Vacation hangover

Here I am in the office hungover from Vacation at the beach. I've had so much grilled food/seafood/beer/alcohol/sun/sand that It's going to take a week to get normal. The good thing is that I get to go to the beach whenever I want. My parents inherited a great place....and it's only a 40-minute drive from the house. My daughter is going to grow up with constant entertainment....'StoryLand' across the street from my condo in NH and Salisbury beach 40 minutes away from the house.

I had a great win (for me) on PokerStars the night before I went on vacation...did I mention that the 4.40 buy-in (180 NL MTT) was just barely covered with my 4.90 that was in my acount? A nice addition of 212.00 to the PokerStars account.

Anyway, since the beach cottage was only 40 mins. away from the house I was able to get to my Thursday night NL bar league. It was a good thing....I place 5th for a nice little 101.00 payday and vaulted myself into the top ten. 5 of 11 cashes....6 of 11 to the final table. A couple of hands of note (I got lucky): I was in the BB with pocket J's (I hate J's)and one limper called under-the-gun. I had T975 left of the T2500 to start with. The blinds were increasing fast at 100-200 and this was the last hand before the first break. I wanted a call and I didn't want a call....so I went all-in. I get called by the under the gun limper with K-10o. A flop of Jx-Qx-9x gives him the flopped straight...I'm done right? NOT!! The fourth J falls on the freakin' river....I wanted to scream "Them's Quads Beeeetches!!!" but I just let out a victorious "YEAHHHHH". The second hand was at the last two tables...I had T700 left and the blinds were at 300-600. I went all-in with A-4o under the gun because I had to. The small blind tried to force out the chipleader in the BB with a rather large bet....he called. Time to triple up. I got the miracle straight on the river. Flop was Qx-10x-4x....turn was Kx and the river was a Jx. I make the final table and the big stacks go to war. I think the overall chipleader to my right again had 6x-9x. Some guy with Ax-Qx bets big and the chipleader called. The flop of 5x-6x-8x was scary but the second chipstack went all-in. The Chipleader debates the call with himself...he ends up calling and rivers a straight for good measure. I'm not sure why the second chip stack went all in but the chipleader has a reputation for calling with marginal hands. 5 were left and I had to make a move with anything...I think I had T4500 and the blinds were at 1000-2000 so I went all-in with As-5s under the gun again...(been pretty lucky with that hand lately)...chipleader calls with K-8o and flops Kx-8x-Xx...I'm out. That tournament has to put me in the top ten. Time to ratchet up the aggression this week.

I played an MTT last night on Stars but was a little impatient after a long day....knocked out with the best hand at the time. The guy that knocked me out rivered a flush. I also got knocked out of a 45 player NL MTT with Kx-Kx. The guy called my all-in with a Qx-10x-7x flop. He had Qx-Jx and of course a Jx fell on the turn. Back to Bad Beats....man do I miss them! It's good to be back. I wanted to end up plus for the year so I cashed out half of my tourney winnings before vacation. It does put me ahead quite a bit because I'm doing really well in the 'live' tournaments.

*****This just in....friend gets tickets to annual Allman Bros. concert for this Saturday at the 'TweeterCenter'.*******

The RedSox bandwagon lost half of its passengers this past weekend. I will never be accused of being a fair-weather fan....I will be with the Sox to the bitter end. Always remember 2004....never forget the most incredible comeback in Sports history! I had a lifelong Yankees fan staying next door to me on my vacation. He's from Yonkers, NY and was enjoying the Boston Massacre this weekend. I reminded him of 2004..."What have you done for me lately?". He responded with the typical Yankees credo "The Yankees have how many championships?'"....I said "Two-Thousand and Four?"....he just threw his hands up in the air and walked away.