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Will I Ever Play Again?

My poker game has officially taken a serious kick in arrears. When it's difficult to pay the bills month to month you have no business putting any money towards poker. By that rational I have not played in any real cash or tournament games in over a month, but I feel good about doing so. Though it certainly makes having a poker blog seem strange, eh? I still read, watch, and want to write about poker enough to keep me fully motivated to keep this thing going...so I got that goin for me. In lieu of actually playing I was scrambling to give our family a very merry Christmas. How we made it through Christmas is beyond me, however, for a guy with no dough I feel truly blessed. At our most trying times this month something always happened that was a blessing. When my Button broke a tooth biting down on something the dentist said "that'll be $98". On that same day an employee where I work who is retiring from the business at the end of December gave me a $100 check as a gift for helping him over the years. When we needed groceries...bad...my Buttons mom gave us a $50 gift card to the grocery store. This pattern continued through Christmas and has really hit home how the spirit of Christmas is quite real. Not to turn a poker blog into a religious thing, but I feel truly blessed by God to have little things like this happen to my family.

Back to poker...after playing almost once a week for the last couple of years I found myself in a tough situation this month. I have no doubt made more money than I've lost since I first began playing poker, but this was when we had enough money coming in to justify chancing $20 to make $250. Looking back, where the problem was is I didn't seperate our family money from the so called bankroll. When we had a little money in the bank I would feel fine about playing, and when I won it went straight back into our account to help pay for bills. Problem is, that money I used for the buy-in is just as important to go towards bills as what I could potentially lose/win. I've never played with money when we couldn't afford it, but now that I'm in that situation and not playing, it's a tough pill to swallow, but in the long run it's the right medication.

Next up is an explanation of my plan for when I have some discretionary funds to utilize for a bankroll. Plus I may pimp a few more blogs since I've been doing a lot of poker reading during my play hiatus.

posted by TripJax @ 4:15 PM, ,




Mercier Me

Ladies Night, Part Deux, shown on the Travel Channel on Dec 15th, was strong to quite strong. Actually, to be more specific, much of the play was below average, but one player took center stage. The femme fatale in question was a young lady by the name of Isabelle Mercier who I recognized from a previous WPT televised event. Host of one of the Paris events held in the last 2 years, Isabelle came across as a tiny, timid french belle in the few frames I caught her in back then. For Ladies Night she opened up her can of whoop ass on us all. Not only did her demeanor change to a ruthless/aggressive power player, but her attire went from a sun dress in Paris to Black & Tight for Ladies Night.

Her game and attitude had me completely enthralled. She without a doubt stole the show. Unfortunately, busty beauty Clonie was a non-event this year, but I of course look forward to seeing her in future episodes and events. And as for Isabelle I hope she continues to make a name for herself on the tour and beyond.

Isabelle "No Mercy" Mercier
(If that's not her nickname already it should be)


Clonie Gowen


posted by TripJax @ 2:08 PM, ,




You Suck At The Internet!

You Suck At The Internet!

According to many, pimpin is easy, but I can confrim that linkin is no day in the park. You'll see my first links listed over there on the right that took me an hour to figure out how to list...could I be anymore computer illiterate? I'm no doubt flying by the seat of me ars, per say, in that I know as much about HTML as I know about playing Razz...both I can do...one move at a time...and not so well. As for the pimpin, it should be decidedly easier. Enjoy the few that I currently have.

1.
The Cards Speak - Written by HDouble - The first poker blog I ever read. This guy has a real passion for poker and I found myself agreeing with so much of what he was writing. I'm a bit jealous that he is only hours away from legal poker, meanwhile I'm in a town where a $5 buy-in tournament is illegal. Thank goodness for PartyPoker/EmpirePoker. Word is Harrah's Cherokee - about 3 hours from Greensboro - is set to open a 25 table poker room...fuhshizzle! Anyway, back to The Cards Speak. I printed this guys entire blog and started reading it at night. Since it was just a pile of papers instead of a book, my wife (hereinto referred to as Mrs. Button) asked what I was reading. At that moment, I didn't know how to explain it. Was I reading some dudes journal/diary? How do I explain that? Before I even started the first word she said, "Let me guess, poker?!" I smiled, she smiled (or was that a smirk) and we both delved back into our reading. I, for one, was happy I didn't have to explain myself, however, I then made the decision that I'm not reading some guys journal/diary, but rather partaking in this big community of people who enjoy poker like I do. There...I feel better. Rock on HDouble.

2.
Guinness & Poker - Written by Ignatious - This dude is just straight up a trip. When I need a quick laugh I search out Iggy. I've read back about a year and all of it is golden. His uber posts are dynamite damnit! Recently he made my eyes water in disgust when my mouse scrolled upon a brutal pic of some hairy monstrosity. It hurt so bad that I, of course, immediately emailed the pic to all my friends. I dubbed the picture The Heinous Anus. One of my buddies returned the favor by sending the following pic back to me.





Good lookin out MTW...good stuff, no doubt.

And as for Iggy, you write a sweet ass blog my friend (considering you don't know me, my friend might be a strech).

3.
Lion Tales - Written by Richard Brodie - Wanna feel what it's like to be sitting at a poker table with the best players in the world week in and week out. Then step into this mans blog. I have thoroughly enjoyed the Quiet Lions extremely detailed posts about his life on the road with the World Poker Tour. My bankroll is in arrears, meanwhile the Lion is buying into every event he can. He cracks me up when he calls some tournaments warm-ups when they are $1000+ buy-ins. I've never won a tournament larger than $600 or so. For those that don't know, the Lion was the original creator of the first Microsoft Word...so he's got that going for him. A buddy of mine has one of his books so I'm set to borrow it from him in the near future. I'm sure I'll love that one too.

Well, that's it for me today. Mrs. Button and Small Blind (my son) await my presence so I gotta roll.

posted by TripJax @ 11:36 PM, ,