Home Game Refund

Butch: So we cool?
Marsellus: Yeah, we cool. Two things. Don't tell nobody about this. This shit is between me, you, and Mr. Soon-To-Be-Living-The-Rest-of-His-Short-Ass-Life-In-Agonizing-Pain Rapist here. It ain't nobody else's business. Two: you leave town tonight, right now. And when you're gone, you stay gone, or you be gone. You lost all your L.A. privileges. Deal?
Butch: Deal.

”Pulp Fiction”

Had another go at the home game scene last Saturday night – with a difference. The Distraction wanted to play once again. This looked like a loose-loose situation to me.

The reason being, last time she played she did quite well, and was rather proud of herself. So she wanted to play again, and I had to organise a “wives and girlfriends” game for her. So if she wins again, I won’t hear the end of it – Loose. If she does really bad, she will feel bad and whinge about it forever and a day – Loose.

But like a good little boy, I went ahead and organised the “Wives and Girlfriends” game, clearly aware of the fact that only one “Wife or Girlfriend” would be there.

Instead we had a few new faces, guys that I know outside of poker. They are like everyone else, having recently caught the poker bug. I decided to include them for this little game, and lower the buy ins right down so they feel comfortable. Not that we play massive levels anyway, but it was just a fun game anyway.

We had seven runners, third get’s their money back, second was $20 first was $40.

The new guys were pinned right away as calling stations, and they didn’t disappoint. Sadly, they were the first three eliminated. I wish at least one of them could have made the top three, give them a little bit of confidence to continue to get better.

The final one of them eliminated was quite funny. The flop was 93J, and as he is the short stack he goes all-in with J6, which is ok I guess considering his stack size. Unfortunately, the good player sitting across from him (not me) had 99 for the flopped set. The turn brings a 6, and the good player says “Now you need a Jack, or another six…” I wen’t to chime in, but the dealer had already thrown the river out there – and it was indeed another six. They cheered, until I stopped them and pointed out 9’s over 6’s beats 6’2 over Jacks.

But you should have seen the look on their faces when the second six fell. And then the look when I told them there is no Easter Bunny.

Please, no Easter Bunny comments.

Personally, I was travelling ok. I wasn’t playing many hands and the ones I did I manage to pull a few pots. The new guys all left, but I’m pretty sure they enjoyed it anyways and would return. In fact, I found out the next day they actually wanted to return an hour later, but their designated driver was too drunk.

On the bubble, the Distraction found herself the short stack as she had been cold decked all night. I had the pleasure of knocking her out when she lost a coin flip – and then find myself in a very unfamiliar position, being the chip leader.

This was rare for me, as I’m usually one of those guys that make a late run when it’s down to two or three. I’m not used to having a mountain of chips in front of me and being able to see a raise without putting my stack on the line.

You know what? That’s fun. Having chips rocks!

Through some no-doubt ingenious play (“ingenious” because it was by me and “no-doubt” because the alcohol slightly affects my memory) I manage to accumulate more chips and force out third in a coin-flip. To tell the truth, I just got some good hands that got paid off, which is always nice.

Heads up against the loud Turkish regular. He’s a top bloke, but I would never live this down if I lost from my massive lead here. I also know he loves heads up matches and does quite well with them. Last time we were heads up, we chopped to get the next tourney going and I kind of regretted it.

After a bit of back and forth action, and we see nearly every flop with a raise. In the SB, I make my usual raise and he comes back over the top all-in. I have him easily covered, and call since I’m holding the holiest of holy pocket aces for the first time in the night. He shows A7s, and is obviously a huge dog in this hand. The flop doesn’t help him, and by the turn he’s drawing dead.

Hooray for me.

With only four of us left, we decided to keep going since the night was still young. One player wanted to try a seven card stud game, so we went $5 winner take all. After a while, when me and Turkish already sitting on the side lines, we called it a chop because it looked like it was going to last forever and we had had our fill of 7-card.

For the end of the night, we went into a $10 max buy in NL cash game. I’m becoming more and more fond of them lately.

By this stage, I was “happy drunk”, and also the only person at the table drinking. I was getting good cards, and they were hitting. I was bluffing, and scaring everyone away. I had cleaned out the other two players at the table once each forcing them to reload.

Then my distraction decided to try her best against the big stack.

I had been on fire though. I would throw out some random amount of chips and say “I raise, and then you fold.” She would get the shits, because she would be folding, and was disappointed that she must have some really obvious read. Truth be known, I just had the nuts and was hoping she would call or re-raise to spite me. Anyways, she gets down to a low stack, and this nifty little hand pops up.

I limp with pocket tens, and get to see a TsQd4s flop, with two spades. My lovely distraction does the push, and I of course call to see that she has a spade draw.

The turn is a rag, leaving her with the final outs. The dealer says “All she needs is a spade on the river” and WHAM, there it comes, the Queen of spades. She rejoices!

“WRONG SPADE!” I shout, and point to the other one on the board. She gets a bit tilted, and threatens to go to bed, seeing that it was 4am. But since the other two guys are still willing to play we convinced her to hang around. Instead of buying back in, she just stole a stack from me. While this is very poor poker etiquette, under the circumstances it was just fine by everyone so who is to care?

I didn’t let her forget the fact though that they were my chips, and they will just come back to me anyway.

Very next hand, I raise her big blind – something I had not failed to do all night long. She reminds me of that fact, and I told her “Well, go on then, push it in”. She did so, and I called. I had her dominated as my Queens against her 8’s. She just took the chips back again and kept playing. But at least I can say I cleaned her out 3 times on the night.

We go on for about another hour, when on the final hand Turkish goes all in on a KJJxx board. I have KT, and there was not much action on the flop or turn so the all-in bet was quite a large raise.

I thought and thought about it, and I didn’t want to call but I had a feeling I had the better hand. I looked at the clock and it was just after 5am, so I made them an offer they couldn’t refuse…

“I tell you what, you’ve both bought in for $20 total, right? I don’t want to call, but I think I might have the best hand. Tell you what, it’s been a good night why don’t you both take your buy-ins back regardless of what happens here – I’ll call just to see if I have you beat”.

I didn’t, as he had flopped the Jacks over Kings. So why did I give them both their buy-ins back?

Well, firstly I did think it was a little unfair that the Distraction and I were playing from the same purse. Even though I was the only one pulling in any money for us, and I certainly wasn’t going easy on her, you still don’t want to leave any doubt or bad taste.

Secondly, it had been a good night and we were playing in what I had dubbed a “beginner’s game”. Both guys had stayed around well into the morning and I was enjoying myself, so it was kind of a “thanks for coming” thing too. I just felt like it was the right thing to do at the end of the night. It also meant everyone went home up just a little on the night (out of those that stayed until 5am – except the distraction of course).

And besides, it wasn’t like I had cleaned them out with any skill or anything; I just hit some good cards and got paid.

Even after a good night’s sleep, and the alcohol had worn off, I still don’t regret giving their (small) buy ins back, it was the right thing to do.

Not that I'm going to make a habbit of it, mind you.