Wardonkey's weekend

I have to confess that I've been a bit lazy over the past month or so I haven't put my usual hours in on-line.
This hasn't been due me losing interest it's just that I've allowed my self to be distracted at every opportunity and haven't said no to anyone who's invited me to do anything. I've had a lot of fun and played enough poker to keep things ticking over but one result of my 'Just say 'Yes'' policy is that my summer is already looking very full. At some point (now) I'm going to have to have to put some overtime in to make sure that I am properly financed for an indulgent summer.

I play most of my poker on-line and grinding away on the STTs is my main source of income. I don't really consider my live poker exploits as great money making ventures, but I enjoy them immensely and if I turn a small profit at the end of the year then so much the better.

So when I decided, early last week, to travel south to play the first to days of the Luton triple bill and the P4C event at the Western, it was yet another indulgence that would keep me from the grindstone for another weekend.

I'm so glad that I did, because this weekend I had the more fun playing poker than I've ever had before.

On Friday night I had the pleasure meeting TightEnd again and of Jen's company in the bar for an all to short time before the £100 wotsit kicked off. It was a good tournament, but I didn't play very well and went out in rather silly fashion after deciding that with 10 big blinds left and a tight table that I should step up a gear and try to win some chips. I got creative with my 7,5 of clubs, walked into AK and wandered over to the cash tables.

I don't get the chance to play dealers' choice very often and although I enjoy it, my first experiences of any kind of poker were wild dealers choice affairs, I am no expert and after £300 worth of fun, I surrendered. I left TightEnd battling away on the final table and retired to my hotel room.

Saturday was the £300 freezeout and there was a large blonde contingent preparing to attack. Including Tikay, Noflops, Tighty, Teacake and the InTheBelly crew, apologies for any ommisions I know there were more.

Tikay was drawn two seats to my left and I was lucky enough to enjoy his company all the way to the final table. He is great fun to play with, an entertainer at the table and not a shabby player to boot. Neither of us managed to get hold of a lot of chips so we were ducking and diving for most of the tournament with Tikays ride being even more of a rollercoaster than mine. At one point he was all-in preflop against two callers but his Q7 held up and from there he rode a wave of cards that took him to the final table. I managed to trail in his wake and limped to a blonde packed final table. Despite doubling up on the first hand of the final after Carlo Citrone raised his AK into my aces, I was unable to make much of an impact. I exited in 8th shortly after making a bad call and doubling up Tikay.

I retired to the rail to join Tighty, Noflops and InTheBelly. Lightbreeze suffered a horrible beat to finish soon after but we cheered on Tikay and the impressive Rookie to a 4 way chop. I really enjoyed this tournament and was reasonably happy with my play, my live play has definately improved over the last few months but I still have work to do.

I had booked a seat on the 1107 back to London to get to the western for lunch time, now for many people 1107 is a perfectly reasonable hour to be up and about, but for me it is a very early start. My normal morning routine involves a 2 hour transitional period between a nine hour kip and a fully functional human, this involves lots of strong coffee a few cigarettes and generally loafing around. I was denied this luxury and feeling slightly dazed and severely under-caffienated I found myself a Hanger Lane tube station sometime later. I then endured a 'Kev and Booder experience' as I trudged up and down the A40 in search of the elusive Western Club. Eventually I spotted my quarry, it was on the other side of the north circular less than 100 metres away but looking as hard to reach as ever. I contemplated a frogger style assault on the busy dual carriageway but was put off by the need to commando roll under tall fence in the middle of the road and the fact that unlike frogger I have only one life. In the end, having found a suitable crossing a few hundred metres up the road I arrived at the club dripping with sweat and feeling a little short of comfortable, but happy and looking forward to replacing spent fluids. I was given a welcome hug by the Nun and the Tank put a beer in my hand, all was well.

If I thought that Luton was fun, the Western proved to be the highlight of my weekend. Thanks are due to everyone involved, it was a great day and a good time was had by all. The two hour rebuy period was crazy fun and produced more ridiculous outdraws than a $5 special on blonde. I am proud to say that I was involved in most of them!

My table started with Robert H-M, Poppet (who did a great job dealing), Jagster, North Angel, Mark S, Celtic, Andrew T, and Matt (the poker.co.uk guy, whose blonde alias escapes me). We had a great time, the chips flew around the table, most of the time the price to see a flop was all your chips, the outdraws were frequent and spectacular.

A few hours later I found myself at the final table, unfortunately the seating draw was not good too me and I had an in form Tightend, determined to recoup some of his 68 rebuys, to my immediate left and the Sheriff next door to him after a few twists and turns I found myself on the rail and out in sixth. Tightend recovered most of his rebuy money falling to the Sheriff at the last. It was a great tourney and played in great spirit by all.

It was fantastic to see many blondes enjoying themselves, it was like a mini blonde bash and all for such a worthy cause.

My day was not over yet. My train home was at 6 in the morning and I still had 8 hours to kill. The first two hours were easily disposed of playing 'Western Roll' with Flushy, Matt and John Wong (the Irish open finalist). After dropping £200 in the random game that had been invented by Lee on the night, who sensibly dropped out after a couple of rounds. The club was closing and I ventured into central London to stop off at Gutshot to try and rescue a few pennies on my way to Kings Cross.

I have a soft spot for Gutshot, when I was working at the casino it was one of the few places I could play live, even then I still had to keep it quiet at work or risk losing my job. I was a regular if infrequent visitor in those days and I always enjoy returning. The place was packed at 0200! they had 4 cash games going, the internet room was full and the tourney was still going 'next door'. The games are nearly as fast and loose as the mouths, I sat in the £50 game and enjoyed the banter and the play, got my £200 back, said hi to a few people and it was time to meet my train.

I got home at about 1000 exhausted and happy. I've had 24 hours sleep since then in 3 8 hour batches with 3 or 4 hours between each. I think I've just about recovered.

Far from sating my appitite for live poker this weekend has left me hungering for more! Now I really must get my head down and get some 'work' done before my summer schedule begins. Apart from Wednesday and the Champions league final, oh and the rugby dinner on Friday and did I hear someone say barbecue?

Well done if you got this far, I hope it wasn't too painful! I shall cease my rambling now.