Atlantic City

Thursday night involved a trip to Atlantic City for a night of poker. Considering I was not working on Friday and Mindy's mother and sister were in town to keep her company, there was really not other option when I received the invitation to go.

Three of us drove down, arriving about 8:30 for a quick meal and then to begin a NL Holdem tournament that started at 9:00. None of us did anything much ... I lasted until the first break but simply did not get anything that I could play. I busted out when my all-in with 4-4 was called by Q-J, and a Q hit on the flop.

Now off to the cash tables to complete the night. I was playing a $1/$2 NL table and did OK. Again, did not really get many big hands...no sets; flushes or straights so no really big pots, but I ended up making a $40 profit here This covered half of my tournament buy in, so not too much damage done on the evening. I think next time I will stick to the cash tables - it was more enjoyable I think and you don't run the risk of playing well for a couple of hours and still have nothing to show for it.

An interesting hand happened at Gary's table. The board was showing 3-3-3-7-3; 3 players still in the hand with about a $12 pot. The first player pushed all-in for about $150 and was called by the other two players. Player 1 had something like 6-4; Player 2 had an Ace; Player 3 also had two rubbish cards. The dealer pushed the pot towards the player with the Ace (kicker breaks the tie), when the other two players jumped up and insisted that the kicker does not play in 4 of a kind. The poker room manager was summoned and he was able to confirm that the best 5 cards play, the kicker DOES matter and so the player with the Ace won the pot. Not bad to get gifted $300 like that when you were looking at $12 a few minutes earlier.