Tao of Poker

Lurking in the Shadows

Let me start saying that I have been slacking off the last few days with my blogs. I have been going through some personal things (sigh, relationships drain the life outta me) in addition to writing like a madman this past few days. I will eventually post some things I said I'd post, lol. Bare with me.

On the good side, my lovely and talented intern Paris is back from her European holiday so now I have someone to help summarize the growing number of poker blogs out there. Poker blogs are the new tatoos. I think even my grandma has one now.

Last night, I was multi-tasking, hanging out with my brother, eating pizza, and watching the Knicks game. I aslo fired up Party Poker. I had a rough week playing NL ring games and my bankroll is under $50. So I hit the 50cent-$1 tables to build it back up. Those games require no/little concentration, and I'm on auto-pilot. No loose-maniac-aggressive-Pauly in those games. I wait for the nuts, then attack.

Alas, when I wasn't waiting for my premium hands, I was lurking in the shadows watching the tables that my fellow bloggers played on. I watched Boy Genius win a $10 SNG! He made an incredible call when it was heads up and the chip totals were virtually even. He (as well as I) thought the other dude was bluffing at a pot. With Q-8o our hero from Michigan made a tough call with a pair of 8s and reraised all-in on the flop. Alas, he ran into pocket Aces! Wow. Of course, the poker gods were loving BG last night and he caught another 8 on the turn. Amazing (and lucky) call. But alas, BG walked away a winner. You have to make moves and risk your chips at some point if you want to win a tournament. Good job, BG! Of course BG was giving me shit for playing so tight in my low limit game. He got bored watching me fold, fold, fold, fold...

I also caught some of Grubby playing in several qualfiers and multi-table toruneys. His A-10 ran into A-Q and got bounced from one. And what's a visit to the tables on Party Poker and not checking in on HDouble playing three $3-6 tables at once. I didn't say anything, but I was watching for a little while. HDouble took down a huge pot with A4d after he flopped a nut flush and fish were still betting into him on the river. He talks about going on tilt in a shorthanded $5-10 game in his latest entry: Why Hustling Beats Rounding.

Yeah, it was cool to finally watch some of these guys play. Party Poker is an amzing place. More to come.

One last note, where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio?