Katrina Tournaments

The devastation in the wake of Hurricane Katrina has left me floored. I was glued to the news on CNN for days, something I don't think any of us have felt since 9/11. And in terms of the human toll, we know now that it'll be far, far worse. For those of us so far away, the best thing to do is to open our wallets. And for poker players, this is made so easy with all of the charity tournaments happening online. I signed up for one on Poker Stars and played the Friday one on Full Tilt. Didn't get tremendously far, though it was hardly the point. I was seated at Pauly's table early on and picked up a pot off him. I said hello, but I think he must have missed it in the chat box amidst all of the shoutouts from his legions of loyal readers and fans. I busted out somewhere around 280th in that one.

Ultimate Bet is running three more relief tourneys this week with buyins from $5+5 up to $150+150 and some cool prizes for the final table. There's a dinner with Annie Duke, private lessons from Antonio Esfandiari (Rocks & Rings not included) and of course, a truckload of signed Phil Hellmuth books up for grabs. Check it out.

I did manage to have a good weekend at the tables. I took third in two Full Tilt multis back-to-back, putting my tournament profits back in the black. Man it was good to make a couple of final tables after bubbling, bubbling, bubbling so many of these friggin' things over the past few months. You have enough of those and you start to think you don't even know how to play this game! I re-read the end of Barry Greenstein's book right before I played, and I think it made a lot of things finally click into place for me. I'm also continuing to rock the Party Poker SNGs for a nice profit. So while my NLHE play is steadily improving, my limit game still sucks ass. I managed to drop $200 two-tabling the Party 2-4 before winning about $110 of it back by the time I quit at 3 AM. I really have to figure out what the fuck is going on there.

Showcase and I also hosted an impromptu home game with two of our new neighbors, Scotsman and Iowa. Though I took down the first of our two SNGs with ease, I busted out first in the second one and became the perma-dealer. I was also drinking heavily. Iowa had bought my a forty from the local bodega, and being primarily a smoker, I was silly tipsy in no time. In the end, it came down to an epic heads-up battle in the end between Showcase and poker newbie Iowa, who had never really played the game before that night. Though I adore him, he didn't even know that KQ is a great hand heads-up. Of course Showcase lost. ;) But these things matter little to him, as I would have been pounding the walls if it were me. We're definitely hosting more of these. Especially if we could round up more people to play. But this is L.A. and Angelinos looove to flake.

I'll be bonus-clearing on Full Tilt tonight again, because lord knows that takes a while. That is if I don't have to read some idiotic spec.