OK, let me start out by saying that I really wanted to like this movie.
I hate romantic comedies. HATE them. My ex loved them and made me sit through some horrible horrible shit. By contrast, when I first saw a commercial for a romantic comedy with Janessa, and she said it looked awful and that she hated romantic comedies too, it was such a relief that I almost proposed on the spot.
So my initial reaction to this movie's commercials was, predictably, negative, even though it starred one of the hollywood stars I most want to make babies with. This fact alone wouldn't be close enough of a reason to see a flick anyway. Janessa joked that it would, but I pointed out that Zooey had been in the awful-looking "Yes Man" and I hadn't even joked about seeing it.
So why the change of heart? Well, I read lots of good reviews, heard good buzz, and regularly heard people insist that it was not a romantic comedy. So we figured, what the hell, maybe this will really be a decent film. And they were right - in part - it isn't a romantic comedy. It's about a relationship that doesn't work out. It also wasn't unwatchable by any means. The acting was good and the story was pretty interesting. Ironically, the fact that the movie had potential is what made its shortcomings so much more frustrating.
I'm not a movie reviewer, so I'm not going to spend time summarizing the plot. So...Spoiler Alert... you've been warned:
1. The (500) thing is a pretty reasonable idea. The movie timeshifts around showing scenes at different points in the leads' relationship, mainly for purposes of contrast. It does this fairly well, and it wasn't hard to follow. So points there. But I still have NO idea why the 500 is in parenthesis. No clue. It was never explained and I'm left with the impression that it's just a pretentious touch. This idea is reinforced by how many more pretentious touches are in this film.
2. Despite the fact that the main character was obsessed with Zooey (and I am too, so I can understand, to some extent) - the film's characterization of Zooey was vapid and minimal. We got little to no insight as to why she felt the way she did about either the main character or about relationships in general. One bar scene where she says she doesn't like relationships and likes to "be free" does not a character make. Given that the main character repeatedly insists that she is the love of his life, this lack of characterization is appalling and seriously hurts the film.
3. The lead is extremely self-centered. I suspect the lead is based on the author of the screenplay, because I didn't get even a hint of irony about his focus. One of the most egregious examples involves his job as a writer of greeting cards. This is a weird job for him to have for several reasons, but I'll get back to that. Suffice it to say, the lead has his moment where he realizes that his job is lame and that he should be doing something better with his life. This is fine, in principle. I doubt anyone dreams of growing up and writing greeting cards. But this revelation is not the problem, it's how he deals with it.
Instead of just putting in his notice, he makes a dramatic show of how horrible the job is in front of all of his co-workers. At a meeting he goes off on a huge rave about how meaningless the job is and why anyone who does it, is, basically, an idiot. This is an incredibly immature, selfish move, whether he's right or not. It's disrespectful to everyone else who works at this place and completely without justification. Now, if the author had intended to make this point about his protagonist, it would have been one thing, but I think it's pretty clear from the scene that the author is basically speaking as the character - that he probably had such a job but never said these types of things to his co workers.
I think this is especially likely because the lead in this movie is, inexplicably, supposed to be an architect. This thought is given little to no explanation other than a few shots of the guy sketching pictures of skyscrapers - something I wasn't aware architects were particularly none for. Obviously, the main character is based on the writer, who was working for a greeting card company so that he could eventually write more substantive material. That part makes sense. Why a putative architect, on the other hand, would seek employment as a writer, is not only illogical, but entirely unexplained.
4. Despite not technically being a "romantic comedy," the movie is trite and cliche about its ideas regarding love in the extreme. We are shown the main pussy - er character - as a child, watching presentations of idealized love and, presumably, believing them. I understand that little girls may buy this crap, but little boys? And even little girls eventually realize, well most of them, that the true-love-destiny-prince-princess tripe is purely a disney fantasy, at least by the time they are thirty. Not only does this guy seem to think this stuff is real (he even engages in a fanciful full production dance number when he finally gets with Zooey... a cute sequence, but pretty gimmicky, to say the least) but the author seems to agree. Which brings us to #5.
5. If this film had presented the main character as a clueless douchebag who ultimately changes and learns that women are people, not idealized fantasy creatures, and that destiny is a childish (and I suppose Calvinist) conception, I would have been able to excuse much of the above. The message could have been, hey, life isn't that simple, this chick wasn't for you, move on and try to start a mature relationship. I could have lived with that. Instead, the end is the biggest cop-out in the movie by far. I am not exaggerating when I say it made me want to wretch.
In the final scene of the film, the lead is seen waiting to enter an office for a job interview, presumably as an architect. Waiting with him in the lobby is Minka Kelly, the insanely hot Lyla Garrity from Friday Night Lights. Guess what, she has an interview too. Oops, they are in competition! At the last moment before going into the interview, lead boy nuts up and decides to ask Minka out. The last line in the movie is that her name is... wait for it... Autumn.
Wow. Can it get any more heavy handed then that? Was winter waiting outside to give him a blowjob? Was spring the person interviewing him? Autumn is the next phase in his life, I get it, but there are sooo many problems with this lame ending. First, who the hell names their kid Autumn? NOBODY. I halfway thought her last name was going to be "Equinox." Summer is a girl's name and I thought its use was reasonably clever, but Autumn is just a heavy-handed way for the author to smack you in the face with an unnatural, undeserved "happy ending."
What's worse, the ending implies that the author was right all along. True love is out there, it just wasn't with Zooey, but the very next girl, absolutely. The moral of the story? I have absolutely no idea. Serial monogamy is good? I'm clueless.
In the end this movie was even more disappointing than the lead guy's not finding love with Zooey. Self-absorbed cliched nonsense - a romantic comedy, in other words - pretending to be something more. To me, that's much worse than your latest Kate Hudson-Matthew McChesty vehicle. At least there, I know what I'm getting. In the immortal words of the late Judge Judy, don't piss on my leg and tell me that it's sprinkling...
Friday, February 12, 2010
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Costa Rica Honeymoon Wrapup Blog
Hello friends!
Janessa and I have just returned from our week-long honeymoon in Costa Rica and are almost back in the swing of things. In the interest of sanity, I thought I'd write a nice long blog trip report for anyone to reference and save me telling the same stories 20x :)
We flew out at 12:45am Thanksgiving Morning from LAX. One stop in San Salvador then a plane change to fly to San Jose, Costa Rica, onto a local commuter flight to Quepos, right outside where we were staying, at San Manuel Antonio National Park. Oddly, we had to wait two hours or so for the commuter - a 20 min flight in a rickety old lil plane. Still, much faster than the 4.5 hour drive would have been.
Delirious and dying for showers and sleep, we finally arrived at our first hotel, Arenas Del Mar. This place was faaaantastic, PARADISE, amazing view of the beach from our suite's balcony (and the jacuzzi on said balcony), the place was insanely ecofriendly (solar panels, gave us biodegradable water bottles to keep so we wouldn't use regular bottles, and oh yea, despite being surrounded by forest, it was obvious their environmental impact was minimal). The service as this place was first rate. The people were incredibly warm, friendly and accomodating. I wrote a review of the hotel which you can look at on TripAdvisor here. Suffice it to say, despite Janessa's extensive food allergies and my own allergy to gluten, we didn't get even a little sick once. The chef spoke with us personally at nearly every meal and made sure everything we ate was safe (and delicious!)
We set our trip up through a tourist group called "Costa Rica Expeditions." They built us an itinerary of things to do over our short 7-day trip. We eliminated most of them as we wanted to spend a lot of the trip resting. Travel is exhausting enough without 12 hour tour days. Janessa and I hadn't had a real vacation in years, so we wanted to mainly relax.
The first day we went snorkeling in the ocean and saw tons of beautiful tropical fishes. This was in the morning and a lot of fun. We were done by 1pm - in time to enjoy a relaxing lunch at the hotel snack bar next to the beach and kill a few hours before we both went to the spa. I got a 60 minute hot stone massage, which I'd never had done before. It was good for my back and quite relaxing. Janessa got a scrub/wrap treatment that left her skin very soft and made her happy. Great first day.
Day two, early morning, we went on a tour of San Manuel Antonio park. There we saw many exotic animals and insects including white-faced monkeys, beautiful butterflies (they are everywhere), and lots of sloth - fitting for our mission on this trip! The park features some of the most amazing beaches in the world as well as all of the wild-life, so we had a lovely time. In the afternoon...you guessed it, lunch at the snack bar and really nothing much else but re-lax-ation. Beautiful.
Day three was a travel day. We checked out of our hotel in the morning to take a long car trip back to the San Jose area. Since I'd wanted to try zip-lining, we set up an aerial tram/zip-line thing at a place which was conveniently located almost equidistant between San Manuel and Hotel #2. Janessa was a little nervous, but once we got going, she had a great time. We were wayyy up in the canopy of the rain forest and had breathtaking views that I'm sure we wouldn't have gotten had we just stuck with the slow tram(which is kinda like the aerial trams at Disneyworld, if you're familiar with those). The day we went there were three cruise ships full of people filling up the place, so it was jammed - but all with retirees. Suffice it to say, we were the only people zip-lining and people thought we were crazy! (One lady yelled out to me "does your mother know you're doing this?") Skydiving is a LOT crazier, so this was a piece of cake.
Our guides for the day were with Costa Rica Expeditions and were great to us. One named Max, barely spoke english, but was amiable. He waited in the car during the zip-line. The other went zip-lining with us! I wish I could remember his name, he was a very cool guy. After the zip-line we had a nice lunch and long conversation with him. He'd traveled to many places in the US and all over the world and had great stories to tell. His job is basically traveling with tourists, helping them out, but also doing what they do - be it eating with them or going on the tour they go on. Not a bad deal!
After a long ride up to our next hotel, Finca Rosa Blanca (check the link!), we got settled in the dark. Our initial reception was not great. It was confusing, dark, and the reception chick was awful and completely useless to us. Admittedly, our first impression of the place was pretty grim. Once we checked out our room, we warmed a bit. We stayed in the master suite of the hotel, the best room, the Rosa Blanca Suite, a sprawling two story suite featuring an amazing tub (click the link for some pictures) and a winding staircase. The view from the mountains was breathtaking, we could see for miles. Not too bad.
Our next encounter with the staff was a very good one. The food service at this hotel was just as accommodating to us and our allergies as Arena Del Mar. The food was also - simply put, amazing. The chef quickly became our favorite person on this trip. His name is Rodrigo, and he is a rotund short man with glasses and a constant smile on his face. Jolly is the best word to describe him. He was lovely to us while at the same time a goofball. At the same time, every single thing he made was amazing, even after conforming to our restrictions. Janessa and I loved this guy and made sure the property owner knew it... great job
Our first full day Finca Rosa Blanca was great. Finca Rosa Blanca is adjacent to a coffee plantation owned by the property. We took a tour of the plantation - great timing as it was harvest season, so the coffee cherries were ripe - and were taken through the whole process from picking to processing. As a coffee lover, this was heaven for me, but Janessa loved the story too. That's at least in part because the farm was organic and sustainable, and we got to hear all the measures they'd put into place to prevent pests without using chemicals. Essentially, they plant trees more attractive to pests near the coffee, and do other similar things to great a synergistic environment where the coffee thrives. Awesome stuff, really.
At the end we did a coffee cupping. For those of you not familiar, it's similar to a wine tasting, but a bit more specialized. The idea is to compare cups of coffee objectively through intense palate analysis. Our great guide Leo explained to us the qualities of coffee on particular parts of the tongue, while we loudly slurped samples from a spoon and attempted to verbalize the smells and flavors we were experiencing. Janessa doesn't like coffee, so she didn't drink much of it, but I know we both enjoyed the palate stuff. The wife and I have become very interested in the sense of taste, through wine, cheese, chocolate, coffee, and other things, and are exploring it. But more on that in another blog!
The rest of the day was mellow. It was time for another spa day (what what!). This time, Janessa got the hot stone massage and I got the tiramisu which was a scented hot bath followed by
an "almond body exfoliation" after which you are "cocooned in amazing, warm and hydrating wrap" and given a facial. After that you clean off and get a full body massage. Sounds great, right?
Truthfully, it kinda sucked. The bath was great, but everything else was just weird weird weird. The dude "cocooned" me so tight I lost feeling in my pinky fingers on both hands which was very odd. Plus the "gentle" exfoliation hurt like crazy. It felt like the dude was trying to grind some cheese off my back! To top it off, for nearly the entire two hours the property's dogs barked like crazy, not just for a little bit, but loud as heck CONSTANTLY. Good luck relaxing through that.
Guess I'm not really a spa guy!
Anyway, Janessa loved her treatment so what can ya do.
The next day was our only full day tourist thingy. We went up early morning to go see an active volcano which was about a 2 hr drive away. We picked up a buncha people in a van in San Jose and trooped up there to Irazu. Unfortunately, it was so foggy up there we couldn't see anything. It was also freezing and windy and wet. Not the best time. But, all good, the rest of the day was nice. We saw a beautiful turn of the century catholic temple (right before mass started actually), an amazing botanical reserve with swweeet japanese tea gardens, lunched at a separate coffee plantation, and several other sites. Tiring, but a good time. The people in our group were really cool, all well-traveled and cosmopolitan. It worked out kinda interesting because they were from all-over. We were the only people from the US. Besides us, there was a couple from Lima, Peru, a gentleman from Slovakia, and a young man from Belgium. It made for fascinating lunch conversation.
The last day was to be mainly relaxing. Janessa only wanted to do one more thing - horseback riding. The hotel had that all set up internally so we went for that in the morning. This was the worst part of the whole trip. Despite our telling the guide that we had almost no experience riding horses, he put us on horses with almost no instruction then proceeded to take us over a ridiculously rough course - part of which was, according to him, "where they ride ATVs." I caught air like 20 times. It was insane. I messed up my back badly. Even worse I got a huge welt on my ass that is STILL THERE TWO WEEKS LATER (but mostly healed). Janessa had really bad bruises on her legs and couldn't even finish the ride. Shitty. But what can you do?
We wrapped up our day relaxing and enjoying ourselves. The next day we spent the morning at the hotel before heading to the airport. We took the time to thank Rodrigo and the awesome waitstaff, Louis and Andre and get some terrific pictures. We then toughed it out through the loooong trip home.
All in all, we had a fabulous time. A few shitty things happened, but not even close to enough to ruin the great things we saw, ate, time we spent together and general relaxation of it all. Now to look into that house in Costa Rica to retire to....
Janessa and I have just returned from our week-long honeymoon in Costa Rica and are almost back in the swing of things. In the interest of sanity, I thought I'd write a nice long blog trip report for anyone to reference and save me telling the same stories 20x :)
We flew out at 12:45am Thanksgiving Morning from LAX. One stop in San Salvador then a plane change to fly to San Jose, Costa Rica, onto a local commuter flight to Quepos, right outside where we were staying, at San Manuel Antonio National Park. Oddly, we had to wait two hours or so for the commuter - a 20 min flight in a rickety old lil plane. Still, much faster than the 4.5 hour drive would have been.
Delirious and dying for showers and sleep, we finally arrived at our first hotel, Arenas Del Mar. This place was faaaantastic, PARADISE, amazing view of the beach from our suite's balcony (and the jacuzzi on said balcony), the place was insanely ecofriendly (solar panels, gave us biodegradable water bottles to keep so we wouldn't use regular bottles, and oh yea, despite being surrounded by forest, it was obvious their environmental impact was minimal). The service as this place was first rate. The people were incredibly warm, friendly and accomodating. I wrote a review of the hotel which you can look at on TripAdvisor here. Suffice it to say, despite Janessa's extensive food allergies and my own allergy to gluten, we didn't get even a little sick once. The chef spoke with us personally at nearly every meal and made sure everything we ate was safe (and delicious!)
We set our trip up through a tourist group called "Costa Rica Expeditions." They built us an itinerary of things to do over our short 7-day trip. We eliminated most of them as we wanted to spend a lot of the trip resting. Travel is exhausting enough without 12 hour tour days. Janessa and I hadn't had a real vacation in years, so we wanted to mainly relax.
The first day we went snorkeling in the ocean and saw tons of beautiful tropical fishes. This was in the morning and a lot of fun. We were done by 1pm - in time to enjoy a relaxing lunch at the hotel snack bar next to the beach and kill a few hours before we both went to the spa. I got a 60 minute hot stone massage, which I'd never had done before. It was good for my back and quite relaxing. Janessa got a scrub/wrap treatment that left her skin very soft and made her happy. Great first day.
Day two, early morning, we went on a tour of San Manuel Antonio park. There we saw many exotic animals and insects including white-faced monkeys, beautiful butterflies (they are everywhere), and lots of sloth - fitting for our mission on this trip! The park features some of the most amazing beaches in the world as well as all of the wild-life, so we had a lovely time. In the afternoon...you guessed it, lunch at the snack bar and really nothing much else but re-lax-ation. Beautiful.
Day three was a travel day. We checked out of our hotel in the morning to take a long car trip back to the San Jose area. Since I'd wanted to try zip-lining, we set up an aerial tram/zip-line thing at a place which was conveniently located almost equidistant between San Manuel and Hotel #2. Janessa was a little nervous, but once we got going, she had a great time. We were wayyy up in the canopy of the rain forest and had breathtaking views that I'm sure we wouldn't have gotten had we just stuck with the slow tram(which is kinda like the aerial trams at Disneyworld, if you're familiar with those). The day we went there were three cruise ships full of people filling up the place, so it was jammed - but all with retirees. Suffice it to say, we were the only people zip-lining and people thought we were crazy! (One lady yelled out to me "does your mother know you're doing this?") Skydiving is a LOT crazier, so this was a piece of cake.
Our guides for the day were with Costa Rica Expeditions and were great to us. One named Max, barely spoke english, but was amiable. He waited in the car during the zip-line. The other went zip-lining with us! I wish I could remember his name, he was a very cool guy. After the zip-line we had a nice lunch and long conversation with him. He'd traveled to many places in the US and all over the world and had great stories to tell. His job is basically traveling with tourists, helping them out, but also doing what they do - be it eating with them or going on the tour they go on. Not a bad deal!
After a long ride up to our next hotel, Finca Rosa Blanca (check the link!), we got settled in the dark. Our initial reception was not great. It was confusing, dark, and the reception chick was awful and completely useless to us. Admittedly, our first impression of the place was pretty grim. Once we checked out our room, we warmed a bit. We stayed in the master suite of the hotel, the best room, the Rosa Blanca Suite, a sprawling two story suite featuring an amazing tub (click the link for some pictures) and a winding staircase. The view from the mountains was breathtaking, we could see for miles. Not too bad.
Our next encounter with the staff was a very good one. The food service at this hotel was just as accommodating to us and our allergies as Arena Del Mar. The food was also - simply put, amazing. The chef quickly became our favorite person on this trip. His name is Rodrigo, and he is a rotund short man with glasses and a constant smile on his face. Jolly is the best word to describe him. He was lovely to us while at the same time a goofball. At the same time, every single thing he made was amazing, even after conforming to our restrictions. Janessa and I loved this guy and made sure the property owner knew it... great job
Our first full day Finca Rosa Blanca was great. Finca Rosa Blanca is adjacent to a coffee plantation owned by the property. We took a tour of the plantation - great timing as it was harvest season, so the coffee cherries were ripe - and were taken through the whole process from picking to processing. As a coffee lover, this was heaven for me, but Janessa loved the story too. That's at least in part because the farm was organic and sustainable, and we got to hear all the measures they'd put into place to prevent pests without using chemicals. Essentially, they plant trees more attractive to pests near the coffee, and do other similar things to great a synergistic environment where the coffee thrives. Awesome stuff, really.
At the end we did a coffee cupping. For those of you not familiar, it's similar to a wine tasting, but a bit more specialized. The idea is to compare cups of coffee objectively through intense palate analysis. Our great guide Leo explained to us the qualities of coffee on particular parts of the tongue, while we loudly slurped samples from a spoon and attempted to verbalize the smells and flavors we were experiencing. Janessa doesn't like coffee, so she didn't drink much of it, but I know we both enjoyed the palate stuff. The wife and I have become very interested in the sense of taste, through wine, cheese, chocolate, coffee, and other things, and are exploring it. But more on that in another blog!
The rest of the day was mellow. It was time for another spa day (what what!). This time, Janessa got the hot stone massage and I got the tiramisu which was a scented hot bath followed by
an "almond body exfoliation" after which you are "cocooned in amazing, warm and hydrating wrap" and given a facial. After that you clean off and get a full body massage. Sounds great, right?
Truthfully, it kinda sucked. The bath was great, but everything else was just weird weird weird. The dude "cocooned" me so tight I lost feeling in my pinky fingers on both hands which was very odd. Plus the "gentle" exfoliation hurt like crazy. It felt like the dude was trying to grind some cheese off my back! To top it off, for nearly the entire two hours the property's dogs barked like crazy, not just for a little bit, but loud as heck CONSTANTLY. Good luck relaxing through that.
Guess I'm not really a spa guy!
Anyway, Janessa loved her treatment so what can ya do.
The next day was our only full day tourist thingy. We went up early morning to go see an active volcano which was about a 2 hr drive away. We picked up a buncha people in a van in San Jose and trooped up there to Irazu. Unfortunately, it was so foggy up there we couldn't see anything. It was also freezing and windy and wet. Not the best time. But, all good, the rest of the day was nice. We saw a beautiful turn of the century catholic temple (right before mass started actually), an amazing botanical reserve with swweeet japanese tea gardens, lunched at a separate coffee plantation, and several other sites. Tiring, but a good time. The people in our group were really cool, all well-traveled and cosmopolitan. It worked out kinda interesting because they were from all-over. We were the only people from the US. Besides us, there was a couple from Lima, Peru, a gentleman from Slovakia, and a young man from Belgium. It made for fascinating lunch conversation.
The last day was to be mainly relaxing. Janessa only wanted to do one more thing - horseback riding. The hotel had that all set up internally so we went for that in the morning. This was the worst part of the whole trip. Despite our telling the guide that we had almost no experience riding horses, he put us on horses with almost no instruction then proceeded to take us over a ridiculously rough course - part of which was, according to him, "where they ride ATVs." I caught air like 20 times. It was insane. I messed up my back badly. Even worse I got a huge welt on my ass that is STILL THERE TWO WEEKS LATER (but mostly healed). Janessa had really bad bruises on her legs and couldn't even finish the ride. Shitty. But what can you do?
We wrapped up our day relaxing and enjoying ourselves. The next day we spent the morning at the hotel before heading to the airport. We took the time to thank Rodrigo and the awesome waitstaff, Louis and Andre and get some terrific pictures. We then toughed it out through the loooong trip home.
All in all, we had a fabulous time. A few shitty things happened, but not even close to enough to ruin the great things we saw, ate, time we spent together and general relaxation of it all. Now to look into that house in Costa Rica to retire to....
Friday, September 25, 2009
A tribute to our late cat, Alex
Alex on the left, Louis on the Right
This has been a very difficult month in our household.
I won't go into all the details here, but our cat Alex, went into heart failure about a month ago. We rushed him to emergency vet care and stabilized him after a scary 2 day hospital stay. The past month he's alternatively gotten better and worse and not a week's gone by without us having to take him in unscheduled.
Finally, we took him in Monday evening. He was very weak and didn't look good. He was very dehydrated, and we hoped this was responsible for how weak he seemed to be. Sadly, he passed the next morning around 6am.
Alex was one of our three, now two, cats, along with his brother Louis and (step)-sister Rewind. Rewind had been my first cat, and I lived with her for two or three years before I moved in with my now-wife-then-girlfriend, Janessa. Janessa already had Alex and Louis, so Rewind made three.
Alex and Louis were from the same litter. They are brothers by blood. They were abandoned as kittens, and Janessa adopted them when they were only a few weeks old. Not surprisingly, they grew quite attached to Janessa. That's an understatement, really. They love her more than anything in the world, of that I'm sure. I've never seen either of them happier than when they are close to her. When she is away and comes back, they hear her car, know its her and come racing for the door almost immediately - no matter what they're doing. Nothing was more important than Mommy time.
Alex and Louis were the cutest couple of cats you could ever imagine together. They used to curl up into a sweet ball, laying their heads near each others in perfect repose. They would also clean each other. And of course, like all brothers, they would fight, mostly in play, neither ever getting hurt beyond a bruise or scratch.
But, about Alex.
When I first met this wild furry tabby, I'll admit that I was a bit perplexed about why his momma was so crazy for him. Alex did not like me one bit. I was confused. Cats had always gotten on with me well. I'd felt a natural connection to them long before I had Rewind. Well, with Alex, we soon deduced that he saw me as competition for momma time! He would hiss at me a fair bit, and many times when I tried to pet him he'd swipe at me with his claws out. Janessa kept telling me he'd do that to her too, and maybe there was some truth to it, but not nearly as much as he did it to me!
Not only that but Alex was the most anxious cat I've ever seen. He was always nervous about something, but it was hard to figure out what. Cats have it so easy, especially in a house where they are loved. I nicknamed him "Tweak" because he always seemed tweaked out.
Alex was also the least graceful cat I've ever seen. You know that "cats always land on their feet" thing? Nonsense. It may be true of some cats, but not Alex! He would flop all over the place. Sometimes, he'd flop on the kitchen counter only to realize at the last minute that he was too far near the edge and slide right off. He'd always have this great look of surprise on his face. It reminded me of those Road Runner cartoons where the Coyote would hang in the air for just a second before falling with this look like "Whaaaa?" Alex also had a penchant for flopping onto his little brother when they were cuddled close together. Poor Louis! Alex was about 14 pounds and his brother was closer to 11.
Alex eventually warmed up to me, but I stress the word "eventually." It took around two years, but we finally made a connection last year. Part of it was my fault, I discovered, as I hadn't been approaching him correctly. He responds really well to soft pets, and I was used to harder pets, which is what Rewind really liked most of the time. With that knowledge, and the self-awareness to only try to approach him when he seemed calmer, we ultimately built a rapport.
Alex was at his sweetest at the same time every night, right around 7, when we were eating dinner. Around 8:30pm, all three cats would get the crazies and go into nocturnal mode, but, right before then they were at their most content. I suspect some of that had to do with Janessa and I being home for the day. Anyway, Alex would turn into the sweetest most gentle kitty I'd ever seen around then. He would lay comfortably, sometimes with his front paws tucked under his chin, looking at peace with the world and everyone in it. Even when I, his hated rival, would pet him he would purr softly, his eyes 3/4 closed in what Janessa describes as a kitty smile.
The more I saw of this side of Alex, the more I began to understand him. He was just a big scaredy-cat (literally!) In truth, he was at the bottom of the cat pecking order in our house (My imperious cat, Rewind, the strongest personality I've ever known, cat or person, was on top). And, as I said before, he was attached to his Momma like no other, even more than his brother, I think, albeit marginally. His favorite spot to be was clinging to her neck, purring at maximum volume and drooling all over Janessa. Oh yes, did he drool when he was happy. Gross, but cute.
Slowly, Alex and I found our way. Every night during the week, Janessa would go to sleep an hour or two before I did. Whenever I'd go to bed, there would be Alex, on my side, keeping it warm. I'd get in and he'd run away quickly. Toward the end, I'd try hard to get him to stay, petting him gently and rhythmically. He'd never stay for very long, but when I did that he might stay for a minute or two.
Alex also loved fresh, cold water, and would get very excited when the new water would get poured. I love water ice cold as well, possibly from living in Florida for so long. Anyway, I'd sometimes give him fresh water even when it had only been out for a little while just to make him happy. He'd do a little cute skip when he was excited, and I so enjoyed seeing that.
When we were going through the difficult process of getting Alex to and from the cardiologist, there was only one bright spot: Alex charmed everyone at the doctor's office. Not only did they tell us how much they loved him (which could have been them just being nice), but we heard them audibly say "Alex!" a few times when he was brought back unexpectedly. In the end, Alex was at his sweetest and most tender to everyone.
Alex was a member of our family and he is already deeply missed. It was an awful experience seeing him struggle, and I can't help but think that he's better off now, free of the pain and turmoil of being dragged back and forth to doctors and being poked and prodded, given pills, and all the other things he had to endure. Nevertheless, our house feels empty without him, and I think of him all the time. I love Alex with all my heart, and though I'm an atheist, I sincerely hope I'm wrong and that he's in a happier place, waiting for his family to join him in the end.
Rest in Peace, Alexander Lazon, we will love you forever.
Sunday, July 26, 2009
The Weak Lead and the Hare (Or why it pays to probe)
Earlier today I was playing a 90 man $24 KO Tournament on Full Tilt.
I ran into an interesting spot about halfway through. I lost the Hand History, but I can give you the gist of it.
The blinds were 60/120 and I had about 5000 chips. I picked up AdKd in middle position, and opened to 360. I was called by the cutoff and everyone else folded. I hadn't played any hands with the cutoff as I was fairly new to this table, but I did know, from his sharkscope stats that he was a winning player, probably a regular multitabler.
The flop was gin. Qd9d7d. Terrific flop, but how to get paid?
Obviously, check-raising is a possibility, but its awful strong. Even if he's strong enough to call on the flop, you've lost him after that, and what can he have on the flop strong enough to continue? The three biggest diamonds are out, so he'd need exactly the Kd for a flush draw. Certainly the cutoff could have a set, and in that case, you might even get fourbet. Except the cutoff's a good player, which means he can read your checkraise for what it is: a strong made hand or at worst a big diamond. Either way he is better off calling. A strong made hand is a flush or maybe a higher set. A big diamond might get in, but a fourth diamond on the turn might save you some money if he wouldn't have folded anyway.
The other problem with check-raising is that checking looks awful suspicious, particularly on this type of flop. It's possible you just wiffed, but not once you check raise. Check-calling actually might look stronger, depending on the opponent.
So what about just leading out?
Any normal size cbet will be pretty strong. You will only get action from the rare hands, a set and a big diamond, that could be out -- and we know that the Ad, Kd, and Qd are accounted for, so there's not nearly that many big diamond hands he can have. Any other hands, straight draws, combo draws, random two pairs, unimproved pocket pairs - will fold (remember, the cutoff is a winning player).
So what do you do?
I tried leading, but leading weak. I bet the minimum. I believe it was about 120 into a pot of around 900. It goes like this: "I whiffed this flop, but I feel obliged to c-bet, but since I am sure I'm beat, I'll just bet a little bit so I can get away cheaply..." (not a good strategy, but one some people use at these stakes, certainly).
My opponent raised big - - about 4x my bet size. Cha-ching. I pretended to think for about 20 seconds and then called. Lead-raising here could also set off alarms. Instead I chose to continue to act weak.
The turn was a blank. I checked and he fired off another pot sized pot. Tank. Call. The pot is now about the size of the remaining effective stack (mine).
River - 2d. Terrible card. I can't expect to get any value from sets now. Even if he has the Jd, he's not likely to pay off big. Would you? I grit my teeth and check and hope he takes one more stab. The cutoff pushes in. I snap call.
The cutoff has pocket 2s and rivered the set. He read me as weak all the way from the flop, and my story was consistent. Therefore he thought trips were good on a four flush board.
Weak lead ("obliged to cbet") + ("tank-call") + ("check/tank-call") + (river check) = weak hand, not the nuts, right?
Except I have the nuts.
I drag a huge pot.
Why did this work so well?
I think it's because many people at these stakes are deep in "fancy play syndrome." They are always trying to out-play you, out-think you, and they believe they are playing the player not the cards. To a certain extent, they are right, but its an oversimplification that suffers from the fallacy of the familiar. What I mean is that they assume that other players think the way they do, and because they bluff a lot, they think you do and, consequently - don't believe you even when they really should.
So all I had to do was throw them some "weak" rope and they immediately saw a chance to take down a pot, one they were so determined to get that they never slowed down. This player isn't playing to win money, he's playing to gratify his own ego. It's exploitable, so give it a shot.
PS:
Good players at lower stakes do pay attention to betting patterns. You can use this fact to your advantage using the weak lead. Next time you raise, get called and decide to check fold a bad flop rather than waste a cbet, try leading super weak instead (assuming your stack is deep enough). This way, if he raises you, you fold, and it establishes that this play is weak. Later you can use it when you're strong - or, alternatively, use a normal cbet size which now looks stronger - in comparison. By the way, he might also be suspicious and fold. That's not a bad result either.
but if he has that, the money's going in anyway.
I ran into an interesting spot about halfway through. I lost the Hand History, but I can give you the gist of it.
The blinds were 60/120 and I had about 5000 chips. I picked up AdKd in middle position, and opened to 360. I was called by the cutoff and everyone else folded. I hadn't played any hands with the cutoff as I was fairly new to this table, but I did know, from his sharkscope stats that he was a winning player, probably a regular multitabler.
The flop was gin. Qd9d7d. Terrific flop, but how to get paid?
Obviously, check-raising is a possibility, but its awful strong. Even if he's strong enough to call on the flop, you've lost him after that, and what can he have on the flop strong enough to continue? The three biggest diamonds are out, so he'd need exactly the Kd for a flush draw. Certainly the cutoff could have a set, and in that case, you might even get fourbet. Except the cutoff's a good player, which means he can read your checkraise for what it is: a strong made hand or at worst a big diamond. Either way he is better off calling. A strong made hand is a flush or maybe a higher set. A big diamond might get in, but a fourth diamond on the turn might save you some money if he wouldn't have folded anyway.
The other problem with check-raising is that checking looks awful suspicious, particularly on this type of flop. It's possible you just wiffed, but not once you check raise. Check-calling actually might look stronger, depending on the opponent.
So what about just leading out?
Any normal size cbet will be pretty strong. You will only get action from the rare hands, a set and a big diamond, that could be out -- and we know that the Ad, Kd, and Qd are accounted for, so there's not nearly that many big diamond hands he can have. Any other hands, straight draws, combo draws, random two pairs, unimproved pocket pairs - will fold (remember, the cutoff is a winning player).
So what do you do?
I tried leading, but leading weak. I bet the minimum. I believe it was about 120 into a pot of around 900. It goes like this: "I whiffed this flop, but I feel obliged to c-bet, but since I am sure I'm beat, I'll just bet a little bit so I can get away cheaply..." (not a good strategy, but one some people use at these stakes, certainly).
My opponent raised big - - about 4x my bet size. Cha-ching. I pretended to think for about 20 seconds and then called. Lead-raising here could also set off alarms. Instead I chose to continue to act weak.
The turn was a blank. I checked and he fired off another pot sized pot. Tank. Call. The pot is now about the size of the remaining effective stack (mine).
River - 2d. Terrible card. I can't expect to get any value from sets now. Even if he has the Jd, he's not likely to pay off big. Would you? I grit my teeth and check and hope he takes one more stab. The cutoff pushes in. I snap call.
The cutoff has pocket 2s and rivered the set. He read me as weak all the way from the flop, and my story was consistent. Therefore he thought trips were good on a four flush board.
Weak lead ("obliged to cbet") + ("tank-call") + ("check/tank-call") + (river check) = weak hand, not the nuts, right?
Except I have the nuts.
I drag a huge pot.
Why did this work so well?
I think it's because many people at these stakes are deep in "fancy play syndrome." They are always trying to out-play you, out-think you, and they believe they are playing the player not the cards. To a certain extent, they are right, but its an oversimplification that suffers from the fallacy of the familiar. What I mean is that they assume that other players think the way they do, and because they bluff a lot, they think you do and, consequently - don't believe you even when they really should.
So all I had to do was throw them some "weak" rope and they immediately saw a chance to take down a pot, one they were so determined to get that they never slowed down. This player isn't playing to win money, he's playing to gratify his own ego. It's exploitable, so give it a shot.
PS:
Good players at lower stakes do pay attention to betting patterns. You can use this fact to your advantage using the weak lead. Next time you raise, get called and decide to check fold a bad flop rather than waste a cbet, try leading super weak instead (assuming your stack is deep enough). This way, if he raises you, you fold, and it establishes that this play is weak. Later you can use it when you're strong - or, alternatively, use a normal cbet size which now looks stronger - in comparison. By the way, he might also be suspicious and fold. That's not a bad result either.
but if he has that, the money's going in anyway.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
On the banality of greeting cards and the corporatization of sentiment
Big title huh?
Simple concept. I want to someone a greeting card. My wife's birthday, our anniversary, blah blah blah. I go to Rite Aid, or CVS or whatever and start looking through cards.
Who the hell buys these things? Almost every one I look at is insanely utterly lame. The serious ones are like two page love poems with every trite cliche you can imagine, including my favorite, "I love you more than words can say" (even though you just spent four paragraphs trying to do just that... but there is no recognition of irony in a greeting card, sadly). Do people read this and think, "My wife/girlfriend/mother/father/whatever will love this because they know that I am thinking of them"? I mean its not like YOU wrote the poem. How can the poem possibly apply to the person you're giving it to? I mean make no mistake, I'm not suggesting you have to write poetry to give a card, but for chrissakes, sentiment printed on a card is not real sentiment!
And then you have your 'humor' cards. This is where I spend most of my time since the 'serious' cards sicken the shit out of me. Even these are at least 75% complete junk. Love "humor" seems to consist of teddy bears and bad love poems combined in four way pullout cards, for the most part. To get anything simple and straightforward you either have to make your own, or hunt hunt hunt.
Because I have no artistic talent to speak of, I hunt. I sometimes spend 30 minutes or more looking for a good card, because, it matters to me. I never want to halfass it and give some lameass card. That shows so little thought and consideration, what's the point? I mean a greeting card isn't a gift - the idea behind it is that you're giving someone thought and expressing it, so shouldn't the thought be at least your own or at least thought about?
I know this is too much to ask for in a society that thinks high fructose corn syrup is a "natural flavor" where everyone sleepwalks through their days. Still, if you can't take five or ten minutes to find a card that captures you and/or the other person for real, at least just a little bit, why go to the effort at all?
/rant
Simple concept. I want to someone a greeting card. My wife's birthday, our anniversary, blah blah blah. I go to Rite Aid, or CVS or whatever and start looking through cards.
Who the hell buys these things? Almost every one I look at is insanely utterly lame. The serious ones are like two page love poems with every trite cliche you can imagine, including my favorite, "I love you more than words can say" (even though you just spent four paragraphs trying to do just that... but there is no recognition of irony in a greeting card, sadly). Do people read this and think, "My wife/girlfriend/mother/father/whatever will love this because they know that I am thinking of them"? I mean its not like YOU wrote the poem. How can the poem possibly apply to the person you're giving it to? I mean make no mistake, I'm not suggesting you have to write poetry to give a card, but for chrissakes, sentiment printed on a card is not real sentiment!
And then you have your 'humor' cards. This is where I spend most of my time since the 'serious' cards sicken the shit out of me. Even these are at least 75% complete junk. Love "humor" seems to consist of teddy bears and bad love poems combined in four way pullout cards, for the most part. To get anything simple and straightforward you either have to make your own, or hunt hunt hunt.
Because I have no artistic talent to speak of, I hunt. I sometimes spend 30 minutes or more looking for a good card, because, it matters to me. I never want to halfass it and give some lameass card. That shows so little thought and consideration, what's the point? I mean a greeting card isn't a gift - the idea behind it is that you're giving someone thought and expressing it, so shouldn't the thought be at least your own or at least thought about?
I know this is too much to ask for in a society that thinks high fructose corn syrup is a "natural flavor" where everyone sleepwalks through their days. Still, if you can't take five or ten minutes to find a card that captures you and/or the other person for real, at least just a little bit, why go to the effort at all?
/rant
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Vegas Was Fun, WSOP was Rough; Bad Beats, Doyle and Penn & Teller
So I'm sitting at Mccarren right now, waiting to get on the plane back to the LA. The trip was a lot of fun, but, unfortunately, I barely made it three hours in Event #39.
I was very happy with how I played. I consistently got my money in way ahead and made good, timely steals. Unfortunately, variance picked a bad time to rear its head.
I began around noon with $4500 chips along with the other 2700 entrants. My first table was pretty soft, but that didn't stop me from getting involved in some big pots pretty quickly. Within the first rotation I picked up AKo and raised from LP to 3x (150 as blinds began at 25-50). I got two callers, a late position guy and the small blind. The flop came down 3 low/mid spades. I had the K of spades, so with that and overcards, a cbet was certainly in order. The late position caller folded but the small blind called. The turn was the Queen of hearts. Check, check. The river was the fourth spade, a 7. The small blind led for about $750. Knowing that I could only be beat by the Ace of spades (but also knowing that a raise would only be called by that Ace), I called. A4, Ace of Spades, I lost 1/3 of my stack. Ouch.
After another rotation, it was folded around to me in the small blind, where I looked down and saw a lovely KK. Wanting to build a pot, I raised to 200. The big blind called and the flop came 10-10-9. I thought this was a pretty good flop for an overpair but certainly vulnerable to draws, so I cbet 2/3rds pot and was called. The turn was a blank four. My initial instinct was to fire again to protect my hand. But something stopped me. When the big blind called on the flop it was pretty quick. I had a feeling he didn't think I was that strong. The board was hard to hit and my raise was from a steal position. Even though there were some bad river cards for me if he checked behind, I thought it might be better to go for the check-raise. I did, he obliged, and I quickly moved in, not thrilled to get all my chips in 15 minutes into my first WSOP event(!)
After he tanked, I started to root for a call. Obviously a ten would have snapped me. At that point I figured he had a draw, a small pair, or maybe a 9. He waited forever before folding, and told me that he had 9-7. I dragged a big pot and was up to about 5k. Soon after this, the dealer informed us that we would be the first table in the huge room to break (table breaks were planned ahead of time). Disappointing, as I'd liked the table. After a few more hands we were all moved, and I sat down in seat 7 of a different table not too far from where I'd started.
I ended up playing the first hand I was dealt, pocket 4s. A player raised in middle position and I called from the Cutoff. We were still at 25/50, so we were deep enough to set mine. The player on the button directly behind me also called, the blinds folded, and we saw an Ace high flop 3 handed. I missed my set so I was planning on folding pretty quickly. Oddly, the pre flop raiser checked. I checked too and the button quickly checked behind. The turn was a 7. Again, the pre flop raiser checked. Now I realized this was a good steal opportunity. There was no way an ace or strong hand checked twice here. So I fired and the button and pfr instantly folded. Easy money.
After that, I didn't see too many playable hands for awhile. I watched the table closely and tried to pick up on the dynamics between players and their individual styles. On my right was a small woman with glasses who, it quickly became apparent, was a bulldog. Throughout the time I was at the table, I saw her reraise quite a bit and take down some big pots. I was glad she was on my right(!) At the same time, on her right was the pre flop raiser from the 4s hand. He was raising virtually every hand from middle and late position. It was annoying, but exploitable. I figured I'd be in some pots with him at some point, but simply couldn't get good enough hands to take advantage at this point.
After a few more rotations, the player two to my left opened from early position for 3.5x, his standard raise, even though the rest of the table had been opening to 2.5. I was in the big blind, and it was folded around to me. I looked down and saw a lovely sight: pocket kings! Now I tried to figure out the best way to make money on the hand. I ended up flatting for two reasons. First, I reasoned that the raiser would (correctly), see a 3bet from the big blind into an early position raiser as VERY strong. Unless he had a VERY big hand, at least JJ+ or AK, he might be able to get away pre-flop. At worst, he could call and then escape on many flops. Secondly, I was concerned that if an Ace came off I could end up playing a big pot out of position against a raiser very likely to have an Ace in his hand.
The flop came down queen high with no flush or straight draws. The raiser cbet into me about 2/3rds pot. I paused for awhile, checked my cards, pretending to consider folding, then repopped him 3x his original bet. He quickly moved all in for 2800 more. I had him covered by a little over a thousand and quickly called. He turned over AQo. Of course I then turned over my KK and he immediately went white and said to me "nice hand!" I wasn't feeling so confident however, as with most of my chips in, even though I was pretty far ahead, he was hardly dead. I think I was about a 4:1 favorite at this point with him drawing to 5 outs. I said loudly "the hand isn't over yet!" The turn was a jack. The river.... another queen. BAM. I was down to 1300 chips.
I was shellshocked, of course. My opponent apologized profusely for the beat, which was gracious, but I told him not to worry, as I'd gotten exactly what I wanted in that spot. I got my money in a huge favorite and since I hadn't repopped him pre, I got why he thought AQo might be good there. That's exactly what I wanted him to think. So I couldn't really complain, but now I was hurting. Before I'd splashed around in a few smaller pots, stolen some blinds here and there. Now I was suddenly in short stack mode with thirteen big blinds and visions of not even making the first break were going through my head.
I fought valiently to keep my spirits up and stay focused. Only four hands later I picked up AQo in late position and opened to 300, almost 1/3 of my remaining stack. I got called by the button, a european looking guy who wasn't very active but looked like he knew what he was doing. The flop was just awful, 9-8-5, two spades (no spade in my hand). Cbetting (or shoving) seemed like suicide. Once I bet I would be committed and even if I were ahead I couldn't be far ahead! Sadly, I didn't see any option but to check/fold and give up. It left me with ten big blinds, which at least gave me a chance to get my money in better than that.
After this hand I went utterly card-dead for what seemed like forever. It was immensely frustrating, as I wanted to get back in the game and steal some pots. Still, I had to remain focused and not take silly risks yet. I still had enough big blinds to wait for a good spot, and with the slow structure of the tournament (hour levels... at this point about halfway through level 2, 50/100), I did have the time to be a little more careful. After playing fold-em poker for what felt like forever, it was folded around to me in late position and I looked down and saw... two aces!
I wasn't waiting for Aces. I'd planned on getting my money in with any pair as the open raiser and most pairs as a re-raiser, AQs+ and maybe some other hands depending on the situation. For example, if I saw a spot where I could triple up with a hand likely to have good equity like J10s or 76s, I might have grabbed it. Instead, I got the aces. Now, after waiting that long for anything, I didn't feel raising was the right play. I only had ten big blinds, so any reasonable player would see that I intended to commit myself on nearly any flop. I settled on limping, which wasn't an easy decsion by any means, since slow-playing KK had cost me such a big pot. Nevertheless, it seemed like the best chance I had to double up. I limped, no one raised, the small blind completed and we saw the flop 3 ways. J7x, two diamonds. The small blind led out for about half pot and I pushed over him fairly quickly. I figured he probably had a flush draw, or, hopefully, top pair, and wanted to either end the hand now or get it in ahead. He had a 7 with no FD, though he caught one on the turn. Fortunately, I held on the river and now I was up to a walloping 2100 of my original 4500 stack.
Very soon after the first break hit. We had half an hour. I decided to go back to my hotel room, which was a good brisk walk away from the convention center where the tournament was being held. I did so for a few reasons... first, I'd brought Janessa's Ipod to keep me loose, but it was totally dead, so it needed charging. Janessa was at the spa so I couldn't yet ask her to do anything about it. Second, I realized that running back and forth would be good for me, because it'd keep my blood flowing and keep me loose after sitting for so long. So I went back and carefully thought out a plan for the next hour. When I went back the blinds would be 75/150, leaving me with 13 or so big blinds. A very awkward stack size. I remembered that this stack size was potentially ideal for re-stealing loose raisers, and resolved to use this information to my advantage.
It didn't take too long for me to get the chance. Our aggro raiser mentioned before opened for the 200th time in a row from middle position soon after we returned. I looked down to find J10s in the small blind. I paused. Although I knew this was an ideal re-steal spot, I was still a little nervous about executing it, knowing that it was essentially a semi-bluff. Still, poker is about risk, and I needed chips. I couldn't get a much better spot than this, and J10s played pretty decently against a steal range. So I shoved. The big blind instafolded and said "Good luck." The original raiser hemmed and hawed and tanked. I felt sure he would call me and that he was deep enough to do so and sat there very nervously until he finally mucked. I breathed a huge sigh of relief, though I said aloud, "I wanted a call but I guess I'll take this." I don't know if I convinced anyone but it felt tricky ! (LOL).
Now I had a little over 3000. Not great, but a little room to manuever at least. Only a few hands later our intrepid maniac raised again to 400, 2.5x. I looked down to see AJo in the cutoff. I am not normally fond of calling raises with this type of hand, even in position, but given how wide the raiser's range appeared to be and that I had position on him, I decided to take a flop and see if I could either hit it or out play him. The big blind also called. The flop came down jack-7-2 rainbow. It was as dry a flop as you can imagine, and clearly I was either way ahead or way behind. The bb checked, the raiser cbet about 2/3rds pot and now I had a decsion. I was short enough that a reraise would commit me to the pot, and even though the board was dry, I would obviously hate a Queen or King on the turn or river, so calling didn't seem like the best option. Still, I had a player behind me who might have something worth playing. I tanked for what felt like forever (probably to the other players too!) before pushing in. I reasoned that he probably didn't have top set since I had a jack in my hand, that two pairs were very unlikely given the board, and that because of how loose a raiser he was pre-flop, I was ahead so much of the time that I had no other real option but to move in. The big blind folded and the original raiser snap-folded, looking very frustrated. Since I figured I might want to play back at him again, I flipped over my AJ and told him "I'm not bluffing you," dragging a good pot.
Now I was up to over 4k again, and I felt great. I'd weathered a very challenging storm to get back into contention. I now had enough chips to really play poker again. I got involved in some more small pots and generally was doing pretty well, until an amazing donk made himself known to the table. The gentlemen on my left got involved in a big pot with a guy in seat one. I hadn't watched the whole hand but on the turn he shoved all in on a 7-8-10-5 board with two spades. Seat one tanked, and seemed ready to fold, but surprisingly he called, turning over Q9. Queen high with a gutshot!! 4 outs to what turned out to be a set of 8s. Holy crap! This nut had basically called of his whole stack with a gutshot...which...he HIT. Jack on the river. Unreal!
The whole table was stunned. When seat one got up for awhile we all commented and joked about the play. It was crazy. Several hands later, the aggro guy opened small and the aggressive woman next to him moved in over the top of him. Amazingly, seat one, in the big blind, coldcalled both raises. When the hands were turned over, there could no longer be any doubt this guy was a world class retard. He had pocket 4s. The original raiser had Aces and the woman next to me had 10s. The original raiser was short, so I mentioned to the woman that at least she had a good side pot. Predictably(?) a 4 flopped, no one caught up, the original raiser was eliminated, and the woman next to me took a big hit to her stack. A player near me confided that he had folded a 4 meaning this guy had 1-outted his way to a bigger stack(!)
Well, obviously he became the focus of the table, playing too many hands too aggressively but managing to get lucky a lot of the time, though losing occasionally. I raised his earl yposition limp once from the button and he immediately overshoved. He re-popped the woman next to me several times stating that he didn't like being bullied. The woman insisted "I'm not bullying you sir," but that did not seem to placate him. A little later, with her in the big blind, he open raised from mp. She mucked 10-6s (which I inadvertendly saw over her shoulder) and he proudly flipped over 2-3o.
The very next hand I was in the big blind when nutball open limped and a player in late position behind him limped behind. I looked down to find AJo. Not my favorite hand, strong in this situation, but not fun to play out of position. The blinds were still 75/150, so I raised to 800. The donk moved in pretty quickly and the late position raiser folded. I felt sick. He had me covered, and the thought of bouncing out of my first WSOP with AJ was not a good one.
At the same time, I knew that I was probably ahead and that this might be my best chance to get a sizable stack. I slumped my head on the table grinding it into my arm. A crying call certainly. Someone near me said "Good luck" and I said "Thanks, I'll need it!" Someone else said, "No, you won't," and the donk rolled over A8o. I was a little relieved he didn't have KQ or something like that where it was basically a flip, but still wasn't ready to feel good until the hand was over. An ace flopped. The turn was a blank. The river was a by-now predictable 8 and I was done.
Obviously I was stunned. It took me a good thirty minutes to really get my head back. It had been a crazy 3 hours. I'd gotten my money in consistenly ahead and played some of the best poker of my life. I'd stolen pots, made a blind-blind steal, picked off bluffs, played through an extremely challenging short stack situation and fought back, and generally was in A-game mode nearly the entire time. Still, I was railed before the second break in my first WSOP event. It hurt, I'm not going to lie.
I took solace in two important facts. First, as I said, I played the best poker of my life and it was on the biggest stage yet of my young poker "career." That was and is immensely satisfying. I wanted to see if I could play in those situations and thrive. I did. That felt nice. Secondly, I was still in Vegas until Sunday, my wife was around, and I could still have a lovely time. We in fact did just that.
We had dinner reservations at Gaylord, an Indian restaurant in the Rio, for 7pm, which was around when I'd figured the dinner break would be. We decided to get tickets to see Penn and Teller that night and make a date night out of it. It turned into a wonderful evening. P&T were awesome and worth every penny of the $85 tickets. We had an amazing dinner at Gaylord, split a nice bottle of Pinot and enjoyed the rest of the evening.
The other thing we did a decent bit of was railing. We wandered through WSOP and saw a bunch of great players. As soon as we walked into the spectator room we nearly walked INTO T.J. Cloutier. Wow, that man is HUGE. We then saw Men, "The Master" Nguyen playing a cash game nearby. Very cool. It turned out that TWO final tables were going at this point. A stud 8 table and an NLH one. The Stud8 table featured Jeff Lisandro and... Doyle Brunson! We looked but didn't see Doyle. A break was taken soon after we came in so we figured he was probably in the bathroom. Anyway, the final tables at the Rio are open to all to watch. They are in enclosed areas but the spectator seating is open, and there is a nice porch overlooking them that you can watch them from. At this point we didn't see much.
We walked over then to an area where the limit 2k event was being played. There were only about 45 players left, Hellmuth and Negreanu among them. We didn't see Phil, but Daniel was present and loud. We watched him play for a bit until the dinner break hit and he ran out, twittering as he went. Again, cool
Later, before dinner, I checked the live updates from the WSOP page and saw that Doyle was down to a short stack and almost out. We rushed down and made it just in time to see his last two hands. It was simply amazing seeing Doyle play at a WSOP final table. The highlight of my trip, without a doubt! Later we saw Greg Raymer in the hallway, though I didn't approach him. We watched a bit more of the final table action in the 8 or better tournament after P&T, and saw Lisandro survived and was 3 handed - he ultimately won the bracelet, though we didn't wait around to see it. We did get to see Matusow come in and rail him which was pretty cool too. Also, the night before I'd seen Humberto Brenes walking around and had managed (somehow!) to resist the urge to yell HUMBERRRRTO! at him.
All in all, a great trip. I was disappointed I'd run so bad, obviously, but Janessa and I had a ton of fun anyways. There's always next year. I am planning on putting some savings together to try to play several events next year, including, hopefully the main event. That's my trip report, and I'm sticking to it.
I was very happy with how I played. I consistently got my money in way ahead and made good, timely steals. Unfortunately, variance picked a bad time to rear its head.
I began around noon with $4500 chips along with the other 2700 entrants. My first table was pretty soft, but that didn't stop me from getting involved in some big pots pretty quickly. Within the first rotation I picked up AKo and raised from LP to 3x (150 as blinds began at 25-50). I got two callers, a late position guy and the small blind. The flop came down 3 low/mid spades. I had the K of spades, so with that and overcards, a cbet was certainly in order. The late position caller folded but the small blind called. The turn was the Queen of hearts. Check, check. The river was the fourth spade, a 7. The small blind led for about $750. Knowing that I could only be beat by the Ace of spades (but also knowing that a raise would only be called by that Ace), I called. A4, Ace of Spades, I lost 1/3 of my stack. Ouch.
After another rotation, it was folded around to me in the small blind, where I looked down and saw a lovely KK. Wanting to build a pot, I raised to 200. The big blind called and the flop came 10-10-9. I thought this was a pretty good flop for an overpair but certainly vulnerable to draws, so I cbet 2/3rds pot and was called. The turn was a blank four. My initial instinct was to fire again to protect my hand. But something stopped me. When the big blind called on the flop it was pretty quick. I had a feeling he didn't think I was that strong. The board was hard to hit and my raise was from a steal position. Even though there were some bad river cards for me if he checked behind, I thought it might be better to go for the check-raise. I did, he obliged, and I quickly moved in, not thrilled to get all my chips in 15 minutes into my first WSOP event(!)
After he tanked, I started to root for a call. Obviously a ten would have snapped me. At that point I figured he had a draw, a small pair, or maybe a 9. He waited forever before folding, and told me that he had 9-7. I dragged a big pot and was up to about 5k. Soon after this, the dealer informed us that we would be the first table in the huge room to break (table breaks were planned ahead of time). Disappointing, as I'd liked the table. After a few more hands we were all moved, and I sat down in seat 7 of a different table not too far from where I'd started.
I ended up playing the first hand I was dealt, pocket 4s. A player raised in middle position and I called from the Cutoff. We were still at 25/50, so we were deep enough to set mine. The player on the button directly behind me also called, the blinds folded, and we saw an Ace high flop 3 handed. I missed my set so I was planning on folding pretty quickly. Oddly, the pre flop raiser checked. I checked too and the button quickly checked behind. The turn was a 7. Again, the pre flop raiser checked. Now I realized this was a good steal opportunity. There was no way an ace or strong hand checked twice here. So I fired and the button and pfr instantly folded. Easy money.
After that, I didn't see too many playable hands for awhile. I watched the table closely and tried to pick up on the dynamics between players and their individual styles. On my right was a small woman with glasses who, it quickly became apparent, was a bulldog. Throughout the time I was at the table, I saw her reraise quite a bit and take down some big pots. I was glad she was on my right(!) At the same time, on her right was the pre flop raiser from the 4s hand. He was raising virtually every hand from middle and late position. It was annoying, but exploitable. I figured I'd be in some pots with him at some point, but simply couldn't get good enough hands to take advantage at this point.
After a few more rotations, the player two to my left opened from early position for 3.5x, his standard raise, even though the rest of the table had been opening to 2.5. I was in the big blind, and it was folded around to me. I looked down and saw a lovely sight: pocket kings! Now I tried to figure out the best way to make money on the hand. I ended up flatting for two reasons. First, I reasoned that the raiser would (correctly), see a 3bet from the big blind into an early position raiser as VERY strong. Unless he had a VERY big hand, at least JJ+ or AK, he might be able to get away pre-flop. At worst, he could call and then escape on many flops. Secondly, I was concerned that if an Ace came off I could end up playing a big pot out of position against a raiser very likely to have an Ace in his hand.
The flop came down queen high with no flush or straight draws. The raiser cbet into me about 2/3rds pot. I paused for awhile, checked my cards, pretending to consider folding, then repopped him 3x his original bet. He quickly moved all in for 2800 more. I had him covered by a little over a thousand and quickly called. He turned over AQo. Of course I then turned over my KK and he immediately went white and said to me "nice hand!" I wasn't feeling so confident however, as with most of my chips in, even though I was pretty far ahead, he was hardly dead. I think I was about a 4:1 favorite at this point with him drawing to 5 outs. I said loudly "the hand isn't over yet!" The turn was a jack. The river.... another queen. BAM. I was down to 1300 chips.
I was shellshocked, of course. My opponent apologized profusely for the beat, which was gracious, but I told him not to worry, as I'd gotten exactly what I wanted in that spot. I got my money in a huge favorite and since I hadn't repopped him pre, I got why he thought AQo might be good there. That's exactly what I wanted him to think. So I couldn't really complain, but now I was hurting. Before I'd splashed around in a few smaller pots, stolen some blinds here and there. Now I was suddenly in short stack mode with thirteen big blinds and visions of not even making the first break were going through my head.
I fought valiently to keep my spirits up and stay focused. Only four hands later I picked up AQo in late position and opened to 300, almost 1/3 of my remaining stack. I got called by the button, a european looking guy who wasn't very active but looked like he knew what he was doing. The flop was just awful, 9-8-5, two spades (no spade in my hand). Cbetting (or shoving) seemed like suicide. Once I bet I would be committed and even if I were ahead I couldn't be far ahead! Sadly, I didn't see any option but to check/fold and give up. It left me with ten big blinds, which at least gave me a chance to get my money in better than that.
After this hand I went utterly card-dead for what seemed like forever. It was immensely frustrating, as I wanted to get back in the game and steal some pots. Still, I had to remain focused and not take silly risks yet. I still had enough big blinds to wait for a good spot, and with the slow structure of the tournament (hour levels... at this point about halfway through level 2, 50/100), I did have the time to be a little more careful. After playing fold-em poker for what felt like forever, it was folded around to me in late position and I looked down and saw... two aces!
I wasn't waiting for Aces. I'd planned on getting my money in with any pair as the open raiser and most pairs as a re-raiser, AQs+ and maybe some other hands depending on the situation. For example, if I saw a spot where I could triple up with a hand likely to have good equity like J10s or 76s, I might have grabbed it. Instead, I got the aces. Now, after waiting that long for anything, I didn't feel raising was the right play. I only had ten big blinds, so any reasonable player would see that I intended to commit myself on nearly any flop. I settled on limping, which wasn't an easy decsion by any means, since slow-playing KK had cost me such a big pot. Nevertheless, it seemed like the best chance I had to double up. I limped, no one raised, the small blind completed and we saw the flop 3 ways. J7x, two diamonds. The small blind led out for about half pot and I pushed over him fairly quickly. I figured he probably had a flush draw, or, hopefully, top pair, and wanted to either end the hand now or get it in ahead. He had a 7 with no FD, though he caught one on the turn. Fortunately, I held on the river and now I was up to a walloping 2100 of my original 4500 stack.
Very soon after the first break hit. We had half an hour. I decided to go back to my hotel room, which was a good brisk walk away from the convention center where the tournament was being held. I did so for a few reasons... first, I'd brought Janessa's Ipod to keep me loose, but it was totally dead, so it needed charging. Janessa was at the spa so I couldn't yet ask her to do anything about it. Second, I realized that running back and forth would be good for me, because it'd keep my blood flowing and keep me loose after sitting for so long. So I went back and carefully thought out a plan for the next hour. When I went back the blinds would be 75/150, leaving me with 13 or so big blinds. A very awkward stack size. I remembered that this stack size was potentially ideal for re-stealing loose raisers, and resolved to use this information to my advantage.
It didn't take too long for me to get the chance. Our aggro raiser mentioned before opened for the 200th time in a row from middle position soon after we returned. I looked down to find J10s in the small blind. I paused. Although I knew this was an ideal re-steal spot, I was still a little nervous about executing it, knowing that it was essentially a semi-bluff. Still, poker is about risk, and I needed chips. I couldn't get a much better spot than this, and J10s played pretty decently against a steal range. So I shoved. The big blind instafolded and said "Good luck." The original raiser hemmed and hawed and tanked. I felt sure he would call me and that he was deep enough to do so and sat there very nervously until he finally mucked. I breathed a huge sigh of relief, though I said aloud, "I wanted a call but I guess I'll take this." I don't know if I convinced anyone but it felt tricky ! (LOL).
Now I had a little over 3000. Not great, but a little room to manuever at least. Only a few hands later our intrepid maniac raised again to 400, 2.5x. I looked down to see AJo in the cutoff. I am not normally fond of calling raises with this type of hand, even in position, but given how wide the raiser's range appeared to be and that I had position on him, I decided to take a flop and see if I could either hit it or out play him. The big blind also called. The flop came down jack-7-2 rainbow. It was as dry a flop as you can imagine, and clearly I was either way ahead or way behind. The bb checked, the raiser cbet about 2/3rds pot and now I had a decsion. I was short enough that a reraise would commit me to the pot, and even though the board was dry, I would obviously hate a Queen or King on the turn or river, so calling didn't seem like the best option. Still, I had a player behind me who might have something worth playing. I tanked for what felt like forever (probably to the other players too!) before pushing in. I reasoned that he probably didn't have top set since I had a jack in my hand, that two pairs were very unlikely given the board, and that because of how loose a raiser he was pre-flop, I was ahead so much of the time that I had no other real option but to move in. The big blind folded and the original raiser snap-folded, looking very frustrated. Since I figured I might want to play back at him again, I flipped over my AJ and told him "I'm not bluffing you," dragging a good pot.
Now I was up to over 4k again, and I felt great. I'd weathered a very challenging storm to get back into contention. I now had enough chips to really play poker again. I got involved in some more small pots and generally was doing pretty well, until an amazing donk made himself known to the table. The gentlemen on my left got involved in a big pot with a guy in seat one. I hadn't watched the whole hand but on the turn he shoved all in on a 7-8-10-5 board with two spades. Seat one tanked, and seemed ready to fold, but surprisingly he called, turning over Q9. Queen high with a gutshot!! 4 outs to what turned out to be a set of 8s. Holy crap! This nut had basically called of his whole stack with a gutshot...which...he HIT. Jack on the river. Unreal!
The whole table was stunned. When seat one got up for awhile we all commented and joked about the play. It was crazy. Several hands later, the aggro guy opened small and the aggressive woman next to him moved in over the top of him. Amazingly, seat one, in the big blind, coldcalled both raises. When the hands were turned over, there could no longer be any doubt this guy was a world class retard. He had pocket 4s. The original raiser had Aces and the woman next to me had 10s. The original raiser was short, so I mentioned to the woman that at least she had a good side pot. Predictably(?) a 4 flopped, no one caught up, the original raiser was eliminated, and the woman next to me took a big hit to her stack. A player near me confided that he had folded a 4 meaning this guy had 1-outted his way to a bigger stack(!)
Well, obviously he became the focus of the table, playing too many hands too aggressively but managing to get lucky a lot of the time, though losing occasionally. I raised his earl yposition limp once from the button and he immediately overshoved. He re-popped the woman next to me several times stating that he didn't like being bullied. The woman insisted "I'm not bullying you sir," but that did not seem to placate him. A little later, with her in the big blind, he open raised from mp. She mucked 10-6s (which I inadvertendly saw over her shoulder) and he proudly flipped over 2-3o.
The very next hand I was in the big blind when nutball open limped and a player in late position behind him limped behind. I looked down to find AJo. Not my favorite hand, strong in this situation, but not fun to play out of position. The blinds were still 75/150, so I raised to 800. The donk moved in pretty quickly and the late position raiser folded. I felt sick. He had me covered, and the thought of bouncing out of my first WSOP with AJ was not a good one.
At the same time, I knew that I was probably ahead and that this might be my best chance to get a sizable stack. I slumped my head on the table grinding it into my arm. A crying call certainly. Someone near me said "Good luck" and I said "Thanks, I'll need it!" Someone else said, "No, you won't," and the donk rolled over A8o. I was a little relieved he didn't have KQ or something like that where it was basically a flip, but still wasn't ready to feel good until the hand was over. An ace flopped. The turn was a blank. The river was a by-now predictable 8 and I was done.
Obviously I was stunned. It took me a good thirty minutes to really get my head back. It had been a crazy 3 hours. I'd gotten my money in consistenly ahead and played some of the best poker of my life. I'd stolen pots, made a blind-blind steal, picked off bluffs, played through an extremely challenging short stack situation and fought back, and generally was in A-game mode nearly the entire time. Still, I was railed before the second break in my first WSOP event. It hurt, I'm not going to lie.
I took solace in two important facts. First, as I said, I played the best poker of my life and it was on the biggest stage yet of my young poker "career." That was and is immensely satisfying. I wanted to see if I could play in those situations and thrive. I did. That felt nice. Secondly, I was still in Vegas until Sunday, my wife was around, and I could still have a lovely time. We in fact did just that.
We had dinner reservations at Gaylord, an Indian restaurant in the Rio, for 7pm, which was around when I'd figured the dinner break would be. We decided to get tickets to see Penn and Teller that night and make a date night out of it. It turned into a wonderful evening. P&T were awesome and worth every penny of the $85 tickets. We had an amazing dinner at Gaylord, split a nice bottle of Pinot and enjoyed the rest of the evening.
The other thing we did a decent bit of was railing. We wandered through WSOP and saw a bunch of great players. As soon as we walked into the spectator room we nearly walked INTO T.J. Cloutier. Wow, that man is HUGE. We then saw Men, "The Master" Nguyen playing a cash game nearby. Very cool. It turned out that TWO final tables were going at this point. A stud 8 table and an NLH one. The Stud8 table featured Jeff Lisandro and... Doyle Brunson! We looked but didn't see Doyle. A break was taken soon after we came in so we figured he was probably in the bathroom. Anyway, the final tables at the Rio are open to all to watch. They are in enclosed areas but the spectator seating is open, and there is a nice porch overlooking them that you can watch them from. At this point we didn't see much.
We walked over then to an area where the limit 2k event was being played. There were only about 45 players left, Hellmuth and Negreanu among them. We didn't see Phil, but Daniel was present and loud. We watched him play for a bit until the dinner break hit and he ran out, twittering as he went. Again, cool
Later, before dinner, I checked the live updates from the WSOP page and saw that Doyle was down to a short stack and almost out. We rushed down and made it just in time to see his last two hands. It was simply amazing seeing Doyle play at a WSOP final table. The highlight of my trip, without a doubt! Later we saw Greg Raymer in the hallway, though I didn't approach him. We watched a bit more of the final table action in the 8 or better tournament after P&T, and saw Lisandro survived and was 3 handed - he ultimately won the bracelet, though we didn't wait around to see it. We did get to see Matusow come in and rail him which was pretty cool too. Also, the night before I'd seen Humberto Brenes walking around and had managed (somehow!) to resist the urge to yell HUMBERRRRTO! at him.
All in all, a great trip. I was disappointed I'd run so bad, obviously, but Janessa and I had a ton of fun anyways. There's always next year. I am planning on putting some savings together to try to play several events next year, including, hopefully the main event. That's my trip report, and I'm sticking to it.
Friday, June 19, 2009
This Wkd: Vegas & WSOP Event #39
| 2009 40th Annual World Series of Poker | ||||
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No-Limit Hold’em (Event 39) | ||||
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Rio Hotel & Casino - Saturday, June 20, 2009 to Monday, June 22, 2009
Yup, off I go to take a stab at this thing. I figure it's about time I try, and so I'm off tonight. Janessa and I are staying at the Rio. She'll enjoy a lovely spa experience while I toil away at the tables in search of treasure! I am pumped. |
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