Oh Woe Is Me

I've had a pretty grim last few days.

Work is a bit of a nightmare at present. Last night I got home from my 9 til 5 job at 11pm. Now, I'm definitely more of an evening than morning person, but that's taking it to extremes.

The entire family (all 3 of us) have a cold at present. Mrs Div is worst off, baby Div is coughing and sneezing, but otherwise unaffected, and I'm teetering in between. Absolutely shattered, but otherwise getting by.

It's one of those situations where if I worked for 'Huge Corporation Inc' I'd be tucked up at home for a few days. Working for a tiny company I just don't feel I can do that when we have deadlines to hit.

Mind you, staying at home isn't always such a great option. The damn cat is in a helluva mood at present. Twice this weekend he bit me while I was playing poker.

I can cope with a fair few distractions, but when I'm three tabling Pot Limit Omaha - three being the most my feeble brain and monitor combination can manage - the last thing I need is a demented feline channeling the spirit of his ancestors on the Serengeti to mangle my arm.

To add to my woes, last week I finally got my act together and sorted out a rakeback account. My first sign up - Eurobet. Tarnation. Could my timing have been any worse?

I also signed up to InterPoker, and having cleared the Eurobet sign up bonus last week, I set about the InterPoker small stakes PLO tables.

Perhaps playing on the weekend was an influence, but my initial impression was there was no difference in standard or style of play between Crypto and Party. Both sites play very loose-aggressive at my buy-in level, whereas PokerStars tends to feel more loose-passive.

Very loose-aggressive makes for a swingy, but potentially profitable game. As an example, I offer up a big hand I lost. I can't say I was delighted to lose it, but if people keep offering these odds to me, I'll take it every time.

This is from memory, but I checked the stats straight after so they are definitely accurate.

On the hand in question I am under the gun and find AAQ8ss. Having only played a few orbits, I've established small raises will not be respected, and being in poor position, I decide to limp with my original buy-in almost intact, and hammer the flop if I hit.

There are a couple of calls, a mid-position raise, more flat calls (told you!), and the obvious table maniac reraises the maximum. Folded round to me, with the pot now big enough to facilitate a meaningful reraise.

In previous posts, I've touched on learning that overplaying aces in Omaha can be very painful, but I figure in this situation I am now in a position to be either heads up or three way to a flop with probably the best hand, and a fair amount of dead money in the pot. So, I reraise the maximum.

The original raiser flat calls, the maniac reraises all-in, I call all-in, as does the original raiser.

Cards on their backs, and my AAQ8ss is up against KK23ds(maniac) and an ace and three low cards single suited (original raiser).

My immediate reaction is 'woowhoo'! My second reaction is do these guys think we are playing Hi/Lo?

Of course the flop/turn brings two 2s putting the maniac ahead with trips, and the river completes a wheel for the original raiser.

At which point I groan and reload, as the maniac berates the winner as, and I kid you not, a 'lucky fish'. No mention of my holding.

Back to the Cardplayer Omaha calculator, to discover pre-flop I was 52% to win the hand. So I got my cash in at roughly 5/2 on a better than evens shot.

I'll lose 48% of the time, but that's still a massively +EV bet. Even better, at least one of the two guys I was up against didn't even seem to realise he was a huge dog in the hand.

Losing in this situation is hardly a cause for celebration, but definitely an incentive to get back around the table with these guys as often as possible!

Ah, just typing that makes me feel better. My woes recede...