Joanne - who's going to be the first female blogger to win a major tourney, eh?
First of all Al, I am glad you added the 'eh?' cause otherwise I may not have understood the question. Us Canucks get confused easily you know.
I would love to say that the first female blogger to win would be me. But you know what? It ain't gonna happen. I have far too many obstacles to overcome before I could even consider achieving that goal. Logistics The most obvious is logistics - first you gotta get me to the damn thing. You know firsthand that no amount of asking, begging, pleading, coercing, bribing, threatening, guilt-tripping or forcing is going to actually make me leave my house. Hell, if I can't even make it to a blogger event, how am I going to make it to a major tournament?
Dial-A-Shots Let's imagine, shall we, that I managed to stop ice fishing for a moment and the dogsled teams were able to drag me from the vast hinterland I call home to the nearest airport. The stars somehow managed to align and I actually made it to the event. Would I now have a chance? Oh no - there is still far too much to overcome.
I would be seated at the final table with the likes of Johnny Chan, Hellmuth and Scotty Nguyen, when all of a sudden my cell phone would ring. Sure enough, it is the Philadelphia Chapter of Quantity Control on the other line inquiring if I have reached my daily quota of liquid sunshine yet.
Sheepishly admitting that I haven't, you proceed to wax poetic about the virtues of SoCo and Dial-A-Shots. Like I could say no. Has it ever done me any good before?
No Al, I can’t have a shot cause my parents are over No Al, I can’t have a shot cause it is only two in the afternoon on a Tuesday No Al, I can’t have a shot cause I have to work for another four hours
Yeah right. Like any of that has ever worked. Even before I could say...
No Al, I can’t because I am at the final table of a major tournament
...BigMike would join you on the line and all I'd be able to hear would be a rousing chorus of “Joannada” until I caved and ordered a damn shot from the cocktail waitress. I’d have to tip her big and tell her to keep ‘em coming, cause there is no such thing as a single Dial-A-Shot during momentous occasions like that one.
Eventually I would have to sit out and run over to Pauly’s laptop, because you know he would be there covering the tournament. I would proceed to get my fill of IM-A-Shots with everyone else as my hands got mucked over and over in my absense.
This could only lead to drinking games at the table (cause you know I’m not going to party by myself) and I would talk Scotty Nguyen into having Fold-A-Shots and Bluff-A-Shots with me. Before long, he and I would be sitting out constantly, as we would need to keep going for those in-between-drink smoke breaks. We would bust out, but who would care at that point?
The point, Al, is that you are probably –EV for my game. (And Scotty Nguyen’s as well, apparently.)
The ‘Eh’ Factor
Even if I managed to successfully leave my cell phone at home, I still wouldn’t have a hope in hell of winning the damn thing. There would certainly be an incident that sparked the tournament director to declare English-only at the tables, and my vocabulary simply wouldn’t cut it. I can understand this though, really. It would certainly be too much work for the film crews to add subtitles or dubbing so the general population could understand me.
Imagine me getting into it with Phil Hellmuth.
PH- You called me all the way to the river with that hand? Me- Take off, eh?
PH- If it weren’t for luck, I’d win ‘em all Me- What’s this all abooot?
PH- You are a Jopke Me- Ya Hoser
Yes, I would certainly be disqualified for being too damn Canuck.
So, to answer your question, there isn’t much chance of me winning a major tournament. The actual game of poker? Ah hell, that is the easy part – raise, fold, check, bet. It’s the rest of it that is too difficult to master.
What a weekend. Flew by way too fast, as most enjoyable weekends do.
On Friday night I had a dial-a-shot conference call with April and Iggy, which turned into a four-hour discussion about online tournament poker strategy, among many other fascinating topics. You guys are the best, by the way - that was a ton 'o fun.
Iggy expressed his hope that I would discuss my thoughts and theories about tournament play in a blog post, so I have begun. However, I will be posting them over at CardSquad because, well, I am sure it is obvious why.
You can click here to read the series, which will continue over the next few days. Yes, I am giving away all my 'trade secrets' ;)
Saturday night I played in the PokerStars Deep Stacks tournament and came in 70th out of 1100. I doubled my entry, but it took 7 hours and 1 minute to accomplish that minor victory. The full tournament ran 11 hours before crowning a champion, but I would play it again in a heartbeat. I really enjoyed the format, though it certainly wouldn't appeal to everyone.
Last night I played in my weekly live tournament, and placed 12th out of 50th. Not a great showing, but it was fun as always.
I'll be focusing on writing that tournament series for the next couple of days - hope you enjoy it.
Yes, the rumors are true, I did finish in first place. Wow, what a field of players though, there was a lot of talent there. I have cashed in MTT's before, but this one was more exciting just due to the fact that I knew a lot of the players and have a great respect for all of them.
Our final table included Derek, Maudie, April, Decker and Jaxia. Bloggers definitely represented!
I can't wait for next week's tourney. Hit up CardSquad for details about the next event, Wil should be posting that soon.
I am sad to say that my daughter is NOT the new President of Degrassi Junior High. Fortunately, she has since decided that it would take up too much of her spare time and is now focusing all her energy on her thirteenth birthday next week. Priorities, I suppose.
Also, thanks for the Turkey Day wishes. I have to admit though, I didn't have turkey for Thanksgiving. No Pauly, I didn't have moose either. We actually had ham, scalloped potatoes, and assorted vegetables. There was pumpkin pie, but no - I didn't have any. Ick. No offense to the 'chef' who brought it along, I am just not a pie fan. Though I did sample a half piece of irish cream nanaimo bars - those were really good.
I am still struggling to catch up and get back to my normal schedule after being sick for a few weeks and shuttling parental-types to and from the hospital, but I will try to post more regularly this week.
One of the hardest things about getting older is realizing that the recent memories you have are actually not recent at all. When I think back to Junior High (in Canada that is grades 7-9) it doesn't seem all that long ago.
Now, my daughter is in grade 8 and is running for School President. Oh my. My little political offspring will find out the results today, so please keep your virtual fingers crossed for her.
So we have hockey again, eh? I only have one word for that: BAH. I stopped caring what happened in the NHL years ago and I have little-to-no intention of watching it this year either. That said, I know that deep down something will trigger in my canuck blood and I will be drawn to it inexplicably like Al to a Soco shipment.
In happier news, it is good to live in Alberta. Our Province is so rich that our Premier Ralph Klein (Canada's equivalent to US Governers) is sending a cheque to every Alberta resident for $400. I am planning to use part of it to cover the increased fuel cost of gassing up my car, and the rest I want to donate to Hurricane Relief - hopefully via some poker tournaments if there are any more. Gas prices here average $1.05/litre now, which converts to $4.20/gallon. There isn't much difference between our dollar and the USD anymore, so needless to say fuel prices have skyrocketed here.
I am finally over the flu that has plagued me for the past 3 weeks, so I am looking forward to doing a little partying, playing a live tournament tomorrow night, and enjoying the three-day Thanksgiving weekend coming up. Yes, Tryptophan Day is Monday here in Canuckland. I will definitely be sedated in a turkey coma next week.
It's been a little while since I posted, so I figured I better catch up.
Life has been a little crazy. Both my parents had (scheduled) surgeries within the past two weeks, so I have been playing chauffeur/personal shopper/nurse to them. My Mom had a few complications, so at one point they were both in the hospital at the same time. Nothing like running back and forth to her in the ER and my Dad in his room, where he had to stay for five days.
Between that, having the flu, looking after Jess and trying to do some work, I haven't had much spare time. Unfortunately, that all contributed to my NOT going to the Boathouse Bash. I had an amazing offer from Al & Co., and I thank you guys for it, but with all that going on there was just no way I could go.
Last night marked my return to playing tournaments though. I played three total, including two of my small Calgary ones. I placed third and first in the Cal. tournaments, and busted out in 32nd place in the larger one. Didn't really surprise me though, as my attention span has been relativaly short over the past few weeks.
Anyways, I am back and will be playing at least one tournament a night this week, so hopefully things will get better by the weekend.
