of the table had a good time with all of it.
They liked the argument. And that is one of the draws of no limit poker, the constant bickering.
I don't care for it.

I better liked the old Greek from Cyprus I met at the 2-4 who was not a very good player but told me great stories. One was of being in a Bahamas casino playing blackjack when bandits came in with AK-47 rifles and robbed all the tables of chips. He said he was not scared because he knew they were not after him and he described the entire scene, told of people rolling along the floor and of all the chips left on the floor after the quick robbery. They escaped by boat and were never caught.
He should have been scarred. Recently that happened in Mexico and a lot of people died.

At that table also was Tony, a Polish fellow who was taciturn most of the time, but had a good time when he played with players he knew. I liked him. He beat me just by a hair often.
On Friday, I played with mostly Canadians who came over because limit games were not played in the Canadian Niagara Falls casinos.
I sat between a husband and wife, Brian and Janice, and they bantered the way I do with Elizabeth, laughing and having a fine time. I also sat next to a cute blond girl, so attractive in a plain and fresh sort of way, with a girl next door look. She was very personable to me and it felt just great.
She and her sister also bantered with the table and it was all like Vegas. Her sister looked like a famous comedian named Amy something, and once Janice remarked on it, we all would tell the girl to write down almost every bantering joke, for her act. She had been quiet along side her super friendly sister, but with this new attention, she got into the game of it.
They told me about Brantford, Canada. Everyone agreed that was the place to look for limit games. All kinds. One dealer said it was the best in a circumference of 300 miles. I am reading some mixed reviews, but the games look interesting. There are lots of high stakes limit games, but there is a 2-5 game that was reported on the internet as very loose.
https://www.olgpoker.com/wheretoplay/casino.cfm?CasinoID=1

They even have a pineapple game.
There are some camping areas there too. So now I have another sort of trip to plan.

The Seneca Niagara casino serves some drinks free. I had some whiskey. I had Captain Jack rum. But not much of anything as I was driving. I wanted Sambuca on the rocks in my coffee, but I would had to pay for the Sambucca. However, Irish Cream was free. It was fine.
Water came in those three swallow bottles, but if I remembered I would ask for two. Next trip I'll bring my own water bottle and fill it at the cold fountain near the bathroom. I'll have plenty then and not be thirsty a minute after the waitress leaves.
There was one obnoxious woman named Kathy, drunk, who kept asking the same questions and telling the same stories over and over. She drove us crazy. She was really sort of hitting on a young Pakistani young man who had such a beautiful face. She would not let him alone, and he was too polite to back her off. Once she offered him a high five but took his hand when he returned the gesture. There is always one.
On a prior table where my nephew played, she had driven them crazy as well. Then she had gone out for a smoke and come back a half hour later to find a broken table and her chips locked up. Well, she had no idea what to do. She told us that story at least six times, each time almost outraged that such a thing could happen.
Kathy played very bad poker but caught on the river.

At one point they gave away a jacket per table and then gave away hats to anyone who wanted one. I was happy to have one. I could have swapped my card protectors for the jacket the fellow at my table won, but he did not hear me offer and later he only talked to Chris and not to me.

I don't remember hands the way I once could, but here are a few:

3-6 A woman has 10-J and so do I, but mine are suited spades.
The turn card gives us both a straight but two of those cards are spades.
We start to bet and raise. Soon I am sure she has 10-J and I keep tossing out $12 quickly until she gets it and quits.
But no spade comes. The nine would have given me a straight flush. As it is, we split the pot.

2-4 My K-K flops K-Q-Q. I slow play and a fellow bets into me. I call. I raise the turn and he stays with me and calls my river bet. Tony, the Polish guy who has taken three pots from me by just a hair, laughs out loud, "I bet you wish that I was in that hand?" I agree.

3-6 I am the blind holding 9-6. Flop is 6, I bet and am called. Turn is 9. I bet and am called. River is another 9. I bet. No callers. Too bad.

2-4 A-A - I did not get this hand very much. I had only one opponent, but I lost to a flopped set of nines.

So, I'll be back to Niagara Falls casino whenever it works that Elizabeth visits her friend again, and I can go on the same gas. Next time I'll make a profit.

Niagara Falls - Swiss Cottage Inn

2011-09-27T12:55:00.000-07:00

The hardest part of this trip was finding a cheap place to stay. There are dozens of motels along the old Niagara Falls Boulevard, but the reviews on Trip Advisor are terrible. Stressed is grime, dirt, unchanged linen, surly desk persons and even bed bugs. I read one from a woman who ended up with a house infestation. A young man reported that he and a buddy went to supper and came back to find a naked woman in his room.
At first I thought I would not book ahead. I thought I'd take the Roomsaver coupon book and go from hotel to hotel and look at rooms. However, I realized I could be there a day doing that as there are so many places. I did not want to shop for rooms; I wanted to play poker.
That was when I found this place. And it was a great find!
The strategy for finding it is worth exploring.
Often on Trip Advisor and other such collections of reviews, the bad reviews outnumber the good. People with complaints are more likely to want to vent them; while folks who have had a fine time are less moved to report it.
However, bad reviews can be the way to find the better places.
If the bad reviews stress that the place was small and other minor inconveniences, then that writer must have experienced a clean and bug free room. When small annoyances are reported, real problems must have been nonexistant.
One other tip was a reviewer who said that the Swiss Cottage Inn was full, so he went to the other spot. The second spot is what he vented about. That told me he goes often and stays at Swiss Cottage Inn. He must like the Swiss Cottage Inn, because he is a person who complains when he does not like something.
I found good reviews on different boards.
And finally, I booked on booking.com at a great rate and got all three nights for $155 plus tax- f, Sat, Sun. These were the better rooms too, the slightly larger rooms with a queen bed. And when I booked there was just one of these rooms left. That told me it was popular.

I booked knowing I could cancel and kept looking for a few more days, but finally I decided to just go there.
From the first, my conversation with the desk person convinced me it was a good pick. I told her that the medicine I take reduces my immune system, so a bed bug bite might make me sick. She said she did not have them and then she said, "I hope you are not bringing them with you." Her anxiety convinced me. Many of the reports told of clerks who just brushed off the issue.
My room inspection proved not only the absence of bed bugs, but overall cleanliness. In Vegas, when I check behind beds and tables, I usually find these places have not been cleaned. Everything here had been cleaned and the painted walls and ceiling were fresh and without blemish.
The water pressure was good. Everything drained. The refrigerator and the microwave worked; I used both for leftovers and to chill my favorite seltzers. The air conditioner was not noisy.
So the place exceeded my expectations for a small, inexpensive room . I always wonder why the owners of other places don't avoid all the hassle by keeping their places clean and repaired as this was kept. These are small motels with small rooms, and they have been around a while. Some people will be disappointed because they expect the Holiday Inn, but most people know what they are getting and only hope that the owners work hard to make it comfortable and safe.
These owners do that.
While I was there, they were out doing a bit of digging in the daytime to make a mulch area around some trees they had recently planted. One day the trees will add shade to the pool area.
The weather was so hot I almost swam, but the time in the casino precluded those issues.
I liked it that they had two internet networks, so if one was busy or not strong in signal, I could try the other. The internet worked great while I was there. In fact, it was better than it usually is at home.
I also liked the area. Along this route were plenty of places to eat, including the Mom's place I wrote about.
http://foxwoodspokertr.blogspot.com/2011/09/niagara-places-to-eat.html
My bank was there. A Tops food market was there if I wanted food for the room. Everything was handy and the casino was just 4 miles away, an easy journey even early in the morning when I was tired.

Parking was whereever because there were no assigned spots, but I generally parked close to my room.
It was fairly quiet. If I slept late, I could hear the maids in the late mornings talking or wheeling their carts, or someone would talk outside or on the phone. Generally that bothers me, but it did not this trip. I slept fine in the few hours I allowed myself to sleep.

This was my first overnight gambling trip to Niagara Falls. I'll be back and I'll book this place.

Niagara- Places to eat

2011-09-27T09:54:00.000-07:00

As well as getting a good Polish meal on Sunday (see other post) I bought three meals while at the Falls. One other night the casino fed me beef on weck with macaroni and potato salad. It was for the tournament players, but they invited us afterwards. It was very good.

Nephew Chris and I went to a pizza place and I used a restaurant.com coupon. We got a huge pizza with everything they had on it and anchovies on the side, and 50 chicken wings. Much more than we could ever eat. Chris took the pizza home, and I have eaten wings three times since then and Elizabeth once. So I think I got my $40 worth. It was not a great place to eat. Outside it was too sunny for the picnic tables so we ate inside and it was hot. Still, we managed quite well.

When eating solo I sought out a couple places I had read about both on the American side. Murphy's Pub is in walking distance of the casino. I liked it. There were large comfortable chairs and a pleasant young girl as a waitress. She was a bit confusing or confused but very friendly and helpful. I asked for napkins and she answered by asking me if I wanted a paper, which I took to be paper napkins but was an offer of the days paper. Then she gave me directions to find free parking near the Turtle building, even writing them down in detail, but the street she sent me down was closed and there was nothing free I saw around the turtle building. I had a pannini and coffee. Both were good, but it all cost me $10. The coffee I would go back for. There were three kinds and I had the dark roast. It was very good.
A better breakfast I had at Mom's Family Restaurant.
Tucked up in plaza not far from my motel, this place would have been invisible to me as a rambling tourist, but I had read very good reviews and with the GPS I found it. It was just great.

The eggs sort of blend into the table in this shot, but they were there.

The eggs were large eggs and cooked right although just a tad under the hot eggs I like best. The bacon was crisp as ordered. The coffee was not as fine as Murphy's, but good standard coffee. Check out the little on reading the menu.

In the same plaza was this bargain store I had not heard of before. It is a chain coming to various sites across the country. I had no time for it this trip. Maybe next time.

NIagara Falls- Polish Platter

2011-09-27T09:53:00.000-07:00

I grew up in a working class neighborhood on Buffalo's East Side. It was a largely Polish neighborhood, filled with families supported by men who worked in factories that made steel or cars or other commodities. My father worked at Westinghouse. It was the kind of neighborhood where at 5PM you could see the men coming home from work swinging there black lunch boxes. Many took the bus or car pooled so their wives might have the use of the family car during the day.

The houses were for the most part built in the early part of the twentieth century on small lots with small patches of grass in the front and small gardens and garages in the back. They were well maintained, and the neighbors were friendly. We were not Polish, but many thought we were because my Dad had played baseball on the Polish International Team, in his youth, before playing professionally with the Bisons and other minor league teams followed with the House of David traveling team.

My old neighborhood has been decimated by unemployment, poverty, dysfunction, drugs. My old house must have burned down, as the last time I visited my block the lot was leveled.

So some of my visit to Niagara Falls was to drive through similar neighborhoods that have suffered the same sort of terrible decay or threat of decay. In an odd way, I am comfortable in those neighborhoods.

I read about two places in an old Polish neighborhood where I could get a Polish meal. The first place is an old restaurant called Gadawski's. I visited this spot a couple times. It is in a section that may have lost much of its houses and still has some boarded up, next to a closed Polish Catholic church and school that is now preserved as a landmark and could have easily been built in my old neighborhood in Buffalo.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Trinity_Roman_Catholic_Church_Complex_(Niagara_Falls,_New_York)

http://www.preservationnation.org/magazine/2008/todays-news/closed-niagara-falls-church-la.html

Gadawski's was to elude me this trip. It was closed on Sunday.

So I went up the street a mile or so to Koban's because on Sundays they served a Polish platter special. The neighborhood improved dramatically in just this short ride.

At first it looked like this was closed as well. the street was quiet except for some folks cheering the Bills in their game against the New England Patriots at a tavern across the street. There was no sign on the building indicating hours, and it was very quiet all around. However, someone was inside as the back kitchen door was open.
I wandered around to the rear of the restaurant. Here, one of those very narrow roads gave the locals access to their tiny garages and in the one directly behind Koban's some young men were working on bits of motors spread out in disarray. They told me that they thought the restaurant would open twnety minutes later at 4 PM and by the time I got back around to the front, a waitress, Mary, was there at the door and she let me in to use the bathroom.
It was a hot day and I asked if I could wait at the bar and drink a beer until the cooking began. And I was treated like family.
What followed was a long interview with the waitress who like to talk about the history of Koban's and who let me wander in the still deserted restaurant and take some photographs. It was really a stoke of luck to arrive when I did.

The restaurant had been in the family for 33 years. Ron Koban had established it. He worked as a Social Studies teacher and played the organ in the I visited when it was open and thriving. Now his daughter and other family members ran the place. Mary, who talked to me, had worked there for 32 years. She had been friends with one of the daughters since she was 16 and she felt like the restaurant was in her family as well.

She told me there had been a fine wedding there and the couple from Pennsylvania had written it up in praising tones.

http://www.tripadvisor.com.my/Restaurant_Review-g48261-d389484-Reviews-Kobans-Niagara_Falls_New_York.html

Just as it was odd to a reviewer of Gadawski's to find it decorated with fighting Irish memorabilia, it was a surprise to me to see this place decorated with boats. Ron had a couple sailboats and customers and family started to give him paintings and wall hangings as gifts until the entire restaurant was decorated with them.

These next four are actually made of small parts of wood, finished and arranged to depict sailboats. They came from a vendor at the Allentown Arts festival who did this sort of work.

It was a comfortable bar and the Molson's was a tasty way to wash out the heat of the day. I had spent a good bit of time walking around the Canadian Falls and the cool was comforting. I happened to be there just at the end of the exciting Bill's game as the score went from one broken tie to another. Finally, just as the clock was running down, Fred Jackson was so close to a touchdown that it required a review where it was declared just inches too short. Buffalo ran the clock down to 3 seconds and 4th down right on the goal line, and then kicked the field goal for the victory of 34-31 over the undefeated Patriots. I am not a football fan, but this was a classic game and it certainly was cool to be watching it in a Polish bar and in a neighborhood that very much reminded me of my old Buffalo neighborhood.

Finally my meal came, a huge platter with one breaded veal cutlet, one link of kielbasa, one large meatball with cabbage (what they called inside out glomki) ,sauerkraut and a few good chunks of boiled potato. It was all good. Salad and a nice slice of rye bread came with it. All for about $15.

While I ate at the bar, I talked to Ron's grandaughter Christy who was just finishing her studies to become a special education teacher. We talked about how hard it is now to find a teaching job, of how much being a substitute might set her up in a school, and about whether she was willing to travel for work or needed to stay home and be around the family.

Once the Bill's game was over, folks started to come in for Sunday dinner. I talked to a fellow poker player at the bar for a while. And then it was time for me to head back to the casino.

I guess this is the best tavern experience I have had this year. I'll certainly return if I get the chance to make that trip again.

Niagara Falls- the Falls

2011-09-27T09:21:00.000-07:00

Both sides of the Falls are interesting for different reasons. Most visitors probably prefer the Canadian side. It is much better developed, and because we can look across at the various sections of the Falls, rather than down at them from above, it is in some ways a better view.

However, I started my looking early one morning, finding a free 2 hour parking spot and an uncrowded park and viewing area.

I walked back to see the rapids. There is a bridge to Green Island and I walked across, but did not have time to walk all the way to the point of the island where a viewing platform has been erected for better viewing.

Here is the bridge I crossed

It is one of those sad bridges. It could be just wonderful, but for some reason the original structure was built over with this iron girders that block the view, and then an ugly wire fence in front of them. So the view was obscured. There were small peeks through the girders, but they were disappointing.

and taking a photo was impossible. Here is my attempt with the camera held up above the girder.

I don't know if this is for structure or to stop people from falling off the bridge. It does get slippery and they have a fine yellow rope strung as a railing, but perhaps they also wanted just to protect people. I am against all this protection. Too many fences; too many signs.

Look at how ugly warning signs have made this delightful little stone structure at the beginning of the bridge.

Here is the walkway along the rapids in the park area. The guard rails are low and decorative. Those along the Canadian walkway are nice to look at also and there are not a hundred signs.

Does anyone coming to the Falls not understand that if they drop off the edge of land, they are most likely going to die?

I remember when the Japanese student recently sat up on a railing and for some reason fell. Some folks then called for more signs. I call for fewer people sitting on railings. Rather than a sign, hire a few people to watch the crowds.

Within the park there is a very small garden that was pleasant and even contained blooming flowers this late in the year.

In the garden were some remembrance of Native Americans who were at the Falls long before white eye looked and decided to develop. It must have been quite a wonder in those olden days.

THE CANADIAN SIDE

I had thought of staying on this side as there is a casino there as well, but they only deal no limit poker, so I am happy I did not plan to do that. I'd have had to cross the border every day to play cards. More development on this side makes it a better vacation destination, but not an easy place to have a quick look at the Falls away from crowds.

I first drove along the shoreline as long as I was near the water. Parking is very limited and expensive. I turned right and wound my way up to Portage Street and was amazed to find some free parking with no limitation except not to park on the grass. Views along the walkway were limited. Too bad as this would have made a great place to view from up high. Trees blocked the view.

I suspect that no one wanted to clear a view in this area. Here were hotels that had captured that view, so giving it away would not be profitable. This is one of the strangest viewing buildings I have ever seen. I am curious as to what is inside.

A short distance away I found the for $2.50 each way I could be lowered and brought back up and get an interesting view along the way. American money was accepted as far and American change given.

In a sense it seemed a shame to put a building right in the line of sight here. An underground visitor center might have made more sense. This building looks great from all angles except the incline.
From this angle only this part really reflects the architecture of the fine stone building.

Still it was fine to sit and wait for the incline to start and get an interesting look back behind the Falls while the cool mist coming up from the Falls cooled off the heat of the day.

I made the visitor just in time to practice my retirement hobby. In the bathroom I found the most unusual amenity I have ever seen. Are these common in Canada? I laughed because it seemed odd to have a place to wash your feet at the Falls. There is no sandy beach and were you to go swimming, you would not come back to rinse sand off anyway.

Along the large walkway there were many spectacular views.

And here are the railings. I liked these better than the more modern railings on the American side. I saw one sign warning people not to climb on them. Some did. One young fellow was having his photo taken leaning out from the top. Seemed risky to me.

It was rather cool to see the casino where I played poker across all this water and Falls and all.

To take this photograph I am standing in an elevated grassy section on this side of the road designed so that we can see views of the Falls over the heads of the streaming tourists. Here the great inventor Nikola Tesla is celebrated in the Les Drysdal sculpture He was born in Serbia and some of the reason he is celebrated here is due to the work of Servians throughout Canada,; however Tesla himself was an American, a contemporary and outspoken critic of Thomas Edison. The artist Les Drysdal is Canadian.

He is an interesting character. He is not personable like Edison. He is much more like the poker players at the no limit table that I wish to avoid. He speaks critically often of his contemporaries. Had he and Edison been friends instead of enemies together they might have achieved much more in their lifetimes.

On the other hand, he loved pigeons and so we have that in common. And he and my favorite author Mark Twain were friends.

http://www.teslasociety.com/victoria.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Tesla

I did walk up to the Canadian casino and it was very nice inside. I'd say it compares to a Vegas strip casino. But they had not had any limit poker in a long while.

This greets us walking into the casino

And this is quite an interesting fountain that also reflects the development of electricity using water and honors Tesla.

In every way the Canadian side is much more upscale, better attended, much better planned. The American side still suffers from the decay of neighborhoods. I am certain the reason for this is complicated. For one thing, in the past the American dollar in comparison to the Canadian dollar had more value. That has changed. I think of the American side as similar to the downtown section of Vegas. That is experiencing renovation in the face of Recession with just a promise of slow recovery in sight. Perhaps that will happen to the American side of the Falls.

On my way back to the Rainbow Bridge I drove down the Falls view road and could see that up in that area parking could be had for $5 day, so I think I'd go up there on a future visit.

Also I passed through a long street of tourist places where every inch along the street and up two stories was packed with colorful advertisement of decoration. The entire street was a collage of color. It was really a fun view.

When I come again, I will consider parking on the American side and walking across the bridge, especially in a more busy season. I have read it is easier to go through customs. And if I found free all day parking close enough on the American side, it would be a good bit cheaper and easier to walk it.

If I wanted a long hike, I did see places to park far back along the rapids on the American side. It would be a good long hike, but on a nice day it would be a way to make a day along water that is the opposite of serene, seeing first the American rapids and then the Falls from the top, then crossing the bridge for a panoramic view and a walk up tourist avenue.

On the Canadian side there are inexpensive hotels along Lundy's Lane, but I did not drive up there and look because I won't stay on that side when I go. Now I'll be looking for good deals around Brantford Ontario. My wife is saying that she and her friend might like to do Toronto and would not need a car to do it, so that would free me up to do a night or two in Brantford.

Gregg's game just before the Falls trip

2011-09-22T00:28:00.000-07:00

Well, I was brushing up on my game so that I am ripe for Niagara Falls.
So I bought in this $20 game for $110.
Some brush up.
More like a brush off.

The new rebuy in rules are just great. Gregg did a find job making it more like a casino, easy enough to bank and fair enough to let the rebuy guy into the game again. I know. I came back. The new rules are: one row or less, buy in for $10. No chips, rebuy for $20. No busted Aces or Kings advantage.

I don't think it was my play. My lost hands were close hands in one way or another. On the real stupid draws I got lucky. It was the solidly played hands that lost. No flops. No turns. No rivers. I guess I used up all my luck getting the pickerel and the quiet morning air off the dock.

What a group Gregg draws. Even with Bruce home we had 11 at the table. Blowers made a rare visit and pumped up the action, the mucka jucka, the actual mathematics which is often mucka jucka to me and a few very important sounding cell phone calls.
Jim, Charlie, Peter, Gregg, Bill, Slink, Phil, me, Ron, John - 10 at the table.
I had quad nines and was first to act, and no one bet on the river. I should have bet a bit. I counted on an all-in bluff.
Charlie had quad tens and pushed all in early, a huge pile of chips. He won the pot. He lost a bundle.

Peter played some fine poker just as he did at Blowers. I'm happy. I don't see him any longer as destined to be aggressive until bankroll death.

Gregg got hammered again. Ron left with some money. Phil played a nice game and left with money. Bill was sick and could not catch a draw. Jim got bad rivers....again. Slink faked all-in bets and laughed and did the 222222222222222222's genuflection. Ron more than doubled up and went home early. I don't remember too much.
I caught an inside draw and took John for 15-15-15.

I was wired again on the coffee, clumsy as a drunk, had one of the Smuggler's whiskey.
Afterward Peter and I went for a meal and a talk at a new Mexican place on Central, Fiesta. On Wednesday 2 people get an appetizer (spinach casadia) entre (chicken fajitas) all from $20. Nice.
Good to have some father-son time to talk as well as play.

Thanks Gregg. You sure can pack them in. Now if you can only fleece them. I guess you got too rusty over the summer growing all those tomatoes. Hey, save me some green ones.

See ya next week.

Pirate Poker

2011-09-17T09:02:00.000-07:00

Well, John wanted a much better write up than this one. However, having virtually no memory left for anything, I can just write an overview.

I left for the game totally disorganized and forgot my Somali-Useful Phrase book. Too bad. I could have been the affirmative action player with pirate phrases like, " istaag ma waan ku tooganayaa" ha ooyin" or bet with the numbers. I have all the numbers.
On the way I had no voice in the GPS so I was often on the side of the road with my blinkers on.
On the way home the voice came back, but in Africaneer. Wow! given I'd forgotten the Somali phrasebook, that was a bit eerie.
I did bring what I could pass off as doubloons, those silver strike rings with the silver missing. The guy I bought the rings from "pirated" in one sense the silver. John's kids liked the rings.
John splashed the pot (or is it "loaded the chest") with plenty of treasure. There were pirated books and cups and shot glasses. He won one of his own books about three times before it went to Peter and so he got his money back. I chased the books. So John would splash the pot with the book which would build the pot and then he would take the pot down. New pirate poker strategy.
Peter did the best. I was happy. I staked him. He started at the 20 dollar table and with one buy in cleaned that out, then he came to the $100 table and did a nice job winning the most money he has ever won at poker. Shiver me timbers!
Once he layed down a straight because he knew he was beat and he was.
Once he called Todd's $20 raise holding only a pair of nines and won.
Once he folded to Todd's strong hand and did not lose.
He seemed to just read the player's well.
I think Peter was also ahead on the booty he took home.
I did my usual.
I did fairly well in the beginning and then it drained and drained and I had to rebuy. I took a decent pot and so ended down $14.

Ed has the worst luck. A fellow called his $30 preflop raise holding just 2-4 offsuit and after other decent bets proceeded to catch a wheel on the river.
Then I tried to push Ed off with an all-in bet on my bare pocket queens, and he must have seen that. He called with his bare pocket jacks.

I made lots of mistake. I misread cards and remembered cards and overbet.
Perhaps it was the pirate movie: Pirates of the Carribean:On Stranger Tides which John had playing in the background. Much of it was boring pirate and old English talk or Johnny Depp being cute, or long marches through jungle like, watery, mountainous terrain with bits of dialogue like, " We have to keep going."
Well, yeah Jackass, the movie has to be long enough for folks to eat a couple popcorns.
But this one mermaid played by the French actress Astrid Berges-Frisbey caught my attention. And I had John play the movie twice. French actress with a Spanish parent. Sweet!
And I love vampires anyway.
Most of the mermaids were vampires.
No manatee inspired this movie.

Rich played a fine game, then got no cards, then went to sleep, then cashed in. I was glad Rich was playing tired. He was good. I was in three good pots with him and each time we held the same hand. You would have liked him Gregg. He straddled every time.
Did I mention he was to my left?
Bilge sucking Scalawag!!
I tried to get him to move to my right, but even the promise of seeing Astrid-Berges-Frisbey without turning around was not enough to entice him to move.

John played his usual aggressive self and won money.
And books!! Did I mention he won books?? His own books??

John's girlfriend Danna was the only women at the gathering at either table. She was sweet and very hospitable. Nice to meet you Danna. She played a while and then saw to it we were fed and then I guess she was sleepy.
In Jeopardy we had a category, "People named Danna"
Well, the kids were prepared for that one at least once.

John put out a spread of food: munchies, two kinds of lazana, pizza, fruit, veggies, and this huge platter of meats and cheeses all nicely collated. It never seemed to empty. and we had a fine lunch while we tried to do Pirate trivia on Pirate jeopardy.
This is not my game.
Rich, the good poker player, once won on Jeopardy and he was very good. Our team just stumbled along. I stumbled and fell. I did know the pirate joke, however,
"What is on each side of your buckin' head?"
"Your buccaneers!!"
This was the extent of my knowledge of pirate trivia.

"Did they want to use another letter in that question?" asked one of John's kids.
"No, why would you say that?"

And off the kids went with their Mom.

Rich was very helpful because he had just played at Niagara Falls (American) and I am going this month for three nights. He gave me a sense of the no limit games and I may play them. I told him where I intended to stay, and he told me I might get mugged there. But I really don't think he has a good sense of Niagara Falls Blvd. motels, left from pre-Thruway days, when that was the main highway to the Falls. Let's hope he is right about the games, and wrong about the mugging.
I also asked about seeing the Police in Vegas, playing at the Riviera in November. I wondered if they would be too loud for me. Todd and others discussed this group and then I mentioned I only knew the songs like "YMCA" and the table looked at me in disbelief. Finally, they told me it was the Village People sang that song, and yes, they would be very loud.
"Right, " I answered, "It is the Village People who are playing in Vegas."
After that people just made fun of me and I could not get a straight answer from any of my questions.

I explained that I did not really know any names much after Bix Beiderbecke. Then I realize I was rude not to answer Danna's question about who he was. Sorry.
I listen to a lot of old jazz, especially since I bought an internet radio that works off the wifi and pulls in about a thousand stations.
On WGBH Boston they play 24/7 Ray Smith Jazz Decades. It was my favorite radio show years ago when Ray was a alive and being the DJ just an hour a week on NPR. It focuses on 30-40's jazz and Ray gives a short introduction to each set of tunes. Often they play rare, even one of a kind, tapings. Ray was an expert who talked about these players like some guys talk about baseball players. He had been a drummer and got interested in collecting old jazz. Lots of Bunny Berrigan and Jack Teagarten. Some of the tunes were created much later, but still reflect that era of jazz before it became abstract and disharmonic. And sometimes he will play older jazz, perhaps the first in a particular style.
I go to sleep to this every night.

Someone had quads. I forgot.
It was a very pleasant game without the action of the last one. No one bought in for $600 (John) like last time.
But then last time I took home over $1000, my largest lifetime poker win.

Gregg's Birthday Game

2011-09-07T17:46:00.000-07:00

I had such a great run of luck at this game this week. It seemed I could not lose. If I bet to bluff, everyone folded or called me with less than I held. I started with great cards often and they won, even my pocket jacks. I only remember losing one hand that I bet on the river. I was trying to push Bruce out. I had a pair of fours and he had a pair of nines. Plenty of better hands out there, but I could not get him to budge.
Here is how I wrote the game up in an email:

There are those days when it just seems that losing is impossible.

I cleared actually $303 in profit, but still I think that is a record for me at Gregg's.

No matter what I did my opponents seemed to be second best.

I played a few minutes of head-to-head with Gregg before the real game. When we do this, we cash out afterwards so everyone starts even. I lost $16 dollars in just those few minutes. A few hands in an all-in with Gregg brought all that back.

In one hand I held junk. The flop gave me 3-4-5-6. I bet $2. The turn gave me a 7. Bruce had a king and Jim had a king and the river put two on the board. They bet, raised, reraised and it put Jim all-in and Bruce close to that. I figured I'd lose to a full house. Nope!

I won twice with pocket jacks, catching the third on the flop once.

I tried to push Gregg off the river with an all-in bet when I held just 10-J of diamonds with Q-9-X on board and two diamonds gave me both a flush and a straight draw. I was very disappointed when Gregg called me, but he had 5-6 of diamonds. Nothing developed, and I beat him just on the high card.

I won once in a hand where I was behind with Gregg until the river gave me a Queen that made my two pair into a full house and overcame his flush. I had out-Gregged Gregg.

Jerry was mentioned because there was a huge debate on rebuy rules. Gregg wanted to rebuy twice in a row with no hands in between because his first rebuy gave him just $10 in chips, the old limit. The new rule is $19 in chips or less so a guy can't just fold a small blind and rebuy. Of course, anyone can fold a preflop call and rebuy, so it has not changed actual practice much. However, I am not concerned since by next game, that rule will certainly change once again. The basic rule is that all rules must change and most of those changes need to be initiated in the middle of a hand, if possible, but at least in the middle of the game.

Once I tried for my own rule change. I was dealing but had no cards, and I decided that after the hand was over the dealer ought to be able to take either the winning player's cards or his winnings. Phil thought this was an ill advised rule and made me give back the pot stack. It seemed a good rule to me, as long as it was changed back again after I followed it once.

Slink, who is now a professional dealer has decided that it is wrong to stack the chips when the pot is collected after any round of betting. If we stack them on his deal, he will destroy all that pot order. So, chips are collected after a round of betting, stacked by some helpful player, unstacked by Slink and then restacked once again by the winner.

But then poker is more about playing with chips than actually efficiently playing cards.

I'm certain that next game, Slink will decide on his deal that the cards too need to be mixed up and redealt just before the river. Whenever that happens, Gregg can rebuy.

So the suggestion was that Jerry be contacted by video phone and become the new skyped poker rules Czar.

At the end of the game I discovered why I had won. The card protector that old Alligator Louisiana Mudgriff Dan's daughter sent me after Dan died had been left last week in the box that is the bank.

Thanks, Dan.

And thanks to all the rest for an enjoyable rainy day.

Oh, and Gregg: Happy Birthday!!

I hope I can play this well and be this lucky in Vegas. Sure does boost my ego.

2011-09-07T13:47:00.000-07:00

photo from wikimedia commons in public domain in the US

Gregg's first game of the season

2011-08-31T17:17:00.000-07:00

Autumn is here because Gregg started up the poker again.
Players were Ed, Jim, Bruce, Phil, Charlie, Gregg, Dewey, and Robin.
I build up a profit of over $100 and lost it all back. I left down $8. Gregg left about even. Charle took about $40. I don't know the other scores.
Nice day. Nice game. I won with pocket Aces twice and both won and lost with trips.
I felt I played well, but I suppose I got tired toward the end and lost my discipline.

Orford Poker

2011-08-01T06:17:00.000-07:00

Well, we had quite a fine game on Saturday night and after breakfast on Sunday as well.
Players included Gregg, AJ, Ivan, Cassidy, Dewey, Peter, Chris, Barry, Bill, Slink, Charlie.
The ten cent chip structure along with brass rings worked great and there was plenty of action and still no huge losses.
I did not feel well. A week of a tough cold and then that misstep on a large common nail that pieced my foot kept me rather uncomfortable. I think the tetanus shot gave me the huge head ache which did not clear until 2 am. Still, unlike any other activity, poker is very easy and I just sat still and let folks poke around to make sandwiches. My beans and rice were very garlicy good, but I think I was the only one to eat them. Peter made a fine barbecue chicken and the cold cut sandwiches with kimmelwecks from Buffalo brought by Chris went very well.
Slink brought some chocolate brownies. Good too.
I lost $50 over the two sessions. Gregg was the most dramatic, getting up to about $100 in winnings and losing it in about two hands. Slink went home with good profit. Chris did okay. Mostly it was just fun.
The heat overcame the air conditioners but it was not stifling, just not as cool as we are accustomed to.
Peter did most of the work: cleaning before and after, making up beds, arranging food and picking up afterward, even some of the shopping. Thanks. Peter.
Barry cooked the bacon and egg breakfast and it was tasty. Thanks, Barry.
My real losing hand was to Gregg. Pocket Aces were cracked by his king high flush. Had a spade come on the river I'd have beat him.
All in all a great time. Nice to see Gregg again. Seems he was not a clone after all, but some of the emails have been twisting up in the sending.

“If it wasn't for all the money I keep losing, this poker thing could be a lot of fun.” —VP Pappy

Orford Poker Room

2011-07-09T18:56:00.001-07:00

Turning stone loss

2011-06-13T11:12:00.000-07:00

It seemed like a good idea.

It was raining.

Elizabeth was gone all day.

So I rigged up the van with the mattress all made up. I have great sheets now, these old soft flannel sheets. I hooked up the curatins for the side windows that I made last year. I found a new blanket that works as a great draping door. And the best innovation was a $1 plastic table cloth from the dollar store in black. The plastic is so thin that I can close the hatchback on it and that effortlessly takes care of the sun through the back window.

The trip out was great. I decided to see what I could do about gas expenses, so I traveled the NY Thruway (where the max speed is 65) at 55.
When I started, my MPH was 17. Very soon on the trip it jumped up to 20. When I got home it was 24.5. I estimate this saves a fifth of the price of gas for this trip. I estimate it adds 20 minutes to travel. So how much is my time worth. Well, if I dropped my speed each trip by that 10 MPH, I'd be earning about $30 an hour for being willing to ride a longer time.

A good part of the trip I listened to a Yankee game on AM radio. I liked the commentary of John Sterling and Suzyn Waldman but I guess I may be the only one. They also may be short lived as their contract runs out this year. I am not much a fan of any sports and don't watch or listen often, but I enjoyed this game on the AM radio and it shortened the ride.

I liked just being in the van and driving along with no passing, no coming up on anyone. Other times, dropping to just the speed limit, I'd find I had tailgaters, but this was not the case at 55MPH. Folks just passed me. Once I had an annoying tailgater, but it was because s/he was going to exit.

I did not go directly to Turning Stone. I went to The Landing, my campsite for the night. I saved a dollar on the toll as the GPS took me off at exit 31, and I also got good variety in the traveling. It took me through Rome, NY. so were I to do this at night, I might plan in a stop for dinner at the Savoy, one of my favorite restaurants.

The woman in charge of the campground remembered me and gave me my favorite spot. For $25 I got a hookup for my sleep apnea machine, a close bathroom with a great hot shower, and a picnic table for my breakfast of hard boiled egg, sourdough pretzel, and trailmix. I was ready too to make my own coffee in my new traveling cup, but as it turned out, I did not bother.

I was at the casino by about 4 PM and I played, with one break, until 4AM and then slept just a few hours.

Poker buddy Ezzy showed up. He had decided too that it was a rainy day and taken the long drive out, but he left for home at 9PM. He played very well, was very hard to beat, and took away a good bit of money. Then he got picked in the random drawing for a $350 future tournament seat, so he was very happy.

All of us got horses to watch in the Belmont, but we did not win whatever the promo was at Turning Stone because our horses did poorly.

I needed to be back home by 3PM on Sunday, so I knew that I was not going to play long on Sunday and when the game turned into young guys who had lost their NL money and were just betting everything on the Limit game, I wanted to stay and play. This is the game to play at Turning Stone.
The table not to be playing at is the one with six tight players. Turning Stone rakes early, so that small pots end up giving the house, the bad beat, and the dealer about 30% of the pot.

Here is how that happens.
At the flop they take $1
At $10 they take a second $1
At $12 they take the bad beat.

So a $12 pot with a $1 tip means that the winner is only getting 66% of the pot and often has contributed perhaps 40% of the pot, so the profit is very small

At $20 they then take another dollar.
The last dollar to be taken waits for the pot to hit $40, so from $20 to $40 is when the profit is all the for the winner.

*********************************************

Mohegan Sun meanwhile takes a $1 at the flop and $1 for the high hand then as well, but the next dollar is not take until the pot is $20. Then there is a $1 at 30 and a $1 at 40.
So a $12 pot here would be raked $2 and with a tip to the dealer, the profit would be 75% of the pot.

*************************************************

Foxwoods they take $1 at the flop and another at $10 but the third rake dollar as well a the badbeat dollar are taken at $20 and the last dollar is not taken until $40.

A $12 pot here would give the winner 75% as well.

************************************************
For a game of small pots Mohegan Sun has the best system and Turning Stone has the worst. And while the percentage would increase slightly until $20 any pot from $12 to $19 would be raked more by Turning Stone than the other two casinos.

Under these conditions at a 2-4 game there are not winners unless the table is full and there is some action. In 4-8 the pots are larger, so even small pots there may give a higher percentage of the winnings to the winning player. In games where everyone sees the flop and there are nine players, then Turning Stone is worth playing. Otherwise, I will quit unless there are at least seven.

On and off the table went down during the time I was there, but never for very long. I'd be just about to leave and in would come new players.

However, for the first part of my play both the tables I was playing at were full of good players. Not good. There should be at least one good fish. I switched to a new table looking for that and got even better players. On those two tables I lost $163.
I could have made that up on the third table, but I just missed the pots. One other fellow came and he did not miss them. He made a bundle. I liked the game and I liked the good humor of the young fellows playing. It was my favorite poker time.

At about ten thirty I decided to get some food and give the tables time to fill with looser players. I drove into nearby Oneida and stopped at a spot for a bowl of chili and an old fashioned milkshake made with cotton candy ice cream. These are treats for dieting me.

No one was there. One other couple was having pizza. The idea that a casino is an economic boom for the area is just a pipe dream. The casino was full. I watched a movie on a large screen. Horton the Elephant and other cartoon characters were trying to save the little people on a flower. It was fun.

But the dark streets of Oneida were just a bit depressing. I went back and found I had been right. The table was much better.

The next day I drove early through Sylvan Beach and there too was little activity. I know it was a rainy cold day and it is still June, but there are some really interesting places there and it seemed deserted. I did not even see a good breakfast spot. Good thing I had brought my hardboiled eggs, cheese and travel mix for breakfast with the singing birds at the campground.

I did think I'd play an hour of poker on Sunday at Turning Stone, but they had no 2-4 game and only a couple people on the interest list. They did have free doughnuts. So off the diet again.

I am discouraged at this losing. Everyone says these streaks come, but I think to some extent it is my poor play. I did misread cards once, holding a 4 that I thought was an 8 and I lost there, even raising on my faux straight to the Queen. Dumb. That cost me at least $8.

The people were fine. They were more fun later. I especially liked a Black guy who was funny and very aggressive and lucky as well, catching the river, and playing for a long time until his woman made him leave. She was funny as well. A big, loud Hispanic girl, just full of banter.

I liked the adventure.
But I did not like the ride home.
I was too tired. I napped at a rest stop.
That got me thinking that perhaps I should skip the camp ground and drink enough coffee to play into early Saturday morning if the game holds up, and then just drive to a truck pull off on the Thruway and sleep for free until dawn.
For one night that might be the best idea. Two nights I need to camp and have the shower and I need my apnea machine.

I might also look for a similar camping opportunity near Mohegan Sun/ Foxwoods and drive out there for a couple nights. I like the games there and do better. They rake the same as Turning Stone, but they don't take it very fast, so it is 5% to 10% plus bad beat and tip.

Turning Stone Poker

2011-05-25T04:31:00.000-07:00

Buddy Chuck and son John were going up to Turning Stone for the Weird Al Yankowich concert, and I decided to visit with him at his place, and then ride along doing more visiting, and play poker while they listened to Weird Al.
John is a huge fan.
I was a bit worried about all this lack of sleeping lately because it meant a 45 drive home from chuck's alone at 1a.m. but I did not need to worry. I was awake for the entire drive, even when I thought I was running out of gas, and in a panic skipped my plan to run the tank to near empty, so I can use my Price Chopper 40 cent a gallon discount.
I paid full price for gas in Troy.
Today buying a few more things at Price Chopper means when this gas is nearly dry I can get 20 gallons at 50 cents off per gallon.
Except for driving to Red Rock Canyon, it has been about a month since I have driven a car. It felt good to be in the van, although something is not right with it.

So the first treat of the day was a slice of Mary's rhubarb pie. Some of the rhubard is home grown. The crust is something out of distant Iowa past. There is no use thinking about being on a diet when Mary's baked goods are around. Later, at one A.M. I invited myself for a chocolate chip cookie for the road.
Chuck insisted I take two.
It was a day of eating things I never eat.

An entire thermos of hazlenut coffee consumed on the way meant that I could talk faster than my mouth could move, and Chuck is the only person I know who is willing to listen to so many Vegas stories. He told his stories of being Dean and renovating his bathroom, and traveling in a world where the characters he meets are just delightful. He had great family news as well and with all I had gathered from Chicago and Denver, we got caught up on that as well.
The fishing is also part of Chuck's interests.
It was easy to keep the talk going in both directions.

The poker was just great. It is fine to come back from those tough games in Vegas to a truly soft game at Turning Stone. Folks were just giving me their money in the first part of the night, and I built my $60 buy in up to $135 at one point. Unfortunately, I did not leave at the peak and lost back about half before I quit at $69 profit. I'd have made money in the latter part of the game as well if I had been able to get cards. i had good opportunities and did some early pot building and got free cards. Nothing worked for winning.
I got river lucky early in the night.
My K-8 blind flopped trips and then clearly a woman turned a heart flush. I river an 8 for the full house and check raised, trapping the other trip kings for $4 and getting the full $8 from the flush player. Her flush was just a 10 high too. She still called the check raise.
Sometimes my luck was the other way. I remember trip 7's that I just could not bet because there were so many hands that could beat me, and yet I won anyway. The dealer was even amazed.

There were no really good players at the table. Two guys to my right were regular no limit players. One older guy just talked all the time about his cards, even during the hand, making it easy to know what he had. Another young guy talked no limit talk, but he was intimidated by my preflop raising and he played such crap I just could not see him at a not limit table.
All were friendly. We talked about the old movie "Paint Your Wagon" and I remembered the theme song. Lee Marvin was great in that movie. I'll have to see it again soon.

It was a friendly crowd. No great stories. But it felt good to be in a game where I never was behind.

And Chuck and I chattered all the way home, so i got to hear about Weird Al and his concert takes as well as plenty of other funny things.
Oh....okay.......Chuck chatted; I chattered. The coffee still was working.

Last Tampa try for this year

2011-03-20T20:24:00.000-07:00

I drove up to the Tampa Hard Rock today and played for about seven hours. Lost in the end forty two dollars.
My first session was the hard one. I won just two hands in over three hours of play. The table was perfect. We even had a guy who would raise on the river with A=K and no pair. But it did not do me any good.
My second session was much better. I had great cards and most of the time they held up. Then I caught some help on blind hands like K-6 offsuit and I even called one girl with my pocket fives, a girl who bluffed often, and luckily I was right that time. She had nothing.
I raised once with pocket sixes next to the button, just to push the button off and be last to act. I thought I'd just see if I could hit a set by the turn. The table was just so passive. I flopped the set, and of course I was in total disguise then as everyone put me on a big pair, so they paid me even after the turn and river gave me a full house.
But at about nine most of the weaker players had been replaced with stone faced regulars. So not only did the pots start to shrink, but the company was so dull and boring I could barely stand it.
That one delightful young bluffing girl was playing for the fun of it. She had one of those fresh, girl next door faces and an attitude that just beamed good humor. The rest were so damn serious. And this was two-four.

So I headed home.

The drive back was more direct and absolutely dreamy. Sunday night and few were on the roads out of Tampa, but by the time I left 75 no one was on the road. I could see those reflectors in the middle of the road, winding like long Christmas tree lights into where I was driving next. There were no lights to weaken their effect, no car lights, no signs, no houses, nothing except the winding double run of reflectors and the dark woods on either side. How do they get these reflectors to pick up my headlights so well that it appears the road is lit with little lights all along the way?
I don't like driving much in the dark, but I loved this. I just set the cruise to the speed limit, turned on one of my favorite CD's and eased on down the road.

Of course, the advantage of Vegas is I don't have to drive at all to get to bed. Also, a forty two dollar loss at poker over seven hours would actually be break-even once the value of the rum and free food was computed.
I tried to use comps I thought I had at Tampa, but all I got was twenty cents off my supper. And forget a free buffet. The Sunday Brunch buffet costs thirty dollars and runs ten am until ten pm. How can you serve food at ten pm and call it brunch?
So I just grabbed some chicken and veggies, but even that was a hassle. The line was held up when the computer broke and they could only take cash. The guy behind me had four slices of pizza at about five dollars each and he had no cash. He had lost a thousand dollars that day and was grabbing some food to lick his wounds. It was very sad compared to what I might have done in Vegas.
Still, I had a fine time, and that will be it now until next year.
I do love it here in Florida. Yesterday we were out in the Dade Memorial Park listening to the BlackCreek bluegrass band play some great stuff, just sittin' under a shady tree in summer-like weather and watching the little caterpillars drop down from tree branchesto sway on threads in between the drapped Spanish moss and often onto our laps, their cute little antennae weaving this way and that way as if they were dancing to the sound of the banjo.
And today I was playing poker.

video poker at Mohegan Sun

2011-03-09T02:45:00.001-08:00

The Hall of Lost Tribes has 8/5 bonus poker.
from VPfree

25¢		1 Play	blue glass Game Makers in the Hall of lost tribes near the bar	10 Slant-tops
25¢	5-30 Coins	1 Play	blue glass Game Makers in the Sky -in non smoking casino	8 Slant-tops
25¢	5-30 Coins	1 Play	blue glass Game Makers - Casino of the Earth - Nr the Ldoge Bar	12 Slant-tops

Tampa Hard Rock 2

2011-02-03T10:12:00.000-08:00

Well, I took my second ride up to play poker. Again I played no limit and found it easy enough. I just did not get cards. I was ahead for a while, but ended down $96.
AK won a good pot when I called a bet on the turn made by a guy with a smaller Ace. I had a good straight draw and figured the Ace or King would win. We both checked the river. Funny thing was the guy's be on the turn forced out a pocket pair of jacks. That guy was unhappy.
I lost a hand with 3=6 when two 3's flopped. The other fellow had an Ace kicker.
I won a hand with A-Q when an Ace flopped. A guy added fifteen to the river because he had a little Ace.

I did not have a pocket pair over 5's all day. One flush made by a 3-5 of spades. no straights. NO full houses. It was a day of terrible cards.

I had a fine visit with Jacky on the way up and back and then she fed us a nice turkey supper complete with a pecan pie. Very nice.

Tampa Hard Rock

2011-01-31T04:46:00.000-08:00

Played no limit for about five hours yesterday and lost $212. Elizabeth and I went up on the bus and she had a massage and a swim while I tried a $100 max no limit table. I liked the low max so I could stay at top buy in all the while. I did not do well, but I liked the game and my play. I was pretty disciplined and my loses were for the most part a draining.
I lost one all-in bet when I held two pair, queens and jacks. My opponent had trip queens and called my all-in turn bet. I was both betting my two pair and representing a spade flush which I was quite certain he did not have. I was right. His trips meant I was drawing dead.
I bluffed and won one hand, putting $20 against a player who showed some weakness when I only had a pair of 6's. It took him a while to decide, but in the end he put me on a higher pair than he had.
I won one hand with A-K when the Ace flopped. My opponent considered a long time before he folded what certainly I could have beat. But I worried he had a set and was going over the top of me.
In general, the betting was reasonable. There were some very good players and there were some who played more poorly than I did. I liked the table.
The biggest bluff I saw was when the high chip person bet $130 on his pocket queens. Both king and Ace were on the board. He wanted to push the fellow off. K-10 called him with two pair. An amazing bet at this table, probably the most I saw.
Bobby's Bus from Springhill seems an easy way to go. It takes a bit over an hour and the ride is just short enough that it is not too uncomfortable. The seats are just a bit too narrow for a big fellow like me. Luckily the bus was half empty and Elizabeth and I both had our own seats. I go with Jacky on Wednesday so we will see how that works out. The Wednesday trip gives me one more hour of playing time. I will like that better.
The Kass plaza where Bobby's bus picks up had an interesting Paesano's Bakery where we had a bit of decadent treat before we left. I had a poppysees bagel with butter and procuitto that was just delicious. Elizabeth had a crumb coffee cake the was more crumb than cake. I even brought some of the cinnamon crumb home with me.
At the casino I just grab a quick slice of free pizza and keep playing poker. Elizabeth used her $5 to help pay for a poolside margarita. We both had a fine day and were tired when we got back home.

Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun

2010-12-21T16:28:00.000-08:00

I took a pre-holiday solo trip to play some poker and see Johnny Mathis. It was a great break from all the holiday planning. I did fine in the 2-4 games, but I could not win at the Foxwoods 4-8, so I ended up down over $300. Not a good score.
All the rest of the trip was delightful.

I had decided to see if I could not get a last minute deal on a Mathis ticket. I know most of these tickets are comps given to slot players who don't value them but get them and then sell them or give them away. When I checked the box office early in the day, a woman approached me who had two tickets and wanted $30 for both of them. One ticket at the box office was $35.

I only needed one and she would not split them, but that gave me the idea of price. She told me that few of these shows are sold out and there are usually people trying to sell or give tickets away. So about 6PM I headed toward the box office and on the way I saw six people talking about tickets. I waited a bit away from them, and then said, "Excuse me, I wondered if anyone had an extra ticket for Johnny Mathis."
Four of the group just left, but two fellows talked to me. They had two tickets, but one fellow was not sure he wanted to see the show.
"Were you looking for a free one?" he asked.
"I was looking for a $15 ticket," I offered and that made him decide he did not want to see the show.
I did not pay attention to where the seat was located, but just headed to the theater.
The place was huge. I can see why they do not sell out. It was like a huge sports arena.

I realized I should have taken a look at where the seats were located.
I was guided downstairs and then seated seven rows back and right dead center in the middle. I have never had a seat this perfect for any concert. Amazing luck.
Johnny looked and sounded great. At 75 he is younger looking than I am at 64. His voice was still pretty much the same. That unique sound was so important to me in my high school years. I was impressed and very pleased.

I expected the show might be Christmas dominated. Some take the theme so intensely that little other music happens, but this was a relaxed show with Christmas music and all the favorites and some newer songs I had not heard before. He also sang “Crazy” from his new Country music album, “Let It Be Me.”
I loved it all.
Behind him was a 30 piece orchestra. We don’t hear or see this sort of thing often.
The set was soft and gentle. There was a huge backdrop portrait of an old New England town covered in snow with just the lights of a church showing. It seemed perfect.
All in all the show was a throwback to shows years ago. Not too much glitz and glitter and the music was not loud and in our faces. It was relaxed. Mathis is a relaxed, almost shy fellow anyway. He just moved a bit to play to different sections and sang the songs. It was about two and a half hours with a fifteen minute break in between for the bathroom and a water fountain.
I have never seen such a long show.
It all seemed simply wonderful.

http://www.masslive.com/springfield/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-32/1292921163179900.xml&coll=1

There will be an interesting broadcast this Thursday.
http://johnnymathis.com/news.html
Also on this site I get some of his music playing nonstop and it is fine to write this trip report to it. Just now he sings with Ray Charles, “Somewhere over the Rainbow.”

Here is a review from Reno that also reviews Gary Mule Deer, whose fine comedy was sandwiched in between Mathis.
http://www.sacbee.com/2010/05/30/2782171/reno-tahoe-this-week-gary-mule.html

Maybe I’m one of the few who has not heard him. He was really funny and had perfect delivery. He sounded like Johnny Cash, but only finished one Cash song. His jokes were aimed a good bit at seniors, a good choice for this audience. I’m going to search him out and see his Utube clips.

Here is a local interview:
http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/wamc/news.newsmain/article/231/0/1698724/The.Roundtable/Gary.Mule.Deer

Johnny also sang with guitarist Gil Reitgers. This song was included.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQGVucAFjM4

I heard Johnny interviewed here locally a while back:

http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/wamc/news.newsmain/article/0/231/1707376/The.Roundtable/Johnny.Mathis

I gambled the first two nights at Mohegan Sun and had such a fine time joking with other players. The first night we all got to hear from one young woman who accepted a marriage proposal at the Mohegan Sun bar that night. She had lived with the fellow a while, but she did not really expect the proposal and it was fine and fun. Her best man played with us as well as did a very pretty girl who was his brother’s girlfriend. She had a dry sense of humor. She knew nothing about the game. She would toss in her cards saying “Call” and someone would say, “ You mean fold” and once she said, “Well, they are the same in my world.” I loved it.

There too was a delightful young black woman and her man who engaged me in a bit of joking and talk, and a cute personable Spanish girl with the coolest black cap. She was out of money by the second night but watching a family member and she was fun to sit with.
I played right next to a dealer from Foxwoods who liked to raise preflop. I wanted to be to his
left because of that.
I only really could use the position one time. I had pocket kings and reraised to eliminate the competition. It worked, but my hand ended up so good I should have just called and kept more people in. I caught a king on the flop and the turn and river were both deuces. He knew what I had, but he paid me anyway.
Then there was a young fellow who pretended he did not know anyone. Not Mathis or Lena Horne or anyone. He had me going for a while until I got that he was putting me on. He was very funny.
We also had a good discussion of jazz when he asked some serious questions.

I loved playing and talking with all these characters.
I ended up ahead after two days and about 17 hours of play.

Then on Monday I went to a serious 4-8 at Foxwoods. I want to learn a bit more about playing these harder games which are more poker and less luck. If I can get more comfortable, I can play the game at the Venetian. Most of these folks know one another and play with each other often, so that puts me at a good disadvantage. They also play the game better than I do.
I started aggressive, lost, and showed I was playing crap. I had had the experience at a 4-8 the night before at Mohegan when as soon as I bet, they folded. It helped me with pocket kings that held up as two people stayed with me to the river and had just a smaller pair. So I go paid, but I was lucky that the kings held up.
However, the rest of the morning was just terrible and I played poorly.
By the time I reined in my bad play I was down almost $200.

I should probably have quit earlier, but I kept hoping I’d get some of my losses back. All day I had just one full house and other than that not a hand bigger than a straight and few of those. The full house was a strange 4-6 that flopped full. I had some pocket kings and they won but lost with jacks and queens.
The only thing I did not like is there were a couple arrogant players. One old woman was the enforcer and any variation from strict rules, she called. She was annoying. Another fellow was a know-it-all and was downright rude at times. Most of the time these arrogant folks don't play as well as they think they do. I took pots from both of these folks who were surprised at my strength.
The good players say very little and if they do think they can play better than I can play, they keep that to themselves because they don't want me to leave. One fellow did say he folded because I had a "glow" when I flopped my full house. That was good information. I'll try to work on that. I used to try to pretend that I had bad cards and try to believe it myself. Generally, I had not thought my expressions gave much away. In that hand another fellow called me to the river.
The dealer at Mohegan also gave me a good tip. He said that when there is a lot of talking, that means the guy has a good hand. I had never heard that. He said that was how he suspected I had a good hand with my pocket kings. I was joking about them too much with him.
We did not have many head to head battles. We more or less stayed away from one another. I liked knowing he would raise just before me so I might throw away good but not great cards, especially things like Ace 8 or Ace 9 which I probably should throw away anyway. Also, I think he was smart to raise preflop on big cards in early position. That way he gets out the cards that might draw small cards and beat him.
I had a funny hand at Foxwoods. I like to raise on the button with suited middle connectors in games where most people play big cards, if everyone is in the pot. It builds a pot, disguises my cards, and often gives me a free turn card to draw to a straight. I should not do it with unsuited, but this one time I did, as everyone was in. At that table that meant that most had large cards, and it might mean that those were used up and not coming on the flop.
This time the flop did not help me at all. After the flop they all checked to me and I checked. My free card was a nine on the turn and one fellow bet just before me. I called and everyone else folded. He had pocket jacks. A nine came on the river. He bet and I raised, was called, and took the pot. Well, that caused some stirring of talk.
"You raised that preflop with 8-9 offsuit?"
"I did"
There was amazement all around.
For many of them that also identified me as a poor player. I certainly do not explain my thinking. Sometimes I just say that I felt lucky. I had not bet at all in a long while, so I liked offsetting my rock status with an unusual bet. But it did not help me because afterwards I never had any cards where I might show the power of betting out or raising and want to be called.

I was pretty careful, but I did have a bit of an on tilt experience. I don't play video poker because the pay schedules are so bad, but I was down a bit my first night of live poker and still not ready to drive back, so I decided just twenty bucks in the Double Bonus. Now in Vegas I play 10/7 DB, but here it was 9/6.
Well, my twenty ended up being $80 in. First I had made the mistake of hitting max bet for the first $20 and that is much higher than just 5 quarters. I had stretched it a bit by hitting the double up for any win on a pair and actually went three times once and won all three. But it dwindled as I played. Finally, I hit four 4's. Only 5 coins in, but it was enough to give me almost $40 profit and I cashed out and breathed easy.
Ironically, the pay table had not affected my play because I never hit a flush or a fullhouse. I sure was happy to see those nice paying quads; however, I wish I had hit them when I was playing max bet by mistake. I did not have the guts to try the double up on those quad 4's. I suppose it was the best bet in the casino, just like free odds on the dice, no vigorish, but I guess by then I was off tilt.

I stayed the weekend at a Ramada in Groton where the inexpensive hotels cluster. It was a few dollars more than the cheapest Super 8,($123 total for both Sat-Sun taxes and all) but had better reviews and an indoor pool. I liked it. It was not very fancy, but fine enough. I could actually park my car and see it out my window. I was on the first floor of two floors available. The service was great.

One of Gary Mule Deer's jokes was:

"If the room is $29.99, you better just skip the complimentary breakfast."

Well, this was one of those breakfasts. On the other hand, a bit of orange juice and some oatmeal is plenty to start my day. I brought two ceramic cups this time, so I could avoid the Styrofoam bowls in the microwave.

Across the street was a Walmarts and the room had a coffee maker, fridge and microwave, so it was easy enough to eat there during relaxed non poker time and watch a bit of television.

The pool was very shallow and the jacuzzi was very old. It may have been brought to Groton by the first Connecticut pioneers. Still I enjoyed swimming around a bit, especially on Monday morning when I had the pool all to myself.

The television lacked my TCM so all the television was commercials. I can no longer tolerate commercials. I'm spoiled at home with being able to tape and fast forward and with Roku and Netflix. While having my bagels, I flipped between Bing Crosby in Holiday Inn and some other easy to follow story, but sometimes the commercials were on both stations.

I did have wifi, but I forgot to pack my external speakers or that would have entertained me.

I told the fellow at the counter that I was taking immune suppressive drugs and nervous about bedbugs. He said that he had been there three years and no cases had emerged. He was worried about guests to went to the cheap places, did not like them, and then came his way as the cheap spots nearby had had some cases. Of course, that was good marketing, but he also talked about his mother, struggling with cancer and on immune suppressive drugs, and her fear that just getting a cold might kill her. So I don't think he was just marketing. My humira is not at all that serious, but I do worry about the bugs. I checked completely and everything looked great.
Both the fellow and I agreed that it was not so much about cleanliness but just about luck. Still, I wonder if folks who have not treated bedbugs in their homes might also be folks who don't want to pay an extra few bucks to stay in a hotel. Or perhaps the slightly more expensive places get less traffic and so the odds are with them for less infestation. Just a thought.

The ride to Mohegan was about 8 miles and almost a straight run along the river on an uncrowded road. It was an easy drive. The drive to Foxwoods was a bit longer and windy. I liked it in daylight as it was through country with many old stone fences, some horse farms. At 3am I'd rather be coming back from Mohegan Sun as the turns were less complicated.

I drank too much to drive the first night, so I was not comfortable driving back at 2 or 3 am and waited until almost 5. It was a mistake to drink late into the night. But the poker was entertaining even into the early morning.
They gave great alcohol. On Sunday I had Glenlivet and they really brought a double so two was it for the day. After that I had virgin bloody Mary's. I asked for a bunch of olives and the waitress brought me three in my bloody Mary and another cup full of olives, maybe twenty. Well, that was supper. Amazing!

For the most part I ate bagels in the room, but I did have a free buffet at Mohegan Sun. It was really delicious. I like it better than the Foxwoods buffet, but that may be simply because I am used to that one.
Particularly tasty was a braised lamb and cavetelli pasta and a medley of roasted vegetables. Other things looked very good, but these were so tasty, I made my meal on them. I had a few deep fried shrimp that were quite meaty. The deserts were very good as well. There was a good bit of fruit and as well as a normal salad bar, I saw some fancy cold salads. In the spot where they must do the morning omelet was a pasta station where you picked the pasta and the chef put it together with anything you might like. I could not try all these tastes. I'll have to return.

I love the Mohegan Sun casino decor. Foxwoods reminds me of an overgrown shopping mall, but Mohegan is just full of glass and beads and colors and Indian shapes. It is like walking through a piece of modern art. I was sorry not to have the energy to pack a camera and share some of the sites.

This fellow captured some of the visual ideas a couple years ago.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kingfal/3000850377/in/photostream/

Hit "older" so see some of the idea of the place.

The poker room there is brighter too. In Foxwoods you do down in the basement. At least this trip I played where I could see out the window and watch the pines move in the chilly wind.
I expected snow on Sunday, but the storm blow over and I had all clear traveling and an easy drive back home on Sunday. I waited until after rush hour to leave so as to hit the confusion of Hartford when there were fewer cars. Even so I exited once too soon. The GPS brought me back easily, however. Cost me just one minute in my ETA. Then halfway home there are few cars on the road at all. No tolls either. I picked up a ticket, but was not charged either way. I am not sure why. Gas for my van is about $40 to $50 round trip. Not a good daytrip, but for three days of gambling, not so bad. Often I go with friends, but this time I wanted some time to myself and the ability to be flexible around my own comfort. I slept very well, did not push it so as to be overtired and all in all, except for playing over my ability level, it was a good trip.

Well, I can never remember many of the jokes I hear, but here is one from Gary.

In the senior citizen home yesterday I heard an old man say to an old woman,
"I bet you can't guess how old I am"
and she says,
"Sure I can, just drop your pants and I can tell."
So he drops he pants and she studies the scene a while and then she says,
"You're ninety -two years old."
"Well, I'm be dad gummed," he says, " how did you you figer that out?"
"Why it wasn't very hard at all," she answered, "you told me how old you were at breakfast this morning."

Joke 2

So it seems Arizona has conducted a resent poll on the illegal immigration issue to see if it was really bothersome

27 percent of those who responded said that they were very concerned and wanted he government to do more about it.

70% percent said,
"No creo que haya ningún problema"

Article signing

2010-12-06T19:11:00.000-08:00

Well, it was a bit cheeky of me to turn one published article into a book signing at the local bookstore, but it was a lot of fun just the same. I asked my friends to come just so I would not look too pathetic and they did so it was a bit of a party. I did well with what was ordered and sold three of the John Blowers signed leftovers as well.

Here is how it looked:
(clicking on photos will make them larger)

With granson Casey and his mom Jen

l to r: Jerry, Gail, Kathy, Charlie, me

Meliss and her daughter

Casey brought along his favorite toys

Don and

Foxwoods on the bus, a Saturday trip

2010-10-16T19:16:00.000-07:00

Well, I did not break the bank at Foxwoods, but I did break the seats in the Yankee Trail bus. I was sitting by myself in the second to last window seat with two women in the three seats behind me. I decided a few minutes before arrival that I would move to the aisle seat and make my exit effortless, so I stood and arranged my belongings and when I sat back in the aisle seat, the support snapped, putting the entire seatback as well as the seatback connected to it and me on the laps of the ladies behind me. Luckily they were not hurt. The heavier seat with me in it landed on the empty seat between them. They were nice about it, but it did mean we all had to find different seats for the return trip and would not have as much space.

My day at poker was a very good one. I drank a good bit of Myer’s rum, met some very interesting people, ate a large portion of free chicken at Pollo Loco, and left with a profit of $132 for the day. All in all it was a success.

As the rum loosened me up, I engaged more and more of my companions, asking questions, joking, and having the experience I like, one of interaction and sharing that is similar to what happens around the televsion setting of Cheers, only with strangers. Most people are more than willing to talk about what they know, so it is only necessary to find some opening and ask the right questions and follow up for more information.
Soon they are telling life stories.
This Saturday group was more diverse and Cosmopolitan than the regular local rocks I usually encounter on weekdays at Foxwoods. I joined a new table too. I like that very much as no one knows anything about anyone and the folks who are programed to quickly lose their day’s bankroll have just started. Joining a table in progress often means playing against those who have survived by using good play and while new bad players join, it is not the same as starting when everyone has fresh money.

The people were more fun than the poker.

I played poker with a Polish fellow from Warsaw, and so I got to drink my Myers Rum and say:
na zdrowie

He was a friendly fellow, and he told me that in Connecticut the good source of Polish food was New Briton, especially Broad Street.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Britain,_Connecticut

From his comments, I suspect that this neighborhood has experienced the same sort of problems as Polish communities in Utica with the end of factories in America, but perhaps the Polish community is a bit more vibrant and not hit quite as hard as those in Upstate NY.

Also it seems what the Guzik's call simply kapusta is technically bigos kapusta. Kapusta is more generic for cabbage and when we add the sauerkraut, it is bigos kapusta.
That was a good key search word for more information on this delightful dish, and I liked the following particular blogged description of how it might be made.

http://www.transparent.com/polish/im-hungry-lets-make-bigos/

Perhaps I'll try some of this bloggers variations one of these days.
My basic attempts at bigos kapusta are in my blog of recipes here:

http://weightlossveggie.blogspot.com/2008/11/kapusta.html

We also talked about the rock concert son Dana had attended in Warsaw. The Polish fellow livened up to talk about Warsaw, and it was very entertaining to listen to him between playable hands and hear the charm of his home city.

He also was familiar with Dyngus Day, but not because of Buffalo, but because of coming from Poland. He tried to teach me how to pronounce the full name, but said we Americans could not really ever pronounce it, and that is why in English speaking countries it shortens to just Dyngus Day.

He has children in Chicago and actually had shopped at Wally’s market in the Polish Community there. I shopped there a few years ago when Wally’s had so many choices of kielbasa that it was impossible to chose one, and since the young, pretty blond girls behind the counter spoke only Polish, impossible for an illiterate fellow like me to get any help in the choosing. I could not even manage to communicate the idea of barbecue grill.

*****************************************

While I was playing in the seat to his right, I learned a new rule, at least for Foxwoods poker. I put four chips in my hand with the intention of calling, but before I could act, my Polish neighbor announced a raise.

I wanted with this new information to fold, but the dealer would not let me fold. I pointed out that I had not passed the chips over the labeled “bet line,” but she told me that line meant nothing. It was just there for the convenience of the short armed dealers.
Later, when the floor was around, I asked the question for clarification. He told me that if the movement to bet took chips past my cards, I then had to make the bet.
The dealer's name was Wilton (or something close) and she was from Haiti. She both knew her ability and was confident she was right. She was also delightful, and we laughed together at all of it and I overtipped her once later to show there was no hard feelings. Then she later helped me get seated for my last half hour.

So many times these discussions of rules leave either the dealer of the player outraged. It is so unnecessary in a casino where the floor is the final arbitrator. So, after that I put my cards far in front of me and just short of the "bet line", protected from being folded by my huge clay card protector, so that any action I might take would be on my side of the cards. They let me do this. In a sense, it allowed me to establish my own betting line.

Soon after, I moved down two seats to be more directly across from the dealer and had an Italian guy to my right. We had a fine time talking about Italian and Spanish and how both people can understand each other’s language, a speaker like me could not get by in Italy with my limited Spanish, but natie speakers have no trouble. He taught me a few Italian words, and we spoke in Spanish occasionally, so that one of the other players asked me:
“So, do you intend to speak every language?”

And so the banter and laughter continued.

On my left was a very pretty girl who was quiet and reserved, reading a People magazine in between playable hands. People magazine always reminds me I am now old because it never contains photos of any people I know, and after seeing page after page of young celebrities that I have never heard of, I sometimes get depressed because surely the world in this way is passing me by.
I kept glancing at the photos and finally saw someone I knew, Halle Berry with her new French lover Oliver and so I started to talk to the pretty girl about Halle.

I could not remember the title of the movie that first attracted me to this actress, nor the name of her costar Billy Bob Thornton. I could remember “Sling Blade” that Thornton had directed, and that prompted another player to name Billy Bob Thornton, but none of us could come up with “Monster’s Ball.” I kept coming up with "Midnight Dance" and knowing it was wrong. The girl had never heard of Billy Bob or either movie I described, and I knew that even these movies that I think of as fairly recent flicks were as ancient to her as “Hollywood” with Cary Grant and Katherine Hepburn, which is the last movie I’ve watched here on the Roco.

One old fellow named Ascher, directly across from me, wore a cap that said Dave and Buster’s, so when I had an opening I asked him if that was a construction company or a sandwich shop. He told me it was a bar where there was a Midway of new arcade games and that he had not been there, but his daughter had sent him the cap from Orlando. The pretty girl next to me chirped in with more information, that one existed in Providence as well and called it like a Chucky Cheese for adults.

A while later the girl stood up to proudly show us her beginning pregnancy, and it was so sweet to see this rather indrawn woman smile and share with us her coming baby. Her Asian husband was nearby and we congratulated both. She looked Irish.
Ascher was a great comfort to me because here he was looking seventy and still playing good poker at 97 and could tell people about Dave and Buster's although I am sure there are no 97 year old people playing in that arcade. He was just a wonderful fellow.

One newbie to the game just kept catching full houses. It was amazing. He did not play poorly, but it is hard, after all, to play full houses poorly. He walked with a good pile of chips.

Across the table was a young fellow named Shaun who could be counted on for a bet if no one else bet. He did accumulate chips when the table felt too weak to call. Because of this and the general loose attitude at the table, even with good cards I rarely bet out, but let someone bet into me and then decided where to call or raise.

Once I held jack/Queen and the flop came king/jack/XX. It checked around and was going for the second time around when Shaun decided to bet the turned three. I called. He bet again on the river and I called and showed the winning jack. He was surprised I had not bet the jack. I learned then that he would always bet second best, so if he was in the hand, he would bet into me and I could wait for him.

It was hard to push anyone out, so raising did not often seem practical. Only once did I push successfully. I had 8-9 suited on the button and everyone put in the initial $4, so I button raised to $8 to build a pot and give me a chance of an after flop free card in a straight or flush draw situation. The flop was A-A- X and everyone looked weak, so I took a shot at bluffing and bet my button.
The table folded.
It was a good pot because of my initial bet, but no one wanted to play with me, figuring I had raised earlier on an Ace. This is another advantage to that button raise with suited connectors in limit. We can represent the ACE.

Otherwise, I was not very aggressive except in the check raise.

My first twenty minutes at the table were brutal. My very first hand (one where I had to post, so I saw a free flop) I had 9spade-5heart and the flop came 10-J-Q all spades. The betting was frantic and I was squeezed, but I went along for the ride, thinking that the straight flush would be great and thnking I had the third highest spade if a fourth spade dropped.

The turn gave me a straight, so I called with more hope, and I held at that point the winning hand.

The river was an Ace which made bigger straights. No one had a flush.

Then a few hands later I had K-4 of hearts, flopped 4-4-x, and bet, but lost to runner-runner heart flush.

So, as the day wore on my money dwindled as I'd get good cards and bad flops or bad cards that ate up my potential. I was down almost $200 when the tide turned and I made it all back with profit.

Many writers say that we should not drink while playing, although some of the old players at the El Cortez have said that "no one can beat a drunk."

In no limit I would never drink, but in limit, I play better when I am drunk and happy, and I also manage to liven up the table a bit with my questions. I find the wait between playable cards less boring, and I think that I disguise my ability to play and that helps me win more on good hands.

For example, in this game I had pocket kings and raised on the big blind. It is the only time all day I raised a big blind. I rarely do that because position is just so bad. So it should have signaled that I had cards, pocket kings being one of the three possible general hands to raise with in early position.

I ended up head to head with a very good player. Perhaps he just put me on A-K as I slow played the trips when they came on the flop and just called his bet on his building flush.
He caught the flush on the turn, so I did another check/call.
The case king came on the river. I bet out wanting to insure my $8, and he raised his flush. With a pair of kings on the board, he should have just called my bet unless he had a full house. I reraised, and he still called and I showed my quads.

He was very annoyed, but polite about it. I expect he was playing the drunk and not the cards. Why else would I bet out on the river? I had to have a full house to do that unless I am too drunk, see my third king and miss seeing the flush he was betting.
I have often played this man and found him very disciplined and not at all like what he was in that hand.

Drunken play also gives me a chance to cover up why I bet with less power in the few instances when I am trying to push out the other player on the river. As I turn my cards, I can say that I misread them. I won a hand that I should not have bet and covered my push bet that way.

One bad poker decision was to throw another $4 at pocket sixes when the flop was 2--2-XX The turn was free and the river dropped one of my two outs to give me the full house and a nice pot, but it was bad poker and I need to avoid it. The table looked weak. I did not think anyone had the trips. I never knew since after I was called on the river, I was the only one to show.

Most of the rest of the day I tossed stuff away. Peter was teasing about playing 10-2, but I refused to play any A-small unless it was suited (I won once with A-2 of clubs just because I had the only Ace.) I threw away any unsuited middle connectors which I am at times tempted to play. I threw away even middle suited cards with gaps like Blowers favorite 5-7. In early position I threw away anything less than picture cards, especially with Shaun doing his raising thing.

It worked.

I think at least in limit I just have been too often taking a chance with bad cards. Once in a while I'll play them if I think that my reputation is as a rock, so any bet I make gets too much respect, but at this table, no one seemed to know I was a rock. I suspect they knew I was a talkative drunk who claimed to lose often and talked about getting the value of the rum to offset my losses. They did not see me toss away so many of my hands. But perhaps I tossed less than I remember. It may be that the bad flops on high cards still kept me from looking like a rock.

Of course, playing once every three months on drink is easy, but playing everyday in Vegas for 17 day, I'd kill my liver with that much rum. So I'll need to work out a sober table persona.

One fellow was called to the table as Mac, and when he joined us, he looked a bit like a fellow I had been to parties with twenty years ago, a friend of an old friend Wayne. He had greatly aged, much more than me and much, much more than Wayne, but the resemblance was close enough, and finally I asked him if he knew our mutual friend Wayne. It was the guy. He did not remember me, but it was fun to have noticed and remembered him, and I'll pass on his greetings.

The buffet was too crowded, so I went to Pollo Loco for my free food and that was a great decision.

In line behind me was a Latino woman and her husband and eight others in the family all speaking Spanish and very excited because she had just won $250,000 at bingo. What a party!! She showed us the sign that she had to hold for her photo. I am not certain I would want to advertise that I just won $250,000 but I suspect that she did not have it on her in cash and there were 10 people with her.

Even sober I can never figure out what to get on posted menus in fast food joints or how to maximize a coupon when it is ala carte. So when the counter worker asked if he could help me, I showed him the coupon, told him I did not want a drink, and knew I did want the marinated and grilled chicken, and asked him to help me by maximizing my coupon without making me pay any more money.
He had me pick two sides, white meat or dark.

What I got for $15 was an incredible amount of food, especially the chicken. It came on two plates and was delicious as were the bean dishes I chose for sides and the cinnamon sticks he chose for my dessert. Free water too and lots of salsa to add zest to bites of chicken or bean sides.

It was so fast, that I was able to play another half hour of poker. I lost $20 doing that. And the dealers were the worst in the world, slow and completely baffled by any little aberration so they needed to ask the floor. I did not get the same kind of poker I had earlier.

Still it was a good day and I quit ahead $132 which included $3 I won at video poker using my freeplay.

I was just under the wire for the bus because at the last minute I discovered I was without my nice warm pullover shirt. I rushed to check security before going back to find it still on the seat at Pollo Loco where I had been eating. The search for the shirt gave me just three minutes to board the bus.

I hurried and made it.
The ride back was less than ideal. The bus was too hot for me, and I no longer had my own seat. It was dark and no movie was played this time.
I felt the beginning of the hang over, drank all my water and just drifted. Next trip I need to bring some books on tape since on the way back it is too dark to read.
My companion was a woman who perhaps had had a lobotomy this past month and had recovered enough to ride the bus and play the slots. She was pleasant but not engaging.
Still there were two talkative Black guys in the next row talking about fishing all the local shore spots in our area. Many of those spots I knew, but many were new to me. They told some fish stories from Basic Reservoir of large bass breaking straightening the hook and in general entertained me with plenty of annecdotes.
One said he thought in Round Lake that the weed treatment had killed the fish and they would stock again in a couple years, but the fishing had suffered.
They talked about how an Asian guy they knew who prepared Carp by keeping them alive in his bathtub to purge them and then filleted them.
After the fish talk, one started to tell the other about street craps and how it is played, detailing how the bets are made and explaining how complicated it is with side bets on all sorts of combinations adding to the usual bets we see in the casino. They talked about dice games with up to six die and combinations of numbers. I could not follow all of it, but it was a great conversation to overhear.
And behind me one woman was telling another all the recipes of things she made in her slow cooker. While I did not hear of any I wanted to try, most being just put together meals with cans of this or that, it was fun to listen just the same and it made the long, dull ride home more entertaining.

So I had quite a day of it.
I like Foxwoods.
I do well there and even if I don't do well, I have fun with the free rum, the free food, the free conversation.
This had been my fifth free trip, using points for the bus voucher, but I could not get another voucher this time as I had but 24 points to start and I needed 27, so I may have to actually pay to go in December or when I get home from Florida next spring.

Comments Welcome

2010-09-23T16:20:00.000-07:00

You can comment on any of these posts by going to the bottom of the post and hitting the comment button. Choose the Anonymous option but include some hint of who you are in the text of the comment because I do have to clean out spam.
Comments won't post immediately because they are reviewed by me first, so I can more easily ferret out the spam posts. Sorry for the inconvenience. Please comment anyway. If you arrived here from a Vegas Discussion board, it is better to comment there as interaction is pretty slow here.

2010-09-21T07:43:00.000-07:00

FINDING A FRUGAL WAY TO STAY at TURNING STONE

For a poker player who strongly believes that frugality precludes penury, playing weekend Hold 'em at
the local Turning Stone Casino poses a dilemma. Since most of my poker play is low limit (and at Turning Stone this means 2-4 because they rarely have more than a small interest list for 3-6) I can't have expenses of more than a hundred a day and ever expect to turn a profit for the trip.

At the same time, weekend poker, especially around midnight, is fun and often full of loose players who are tired or in party mode. On weekdays at Turning Stone, the cheap 2-4 game is likely to fold up at 10 PM, but on weekends full tables can be found until 2 or 3 AM. I can only play No Limit when I am fully rested and alert, but Limit poker I can play tired or drunk or distracted, and while No Limit is more exciting and much more complicated a game, Limit is more social and full of folks who laugh and joke and tell stories between hands. It is more about cards and luck than the subtle tells of players.
And while a couple hours at a No Limit table is plenty for me, win or lose, I can easily sit at a limit poker table for ten hours waiting for cards and watching the pretty girls.

So I want to go to Turning Stone to play on weekends. I want to have a cheap, comfortable place to sleep. And when I have a winning weekend, I want the wins to cover my expenses so my entire experience is free.
Gas and tolls are about $40 from my house to Turning Stone.
However, hotels prices are not like Las Vegas.

Staying in a room at Turning Stone is only a bargain for slot players who get lavish free room offers based on their play. Poker players get a poker rate of $80 at the casino hotel or at times $55 at an the Inn down the road. Often these are rooms filled up. Unlike Vegas I rarely plan very far in advance for these local trips.
This past Friday an available room online at Turning Stone was $235, almost what I will pay for my 17 November nights in Vegas.

I located a good Super 8 just 3 miles away which can be had for as little as $40 plus tax, but the price goes up to over $60 on weekends.
The cheapest way to go is to sleep in the back of my van somewhere in the casino parking lot. I don't mind trying this for one night, especially if I am basically playing into the early morning and catching a nap before I get breakfast, play a couple hours, and drive home. However, I sleep poorly even at home and should always use my apnea machine, so while sleeping in the parking lot is the most frugal plan, it does not satisfy my sleep needs and I arrive home sleep deprived. And if I play for only one night, I lose value on the travel expense. If I can play a second night, I save $40 over making a second trip another time, and if I play Sunday afternoon I can add another saved $40.

This trip I wanted to stretch my play over three days, getting both the action of Friday night and Saturday night as well as some Sunday afternoon fun.

I took a look at camping grounds in the area.

Turning Stone has a RV park where I probably could stay with my van and I have heard it was nice. It was $45, more than the price of hotel on weekdays, but a bit less than the weekend hotel.
I kept looking.
About twenty minutes away I found the Oneida Lake area of Sylvan Beach with a State Park and a number of little campgrounds along Fish Creek. I decided to take a day and poke around that area, sleep in some campground, and see how I liked it.
Added to the frugal utility of the decision was the value of the water. In Vegas free alcohol adds value to every 2-4 game. Turning Stone gives none away. But waking up near water is added value for me and will give me something to do if I wake up at 6AM which I do often even if I have played until 2 AM. I don't like wandering much anymore in casinos. I like the poker room. But in the early morning hours when the poker has yet to start or is only peopled by local regulars, I like some other diversion.
I thought I would spend more time exploring a number of alternatives, but my first pick was The Landing Campground and there I could get a site with electric for my sleep apnea machine, hot showers and a bathroom just a few steps away, quiet, free wifi, and open access even at 2AM and all for $25 total a night. So I took it.
Nearby is another spot I might try if The Landing Campground is ever full. It is fairly new and called Mayfair Campground.
Also nearby is Tagosoke, but one walk through there on Saturday afternoon was enough to discourage me. I found out this was really a camp for dogs and the human occupants just came along to see that they could be fed, walked, pampered, and kept out of trouble. No one played the radio because the barking offered plenty of disharmonic jazz to insure against any intrusion of wild quiet. All wildlife must have avoided this place. Were I a tent camper, I might pick this place because there were a few spots off in the woods, but when I walked near the one tent that was set up in the woods, I found this one too was apparently owned by a dog who was the only creature around and apparently unhappy to have me poking around at a nearby site. If I did stop there, I would probably pick the cabins at $41 a night compared to $38 for my van and the same electric I got at The Landing for $25. Mayfair is priced at $35 a night. Nothing gave me such easy access as The Landing. Here is a good place to start if you would like to see other possibilities in the area.

The Landing worked very well. It was very quiet and yet the owner did not mind me rolling in at 3 or 4pm. "Quiet as a church mouse" she rated me. And while I rolled in at 2 AM on Saturday, I was awake at 8AM. Motels never give me anything to do in the morning except go to eat. I don't need to eat. A bit of fruit and a handful of trail mix makes a fine breakfast if I am going to indulge the buffet later. Here on Saturday morning I walked along the Fish Creek and watch blue heron and migrating geese while I fished for any hungry bass. Then I went for a stroll in the area, checked out the other camping area, watched minnow feed from the bridge, and in general had a very pleasant Autumn morning before heading to the buffet and another night of poker.
This is the best time to do this. I could not sleep in my van in the humid heat we had this summer. And the campground would be filled with folks escaping home. Most of the sites are RV or hard shell campers all fitted in like sardines in the small space of the grounds. If it got crowded, it would not be much different than the city. This spot had some of the regulars, but with poor predicted weather most stayed home and many had left for the season or were getting ready to go. I had the shower in the morning all to myself.
Hot showers still feel odd to me while camping. When I was younger, I spent a good bit of time camping and there was no hot water where I went. Even Arrowhead Campground which was built by the Bull family, long time friends, did not have hot showers in those days. I spent a good bit of time sleeping there as I was best buddies with Dick Bull on Lime Lake before his father bought the dairy farm and converted it into a campground. A hot shower and a shave sure adds value to sleeping in the parking lot. That alone is probably worth the $25.
Sleeping in the van also had the added advantage of giving me a fine place to take a break from poker, nap comfortably right at the casino, and come back to play. My bed was always with me. If I was overtired on the drive home, there would be a comfortable place to nap a while as well. And all my belonging were always with me.
Finally, I did not have to worry about bedbugs because I carried my bed from home. If someone does not soon find a way to eradicate these bugs, they are going to be everywhere. Philadelphia and NY city rank as the most infested. This past week a NYC Nike clothing store closed down because it was infested. Exterminators who were getting calls a year now say they are getting 5 calls a day.

FINDING A WAY TO PLAY

Winning was more difficult this trip than sleeping. I played over 25 hours of poker and rarely was ahead. The first hour I was down about $150 playing No Limit. I brought that back by the time I moved to the Limit table and left down $83. The second day I won $20 more back. But Sunday I caught losing cards again and so I left down $193, all of it lost at Limit Poker. I had a good bit of fun, payed only a total of $10 to eat, and was sleeping so frugally I spent less even with my losses than my wife did on her weekend with her old friend, so the hobby still makes good financial sense, but I sure wish I could just get over the hump and begin to grind out a few dollars each trip.
No free alcohol meant that the value of that was lost. At Foxwoods I would have drunk my share of Myers Rum and almost broke even.

I did do well in table selection. I managed to get new tables whenever possible and moved when the table seemed full of rocks or good players just passing money around. The hardest table I played was a couple hours at a No Limit on Sunday morning. I did win two hands, but the small bets drained me, so that I had just ten dollars in profit left. My best play was to call a bluff by a good player who had just a pair or jacks to my three tens but represented a straight. I am working now on trying to get a better sense of bluffing. There is none in Limit poker, but in No Limit it is part of the skill of the game. I think I have a good sense of how much to bet, but I don't really have a sense of how to read a bluff.

The 2-4 games were lots of fun. I played against some crazy players. One raised and reraised every hand he played. I played him well with my pocket Aces, letting him cap preflop and then check raising when my third Ace came on the river. He stayed until the end. Another fellow liked to put up $4 in the dark when he was under the gun and play it blind as long as no one raised him. He would look if someone raised him. I was next to him, so on any playable hand a raise would generally isolate him and then I'd just call his blind bets down. He won more often than you might think, but the odds were with me, and I'd do it all night on good high cards.

I met plenty of interesting folks. Three Black girls played for a while and they were cute and funny and good retirement therapy for me as what I miss most from my teaching days is being daily in a community of young people. I met a fine and friendly young fellow from Corning. I saw many of the regulars including this one fellow who calls everyone cousin and is very friendly until he gets beat for a while and then turns a bit nasty. I met a Marine who had served in Afghanistan who was preached at for a while by an old, loud regular whose sermon was that the cards would come if the kid just said, "Just one time." I suppose the fellow wanted to keep him loose, but he really insulted the kid in some ways acting like he could tell him how he should live his life. It was after midnight and folks often get a bit nutty then. The kid was very young. It was hard to picture him as a Marine.
I met a fellow who solved my sleep place dilemma by just staying in the casino around the clock and drinking energy drinks. He was almost fifty and when I played with him on Sunday had been going for almost 24 hours. He left the table to get in a blackjack tournament.
I don't know how these guys do it. Nick the Greek used to play for days and hardly get up to go to the bathroom. At Binion's once I played with an old guy who told Benny Binion stories and had been up playing for 38 hours. He napped a minute or two between hands. At the El Cortez I played with "Jimmy" who the dealers said just came to Vegas and took a seat and stayed in it for three days. Jimmy was alert and full of good humor. " Bring me a whiskey," he liked to say, " and leave the bottle 'cause me and the boys are gonna play some poker." I think I am doing well to play into the early hours of the morning. At home I generally am in bed by 9PM. I don't seem to tire at poker. But I want a few hours sleep a night even to enjoy Limit poker.
The buffet at Turning Stone was tasty. I liked it on Friday night better than Saturday noon. The price of $17.00 to $20.00 is certainly high compared to Vegas, but if I don't eat there, my points go to waste. I like to catch a meal at the Savoy in Rome, but this time the only meal I bought was an interesting omelet at Mary's diner just around the corner from the campsite. It was full of Italian sausage, peppers, onions, potatoes and served with garlic toast.
At the buffet I liked the chili with added taco meat from the Mexican section, mushrooms, olives, hot sauce and cheese. Also the mixed summer squash and carrots were good. Friday the meal included a dozen steamed clams. Nothing else was very memorable. I filled up on salad.
I bring my own stainless steel coffee cup into the casino and find it a good way to get a drink of coffee or a coke. So I also carried coffee from the buffet in my cup to the poker game. I get more in my cup than they give in those little cups. They are fine about filling it at a little bar set up in the casino and I go there more often than I wait for the waitress and juggle everything while playing. The tip is the same. And while it is now frowned on, I bring a bit of Myers rum in a hip flask and add it under the table. I only had one drink this trip. Last trip I asked a dealer about the new policy and he said that he would not turn anyone in even if he noticed.
Turning Stone now sells beer, but it is $3 to $5 a cup and not very good. Other drinks are more. It is a ripoff. And what a shame that they do not support the local brewery in Utica which brews Saranac beer, one of the best in the nation in my opinion. They should be pouring only versions of that brand and supporting the local, depressed economy.
Always the argument is that casinos bring wealth to a community, but I don't see the evidence here in this very poor section of upstate NY. Most of the people buy food and drink only at the casino. Nothing else is close. Few seem to venture out anywhere nearby. Using the GPS to drive from the casino to Sylvan Beach, and winding through country roads following the promps, I passed through wonderful farmland on roads where I was the only car. I'd be worried about breaking down out there in the middle of the night, but driving with my bed and a cell phone, I suppose it would not be such an inconvenience as it was in the old days.
I drove by turkeys and hawks and corn stalks and silos. One early morning a fox was pretty surprised to see me coming along the road, and he quickly scampered back into a corn row.
Sunday the poker was melted into the football. I am not much of a sports fan, so that was no treat for me. Even the dealers were watching the screens rather than the game and the conversation was all football. There was no room for humor or stories or even very good attention to the game. It would have pleased me to have my opponents distracted if I could have gotten cards. Along with the poker two people at the table were lost in their earphones and hardly could hear the dealer talk. It was isolating. I was losing. It was less fun than the late night poker.
I drove all the way home without stopping and was back before 9 PM. I had to get up at 4 the next morning to take my son Peter to the hospital and I felt rested enough, so the campground must have been a good choice. I'll do it again this Saturday when I am in the fingerlakes area for a small reunion of a few of us from an International Club I belonged to in college.

Foxwoods on bus

2010-08-18T02:53:00.000-07:00

I had a fine, relaxed day of poker at Foxwoods yesterday, going up on the bus so that the entire experience was free. There were some drawbacks, but overall it was a fine day.

On Tuesdays the bus leaves a half hour early to insure the bingo players will arrive on time, and that works well for me because I am always awake long before it is time to go and always wishing that I had more time. Also it may have contributed to a bus with enough, seats so that I had two. However, the driver had left Latham and forgotten to pack a wheelchair so we were forced to go back to the parking lot at Latham. There the chair was, sitting in the middle of the parking lot. The error cost us forty minutes.
Then I had decided to eat breakfast at Foxwoods and join a later game that might avoid some of the regular rocks who make the limit game pots so small that it is hard to leave with profit. However, there was a huge Megastack tournament which was attended by a huge unexpected crowd of players. This took up space and dealers both for the tournament and for the NL games needed to accomodate the losers. I waited almost an hour for a table and then considered myself lucky to be early enough. I won't go on days when there are huge tournaments. 4-8 and 2-4 tables were limited.
I caught a seat finally at a 2-4 which was exactly my sort of table. I was relieved because I knew that if the players were all too tough, I would be stuck there anyway as there would be no seat changes possible. It ended up being a table with three young, inexperienced players and a few loose folks as well as perhaps three local rocks. There was some friendly banter, especially between a young fellow who worked on large equipment named Chris who sat next to me and talked and joked the game away. I liked him and his buddy very much. I get so little exposure to young folks. He drank Jack and Coke and I had my favorite Myer's rum so it was poker, but is was also like going to a tavern, except the drinks were free.
The breakfast did set me up to have the rum and not feel the alcohol so much although I did make on mistake where I misremembered my hand. It did not cost me money, but it was strange to think I had won with a straight but only had pocket nines.
Only one old guy got mad at me and then only once. I bet so seldom that I thought I might take the pot down on the river by making a bet. I had nothing, but held an inside straight draw, the nut club flush draw and an Ace. He had bet after the flop but did not seem strong to me. He was my only opponent. I bet, he called and the river gave me the club. I bet and called again and he showed his two pair and said, "Show me your straight."
"Will a flush do?" I asked. He got mad because I had played on the chase and perhaps because he knew it meant that I was not as predictable as he thought I was. It was a good bet too because when the club came, he did not suspect that I could have clubs and betting out against his early show of some strength. Had I waited and just come out on the river, he might have folded as my clubs would be obvious.

We came very close to the bad beat when one fellow held a straight flush and another jacks full of tens. Had he held pocket jacks, we would have all been rich. The Hold em bad beat is up to $380,000.

I was never down more than a few dollars, but my periodic profits dwindled away slowly. I did get some fine hands, even had full house which my buddy Scott called. My pocket tens caught on the river. Early on I held A-K and raised and then bet each time. The river gave me trip Aces. I lost very few hands that I was in, the most notable was K-9 to K-10 with the other kings on board. I suppose I should start tossing K-9 at that game. At the beginning of the last round I was up $4 but I hit two hands in that one go around and left $34 to the good. My bus freeplay had given me $29 so it was a very frugally profitable day and my fourth free trip. My fifth free trip voucher is in my pocket. Eventually I'll have to pay for a trip unless I find myself going up there by car one time. They still give me ten free points just for showing up.

Disappointing were the dealers. When they have these tournaments, they call in all their blackjack dealers who really don't know poker and don't like dealing it. Perhaps they were to have a needed day off. Most are Asians who speak little English and space out, doing little to call the game. I pay the rake so that I can drink and not have to pay attention to every detail of the game as I do in homegames. These games made our home games seem professional. One woman did not know anything and needed to be told when to collect chips and who to pay. Few could read the cards so someone had to read each hand. We were kind to her, but I was disappointed.

I can avoid all of it by simply not going on huge tournament days. None of the players at the 2-4 had played the big tournament nor would they play anything but NL afterwards.

I did see one fellow come with a roll of fifty cent pieces for tipping the dealer. I have not seen that in many years. It was quite common when I first started playing poker. I skip a tip now and again if the pots are too small, but generally I don't begrudge these hard working dealers a fare tip even it it drains my potential profit. If I can play all day and break even, I am happy.
I don't think I will choose the breakfast option again. The line was short and it was a quick meal. It meant I did not have to leave the poker to eat. However, it was not a dramatically wonderful breakfast and coming in later meant it was hard to get a seat. What I should do is get a seat and then if I don't like it, use the food option to go and eat early and come back to a different mix of players or just put my name on the list again and move when possible.
Also, I might as well get my prime rib for the free buffet.
I noticed that the buffet coupon will also work as a $10 matchplay if I ever want to skip the buffet. Probably that won't happen, but it is good to know so that if I get at a very good table and don't want to leave, I can just leave time for a roll of the dice before I go home.
There was a movie on the way home. The Bounty Hunter. It was fun and made the ride back very easy.

Wednesday poker

2010-07-30T04:41:00.000-07:00

Here is Gregg's summary:

First to my gardening guru, Charley -- I forgot to mention the stuffed eggplant yesterday and the pork/pasta today with fresh tomatoes, parsley, basil and hot peppers -- YUMMMM!

And a couple great hands that I forgot to mention from yesterday's game:

1) Bruce dealt himself an ace and then flopped three aces. He slow played his quads and made a pretty good profit. Later in the day ace, ace, ace hit the flop again but nobody had the 4th one. I forget who took that hand.

2) Biggest transfer of money during the day. Ron held a King/little spades; Dewey held a Queen/little spades. Three spades hit on the folp (or maybe the turn) -- including the Ace. It was bet raise, raise, raise, all-in -- call! Ron, sitting in Dewey's regular chair, made the haul.

3) I held an Ace and an Ace on the Board -- Dewey took me down, but I can't reveal anymore without possibly having the CIA on my butt.

Good Luck to all and Happy Eating, Gregg

PS: Dewey got four pocket Aces

yesterday to tie Ed's record from the previous week -- or was it Bill or maybe Jim (who wasn't even there)?.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
DEWEY'S ANSWER

I did do very well with my pocket Aces, playing them very aggressive so not losing, although none that were called developed beyond the Aces. Pocket Aces also beat me once. Bruce had phenomenal cards and for the most part, seemed to play better poker this week, folding when he was not likely to win.

I played better, folding those huge hands which I have a bad habit of calling from behind. I did call one and caught it to beat Gregg. I played a rare three handed with Peter and Gregg at the end and still did well. I came out $34 ahead. I would have been much farther along had Ron not had the nut flush.......and it was hearts, Gregg, not spades.

Hey, that wasn't the time I bluffed you off with J-Q was it, Gregg? Probably not. I did beat Gregg too with a good river draw. I forgot the details, but it was fun ragging on him.

Good day at the game, but four people left at 4:30.

Montreal no limit poker

2010-07-22T08:50:00.000-07:00

Elizabeth and I stayed with a friend who was cat sitting for one of her friends North of Montreal and spent two days playing no limit poker at the Montreal Casino. It was great fun; however, I did not think about how not understanding French would affect how much poker information I would not get from the other players. I could hear them explaining how they had bet and why, but none of it was useful for me.

They do not spread limit games, so anyone playing poker must play no limit and that meant the mix of players was really amazing. At my table on the second day was the worst poker player I have ever seen and I would not expect to see such in Vegas.

The wait was at least fifteen minutes for a seat. They should have had more tables open. There were no comps although I did swipe my card for some reason. Free drinks were water and some of the best coffee I have had anywhere served in a ceramic cup. No alcohol.

I lost my $200 the first day in just a couple hours, generally on hands I would play the same way again. I was ahead until the river. On the second day I lost another $128 over about ten hours of play. I was even a few times but never ahead. I had pocket kings busted three times once by J-6 offsuit. I layed down pocket aces once because I was sure my opponent had a straight, and I showed them as I folded.
It had been a mistake to show those, and it sent the table into an uproar. That really bad player lectured me and then five hands later lost a over a hundred dollars holding on to his pocket Aces against four to a flush in another suit.

The fellow had really made a very bad bet against me, but it looked like he had hit a straight and he had been very hesitant about betting before the five came that would have given the straight.

My hughest mistake was to forget that there was a side pot in one hand when I held a Queen high flush to short chipped quads, and that cost me $40 when I folded my cards as the other fellow had a ten high. I really felt stupid.

I played against an owner of the White Sox who had a World Series ring. I also played against a blind buy who had a woman behind him telling him the cards.

I liked the soft nature of the games. Action was limited the second day and that is an easier game for me because it is more like limit poker. I don’t play much no limit poker in casinos. Betting hundreds of dollars preflop is hard for me. I like it better when I can play from the flop and I like seeing my blinds flop for free.

A fellow who loved to go all in on second best hands bet a bit when there were three diamonds on the turn. I called with an Ace and a pair, and I made the nut on the river. I checked, hoping for his dramatic all in bet, but he must not have had much. When I showed my nut, he grumbled loud and long and I knew that had he held the flush, he would have bet it all-in and that would have made me rich. It stopped him too from doing that dramatic all-in every few hands on second best.

All in all I thought I did well and was comfortable.

The casino is very confusing with many little nooks and small rooms held together in crazy ways by stairs and escalators and elevators and winding paths.

The people were really quite nice. One fellow was rude to me. There is always one who just does not like folks who only speak English. The rest were very friendly and nice.

Around the time when I was ready to go there was quite a bit of preflop betting. I was on the button with A-6 of clubs and I knew that it was certainly not a powerful hand, but I decided to call. Two clubs came on the flop and I called a woman’s all-in bet as did one other. My club came on the river and I went all-in, but the other fellow folded. She had trip tens. That was my best pot of the day.

At the house the towel bar came away from the wall, so I had the task of finding a way to fix that. I did not know even where a hardware store was and the first folks I asked did not know that English word. Finally, a man gave me good directions. In the store a helpful fellow with very little English showed me what to use to fix the problem It reminded me of going around in Spain to get wall tile and cement for my friend Frank’s place in the North, only there I only had to listen to the Spanish as Frank is a Madrid native, and I know some Spanish.

The roads were very confusing even with a GPS. There were many winding paths and many closed ramps and detours. On the other hand, crossing the border was not the three hour wait I had been warned of, but a three minute wait and not difficulty.

I went to the Four Aces card room, but they were only open nights and weekends and once I had my seat and a good table at the casino, I did not want to take the trouble to head back.

I came home just in time to lost $50 in my weekly home no limit game at Gregg's.

2010-07-17T01:51:00.000-07:00

Well, I had a delightful time at Gregg's this week and then it extended into Mohegan Sun and Foxwoods.

At Gregg's game I collected some money and Gregg collected some money and then I took all the money that Gregg had collected and a couple extra buy-is besides in head to head play that for some inexplicable reason favored me.

At first Gregg took enough so that he almost had two trays and I was almost down a tray from the head to head session. Then the luck changed.

I have 7-2 and the flop comes 7-2-4 so Gregg figures his pocket kings are good and goes all it. I call. Gregg says that he can still win, he just needs two pair, but I remind him that he needs a four or a runner-runner pair or a king. On the river comes another 2 and Gregg has two pair, but I have a full house.

Greg rebuys and goes all in soon after that with two pair, only I have two bigger pair when my 10 and 3 connect on the turn.

I can't remember too many of the earlier hands. I remember cracking Robin's Aces with a full house. I remember that Bruce held on and called Greg's push out bet with a king high and won. Bruce is persistent and eternally hopeful. If he has some chance at something, he stays.

Scott drove me out to Mohegan Sun where we met up with Bill who was on his way to Atlantic City. The three of us stayed at a Micro-hotel that is one mile from the casino. We took the free shuttle over so we could drink. The shuttle service lasts until one AM (two on weekends) After that a cab is $7-$10. We played poker until 4 AM but Bill had his car, so he gave us a lift back. With the RoomSaver coupon, rooms were $77 (taxes and everything) and included microwave, refrigerator and a fine island separating the two beds. Sleeping was easy except for some fan noise. Next time I'll check that before taking the room. The clerk was very nice and accommodating and told us if there was anything wrong with the room she would move us. A light breakfast (cereal, muffins and doughnuts, juice, coffee, waffle machine waffles) was included.

The 2-4 was a good game, and I had a fine time as did Scott. Scott played much better poker than I did. We took a walk around and I played $20 in a slot, winning and then stopping when the win was gone, and rolled craps for a while, winning about fifty dollars and then stopping when one seven took out three of my numbers. I ended up $3.

At the end of the night I was $30. Scott was up $28 and Bill was up $4. So we were all winners.

I also had downed a few Myer's rum.

Bill was pretty sleepy. He kept falling asleep between hands and then waking up to check his cards.

Alcohol ended at one. I drank some coffee to stay awake.

After the light breakfast in the morning, we all went over to Foxwoods for a couple hours of poker, but the early tables were dominated by locals and tight nits. I was going to move, but we had so little time there, I stayed. I decided that the only way to play these guys was to play tight, but to always raise preflop on nondraw hands played in latter position. My rule was I raised or folded. No limping.

This told the tight nits to either put some money in the pot or fold.

It also made the pot worth playing for those who stayed, and gave my high cards with more chance of winning some money if they won. Consistent raising also meant that the old nits knew every raise was not pocket aces, stayed in, and my loss of respect meant I got good pay for my pocket kings, the last hand I played. I lost $3 taking my score for the trip down to $27.

We left Bill at the casino as he was traveling on to Atlantic City while Scott and I stopped on the way home for some Mexican and had a great meal. Once we were beyond Hartford, we felt that we could not get held up easily in traffic, so there was time to eat.

It was great to have a long visit with my old colleague. I was sorry Bill was not in the car with us. It was fun to play three at the same table, but I think Scott would like to play at a separate table, and that does make sense if we are all going to have a chance to win since we were winning each other's money.

My most memorable hand was when I played no limit for a while at Mohegan. Most of the ten tables did not look inviting to me, but one looked very good and I managed a seat. The brush was very accommodating all night in getting us together, in giving us seats. Often they don't want to deal with seat changes, but this fellow was easy going and helpful.

I had lost about $20 and played few hands winning only one small pot on an Ace-King after the flop showed an Ace.

I was dealt Q-10 of diamonds and the fellow to my right made it $12. All others folded. I suppose I should have folded too but I called. The flop was 10-10-Q. I checked my full house. He bet $10. I called. The turn was a 10 giving me quads. I checked. He bet $10 and called. The river was nothing of value, and I had to decide what to do. The dealer asked me if I checked and I said no. I was a bit rattled. Finally, I just picked up my largest stack of reds and dropped them as a bet, leaving a bit over $10, so that it would look like I did not want to risk everything. Holding a queen, the fellow called and I had a very nice win. After that the table dwindled in numbers and I left. When I did, the table broke. I went back to play 2-4. So really on the 2-4 I lost money over the course of my play.

Scott ended just under $200 profit and very pleased with himself for his discipline and attention to the game. He had come a bit worried. He left knowing he could easily play this game.

My confidence after so many losing sessions was higher.

One thing I learned was to scout out the tables and then ask for the one I wanted. I could not do that in many casinos. Table selection is clearly important. Looking at accumulated chip stacks, faces, and just the patterns of betting helps eliminate places that are harder.

Gregg almost came with us. He thought about it. Perhaps he will next time. Perhaps others will as well.

While at Foxwoods, I got my 10 comp points for showing up at the Player's club and that brought me up to 33 points, so I have my third free trip voucher now for the bus and enough points to get my fourth free trip voucher on my next visit. Just I am ahead over a hundred dollars in free rides, free bus, food, and freeplay just over the last few trips. This is one advantage Foxwoods has over Turning Stone. Lately Foxwoods gives me $10 for just showing up while Turning Stone charges me $2 to play poker.

Total score for these two days is $256 plus $28 or $284.

Foxwoods bus trip July 8

2010-07-09T19:27:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a fine day. Bill and I went up on the bus to Foxwoods, had a fine visit on the way up in part planning Vegas in November when we overlap visits. This morning I called Harrah's again and before we were done, they had comped me two more nights so I have five straight nights in Vegas at Harrah's casino (where I have never played or stayed by the way) This is the weirdest system for making and approving offers I have ever seen. I got lucky twice with good operators, and they added extra free days each time, so it beings my hotel bill down to an average of $15 a night for the last nine nights and I have a good long time to work on the first seven nights and all the Coast casino offers hopefully still to come.

But I did not get as lucky at Bill. With the bus to Foxwoods we get ten dollars of freeplay and somehow that became fifteen this trip. Playing his freeplay Bill hit for two grand. And when he was signing the paperwork and getting the hand pay, the attendant said he had to play one more hand to clear the jackpot from the machine. On that hand he won another hundred dollars.

On my free play I won three dollars.

I did beat Bill's score in casino poker, however, ending up $37 ahead to his $30. We played for most of the day at the same table. I drank way too much, working my way through about $60 in free amaretto and free rum and one free Courvoisier. Oh well, we are only young once.
I was playing pretty drunk just before going to the buffet for dinner, and I tried a trick I learned at the El Cortez. Holding Queen-jack I had flopped 8-9-10 for the nut straight, but there were two spades as well, so most likely someone would be holding a flush draw. So I pretended to want a spade, hoping that at least I could save one bet if the spade came and beat my straight or keep in folks with other sorts of hands if no space came or if straight cards came and might make my bet too obvious. No spade on the turn, so I look defeated and say, "Well, I gotta bet it."and I do and they pay me.
No spade on the river, and again I am down in the mouth and I say, " Well, I still better bet it," and I do and get two callers.
They just figured the drunk, old guy had lost his filters and was revealing his missed flush. Even Bill thought I had missed my flush draw and maybe had a pair at best, when actually I had the nut hand and was just building the pot. Of course, the win would have been more satisfying had someone at the table raised me, but it was a good pot.
Another good earlier play was a button raise with 8-9 offsuit to get a cheap free card on any straight draw. They all were in and they all check to me on the turn and I checked for the free card and catch the straight on the river. They paid me in that hand too because the raise suggested that I had a high pair. One fellow thought queens but could not understand why I raised him on the river.
It was a great table and I had a fine time.
When I left for dinner, I was up $124, but a short and sober session after dinner before we left gave me second best cards and took me down quite a bit. In and hour I won only one hand and was underpaid in that one.
I got another free bus voucher, so that will be my third free trip in a row, and I expect I will get another, especially if a few of us go up to Foxwoods/Mohegan Sun next week for an overnight. The points add up and then are sweetened by the 10 points they give me just for showing up.
It was good to be in the cool casino on such a hot day. If I did not gamble, I'd be tempted to take the bus ride, read a book, play the freeplay and eat the buffet. All worth $27 just to stay cool+

Here is a bit of poker from Wild Bill in Vegas

2010-06-19T03:40:00.001-07:00

I decided to stay at Imperial Palace for my last 3 days in Vegas. I called them to ask what they could do for me. I told them I stayed here last year for a week while here for a bowling tournament. The lady came back and told me I could have Thurs. free, $70 for Fri. and $60 for Sat. I thought that was great. I didn't check in until 7:30 and decided to watch the basketball game. When it was over I closed my eyes for a second, and didn't wake up until 1:30. So I decided to go play hold em and maybe catch a few drunk players. I had such bad luck, it got to be funny. One of the better players looked over at me after my third bad beat and just shrugged his shoulders. the first one I had pocket kings and the flop come J-7-3. someone earlier than me had raised pre flop, so I decided to slow play and just call. When someone bet on the flop, I raised and 3 players called. The turn and river were uneventful and I kept raising the whole way. The river was a 5. there has to be $80 in the pot and I show my pocket kings. One of the drunk, bad playing kids, turns over J-5 for two pair.

I won't tell you all the horror stories, but this one ranks up there with the all time. I had Q-10 suited. Flop comes Q-5-6 with the 5&6 being in my suit. So I am raising and there are 4 players including the guy next to me who was hammered. His wife wanted him to go, so he kept raising and with me re raising the pot quickly went over $100. Of I forgot the best detail Dewey, he never looked at his cards. You can guess what happened, i never caught my flush, but still held that I would win as my Q's were top pair. So what does the drunk guy turn over? first a 5, which game him a pair, then a Q. Just with those two hands I could have been up $180. Another hand, the one before my pocket kings, the guy next to me won a $100 pot when he caught trip K's. I folded and the K he caught on the river would have given me the nut straight.

I don't think I will play here anymore though, too big a rake. I'm going over to O'sheas to play this afternoon. Take care and talk toyou when I get home. bill

Newsletter to Poker group

2010-06-18T09:03:00.001-07:00

Hello poker fans,

I thought I'd post a bit of a newsletter.

We are having some games at Orford, unfortunately not announced with much lead time. They are fun. Sometimes Peter calls them and sometimes I do. If you are not getting an invitation, drop me a note and I'll add you to the list of invites.

And to answer a question posed this week again, Orford games are not all-guys games, but mix the genders whenever there are women interested enough to join us and not intimidated by being outnumbered.
Foxwoods

I went up to Foxwoods yesterday by bus. The details are in the following post.

Wild Bill says he wants to go sometime on the Foxwoods bus and I do have another free voucher for me to use so I'll be ready. Wild Bill is in Vegas as I write taking all the money from the Downtown poker tables after bankrupting SouthPoint. I think that is why the Gaughn family is in financial distress this week and unable to pay their loans. Wild Bill struck again.

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/jun/14/gaming-exec-john-gaughan-sued-over-business-loans/

If you are interested in heading to Foxwoods on the Yankee Trails, let me know and I'll make sure that you know when we decide to go. $25 booked ahead on line gets you $15 in free play, a $17 buffet and the ride up and back.

POKER FOR A GOOD CAUSE

John Blowers suggests you put this event on your calendar.

http://www.allinforwishes.org/

BOOKED FOR VEGAS

I am booked for my next Vegas trip. November 1-16. Southwest will book now thru January instead of just at their prior pattern of three month advance bookings. I booked using my free Rapid Rewards credits and the availability of seats was all over the month. Also the one way price was $144 which in today's market is a good deal. Going nonstop on RR credits was a bit tighter, but I managed it. I am delighted to have a time frame now in which to plan.

If anyone wants to meet me in Vegas, that would be fun. Elizabeth does not go with me. I don't think of myself as a good gambling companion anymore because I don't share my room, and I spend way too much time at some poker tables, but generally I meet up with folks in Vegas for a meal on a coupon or some other fun experience. Often I meet people from the Vegas discussion boards.

PARIS FOUNTAIN IN GONE

Missing from Vegas will be my favorite fountain, the Paris fountain where godlike figures hold fish aloft.

Plenty of photos of the fountain here:

http://blonde4ever.yuku.com/reply/135076#reply-135076

I guess I can still see the collage of canoes at City Center,

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2009/may/03/citycenters-crown-jewel/

but the cement fish are gone.

I'll have to go to Utica for a sculptural experience similar to that one.

REDISCOVERED WORD

idiophone - an instrument producing sound primarily through vibration.

The poker application has to do with our Rebel pal Jerry and his constant click clacking of chips while he took inordinate amounts of time to make a betting decision.

He recently complimented me at coming to the conclusion that I needed to slow down the action a bit to consider; however, I don't intend to give folks time to go for a sandwich in between plays. We might be talking about very different lengths of time.

Incidently, my calling unclearly for time at Foxwoods cost me at least $4.

Okay, hope you are all winning and happy, whatever your game.

A Day at Foxwoods

2010-06-18T03:59:00.001-07:00

My gambling had been in a long slump until three games ago when the live poker started to turn around. I have not been winning huge amounts, but I have been feeling more in charge of my game, more as if I am thinking clearly and taking full advantage of where and when and for how long I play. Clearly I did not do that on my last Vegas trip.

I don't require much from this gambling hobby. I have the Jean Scott mentality that studied attention to detail will not make me rich, but may put the random part of the experience at a break even place while the comps push the value into the black.

I know there are gamblers content merely with the thrill of riding the random roller coaster and happy to be entertained even when playing low expectation games if on some days they have the thrill of winning and on the other, they have the thrill of losing. However, if I gamble very long in a situation where the mathematics are such that I know I must be ground down in the long run, then it takes the edge off the fun for me, and I feel like a chump simply being exploited by this big casino industry.

Live poker puts the math in the power of the players and merely pays the casino to do the service of dealing and enforcing the rules, of calling the game and paying attention to mistakes in reading cards, and of providing a comfortable venue of strangers.

I love my local home games with poker buddies, but it means playing with the same folks every week, understanding their patterns, knowing who can easily be beat and who cannot. And it means constant focused attention on aberrant behaviors that confuse the play, both theirs and mine.

A bus trip to Foxwoods frees me from all of that responsibility for monitoring the rules, as well as from bringing my own refreshments and staking my underfunded son. Driving for the Yankee Trails bus means I drive just a third of the distance it takes to get to my weekly local game at Gregg's and that the time between drives makes it much easier to have a few drinks.

However, the Foxwoods bus ride round trip is almost 5 and a half hours. I have to be in the right frame of mind to enjoy that ride. If I am at all impatient, it is grueling, especially if it is crowded.

The price is right.

I can book it on line for $25 and this includes $15 of free slot play, a $17 buffet, and transportation. Lately, just for showing up, Foxwoods adds another $10 in reward points.

This trip was free because last visit I used my accumulated points to get a voucher from Foxwoods good for a fee trip.

For that I get about seven hours of poker.

Sometimes the bus will have a sale and the price will go down to $16. I don't like to book then unless I have a buddy coming along as the buses crowd up and I won't have two seats to myself. Today the bus was only a little over half full.

Having a buddy come also means a long time of focused conversation and storytelling. I enjoy that as well.

But this time, I was solo. Wild Bill says he wants to go with me next trip, but he says it in an email from Southpoint in Vegas where he is winning some at poker, but more at slots so it won't be for a while.

Sometimes it will be dead quiet on the ride up, but on the way back there will be a movie. We had an inexperienced drive this time who did not bring a movie or entertain us with jokes. However, two older women behind me and a group of laughing men in front of me entertained me both ways and seemed never to run out of things to say. Often I engage other riders, but this time I just sat quietly and listened to the banter and the stories. I have always enjoyed diners or taverns for the same reason. They put me in a community of strangers and let me watch and listen.

Some of the men did not live far from me out here in the country. They talked of boating and deer, of where to buy a case of inexpensive cigars and of road work in the area. I think they work on the highways here. One kept joking that he had told everyone (perhaps his wife) that he was on jury duty. This included some of the fellows he encountered on the bus who were surprised to see him, so perhaps for him this was a mental health day.

The women behind me reminded me of listening to my grandmother. It is rare at 63 to be able to encounter old folks, but these bus trips are often filled with seniors averaging 20 years older than me. It gives me hope, and it makes me feel like a kid again quietly listening to their converstation the way I listened to my parents talk over a late night lunch in the kitchen after I had been sent to bed. It is hard at 63 to remember what it felt like to be nine.

The women were doing a simple crossword puzzle. This was not the NY Times puzzle, but these were not college educated women either. They struggled with very simple clues and asked around in their group.

So _______________ Alva Edison took them forever and I don't think they ever did get that "fisherman's basket" was a creet. I am not a good crossword puzzle player, but I knew most of the simple clues over which they struggled. I kept my mouth shut. And I think that was very wise.

This attention to trivia however was wonderful when they started talking about old movies. One woman could remember the players in dozens of old films, remember their marriages and how they died, remember what happened in the old movies and certain scenes that moved them. I love old movies, but I I could not tell you how many time Elizabeth Taylor was married, or that she was infirm now and wanted to die, or even than she fell from the horse acting in National Velvet and never fully recovered. I had just seen Barbara Stanwyck in "Ball of Fire" and I did remember that "Big Valley" was her television show, but much of the detail of the lives and accomplishments of these actors was not in my memory.

They did talk of the weather and how much more the trees had filled out in green since they had come last, and of the many, many people who they knew who had died. Death and disease are common conversation among seniors. Funerals are as common as poker games.

"That is why you have to enjoy every day," the old movie buff reminded, "Because in the whisk of an eye we can be gone."

That malapropism was worth the entire trip.

And so I was entertained.

There is also from the bus a certain perspective that I can't get even in my van. The window was huge and clean and the passing forests and farms, the rivers and lakes and birds all looked much more grand than they do from a car. Perhaps it is the added height or just the freedom from thinking about the driving.

At one point I watched a hawk circle for a long while. In car travel the site of a hawk is a brief glimpse,but the large picture window meant that I he had plenty of space to circle and swoop and still be in my vision.

He was looking for some poor mouse who in "the whisk of an eye" would die to be supper.

Even when I don't drive myself, I find I am constantly watching the details of the driving. Having the paid driver as well as no real view of the traffic or road conditions is like having a dealer in the pokerroom. It frees up my focus and changes the experience.

We arrived in good time, twenty to ten, a full half hour earlier than we had arrived on the last bus trip. There was a good bit of action in the card room, perhaps because the badbeat is pushing closer to $200,000. I was signed up to play either 2-4 or 4-8, and started on a new 2-4 table which usually makes me very happy because I will get a shot at some poor players before they lose their money for the day, but this table was tight. In the eight hands I had A-A, A-K, A-J, pocket kings and a couple other playable pairs, won most of them, and looked down to see practically no profit. Even betting that many in a row had not pushed the old rocks off their tight game.

So I changed tables.

I had looked around earlier and notice a table I liked with some mixtures of people.

I sat down just to the right of the button, and posted, only to have to see a $2 raise on my 6-9 opffsuit. Everyone was in.

The flop gave me a gutshot straight. Again, everyone was in, so I tossed in another $2.

And I caught.

The fellow acting a few players ahead of me bet. I decided not to push out the player's acting behind me, and that was a good choice as four more folks called me.

I raised on the river when I had the nut and still had two callers.

When I collected the chips, I was up $80.

Well, I was up and down all day. The fish at my table kept catching trips when I was in a hand with him, so while he lost all his profits eventually, he did not lose to me but merely distributed my money around the table. I was positioned perfectly, right to the left of a regular tight player and an overbetting fish, so I had generally had the advantage of seeing raises and a rock's calls before I acted.

Still in the long run I lost for the session.

And I lost in my second session as well.

There I played one interesting hand.

I had pocket fours on the button. Two nines came on the flop. Someone bet. I should not have played the fours, but I wanted to play them. Calling was foolish, so I raised.

Sometimes that says "I have a full house" and they fold. Other times it at least buys a free card for just $2. The turn brought me nothing, but everyone checked to me and I checked. Some of the checkers had trip nines.

The river brought me my four, so I raised and beat a guy with pocket queens, and two players with trip nines. I also totally confused and annoyed them which helped me in the rest of my game. A few hands earlier with pocket aces I had raised in middle position and had isolated players as intended, but won me only a few chips. I thought that showing I could raise on pocket 4's might help my next Aces.

And I felt like although I probably should have folded those fours, I did play them perfectly, minimizing my risk.

i got lucky.

So while I ended up the second session down again, I felt my poker was fine.

For a short while after dinner I sat at a 4-8 table and let the play come around to me while I waited and watched and listened. Guys there were talking about how they just could not afford to play 30-60 anymore or some such high stakes game, and I saw how tight the rest of table was.

"know when to run"

I left and went back to my 2-4 game.

I must remember that in Vegas. Evaluate the table and then get out even if the next game is a casino walk away.

All day I remember only one real misplay, and then it was because the dealer missed my " wait one sec" for "check" and I missed a bet. I had wanted time to think through how likely it was that someone had caught a bigger straight than I had when the river made that possible, as well as time to represent some doubt to offset an earlier successful check raise that had built my pot. It was a poor choice of words. I am certain there were more, especially when the waiter forgot the lime in my Myer's rum and so brought me a complete new drink with two limes. That was just before dinner and I did feel the rum working along with an earlier coffer and amaretto.

So I was down over ninety dollars on the poker.

However, I picked up $19 on the free slot play. I have found a two coin dollar machine with a relatively low large jackpot. This means it will more likely bring me some profit on my freeplay. I hit three sevens twice and cashed out $19.

A poorer but more lucky choice was to play some bad pay video poker. I was attracted by a paytable on a Bonus Poker machine that looked like the full pay of 8-5. I even put in $20 before I noticed that the table started at two pair.

What a ripoff!

But I wanted just ten minutes of play before the bus, so I put my $20 in an 8-5 Double Double Bonus machine and hoped for the best. When I got down to 40 credits, I told myself I would quit at zero or if I broke back even. About this time I hit quad jacks.

So my losses for the day at poker were reduced to just $17, just equal to the price of the free buffet. In comps the day left me well ahead. I left too with another voucher for another free trip sometime soon.