Happy New Year 12/31/05

In the old days it was Happy New Weir!!! Most New Year's Eves were spent going to see Maxcreek play somewhere in CT or RI with old beau Rob; his bro Chris; and of course Woodstock (Jeff); and my life-long best friend Kim. We then would follow up the Creek by listening to the radio broadcast of the Grateful Dead's New Years show. One of my biggest regrets is that I never made it out to California to see a live New Years show. I did see the dead play at Irvine Meadows several times in the 80's. No Dead tour this year, but Phil and Friends is playing tonite at the Bill Graham Auditorium in San Francisco

Well now that I am clean and sober (16 years on January 2nd) I dont go running out to bars to party. Last year I was in bed early with a bad cold and laryngitis. I wound up losing the last part (about $22) of my original $50 party poker deposit over the course of the new years holiday playing limit holdem. Shortly thereafter, I won my first no-limit MTT. In retrospect, my learning curve was short and sweet. Ive probably invested no more then $135 total and turned that into over $2000. In fact I withdrew off my original investments and have been building my bankroll up from profits.

Today I capped off the year with a win in a small tourney for the Ladies of Holdem. Yesterday I did my first $20 buy-in since the Carribean Sun Poker $25 buyin I did in July which was a fiasco. I played on AP and played absolutely flawlessly. I built a nice stack early on and then went card dead. That was coupled with the fact that I got moved 4 times and each time I was moved I was reblinded. In other words, I had just sat thru my blinds on my original table and was literally back in the blinds at my new table. This didnt happen just to me, but it was pissing me off and I lost quite a good chunk of my stack. I remained patient and regained the chips I lost in the middle rounds. 79 entered the tourney. Top 12 moved on to the AP challenge and the top 9 paid. I get dealt AA I raise to $1600 4x BB. I get reraised all in. I love it... the dude had been on a blind stealing frenzy and I knew I had him. He flips over QQ. FLOP is blanks... Turn blank.. and horror of all horrors the third Bitch comes out and sends me packing 16th. If it hadnt been for the river I would have been set up nicely for the Final table and a very nice payout. The good thing was it showed that I can easily handle that level buy-in now and I'm definitely ready to move up. Even though that event didnt have the outcome I wanted. I went on to final table in two other tourneys last night both which were league championships.

So time for some New Years goals. We wont call them resolutions:

1)Become a ring game no-limit player. I intend to accomplish this by hopefully being selected for a 40 week school thru one of my forums. Limit holdem causes me great AGITA as we Italians say. I know it should be my bread and butter but I hate the chasing that goes on in limit. So, no-limit shall be my ticket.

2)Make 10K from MTT's. Lofty goals but I did net out $2k last year and that was when I was predominately a freeroller. I only began steady buyins in July and have adjusted nicely. Hopefully, the first week or so of January will see me attempting a deep stack on Pokerstars ($10 buyin no limit). I also hope to book my first $1000 payday.

3)Make my first trip to Vegas. Been to lots of states, Canada, the Caribbean and Mexico but never to Sin City. I hope to be out there during the WSOP. I hope to be playing in at least one of the events and it doesnt have to be the main event. I still have two definite satellites that can earn me seats. OPT finals still are unscheduled but the PA seat will be played for on TITAN on 2/2/06.

4). Continue to improve. Take the time to study hand examples and really work thru them, work on my blind stealing, work on my short handed and heads up play (although Poker Princess my good pal had about enough of the blind stealing today in the tourney I won). The problem is most of the gals are seat of the pants players and arent into the discussing of hands. Jdawg and I often discuss Harrington hand examples and of course Jaykedog and I are always talking poker (among other things). As much as I love my poker gal pals, the guys keep me sane and are the ones to talk football and poker with.

5)Begin running again and perhaps have Lasik surgery on my eyes. Have to look good for the cameras if I happen to wind up in front of one!!!! I hate my contacts and look like a librarian in my glasses. My sister said to me over Christmas, "I never knew Deadheads could be so vain." That was coupled with my mom telling me that I might want to cover up my cleavage.. My sister's reply to that was... "Mom, women spend about $5-$6 grand to get boobs that look like hers"