Before getting back with more details from the night of blogger's poker, which I teased about here, I need to tell you about the big hand from last night's session. The hand involved the the most powerful hand in poker, which is of course definitely not Pocket Aces and most, most defnitely not Pocket Kings. No, no, no. You see, after playing several hours the night before with Poker Grump, the hand naturally had to revolve around the "Mighty Deuce Four."
I had been having an up and down night, and I believe by this point I was a bit down from my $200 buy in. I was in the Big Blind and a player in early position made it $10. Two players called, including the Small Blind to my right. I looked down at two-four offsuit and decided to just call with such a great starting hand--to slow play it. I had just witnessed the awesomeness of this hand the previous night, demonstrated by the master of it, Grump himself. He's already described that event here. Of course, the victim of Grump's mastery of this killer hand, Prudence, was at the table with me, but this time she was, luckily for her, a mere spectator to what was about to unfold.
The flop was 2-2-10, rainbow. The Small Blind checked, and I bet out $20, about half the pot. It folded back to the Small Blind, who check-raised it to $50. Clearly he had expected the original raiser to bet, but I had beat him to it, so he check-raised me instead.
I thought about re-raising but decided I could get more money by just calling for now. Prudence had already told me the story about this guy from before I had arrived at the table. He had totally "Hollywooded" a flopped straight and gotten a couple of people to bet for him and then call his river shove when he had the stone cold nuts. I thought I could use his high opinion of his own poker skills to my advantage.
I called his $50 bet on the turn, whatever it was. When he bet another $50 on the river (another innocuous looking card), I was pretty sure I had the best hand. I think there might have been a Jack on the board by then, but nothing very threatening. I couldn't see this particular guy playing pocket 10's like this. I thought about it awhile, tried to Hollywood this guy as best I could, then said, "All in."
He snapped called (he had me covered by quite a bit) and said, "I have a 10."
Silently, I turned over my deuce-four and watched as the dealer pushed me the pot. I had now around $400 in chips in front of me, and I was able to build from there. I of course pointed out my hand to Prudence, who was watching with great interest.
"The most powerful hand in poker," I said to her. She shook her head in disbelief. "I know, I know. You're crazy." (or words to that effect). Poor dear, she still fails to see the power of this mighty hand. She is sure that "falling in love" with that hand will cost you over time. I guess she will just have to see it action many more times before she is convinced. Oh well.
Meanwhile, I realized that my glee in showing Prudence the hand might have been seen as rubbing it in to the guy who lost a good chunk of his stack to me. So rather than insincerely saying "I'm sorry," I just said to him, "Tough hand."
"Yeah," he said. "It's hard to put you on that hand."
And that my friends, is the power of the mighty deuce four!
Thanks, Grump!
For more tales from this particular night of poker, albeit with a very different tone and focus, check out this post here.
EDITED TO ADD: The Deuce-Four maven himself, Poker Grump, has added a link to my post on his excellent blog, link below. Thanks again for the lesson, Grump!
http://pokergrump.blogspot.com/2012/05/convert.html
Wow, what a night. I don't have time to go into details, but it was one helluva a poker session tonite, what with Poker Grump, Grrouchie, and Prudence all at the same poker table. Three bloggers and the effervescent Ms. Prudence all at the same poker game? Needless to say, hilarity ensued. For now, I can just tease the inevitable marathon blog post that will eventually be produced from this epic night. You see, I had never met Mr. Grump before, and it was indeed a pleasure to finally not only meet him but actually play some poker with him. As with grrouchie, I found he is very much misnamed....not at all the Grump he would like you to believe he is. He is a very nice guy and I look forward to many more meetings and poker sessions with him, where hopefully he won't take too much of my money.
Some of the topics from tonite that will be blogged about (eventually):
Prudence pointing out to me a woman with the largest breasts (and most cleavage) in the history of poker players. Seriously, this gal makes Jennifer Tilly look prepubescent. What was funny and what was not discussed tonite was that earlier in the day, I had seen a stunning looking female poker dealer who pretty much had the largest breasts I'd ever seen on a poker dealer, who was actually dealing with plenty of exposed cleavage. A cleavage-exposing poker dealer? Definitely a trend I'd like to see continue.
Grump demonstrating to us personally the power of his favorite hand, the mighty deuce-four.
Josie's breasts and cleavage, which were indeed discussed, although we did not discuss Josie.
The upcoming TBC poker tournaments to take place in Vegas next month, which will be held with our without Tony himself....again, although we did not discuss Tony himself.
Me, playing the worst poker I've played in the past three years. Seriously, I was a total donkey tonite. Apparently I couldn't handle the "pressure" of playing with both Grump and grrouchie, and I just collapsed under said pressure. I literally handed grrouchie my entire $200 stack at one point early, and he didn't even thank me for it. Probably the worst played hand in my life. It was not only costly, it was extremely embarrassing. Somehow, I eventually recovered and ended up a little bit ahead for the nite, finally managing to play a few hands correctly without just spewing chips all over the place.
Prudence, somehow managing to go the entire evening without talking about her vagina....or anyone else's vagina, for that matter. She didn't say the word one time the entire evening, possibly a record for her.
Grrouchie, playing poker like he was illegitimate son of Phil Ivey and Jennifer Harman. The man was totally on fire, and I'm pretty sure he won every single pot he entered. I believe he left with at least $200,000 in winnings. (IRS, please take note)
I just pray I can remember the other highlights of the evening.
Poker Grump has already posted his version of the night here.
And part one of grrouchie's take can be found here.
And part two of grrouchie's take is now here
And....now the full story of this nite of poker has been told here and here.
This story happened at today's Binions 2PM tournament. The guy next to me, relatively clean cut, I'd guess late 20's, early 30's, overheard some lady on the other end of the table get a bit snippy with the gentleman next to her. I don't know what the issue was. But the guy had recently asked if this tournament has an extended break coming up for food, since it started at 2PM and this was now after 6, and it was clear that with 88 runners, it wasn't going to end until late in the evening. He was told no, and now, upon hearing the woman getting into it with the man, the guy next to me said that this is why you need a longer break for food at some point.
He said something like, "I don't want to get offend anyone, but in my experience, women tend to get very cranky when they are hungry. I think that's why we need a food break."
The lady to his left, who was probably late 50's or perhaps a bit older said that wasn't the case with her at all. She has no problem going long periods of time without food. Her husband is always asking if she wants to eat, and she says no.
The guy says, "Well, maybe I've been dating the wrong women. Do you have a daughter?"
The woman says, "Yes, I do. She just turned 27 and is single. And she just moved to Las Vegas. She's an attorney. But.....she's a bitch."
We all cracked up, and I said, "Her mother folks....her mother!" (That's actually a reference to a line in the Woody Allen movie, Love & Death).
The guy said maybe he wasn't interested after all.
Then she added, "Also, she's turned two guys gay."
The guy said, "Well, then I definitely don't want to meet her."
The woman said, "Well, they said they were gay all along, but I don't know."
We were all giggling about the mother's wonderful description of her very own daughter! Finally, she meekly said, "No, actually, she's really very nice. It's just.....well......"
She never finished the sentence, I'm not sure if she was stopped because she had to start paying attention to the game or because she really didn't know how to finish it.
About a 1/2 hour later, another woman joined our table sitting right next to the lady with the bitch attorney for a daughter. The two ladies were chatting and when the first lady mentioned that her daughter was an attorney, the guy next to me and I once again started giggling, leaving the new woman at the table wondering what was so funny. The mom alluded to a comment she made earlier without explaining it. The other guy and I were too gentlemanly to repeat her comment.
I am left wondering if the daughter knows her dear old mom thinks she's a bitch!
