Grubby at PokerWorks

I’m not sure what it was that caused me to use a sick day and then sleep that entire day and not eat anything (a first), for fear it would come out the same way it did the previous night. Or another way.

But let’s just say that I’m naming my firstborn Imodium A-D.

The last thing I ate was a slab of roast beef, a baked potato, and some fruit from the cafeteria. I also dipped into our admin. assistant’s candy jar, digging around for Kit Kats and vanilla creme Hershey Kisses and flavored Tootsie Rolls. From our art director, I grabbed some handfuls of chocolate-covered raisins. And from the dumpster, I sifted through a vat of raw meat and rubbed it around my mucous membranes.

One of those things had to have affected me later that afternoon.

That night, I more or less spent in the bathroom curled in a fetal position, using much more than Sheryl Crow’s one square of toilet paper, shivering and sweating and for once cursing at something other than bad beats and blackjack.

The next day was $2 taco day in the cafeteria to celebrate Cinco de Mayo. I celebrated my colon by skipping lunch altogether.

***

The night before my stomach exploded, four coworkers and I headed to Resorts East Chicago to play in their $175 tourney.

This is the view from outside — it really is on a riverboat.

This was my third time playing and my best showing at 12th out of 40. My best hand — and the only hand that I showed — was KK which lost to A8s that not only flopped an Ace but rivered a flush for good measure.

I was on the Button and had about 10x the big blind. Normally this puts me in instant push-or-fold mode, and I would’ve pushed if someone had come in behind me.

Last time when it folded to me on the Button, I’d pushed. The blinds were both coworkers. One folded. As the other looked at his cards, I called out for The Hammer: he folded by flipping over 72o. He said he always plays The Hammer when he gets the chance, and up against me would’ve been a good chance. I’ve lost hands to more Hammers than I care to think of. In this case, he had live cards since I only had K8o.

This time on the Button, however, I raised 3x hoping to get some value out of the Kings and one caller.

Instead, my coworker went all-in and asked if I had AQ. In a hand we’d played previously when we were the final three, I’d pushed with AQ and he’d called with A9. He said that hand led him to believe I didn’t have anything this time.

I probably would’ve done the same thing, or if not that, I would’ve tossed in another two bets to see the flop, sensing the 3x raise was a trap. We both needed chips for the final table, and there’s nothing worse than bubbling out (which he did on a flopped flush against two all-in’s over flush draws).

After busting, I retreated to blackjack to try to recover my tournament buy-in. This normally begins my slow slide to losing everything in my wallet, but this time I was able to walk away after dropping $100.

Played slots and was down a bunch before rallying and coming back to even right before blackjack. At one point I was up another $140, but I tried for that extra $35 to get me completely even for the night.

Combining the four times I’ve been to the boats, I’ve not cashed in three tournaments, lost in 5/10 limit, won in 1/2 NL, lost in blackjack, and won in slots. In fact, I’ve won enough in slots to cover the poker and blackjack losses.

Something about that doesn’t make sense.

This entry was posted on Saturday, May 5th, 2007 at 11:11 am and is filed under Uncategorized.