We've been back home for only a couple of weeks, but it already feels as though the trip to Kenya was last year.
Work has been fairly quiet since returning, which has given me plenty of time to play poker and spend some time just enjoying what London has to offer, which is something we don't really do very much of considering we live in the place.
We behaved like tourists last weekend and took a river cruise on the Thames from Westminster to Greenwhich, where we watched an amazing sunset from the Observatory at zero degrees longitude.
I've played a load of poker since getting back both online and live. It had been ages since I'd played any live poker and I really enjoyed it.
I started off with a friend's birthday tournament last sunday. This was the thrid of three annual HORSE competitions that he's held for his birthday and this year there was some serious bling up for grabs for the winner:
Yes, that's right: that the DHORSECOP3 (that's Dan's HORSE championship of poker 3, ofc) bracelt on
my wrist. I'm officially a bracelet winner!
The London poker scene has been buzzing over the last couple of weeks with the WSOPE at the Empire Casino in Leicester Square and the EPT at The Vic on Edgeware Road.
I moseyed on over to the Empire on Monday and managed to say hi to
Change100 who was covering the event for PokerNews. I been enjoying her writing for ages so it was nice to be able to put a face to the stories.
I spent an hour or so wondering around the casino spotting all the various poker celebraties who were over from the US before finding a seat in a very juicy £1/2 NL game that was starting up. Unfortunately I got dicked on by the deck and ended up loosing about £150. In the most memorable hand I managed to get all in with AK against a couple fish who each had AJ and they managed to chop it when a jack landed on the turn. Marvelous!
I ended up coming back to the Empire the following two afternoons for the cash games, which were incredibly soft. On Wednesday the game had been going on through the previous night and there were a couple of drunk fish and another couple of bad players joined the mix. It was super deep for a £1/2 game with over £4000 on the table, but the maximum buyin was still only £250.
Unfortunately I didn't play all that well and got in a couple of nasty spots. I lost with AQ against JJ all in preflop for one buyin. I lost a second buyin with AQ on an ATA flop against the drunk fish who had TT. My third buy-in gradually frittered away missing lots of flops in raised pots and all of a sudden I was stuck £750.
I managed to grind my fouth buyin back up over the next couple of hours and ended with a £350 loss, but I could have been close to even if I had thought through one particular hand a little better:
A mega-station-Russsian fish had limped under the gun and I raised to isolate him with KTo. The rest of the table folded apart from a the big blind (a high stakes Betfair sponsered player, who was killing some time playing £1/2) and the fish. We all checked the the flop of QQ9 and chekced again on a blank turn. The river came a king and brough a backdoor flush. The betfair player checked, the Russian fish bet about £30 into a £45 pot and I flat called with my two pair. The good player then check riased to £110 and the fish quickly folded. I didn't take the time to think it over proberly and also folded, but in retrospect it was almost certainly a bluff. His body language when he first checked the river was that he was done with the hand, only he was then presented with an easy opportunity to take the pot away from us. Equally, with any kind of big hand I think he would virtually always have lead the river against the Russian calling station and because I had been playing quite passively post flop and would have been unlikely to bluff on the end. So all in all, I was really pissed off that I didn't make the call, but heyho I just hope I learn from it.
In my repeated trips to the Empire I'd also been trying to meet up with
Pauly who was in town to cover the poker, but despite seeing him once in the distance, I'd failed, so Thursday and Friday were spent at the Vic where the EPT was going on and I managed to find him there. He was pretty busy covering the tournament so I provisionally arranged to meet him after the tournament finished on Friday night.
When Friday came along, I finished work early and headed to the Empire to see if there was a reapeat of the juicy £1-2 game, but the poker room was closed as they were deconstruting the WSOPE after the marathon 22 hour final table, so I headed home and was happy to log a +£500 session online. I then headed back out and over to the Vic. I got my name on a few cash games lists, but they were of a silly length so I whiled away an hour or so watching the bubble burst in the EPT and watching all the PokerStars big boys (Raymer, Hatchem, Moneymaker etc) playing in a £2500 single table satalite.
Mrs Pink arrived a little later and we ate at an awesome Malasian place just off Edgeware Road called Satay House. The food was incredible and we stuffed ourselves before heading back to the Vic to try and track down Pauly. The tournament had finished early for the night and I though we'd missed him. I didn't have a number for him and despite ringing round a few people I couldn't track him down. We had just jumped in a taxi when I got a call and it was Pauly who was infact still at the Vic hiding by the roulette tables (where else?!) so we headed back.
We sat a drank for a couple of hours and it was cool to finally have a chance to meet and properly chat to the guy.
The rest of this weekend is fairly busy. We're catching up with some friends and family, so I'm unlikely to squeeze any poker in, but I'm sure I'll still try.
I think I've waffled on for long enough now, so I'm out of here. Take it easy .
