Fresno

This was such a busy weekend I had no time to blog.

Last Thursday, my plan was to leave Stockton and stop in Modesto or Merced and play for the day. Then I planned to arrive late in the evening at my daughter’s home in Fresno. As I started driving I realized I was excited to see her and I “passed” on poker in Modesto & Merced. I arrived late in the afternoon and my daughter Carrie, her husband David and I went out for a Mexican Dinner It was sure good to see them both..

The next day I rented a car in Fresno, had lunch with Dave and then when Carrie got off work, her and I headed for San Diego in our Gray, Ford Taurus rental with Pokey the dog and his friend Gracey, the wiener dog. They were both in kennels in the back seat, facing each other for entertainment. Eight hours later we all arrived at my home in San Diego. (Imperial Beach Area) Traffic was horrid as soon as we got to L.A. It took an hour just from Burbank to Buena Park.

It was sure good to be with Caren for the weekend. It didn’t seem like very much time at all before we had to leave again on Monday afternoon to get Carrie back to Fresno for her work on Tuesday.

We did manage to get in two different tournaments at two casinos in San Diego over the weekend. Saturday night we played at Viejas in a $70 tournament with about 125 players. I made a couple of poor moves near the end to force myself out when I didn’t need to.

The first one was understandable the second not so much. I was at the third table as the chip leader of the tournament. When the short stack of the table was the big blind I picked up pocket tens in middle position. So I shoved all in to isolate him. I did, and he showed down Ace-Queen. He picked up a Queen on the turn and I didn’t improve. I lost 40% of my stack on that hand. Then a little later we consolidated down to two tables.

When there were 15 people left I figured I better make a play so I raised 3x the blind with 5,6, suited. The big blind called me, and the flop was a K,6,J. He checked and I put in half my stack to his re-raise, which would have put me all-in. I backed down and folded. I went out two hands later with an AK that didn’t improve and lost to a pair.

This was a case where I could have “coasted” to the final table, but I wanted to win, and I know you have to get aggressive and sometimes lucky at that stage of the tournament. I am second guessing myself with that approach so close to the final table. This was a tournament where the blinds doubled every fifteen minutes, and I wonder if it isn’t better to just squeak to the final table and then do the “all-in with any A or K” and see if you get lucky. I will need to give this a lot more thought.

The best part of Saturday night was when our Son Jonathan came to play with Carrie and me in the tournament. We all had dinner with Caren before the tournament at the Casino. It was so nice to have our whole family together. Caren got a little lucky on the penny slots and gave them each $20 and covered ½ my tournament entry. Overall, it was an enjoyable, memorable night together.

Sunday found out sorting and cleaning out our belongings from a water leak into our garage. It ruined some of our stored items and destroyed the ceiling and wall with mold damage while we have been gone. This is an interesting story I will tell later of dueling insurance companies and real estate developers I will tell at a later time.

After running a few more errands with Caren, it was time for Carrie and I to head for my “home casino” Sycuan. I bought in for both Carrie and I into the evening tournament and she went out in the first ½ hour playing a little too loose. I held on until the field of 250 was narrowed to about 60 and was card dead most of the tournament. I did get a lucky break where I was 4X the blinds and I went all-in with an Ace-Seven. Called by a Ace-Queen and a KJ I was looking like I would be walking this hand. The flop came 7,10,4 and I was actually ahead! The turn card was a Queen as I stood to go the river produced another 7 giving me 777. I played another 45 minutes until I went all-in on an AK that ran into AA and I was out.

I got on a cash table a few minutes later and went up and down with my $100 buy-in and then another $50 went on to the table. I played ok, but I ran into AA with AK again and lost my $100. I built back up to $150 when I ended up with AK on the Big Blind.

I played a little ½ NL and ended up losing my buy-in on another bad beat. Carrie and I decided we both had enough and headed back home for the night.

Monday, Caren went in to work early and then met us for lunch in Mission Valley at Carrie and her favorite eatery: Pat & Oscars. We chose Pat’s & Oscar’s for two reasons. The first was they love their salads. The second is we could sit outside and the dogs could join us.

After lunch we said good bye and Carrie, the dogs, and I headed up Interstate 15 toward L.A. I was dreading driving through L.A. in the middle of the day. So, we thought we could miss the most of it by going up Interstate 15 and then cutting across 210 through Pasadena. Carrie used to live in that area, and the closer we got to 210 we realized we were going to have a lot of traffic in Pasadena at the time we were to arrive there.

I decided to go the back way, by continuing up 15 to US395 and going across Hwy 58 to Bakersfield and then north to Fresno. Eight hours later we arrived at Carrie’s home after having to deal with some Highway construction and frequent stops to walk the dogs.

Now I needed to “gear up” to make some money playing poker, while I am here in Fresno.