Eating is so difficult…
Took off work early last Friday to head to play some cards in Chicago, or more specifically the Horseshoe in Hammond Indiana. Got off to a late start when my ride slept in and I had to go break into his apartment (that may be a slight exaggeration) to wake him up and get going. On the drive there we made a bet that the biggest winner for the weekend had to purchase the last meal.
Six hours later after a fairly uneventful drive we had checked into the Quality Inn and headed up to the casino to find games. There was a bit of a list for 5/10 NL so I jumped into a 20/40 limit game and played. I ended up breaking even in the game because after getting up early I tried a bit of a creative play that didn’t work out. I only played about 30 minutes before getting moved to the 5/10 feeder game.
The game was decent, a couple guys who seemed solid and a few soft players for sure. I built my stack from 1,000 to 1,400 before I ended up losing a three way all in where I raised and flopped top set and got it in against a made flush and middle set. I rebought for another thousand and started over. This time I got my stack to 1400 when the following hand happened.
There was a guy I played with there last time who I knew was a total fish, especially for these stakes who I had been looking to play a hand with. He opened in first position for $60, and there was a guy to my right who flat called. I knew the fish didn’t have anything really strong, he made this raise regularly with any two face cards, or suited connectors, occasionally it might be a small pair. I didn’t worry much about the caller because from what I had seen if he was really strong he would 3 bet there to isolate and play heads up with fishy. I looked down at a pair of kings and had a decision. I had been playing really straight forward to this point, and had not tried anything trappy. I didn’t think a strong 3 bet would get called so I flatted on the button and was looking for a favorable situation post flop.
The flop came AKT, with two spades. Obviously not the perfect situation but I definitely couldn’t complain. Fishy lead out for $60 dollars, and he gets called again by the guy on my right. I decide I with the possible gut shots and spade draws it’s a good time to protect my hand a little, and I raised to $230. Fishy called and the other player mucked. Apparently my protection was not warranted as the case K peels on the turn giving me quads. Fishy checked and I tanked for a second while debating a bet. I thought my best value was checking letting him think the K scared me. It worked as he fired $440 dark before the river card came. The last card was a total blank, a 4 or 6 that was not a spade. I tanked again for a second and put the rest of my chips in the middle and fishy snap calls me. He shows QJos for a flopped straight, and starts yelling at me about hitting a 1 outer. Apparently he can’t read boards or hand values.
That got me up $800 for the night and I crusied along chipping up taking most of my pots uncontested for the rest of the night and booked a $1600 win after about 6 hours of play.
The next day we got up and Shiva decided he wanted Quizno’s, which was fine by me. So we hop in the car, bring it up on the GPS and there is one 5 miles away. We drive there and find out the building is vacated. Shiva is still wanting Quizno’s so we look for the next nearest one. He says it’s 20 minutes away and I’m just cool with riding along wherever since it was still to early for us to hit the card room. We get on the interstate and end up in a traffic jam that keeps makes it a hour long drive to get to a fucking Quizno’s. The best part, by the time we got to the location on the GPS, once again there was no Quizno’s to be found. I’d like to take this time out to tell Shiva’s Garmin Nuvi GPS to fuck itself.
We had decided that if we got there and we couldn’t find the Quizno’s that we would just pick out of whatever was in the area. So we found a colorful looking restaurant called Flavor’s. We had no idea what was going to be inside, but thats where we went anyway. In the entry way we were greeted by a young cute black girl with a well kept afro who told us it was a soul food restaurant that featured live Jazz music though no one was preforming at the time. Sounded good to me, so in we went.
Have to say the food was pretty fantastic. We had a crab meat quisidilla appetizer that was way better than I expected. The corn bread was hot, fresh and full of flavor. I ordered the cajun pasta (chicken & sausage) as my main dish and was very happy with it. The portion was large enough that after appetizers I could only eat about 2/3rds of it. Pretty happy with our choice of eating establishments we headed back to the Horseshoe.
Saturday wasn’t as good for me in the games. It started off fine, we were playing a feeder that was never more than 6 handed and I gradually chipped up and was crusing along. When the table filled up things started working against me and I was happy to escape the main game with my origional starting stack after having to fold QQ preflop to a guy who 4 bet me and showed KK.
The main game was just a series of bad events, but for the most part I avoided disaster getting away from an overpair against a guy who raised and flopped a set. However I was unable to get anything going my way and by the time we decided to go hit the noodle bar I had lost a little more than 1/2 my buyin. Also during this time I was watching the Blackhawks just play like shit in game one and give up home ice to Vancouver. At least I wasn’t upset about it as the guy who came in decked out in full Blackhawks gear at the other table. I didn’t even have to watch the game to know how they were doing since I was getting the general idea based on his reactions.
So we take off and hit the extremely hidden noodle bar, and I order some chicken dish which was lacking much chicken at all and for the price was possibly the worst deals on food I had ever eaten.
At this point I tried to contact a buddy who lives in Chicago to see if he wanted to go out drinking since I knew he would be out watching the Mosley/Mayweather fight. He said he wasn’t going to be out long so we just ran back to the hotel. We watched some TV and played online, while wasting time. I decided not to go back to the card room and get some sleep. I had booked a mediocre win for the weekend and the Saturday games just were not as juicy as the ones on Friday so I didn’t think it was worth it to go.
We took off Sunday morning early enough that I could get into town for a afternoon BBQ that was planned. However on the way back we stopped to hit the Nike factory outlet and then we did have a little matter of a bet over dinner to settle, which I had won (or lost) by winning the most money for the weekend. So we stop in Ankeny debating Smash Burger or HuHot, and when we saw the new HuHot that’s where Shiva wanted to go. Unfortunately after parking and walking up to the building, it was clear that they were not open for business yet as it was still being set up so we had to settle on Smash Burger which is not a bad alternate.
I got home in time to make the BBQ a little late, but my timing was good because I got there just after the rain had stopped. Met my great nephew for the first time since this was the first time my neice had been back here after she moved to Phoenix. Hung out for a bit and enjoyed the nice weather and company. Pretty good end to the weekend.
Addendum…
In the few days that passed from when I first wrote this draft to now the downswing at my local room has continued. Monday I was on my 3rd buy-in when I had a chance to get even getting all in on the turn with top set against bottom set and ran into quads again when my opponenet rivered the one card that beat me. I’m officially on my largest live downswing ever and its getting a bit fustrating. I later lost the rest of my stack to the same player 3 handed in a flush over flush situation. Time to get back to grinding online I suppose.