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I've added "bucky's Associated Press" over on the right hand side of this blog. It's an RSS feed for my Google reader shared items. If you use an RSS aggregator, like Google reader, feel free to add my feed to yours. For anyone who doesn’t know what an RSS feed is, and you know who you are, basically I use Google reader to gather news stories from a variety of different sources and then I can go their and sort through it and just read what I want. It’s a lot more efficient. Now, you can see the 5 most recent stories I’ve read that I find interesting. BTW, I recommend the Mos Def link.

I know in my last post I said that I haven’t been up to too much lately but since then I went down to the Elbow and played a little 15/30 and also went cross country skiing with Bryan. If he emails me some pictures I’ll make sure to post some of them. I’m going to talk about my live play, the skiing as well as a small segment on coffee near the bottom. Read whatever interests you. I would have talked about the democratic debate that I watched, but no one is interesting in my thoughts about that and I won’t have space.

Down at the Elbow Thursday night I treaded water for about four and a half hours. I was up $200, down $200, up $200, down $200, etc. I think I went up and down 3 or 4 times. A couple of times I paid off and if the hand had happened online I would have been 100% correct to pay off in that spot, but live, I’m not sure that I was correct. I think my reads were correct at a high enough accuracy for me to correctly fold, but I erred on the side of caution.

Here’s an example:

A slightly too loose, trying to play good, but lacking some skills young kid opens in early position. He is called in about three spots and I am in the BB with AA so I 3-bet. The young guy caps and we see the flop five ways for four bets each.

Flop: JJ3 rainbow and I check. The young guy obligingly bets and everyone folds to a lady on the button who raises. The lady on the button strikes me as a pretty decent player. She’s tricky, she’s a little loose pre-flop (of course, this is her biggest leak, like it is for everyone in the casino), but I respect her post-flop game. We’ve played together before, but she doesn’t remember me. No one ever remembers me. I decide to 3-bet, as I really think there is a good chance my hand is still best.

Thinking back on this 3-bet I am not sure it’s the best play. This is classic way ahead / way behind type of stuff which means I am either a huge favorite or a huge dog and typically in those spots you are best to simply check/call all the way to the end to allow your opponent to bluff off their chips. The thing is that this spot is a little different. It’s true that I am either way ahead or way behind, but when the action comes to me there is 23 small bets in the pot, and if I call then the young kid will be getting 25 to one to call and he will be correct to peel to try and spike on the turn. In fact, he’s probably correct to call with anything that he has (which is most likely KK or QQ). If I 3-bet, he will probably call me with those two hands and would be making a big mistake. The lady could very well have a jack, or she could have a medium pair like 99. In fact, I think those medium pairs will be a large part of her total range of hands in this spot. These are the factors that lead me to 3-bet in this spot.

The young kid folded and the lady capped. She will almost always have a jack in this spot. I called, the turn was a queen and I check/called. The river was another jack and I check/called again. This is where I am not sure it is worth it for me to call. On the river I am getting 17.5:1 to call and have to be best only 5.4% of the time. Online this is an easy call. Live, I’m not sure. If she has that medium pair that I think she might have had I don’t think a typical live player will value bet it there. They do not value bet light enough live; this is a classic mistake of your otherwise good live player. But the way she bet, and the look on her face was pure confidence. It’s true that the last jack really reduces the number of possible hands she could have that contain a jack, but I’m still not sure. I called and said, “I really think you have quads, but I’m not good enough to fold.” Of course she had quads. Shrug, it really is a small mistake, if it’s a mistake at all.

The only other interesting hand and the one that really put me into the black finally, was a kill pot where the betting limits double. The killer was in early position and he was one of the donkies that were making this game unbelievable. He raised his kill to 60, and the guy on his left, who was playing the big NL game (5/10) head’s up for about an hour raised to 90 and I looked down to see QQ on the button. Upstairs! 120 biatches! SB cold calls before I get my chips into the pot. Ruh-Roh! $495 in the pot before we see the flop.

Flop: QJ9 rainbow. Bingo! Top set, but dangerous board. SB checks, donkey checks, and NL guy bets into me. Well, board is dangerous and pot is big so this is an easy raise. SB cold calls again and donkey folds. NL guy calls. Pot is now $675.

Turn: 8. Can it get much worse? Well, a Ten would be worse. Anyways, check, check to me. I bet and when they both just call I know I’m best.

River: 2. Check, check to me and I bet and they both fold saying they each had AK and were drawing to that Ten. Final pot: $855. My profit: $710 (after rake). That pot had quite a crowd gathered around the table and the players discussed it for a while afterwards because I never did say, or show, what I had.

After that pot I won a few more good ones and finished +$1043 for the evening. Not bad for 8 hours of work.

I know I was going to talk about cross country skiing but this is getting pretty long. I’ll wait until I have pictures and talk it about it then.

On to the coffee. I like coffee. I drink coffee everyday. It brings me a small measure of joy and it’s only vice I have left (is gambling a vice? Hmm….). For Christmas I got a French press and have been making my own coffee but it hasn’t tasted as good as the stuff I get from Second Cup, even though I am using the same beans. This has bothered me, so today I got all scientific and shit.

I grinded up the same amount of beans that I normally use and then measured the amount of ground coffee that I had produced. It came out to ~9 tablespoons. I’ve read in a few places, including the bag the beans came in, that the correct ratio of beans / water is 2 tablespoons ground coffee per 170 ml water. Alright, so I need 765 ml of water. I bust out the measuring cup and poor the correct amount of freshly boiled water into the French press and stir. After 4 minutes I engage the press and drink. The result was as close as I’ve ever gotten to store bough coffee. It was GOOD! It was a lot, but it was GOOD! I’ll reduce the number of beans that I’m grinding so that I don’t make so much coffee but I was really happy with my results today.

The next thing I’m going to do is buy myself one of these. They are supposed to be the absolute shit. I’m ordering mine today and will give you a trip report after I get it.