Wow. I can’t believe I haven’t written a blog in over a month. I guess I expected my new website to be done by now. The good news is that it’s looking really good!

Ok, let’s see how I can sum up over a month.

The weirdest thing that happened involved my last Bluff article. I wrote about a bad play I made, and how a bunch of factors contributed to me going on tilt, and I wrote something to the effect of, “I do this thing I do where I start to shake and lose focus, and it usually goes away once I eat something.”

Entertainme on 2+2 read the article and sent me a private message suggesting that I should see a doctor to find out if I have hypoglycemia. I’m very glad he did, because after talking with a doctor, it turns out I am hypoglycemic.

It’s not a big deal, and it is actually a relief knowing that I have it. The symptoms include dizziness, lack of focus, loss of motor control, depression, sleepiness, and a few other things that suck to have at the poker table. Luckily, all I need to do is make sure I keep my blood sugar level high enough. That usually means as little as having half a glass of orange juice, or even a few peanuts when I start to feel symptoms. Easy fix! Thanks Entertainme!

Ok, now let’s see if I can remember, and sum up the tournaments I’ve played.

In October I played the US Poker Bowl, a team tournament in which the winners received checks that bounced, so I’m not gonna bother and go into detail on how the format had potential to be good. My division was supposed to play down to a winner on the first day, but the crew didn’t have their act together, and we were delayed. We only played half of our division, and all teams had to come back on the final day, which also happened to be day two of the $10,000 event at Caesars.

Unfortunately, I was the only one on my team that advanced to the playoff on the final day, but I decided to play Caesars anyway. After day 1, I had a decent stack, and woke up early to be at the Poker Bowl at 10am the next day. I was short stacked, as was everyone else since the structure was terrible, and it didn’t take long for me to shove my chips in with 66 only to run into aces. I was able to make it back to Caesar’s before it started at noon, and had a great day two. Long story short, I made the final table, and ended up finishing in 5th place for $164,000. I now have 6 cashes over $100,000, and zero over $200,000. That is something that I am not happy about, and am trying very hard to change.

After that, I played WPT Niagara which didn’t go well. Some guy hit a runner runner flush against me early on in a huge pot, and I never recovered after that.

After that was Foxwoods. I decided to skip the prelim events because I had tickets to 3 nights of the band Brand New in LA. They were awesome.

As for the main event… I bubbled. I made a bad read, which of course turned into a bad call for all my chips. I figured the guy expected me to fold since we were on the bubble, and therefore his overbet had to be a bluff. If he wanted a call, he would have bet less. Well, I completely overestimated my opponent who simply wasn’t thinking, and I busted out of the tournament because of it. I now have all 3 WPT bubbles! 7th place (TV bubble), 11th place (Final Table bubble) and 52nd place (Cash bubble since 50 people cashed). I wonder if I’m the only person out there with all 3 bubbles. I guess it’s not something I should be proud of. Other than that hand, I think I played a great tournament.

So far at the 5 Diamond, I think I’m still at the top of my game. There have been 4 events so far. We only started with 3,000 chips in the first event, and 4,000 chips in the 2nd event, and I never amassed a stack in those before the blinds got too big to maneuver around.

The 3rd event had some mixed blessings. It was a $2500 buy in with 237 players, and I ended up finishing 20th, which of course paid $0. Only 18 players cashed. I never really got any cards this tournament, and had to win multiple coinflips for all my chips just to get that far, so it’s certainly nothing to brag about, or even complain about, but I must say for a while that it felt really good to have a double average stack in a 5 Diamond event in hopes of repeating the success I had last year when I made four final tables.

Today I played the $3000 event. I think I played it pretty well, and built upt to 24,000 chips early on (from a starting stack of 6000). I think I made a decent bluff that would have won me the pot if my opponent hadn’t improved to two pair on the turn that cost me 10,000 chips. I lost most of the rest of my stack when I flopped top pair, top kicker, with the nut flush draw against Tom West’s (TMay’s brother) overpair.

Tomorrow is the first of three $5000 events here, and I’m really excited about my chances. I’ve been playing great, and the fact that I’ve amassed stacks in the last two tournaments gives me a lot of hope, even if I haven’t cashed in any yet.

I’ve also been playing some high stakes cash games at the Bellagio including the $300/$600 and $400/$800 mixed games. I love playing these mixed games for the same reasons I like HORSE tournaments. It really takes a lot of skill to be able to play multiple games at a top level. Unfortunately my sessions have been pretty short because the games have been really tough with some of the best players in the world sitting in them. Even though I’ve won money in my mixed game sessions so far, I refuse to stay at the table if I think there’s even a chance that I don’t have positive equity because the competition is too tough, especially when the stakes are that high.

Let’s see… any non poker stuff to write about? I hung out with all the Ship It Holla Ballas in Canada for Halloween. We had a mini theme of felon athletes and other various offensive costumes. I went as Chris Benoit, the wrestler that strangled his son, and wife, before strangling himself as some kind of religious cultish thing. Everyone loved the doll I carried around with a pastic bag tied over its head! I also came up with Alan Sass’ and Tom “Durrrrr” Dwan’s costumes; they went as abortion doctors. They wore coat hangers around their necks and had tiny baby heads glued (via blood) to their scrubs. Michael Vick, Pacman Jones, and Nelly also made appearances to round out the theme. Toronto is awesome, and Halloween was so much fun.

Thanksgiving was relatively low key for me. Just spent it with some close friends of mine in LA. Happy Thanksgiving everyone.

Other than that, I’ve been doing a lot of writing (yes, I see the irony), and also did a photo shoot for my website. It always feels weird. I’m just a poker player, but this is the 3rd photo shoot that I’ve been a part of. I play cards. I really don’t see what the big deal is, but I’m not gonna complain about all the other stuff, since I’ve certainly taken advantage of it.

Not sure how obvious it is from my writing, but I’m really pressed for time as I want to get sleep for the $5k tomorrow, so I’m going to end this abruptly.

I am VERY SORRY for the lack of updates. I PROMISE there will be PLENTY more when my new website is up which should be very soon.