Runner up, again

Yesterday was Srol's birthday, so a bunch of us went to the buffet (it was supposed to be a surprise, but he's a sneaky one and figured out what was going on) and then played some poker. The buffet wasn't as good as usual, according to Mat, but I didn't eat any of the things he was complaining about and didn't notice much difference in quality. The pork was more meat and less fat than usual, so I can't complain.

There was a lack of quality in the ice cream department though. The chocolate was empty, so that left 3 tubs of vanilla, one of "green", and one that turned out to be maple walnut. I initially thought it was vanilla that some chocolate had fallen into, so I took it because it was closest to me. I was pleasantly surprised upon tasting it.

The "green" ice crwam is just that, green. It's an awful shade of green, and the flavour listed on the side is actually "Green". Thaila ate it once, and it's the only thing I've ever seen him not finish. The mystery of the green ice cream is one not meant for mortal minds.

On to the poker. We wound up with a surprisingly large number of players (9 or 10, depending on if you count Dan and Isaac playing together because neither of them could afford the full buy-in), and for some reason we decided to play with less chips than normal, and we messed up the values.

Usually whites are 25, reds are 50, greens are 100, blues are 500, and blacks are 1000. Last night we took out the reds and moved everything down a denomination (so greens were 50, blues 100, etc), and then someone decided that we needed 1000s, so we made them red. The first few hands were complete pandemonium as we all tried to remember what was what, but we fell into the old routine pretty quickly.

People went out fairly quickly, surprisingly, and other people won hands right when they needed to to stay alive. I took 2 big hands back to back and then started slowly losing money, but I managed to outwait Mat, and so it was Steve and I head to head. Again.

During the heads-up play Steve and I got the exact same cards 3 or 4 times, which was met with a combination of surprise and laughter, and splitting pots never hurt anybody. He managed to bluff me out of a lot of my money (I lost my nerve somewhere along the line), and although I won a few hands, the chips kept migrating back to him.

Finally I saw my break. I was dealt a 9, and 2 7s and a 9 came up on the flop. With 2 pairs I decided to go all in, counting on the hope that Steve didn't have a pair or a straght draw, and hoping that the turn and the river went my way. I showed my 2 pairs, and he showed me his pocket queens. I was sunk. The turn was an 8 and the river was a 4, and all my money ran away from me.

Luckily the way we play the runner up gets his buy-in back, so I came out even. Still, I haven't won a poker game in quite a while, but as long as I keep finishing second I can't be too upset about it. Looking back now I can see times when I folded and shouldn't have, or bet when I shouldn't have, but hindsight is 20/20 and it doesn't do much good to dwell on it.

I need to be gutsier when I play, and not fold to every big raise. Unless I have nothing, which tends to happen more than I like to admit.

After checking the bus schedule, I bought some tickets off Steve and ran to the bus stop. Apparently their schedule is out of date, because it said the last 118 was at 12:59, and the bus stop said the last one was at 12:30-something. I waited a few minutes just in case, but when a bus didn't appear, I forlornly walked home.

It's not quite an hour's walk, but it's close. I left the bus stop at 1:02, and I was halfway up the elevator at 1:51. It's a fairly boring walk when you're alone, but it was a nice night so I didn't mind. Plus the peace and quiet was nice.

It was a good night.