I played poker last night in a local saloon til 2:00 am. When I left the house at about 6:00, it certainly wasn't my intention to be out into the wee hours playing hold em. My only plan was to attend a surprise 25th Wedding Anniversary Party for my boss and his wife.
When I entered the establishment where the party was to take place, I noticed a couple of poker tables on the right. As I mentioned, I had no intention of playing; but as the surprise party was starting to wind down, Danimal's wife Liz persuaded me to play, and she fronted me $40 in chips. The blinds were $1/$2 with a max bet of $5. It wasn't a tourney -- just an on-going ring game where you could buy back in anytime you wanted if you ran out of chips.
For the first hour, I didn't get any cards. I was starting to think that I had forgotten how to play. Then I won two or three big pots, followed by a couple more nice ones a little while later, and pretty soon I was up over $150 above my initial buy-in. Then just like that, my cards turned to crap. When the table closed for the night, I tipped the dealer, then went home with exactly $100 in profit.
The interesting part about the whole experience was that, when I did get involved in a hand, there was rarely any doubt in my mind as to whether I had to fold or continue to play the hand. Everybody at the table was drinking, and a lot of them had some pretty obvious tells.
One time, I raised with pocket kings pre-flop, and the flop was J-Q-K all different suits, giving me trip kings. I raised the max, then made a maximum bet when a 2 came up on the turn. Two players called me. When a 10 came up on the river, the woman next to me -- who up to that point was reluctantly calling my bets -- suddenly perked up like she had just been hit by a bolt of lightning or had just won the lottery.
I instantly knew my trip kings were no good, so when she bet, I showed my cards to the guy on the other side of me, then folded them even though the pot was giving me at least 8-to-1 odds. He couldn't believe I had folded trip kings until she showed us her straight.
Liz wasn't real happy with me. On one hand, I hit a straight on the river to beat out the two pair she had flopped. That pretty much did her in for the night. I honestly thought I was going to lose to a flush (given that there were several player in until the end and a third club showed up on the river -- I was sure at least one player was drawing to a club flush), but it is pretty hard for me to fold a straight (that's why I only called the bet and didn't raise it). No one made a flush, though, so the dealer ended up pushing the nice-sized pile of chips my way.
The worst part of the game was how slowly it proceeded, especially once midnight hit and that great combination of fatigue and drunkenness started setting in. Although the dealer did a good job, she really needed to push the game along more than she was doing. Drunk people require control and lots of guidance (I know I do when I'm that way). Hell, sometimes they expect it and actually want it. One time, the dealer even dealt out everyone's pocket cards before noticing that one of the drunk players was still holding his two cards from the previous hand! I couldn't believe that one.
The problem with the structure of that game (i.e., $1/$2 blinds with $5 limit) is that it is almost impossible to force anyone to fold, especially that bunch of loose, drunk players. Out of all the hands that were played, I only saw one hand where the winner didn't have to show at the end, and that was only because this player (the aforementioned drunk guy who failed to give up his cards from a previous hand) was so obviously trying to act weak that everyone knew he had a monster and just let him have the small pot (which upset him big time).
Anyway, except for all the cigarette smoking and the super slow play, it was a fun time. All the people were nice -- no mean drunks -- and I'll probably play there again.
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