Just wanted to touch in with a quick recap of my week in poker.

On Monday one of my backees (in makeup) won the PokerStars $100 + 1r1a turbo for $9000, and later took 4th in the Full Tilt $1k Monday for $30000. Pretty good day for me, though I myself took a disgusting beat in the 1k and couldn’t get anything going.

Tuesday was pretty miserable. I made about 20 different comebacks in the Super Tuesday, only to be coolered back down each time. My horses struggled as well, soooooo yeah. Nothing much to report.

On Wednesday, I decided to go for the full day’s grind, playing a lot of low-mid stakes tournies I wouldn’t normally, and starting at 2PM EST, playing all night. Most of the day, I was 12-tabling on average, something I haven’t done in a while. It took some getting used to, but overall I enjoyed it. Felt like the good old days.

In the afternoon I took 4th in the Full Tilt $200 Turbo, unfortunately running AQ into AA 4 handed. The score was good for $3000. At night, I took 6th in the $215 UltimateBet Sniper, for $4000, unfortunately chopping a very big AJ to A8, losing a big 99<AT, and then losing QJ<AT when I was fairly shortstacked. My horses also bubbled an absurd amount of final tables, just adding to my mounting frustrations.

I’ll be back playing this Sunday and next week, and in a few days I’ll post a full preview of the upcoming Full Tilt FTOPS series.

Till then,
AJK

Going into the tournament I was pretty jet lagged but felt like I could still play pretty well. I started the day just grinding through the early levels without having very many big pots. I was up to about 40k (30k starting stack) at 200/400 50 ante when I played my first big pot. The cutoff raised to 1100 I called on the button with 56ss and the BB called. The flop came J56 rainbow, bb and cutoff checked I bet 2k the bb check raised to 7k cutoff folded I shoved for around 25k total he called with 88 and I held.

Anyway so I entered the 300/600 level with around 60k and unfortunately I didnt make it to 400/800. I lost with an oesd and bdfd vs 2p, tried a small bluff that didnt work, had aj vs aq aipf against a short stack, and lost with an overpair vs pair+sd. I lost all of those hands in around a 30 min period and I was out. Really frustrating to have a big stack in a very soft tournament like monte carlo and then just hit a bad stretch and bust so quickly. But thats the nature of tournaments just have to put it behind you and move onto the next one.

So for the rest of the trip right now my plan is to play the 5k euro nl event today and if I dont make day 2 of that I will be playing the 25k euro high roller event tomorrow and possibly some of the other prelims.

April 24th, Las Vegas: I meet ‘Luckychewy’ in the hallway outside my hotel room. We’ve decided to have breakfast (at 2pm obviously) at the Bellagio café then go suit shopping for him and get him started in the pick up game.

I order my berry pancakes and orange juice and he opts for some very delicious looking French toast. Then I spend the next hour trying to go over every detail of pick up I can get into for him, stopping numerous times to address questions. Chewy is a very bright guy so I have no doubt it will all sink in very well and the questions he’s asking are the right ones. We get up to leave and continue our talks through the Bellagio and over into the ‘Forum Shops’ at ‘Caesars’ hotel.

We go into ‘Hugo Boss’ and find him a sweet ass three button soft pin stripe blue suit with a faded blue shirt and tie. They say they can get the alterations done for him before he leaves for Monte Carlo on Sunday. I am again tempted to buy a suit but refrain. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]

Location: St. Julian’s, Malta

Chilling. Grinding. Up mad buy-ins. Writing. Hanging out. Working out.

Yeah.

Not creative.

Love going to make it alright.

Putting off a bunch of real life shit. Just want to not deal with anything, like ever. I’m so lazy.

A stranger walks up to you on the street and tells you she knows the day and way you die. Do you get the answer or do you walk away? Why?

Dr. Octagon knows.

Currently Listening To:

Paul Van Dyk - Seven Ways
Kate Ryan - Different
Fordirelifesake - A Daydream Disaster

April 23rd, Las Vegas: I arrive at ‘The Venetian’ poker room about 10 minutes late for the tournament. I buy in with the $2500 in cash ‘Shaundeeb’ was nice enough to have hooked me up with and find my seat at a table of unknowns. We start 20,000 deep at 25/50 blinds with 90 minute levels. This is a very sick tournament, particularly since a quick glance around the room confirms it is almost entirely made up of value.

My table plays extremely loose-weak in the early goings, and a few of the guys are clearly huge targets post flop. The English gentleman on my right limps or calls a raise nearly every hand, and calls down like crazy post flop. I take every opportunity I can to get involved with him and it’s not long before we tangle in a large pot:
Effective stacks: ~20,000, blinds 25/50, I hold 4c7c in the SB. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]

Location: St. Julian’s, Malta

Last couple nights have left me happy. Really happy. Over the fucking moon happy.

It’s only when I’m trying to you know, work, that I get annoyed.

That and my house is destroyed, we missed the maid today. The bulk of my San Remo winnings I haven’t received, which just infuriates my OCD. My records aren’t done, my backers aren’t paid, etc.

(3:17:23 AM) Paul “Bootswild” Varano: yeah there always seems to be something preventing me from doing what i wanna
(3:17:44 AM) Paul “Bootswild” Varano: but its definintely in my head
(3:19:03 AM) Alex “Assassinato” Fitzgerald: yeah ditto
(3:19:09 AM) Alex “Assassinato” Fitzgerald: idk i have random days i just hate myself
(3:19:11 AM) Alex “Assassinato” Fitzgerald: im super on edge

Ugh, just need to get my ass to bed. Actually even made money today, wrote some, read some, just something about not having things decently in order gets me weird at times.

I think its a reaction too to just all the drinking and sleep deprivation.

Whatever, had a good time during all of that. Going to handle shit tomorrow. Can’t wait to write the plus signs in the records, see the new totals.

Last week I played in the 25k wpt championship at the bellagio. I made it deep into day 2 and had 280k which was well above average but unfortunately lost some key pots and was out before day 3.

Anyway iam now in monte carlo to play the 15k euro buyin ept championship. The total travel time from vegas to monte carlo was like 21 hours for me because of delays and right now iam really jet lagged right now blah. Not the best condition to be playing a large tournament in but I should manage ok.

The structure for the main event is unfortunately kind of fast with the levels on day 1 being only 60 minutes long and the levels on day 2 and later being 75. But I did get a chance earlier to walk around the resort and the town earlier and the area around here is really beautiful so if I bust early I will take some time off just to relax and explore the town some more. Anyway going to try and get some sleep before the tourney starts in a few hours.

April 22nd, Las Vegas: I awake with only a minor hang over. My water drinking attempt was clearly a great success. I call my friend and ask him if he plans on grinding today, as Wednesday is the second best tournament grinding day of the week. He tells me he’ll be grinding all afternoon and evening and I can stop by whenever.

The girl and I go over to the Bellagio so I can get changed. I take a shower and change into more casual wear, jeans with a dark button up French cuff shirt, an apt opportunity to try out the new cufflinks. They are difficult to insert. I consider cracking a joke to that affect when asking for her help with them, but decide it’s probably a bit early in the morning for that. We stroll down to the Bellagio café and order the standard Vegas 2pm breakfast. My pancakes have many berries on and in them.

Afterwards we return to Panorama tower to hit the pool and hot tub with friends. I go up to their room first and they are already grinding. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]