One Man Gathers... What another man spills.

The other day I logged into my Bugsy's Club account and noticed the balance I had left of about $210 after winning $225 in a tourney on Easter Sunday 2007 was gone. When I checked my account activity it had been transferred to Bugsy's for an inactive account. I found that odd as I had received no email notification from them advising that a transfer had taken place. I will admit I rarely played on the site. Only a few tourneys since I had cashed back in 2007. I fired off a tactful email that asked where did my money go? Within 24 hours it was back in my account and I didn't have to fire off the threatening email that i would trash them publicly on my blog.

A few hours after receiving said funds an email from a forum notified me that Bugsy's was closing its doors. I figured my newly returned money was now gone for good. But when I logged into Bugsy's they had a nice post that explained the UIGEA had made it difficult to do business for players wanting to remove funds and deposit. I'm not sure why they didn't seek a merger with the growing Cake or Merge networks but all was not lost for my funds. Bugsy's Club had worked it out with Pokerstars that funds would be transferred to a players Pokerstars account. Major Woot Woot Woot for IG!!.. Within 24 hours of receiving the email from Pokerstars to enter my Bugsy's info the money was in my Pokerstars account.

It does appear that PokerSchoolOnline and PokerPages will remain in business. I'm sure most of us who play poker have accessed the PokerPages data base for player results at one time or another. Lately, I find myself utilizing the PokerDB or OPR more often then not, or the Hendon Mob database over on Full Tilt. PSO utilized the same software as Bugsy's Club which was the money site.

If you followed any of my twitter updates, you will know that Snake5970's horse he's a part owner of, won her debut race at Gulfstream Park on Sunday, going off at 20:1 odds from a morning line of 12:1. A $2 win bet paid $44 and change. I know my friend Action Hank is happy as he had her twice in the second daily double which paid a sweet $400 plus. Snake5970 was the only owner present on race day. At the last minute I didn't put any money down. The Italian in me didn't want to put the whammy curse on her. Hooked on Hope came out of the race fine and is shipping north to Aqueduct I believe where she will run against some NY breds on the grass hopefully we'll see her run this summer at Saratoga too.

Today I took the day off to once again try to attempt to score PHiSH tickets this time for my home venue of SPAC. I'm not sure most 48 year old women still do this but music is and always has been a big part of my life. SPAC is a Live Nation venue. Many of my phish phan phfriends had been shut out of Ticket Bastard for the Gorge and Red Rocks etc. California Rob and wife Toni both tried online and by phone and were able to score two out of the three passes they need for each night. I assume the third is for their daughter Lauren, now almost 6 (edited from 5 per her daddy) Ms Lauren accompanied us to the Coventry simulcast in 2004 with earplugs. The SPAC box office, a mere 10-15 minute drive away is closed till May 10th, so I couldn't get tickets by going right to the venue. I opened up one browser kept hitting refresh, wound up in the waiting room and....... waited. I decided a few moments later to open up another browser and literally I was taken right to the order form. My hands were shaking as I typed in my info and by 1:04 PM EST a mere 4 minutes after they went on sale I had a nice $250 charge on my credit card. Today pigs really do fly. As I said to Dr Pauly via email, I'll gladly take a months worth of river beats on PokerStars to watch a middle-aged man in a dress suck on a vacuum hose. I've seen TAB, I've seen Trey & Mike, I've seen Mike Gordon's band but I've never seen all four members of PHiSH together live. This will be my first PHiSH show.

Shortly after Pigs took to the air, I saw a twitter announcement from the good old Grateful Dead calling out for NYC fans. A sweepstakes entry for three surprise shows before they kick off their official tour. They are playing three shows on March 30th in NYC closed to the public. My entry is in with BFF Kim as my guest. I'll know by tomorrow if I earned a pair of tickets to one of the shows.

Now that its Spring and I'll soon be on work-free Fridays I plan to get a little more active. Tweeting with one of the Wicked Chops entities who is also a runner has me reminiscing about my days scampering up and down mountain sides and thru the woods. And I did once mention I would do another marathon sometime on or after my 50th birthday which is 18.5 months away. I've served as race director for more marathons then I've run. If only my knees and hamstring can take it. My Orca wetsuit hangs unused in my closet and is probably all dried out and my Specialized racing road bike suffers the same fate. I'm not even sure I would be confident/comfortable riding clip less pedals again. (edited from petals.... you can tell i spend more time gardening then riding these days)

And what is this crazy rule that the State of New Jersey wanted to ban Brazilian waxes? Obviously some man came up with that one. If I want to have hot wax applied to my nether regions by an Asian woman I barely know and then have it ripped off with muslin while I pull in the other direction its my right!! And yes, I've paid for the privilege.

SHIP IT!!

My day started with me trying to land PHISH tickets for Mansfield, Mass, now known as the Comcast Center, but I will always know it as Great Woods. Just like the Albany Times Union Center will always be the KNICK to me. I was looking to score as many tickets as I could. Had I only scored one ticket it was going to be shipped to Dr Pauly. Like Otis, I'm not a hardcore PHiSh pfan. I'm more of an old school Dead Head and Creeker (for Max Creek) and kind of got more into Dave Matthews Band then PHISH. I never saw Phish live but did see Saturday Coventry via simulcast with California Rob and Toni, his wife and baby Lauren when they came back east to visit family and friends. Originally Rob had thought about heading up to Coventry for the finale but opted not to. Rob had gone on to become a die-hard Phish fan after his move to California and the Grateful Dead scene fizzled with the death of Jerry Garcia.

After getting shut out by Ticket Bastard of all dead shows other then my mail ordered Albany tickets which were thru Grateful Dead ticket sales (the tried and true method for us hardcore dead heads). I was hopeful I would have better luck with Live Nation. Alas it was not to be, After being parked in the waiting room for three hours, I pulled up another browser only to find that Mansfield was sold-out. Yeah, the concert ticket version of being cold decked was my lot. As, I said to BFF Kim, I can see three days of great music at Mountain Jam V for the same price as paying a broker to see one Dead show at MSG, Worcester or Hartford. Plus Max Creek will be playing local in March at Revolution Hall in Troy, NY and I do love me my Creek. Come to think of it, I have a great idea for Scott if you happen to read this blog post that since one part of KBM is playing Mountain Jam V already (Oteil Burbridge of the Allman Brothers), Max Creek should also have a gig there!!!

Anyway this is a poker blog and you can read about music over on Coventry, so go check out Dr Pauly's post titled: Denied Phish Tickets.... Again (Sub Title: Live Nation Blows Camel Balls).

My first tourney of the day the 3:15 PM 10k guarantee $11 buy-in saw me going no where fast. I eventually decided to just open raise every hand with ATC just to see if i could eventually hit a flop to know avail. Prior to the second break I texted Snake who was deep in the early tourney with the same buy-in and structure that I was all in with ATC next hand as I was hungry and needed to go get dinner. True to my word, I shoved all into someone's preflop raise, with the all powerful T2c the first hand after the second break, got the call and busted out against AT.

I ran out for Chinese Food as I had decided to play the 6:15 PM $22 deep stacker and Snake5970 was deep in his tourney with a ton of chips and I wanted to watch him play. He managed a deep run finishing 43rd of 5364 in the 2 PM 30k guarantee. After the first break of my deep stack, in late position, I look down to KK in a multi way limped pot. I bumped it to $200 with blinds at 25/50 got two callers and one fold and ran into a set of threes (the original limper) who was the table chip leader. Busto

Now I wasn't the most focused player that i know I can be. And I was trying to make things happen and I was forcing things so I decided to give it one more go. Rather then play a DON I looked over the multi-table MTT listings and saw a couple of new things: an $8.80 deep stack 90 man SNG that starts with 3k chips and a $2.20 kind of deep stack 90 man SNG that starts with 2k in chips. Now since i had already blown $33 in buyins and given back a bit of my SNG grinding money I opted to drop down in buyin and play the $2.20 buy-in. And a few hours later I had taken it down. Cross another pokerstars to do for 2009 thing off my list. Win not just a SNG but a Multi-table SNG. Ive never won a 180 man, 90 man or even a 45 man on stars before. I know Ive final tabled them and cashed but I dont think I ever took one down. If I had I would have screen captured it. I actually dont play them all that much.



I guess I was inspired by cash game great and now he can claim live MTT ballah Steve "thorladen" Weinstein's Borgata Winter Poker Open win (after a few near misses of final tables at WPT events). Steve is the stepson (and I believe current or former bridge partner of). of a running friend of mine who I havent seen in a few years since he lives down in Kingston and I don't run competitively anymore. Steve if you read this say hello to Fred for me from Lori. And Congrats on your big score. From what I've read on pocket fives and other boards it was a well deserved win and couldn't have happened to a nicer guy. A few years ago Steve was one of the backers in the August TLB prop bet that involved a group of players taking on Gigabet. For an old profile of Steve click here.

Full Tilt Poker's FTOPS IX & PokerStars WCOOP Announced

They're Back!!!

Seems like its just one big online tournament series after the other. FTOPS VIII wrapped in May then it was onto the MSOP on Full Tilt. And now Full Tilt has announced the 9th edition of its FTOPS online series beginning August 6th at 9PM and running thru August 17th. Once again they have split starting times up between the Euro-friendly 2PM EST and US Friendly (except if you are caught in a traffic jam on the San Diego Freeway during rush hour of your evening commute home) 9 PM EST.

The full schedule is here!!!

And of course no one can out-do the Grandaddy of on-line tourneys Pokerstars' WCOOP. 33 events over many disciplines (but alas no Chinese Poker or pai gow!). WCOOP begins Friday September 5th and runs thru Sunday September 21st. The WCOOP events start at the ridiculous for the US times of 2:30PM EST and 4:30PM EST.

Full schedule here!!!

Satellites starting soon for all events on both sites.

And in the live arena Turning Stone has added a new tournament series called the Continental Poker Championships July 19th thru the 28th. You can check out the qualifiers and tournaments here. Right after that the 6th annual Empire State Holdem Championships begins August 15th thru the 25th. Complete Schedule here. Satellites for the main event are already running and are on Sundays at 2 PM. Word on the 2+2 forum from the TROCK TD is that there will also be another new multi-day series around Thanksgiving time with some surprises in store as far as new events and structure.

Mountain Jam IV Bound

Tomorrow I'm off to Mountain Jam IV. My first music festival in the new millennium!! I'll be kicking it old school with pen and paper and won't be able to post till the Ratdog grand finale and my descent off the Mountain in the wee hours Monday. Internet and cell phone reception may be spotty at best and I decided not to drag the laptop with me. I will be armed with disposable cameras and notebooks to record the memories and energy. BFF & music teacher, Kim is bringing her drums and we have enough people at our camp to have a real drumming circle. Yes, IG is camping for the first time since I camped on Cape Cod on the eve of a hurricane during the Falmouth Road Race circa August 1993/1994. Normally my idea of camping now is a Holiday Inn.

I'll be doing most of my writing about Mountain Jam IV over on Coventry. Be sure to follow me and my merry band over there!!

Till Monday Peace all!!

And online poker still sucks!!!

And for all you Tri-City locals looking for info about the Albany poker club closure read a neighbors point of view here. *****

*****link removed by request (see new post)