I'm on my way home and I decided to play a little poker. Which isn't really true, I had planned on playing poker even before leaving for the trip, but that's beside the point.
I arrived just in time to see somebody win the bad beat jackpot. Pocket 4's versus pocket kings. Flop comes out 4, 4, crap. Since it's limit the betting maxes out and the pocket kings stay in. Turn comes a king and the betting maxes out again. River is a king and the betting maxes out one last time. All in all there's about $112 in the pot. The jackpot paid out $12,500 to the pocket 4's. $6250 to the kings and everybody else at the table got $1250. Except for the two guys that got up and went to the bathroom.
So I signed up for the $2/$5 no limit and sat at the $3/$6/$12 limit game until they had a seat. Won some, lost some and finished at the limit table down $12. Since I only had $88 when they moved me to the $2/$5 must move table I bought another $100 in chips. I played maybe two hands before moving to a regular table.
Here the playing really got good. I sat down with $188 and in less than an hour had rolled that up into $440. That's when I took a break to call a couple of friends and let them know of what they were missing out on.
A few hands later I am dealt Snowmen. Pocket 8's. I wanted to narrow down the table and make them easier to protect so I lead off in an early position with a $25 bet.
5 callers! So much for protecting my hand.
The flop comes out; 3, Q, 8. I flopped a set and now I'm in serious control of this hand.
And then the big blind bets $75.
At this point I put him on two pair and I agonize about my decision. While the other players are thinking, "he's agonizing because he wants to call but he knows he should fold." In reality what I am really agonizing over is, "do I just call or do I push right now?"
With 4 players to act behind me I just call.
And so do two others.
Now I've got $100 invested in this pot and it's sitting at $452.
The turn comes out with some low middle card not likely to help anybody that called $75.
Big blind leads off with a $100 bet. This time I don't agonize as much but I still put on a little show. I call and the two behind me fold.
Now it's heads up and there's $650 in the pot.
The river is another crappy card that was unlikely to help anybody. No flushes, no straights and nothing higher than the Q on the flop.
Again the big blind leads out with a $100 bet. I pull the chips out and look at my stack. This leaves me with only about $140 left if I call. So I push, $240 and i'm all in.
Big blind calls.
I wait for him to show his cards but since he called me I am obligated to show my cards first. When I show my set of 8's he mucks his hand.
After the rake and at $25 tip I still finished with nearly $1100 for that one hand.
I went to dinner, went through the blinds a couple more times and cashed out for $1130 to end the night.
Then I find out my tire went flat while I was playing so I got to change my tire in the cold ass rain.
And I was grinning the whole time.
