Go trig boy, it's your birthday.

As the last post mentioned, last Saturday was my birthday. And not any old birthday, but my 40th birthday. The big 4-0. I’ve never really cared much about birthdays, but since Sage told me we should “do something special” for it, I figured why not. And by something special, I took that as meaning go to Foxwoods to gamble for a night.

Long side note: Some of you may be surprised I’m even openly discussing my birthday. This is actually new territory for me. In the past I’ve been secretive about when my birthday is, for the most part because I can’t stand those stupid birthday “parties” that offices give you. Someone brings in a cake, you stand around talking to people that you never would even say hi to outside of work, and everyone has to make a big deal out of it. I don’t get it – it’s just the day you were born. There’s no reason to celebrate, and in reality I did nothing to deserve any accolades on this day. I mean, Mom did all the work. So in the past, I always tried to keep the day a secret. At offices, if co-workers tried to find out when my birthday was by going to HR or my boss to find out, I always threatened legal action. I have no idea if it was true, but I always said that it’s a federal crime for a business to give out any personal information on an employee that would be found on their personal file. And I assured every boss/HR person I ever worked with that I would sue the company for all they had if I ever found out they DID give out the information. Sometimes if someone really gave me a hard time about why I wouldn’t just tell people when it was, I’d say something like, “When I was 7 my grandfather was bouncing me on his knee when he keeled over with a heart attack and died. Pardon me if I don’t want to 'celebrate' my birthday and have to remember that terrible day.” That used to shut people up very quickly. (And of course that isn’t true in the least – and I know that’s pretty mean, but sometimes I felt it was the only way for idiots to leave me alone.) Some found out through hard work and investigation. Peggy from National Geographic “found out” by talking to as many people as she could at Time Customer Service in Tampa, although she somehow came to the conclusion that my birthday was July 30. My friend Heather found out when we had an office outing at Buffalo Billiards in DC. I had to leave my ID at the counter for the billiard table’s balls, and while playing she went up to the counter and asked to look at it. (Probably slipped the guy $20 too.) To her credit she never told anyone else. Anyway, I really was getting tired of “fighting” to keep my birthday private, even though I always felt I had every right to do it. So when I took the job up here in Boston 18 months ago, I made a decision: I wasn’t going to go out of my way to keep my birthday a secret. While I wasn’t going to go around and promote it all the time, if anyone asked, I would tell them, and take whatever came with it. And wouldn’t you know – my first year here, not one person ever asked me when my birthday was! Also, thankfully, we’re not the type of company that has birthday “parties” every month either. So no one here at work even knew that August 1st was my birthday until last Friday, when we were having our weekly summer breakfast when someone asked me what I was doing this weekend, and I told them we were going away for the weekend for my birthday. And you know what? No one made a big deal out of it – even when I said I was 40. So what do you know. End of long side note.

The plan for “the Weekend of Doug” wasn’t anything special, but I was looking forward to it. I found a (relatively) cheap room at Foxwoods for Friday night, so we would drive down Friday afternoon, early enough for an early dinner. Then I would play poker while Sage would get a spa/massage treatment. Since we were staying there I could play as late as I wanted, then in the morning we’d drive down to Mystic to hit the Aquarium. Then the plans were sketchy, but what I thought would be nice would be to drive to Newport and do the famous “Breakers” walk, then either find a semi-nice pub for an early dinner, or head over to Westport, MA to visit a winery or two. I thought of maybe finding an inn to stay at Saturday night, but I’d much prefer my own bed if I can, so we’d head home Saturday night.

So Friday at 1:05 pm came, and I was out of the office like I was shot from a cannon. It was pouring all morning, and sure enough it was still raining when we left the house around 1:50 pm. We hit some bad traffic on the Mass Pike, but with my excellent knowledge of Massachusetts' highways (along with our trusty new TomTom GPS system), we were able to skirt the traffic and get to Foxwoods by 3:30. Check in was an absolute breeze, and after dropping off our bags we headed downstairs to find some food (since neither of us had eaten lunch). We settled on the Hard Rock because A) it was empty, and B) I didn’t want to dress up. After an adequate meal there we walked around the facility. This was the first time Sage had been to Foxwoods, and she was quite impressed by the size, as it truly is one of the biggest casinos we’ve ever been in. (In fact it’s like 5 casinos in one, with all sorts of other shopping, theaters, restaurants, and museums. And seeing as whenever I go down I normally sit in the poker room for 90 % of my time, this was the first time I had really taken a good look at the rest of the place as well.) Sage decided she’d rather not spend the money on the massage, so she took the cash and decided to walk by the roulette tables on the way back to the room, where she planned on watching the Sox and maybe taking in an overpriced movie on the room’s HD TV. Meanwhile I headed to the poker room for my 6:00 pm tournament. I like the Foxwoods multi-table poker tournaments because they usually offer a high amount of starting chips (in this case 15,000) and kind of long levels (normally they’re 30 minute levels, but they moved this one to 25 minutes – still better than the 15 minute levels a lot of other casino’s tournaments I’ve been to have). These setups mean that you can sit down and play for a long time without having to make moves with marginal hands to build up your chip stack. That works in my favor, as I’m a player that plays medium-tight, and goes with the “small-ball” style of poker. (Unlike a lot of these young internet kids who will over-bet pots and act overly aggressive all the time. But it works for a lot of them, so what do I know.)

I was going fine at my table through the 1st two levels, and I had figured out most of the players. As most of you know, poker is less about the cards you are dealt and much more about the players you’re playing against. I had pegged three of the players at my table as being the strong ones, and I easily identified 2 of the others as being extremely weak, and a couple others were just very tight. These observations pay off as the tournament goes on, and I knew I could steal from the weak, get in to hands with the tight players with big draws that would have the potential for huge pots, and stay out of the way of the strong players way. It was all going swimmingly until a hand pretty early in level 3.

(Note: Very few people like to hear bad-beat stories. In fact it’s very rare that I ever relate bad-beat stories, because I know that A) people hate to hear them, and B) I hate to hear them as well. But I’m relating this one because A) it’s kind of cathartic, and B) I know Sluggy would LOVE to hear this one. For those not interested, just page down until you see the photo of Gunnersaurus. That’s the indication that my story is over.)

So let me set up this hand. It was level 3, so the blinds were at 100-200. I was in middle position, and I looked down at 3-3. (Note: I’m not including any suits in the cards of this hand – as you’ll see, suits weren’t important at all.) 1 player had already limped into the pot in front of me. In cases like this, with a low pocket pair early in a tournament, I try to get into the pot as cheap as possible and look at a flop, and hope to flop a set. Odds are that with a pocket pair you’ll flop a set around 15% of the time, and obviously a flopped set is a very good hand that normally pays off well – especially if there’s a face card or Ace on the board. So I just limp in myself. If someone raises behind me, I might call if it looks cheap enough. If there’s a raise and then a re-raise behind me, I fold it easily. As it turns out, 4 players behind me also limp in, including the 2 blinds. At this point I think we need some visual aids to describe the action, so the table looked like this pre-flop:

The "D" is the Dealer Button, which indicates which direction the action takes place. In this case, Big Blind would act first, I’d act 2nd, and Leather Jacket would act 3rd.

(Note: wow, I thought my attempt using Microsoft Paint to illustrate my story would turn out better than that. Well, you'll just have to click on it to see it real size.)

I highlighted the 3 important players in the hand: Me; Leather Jacket (who was one of the 3 strong players I had labeled at the table); and the Big Blind (who was one of the “tight” players I had labeled). I had about 14,500 in chips; Leather Jacket looked to be a little bit higher than me, and Big Blind was probably around 10,000. With 7 limpers, there was a total of 1,400 in the pot pre-flop.

So the flop comes down: 7-3-2 rainbow. (i.e., all cards were a different suit.) So I flopped a set of 3’s, and I’m 99% sure I have the best hand. How do I know this? I’m guessing that someone with pocket 7’s would have raised pre-flop, and that’s the only hand that would beat me right now. The small blind checks, and the Big Blind bets 600. I know this guy is tight, but I don’t have a lot of information on him right now. I’m guessing he has a 7 in his hand, maybe even something like K-7 or Q-7. I’m not too worried about a draw out there, although it’s entirely possible someone has 6-5 or 5-4 and has a straight draw. Even so, I just call the 600. My thinking that if someone behind me re-raises, I can face them heads up and hopefully win a big pot. The person behind me folds, Leather Jacket calls, and the other 2 people in the pot fold as well. So now there’s 3 of us in the pot, and it holds 3,200 at this point. When Leather Jacket called, I really couldn’t put him on a hand. He could have a 7 with a weak kicker; he could have 2 over cards (such as 10-9) and is hoping something hits on the turn; or he could just be calling thinking he can bluff both of us off the hand later on. I really have nothing to go on. The dealer turns over the turn card, and it’s another 7. The table now looks like this:

This is a GREAT card for me. I now have a full house, so I no longer need to worry about a straight beating me, and I’m not sure if the turn card put a flush draw on the table, but if it did, I didn’t need to worry about that either. I’m loving my hand right now. The Big Blind leads out with a bet of 2,700. I now put him on a 7, and could very easily be A-7. As I said, he’s a tight player, and if he had an over pair or anything else, he’d be checking at this point. With trips plus the top kicker, he would be feeling good about his hand, and bets close to the size of the pot. My thinking at this point is that I want to go heads up with this guy, and I no longer want Leather Jacket in with this hand. I know I need to raise. Two things go through my head – I want to raise enough to get rid of Leather Jacket, but not too much to scare off Big Blind. I figure a little more than twice his bet would be a good raise, and announce I’m raising to 6,500 total. I know that for Big Blind to call, he’d be left with only 3-4,000 in chips, so he’s liable to either move all-in (which I want him to), or fold (which wouldn’t be horrible for me either – I’d be up to around 20,000 in chips). But then my plans all come crashing down, as Leather Jacket moves all-in. Before I can even think about what this means, Big Blind moves all-in behind him.

So now I need to stop and reassess. I start by thinking what Leather Jacket might have. The only hand I’m worried about right now is 7-7 and there’s no way I can put him on that hand at this point. That would be the stone-cold nuts, and there is no way he can be beat. (No card can come on the river that would beat him.) There is no way he’d go all-in and potentially scare off 2 other players. I can only think of 2 hands that he might have that would cause him to go all-in at this point. He could have 7-X, and he’s moving all-in to scare off any potential draws that might be out there, or he’s got a BIG overpair – A-A or K-K. Strong players like to mix up their game, and one common example of that is for them to limp in pre-flop late in a hand with A-A or K-K to build a pot, especially when they have position, and then use their skills to win the hand later on. However, would he really think that A-A is good here? He might not, but still might go all-in, thinking that even if one of us has a 7, we might fold because we would probably have a weak kicker. Either way, I have a hard time thinking he has A-A or K-K and making this move, so I put him on A-7. So now I move to Big Blind. I had him on A-7 earlier, but now I’m not so sure. He moved in without even thinking, so if he had A-7 or K-7, I think he would think before he committed all his chips after a re-raise then another re-raise all-in. So he must have a hand that he has no doubt is best at this point. Considering I have 3-3, I can only put him on 2 hands: either 2-2 or 7-7. (Looking back I really should have considered 2 other hands as well: 7-3 or 7-2. Since he was big blind pre-flop, and everyone folded to him, he easily could have had those cards. Either of these hands would have given him a better full house than me, but even if I did think he had those, it wouldn’t have changed my thought process.) If he has 2-2, he’s drawing to 1 out – the case deuce. If he has 7-7, again he has the cold nuts and I’m drawing dead. Unlike Leather Jacket, I can see the Big Blind with 7-7. He may have called with 7-7 pre-flop, not wanting to get into a raising war. He could have easily bet 600 with it post flop with top set, worried about a straight draw, and figured that with 7 pre-flop callers he’d get at least 1 or 2 people to go with him to the turn. And after 2 re-raises, he would easily go all-in with the amount of chips he has left. But one thing bothers me with this reasoning: Would he have really bet 2,700 after the turn card with quad 7’s? I determine, just like with Leather Jacket, that a person with quad 7’s would slow-play them, and try to get as much money from the pot as possible. So I figure he has 2-2, maybe even 7-X like Leather Jacket, and I have the best hand. After thinking all this through my head (which took about 45 seconds), I make the call.

Immediately Leather Jacket looks at me and says, “You have Aces, don’t you?” I said, “God no”, and then I see a look of fear on his face. The chips aren’t officially calculated at this point, but based on our pre-chip counts (and with hindsight), I know that the main pot is around 32,000 chips, and the side pot (between just me and Leather Jacket) is around 10,000. The 2 players turn over their cards, and I’m feeling very good about my reads. The table looks like this:

In case you can't read that, Leather Jacket has 8-7 and Big Blind has 2-2.

I read Leather Jacket pretty good, although I really thought he had a better kicker with his 7. I mean, either of us could have had a 7 as well with a higher kicker, and he’d be way down on chips. I guess he went all-in figuring the chances of another 7 being out there are awfully slim. Big Blind I read perfectly, and the look of pain on his face was evident. He had a full house, and unless he got lucky and they pulled the last deuce out of the deck on the river, he’d be gone from the tournament. Leather Jacket looked at me and said, “I really thought you had a big over pair, the way you were thinking about it.” I said to him, “No, I would have folded quickly with a large over pair. I was worried that either of you might have quad 7’s.” And as soon as I said the word “quad 7’s”, the dealer turned over the river card.

Yes, the dealer turned over the case (i.e., LAST) 7 in the deck, giving Leather Jacket quads and knocking out 2 players. “I can’t believe, you just called Quads for me!” he shouted with a big smile on my face. I shrugged my shoulders, thinking he hit a 1-outer to beat me. (In reality, he didn’t have only 1 out. He would have won the pot with either that 7 or the remaining 3 8’s in the deck. So he had 4 outs, which isn’t a huge amount but much more than hitting a 1- or 2-outer.) As I always do when I get busted, I simply smiled, said “good hand”, shook his hand, and walked away. I’m definitely not a screamer at the poker tables, and I don’t slam my hand down on bad beats, or get in people’s faces about their play. I did think that Leather Jacket way overplayed his trip 7’s with weak kicker, but as he said, he just had a bad read on me. Also, since he had both of us out-chipped, he could afford to make a play like that, knowing he wouldn’t be out if he lost. So my tournament lasted about an hour, and thus ends my sad-sack, bad-beat story. The most annoyed I got about that tournament was later in the evening, around midnight, when I looked over at the tournament and they were down to about 13 players. And 2 of the 3 players that I had labeled as “strong” from the beginning of my table were still in the tournament (including Leather Jacket), and none of the “weak” ones were there. So I had the players at my table pegged, but just got unlucky on that one hand that would have given me a lot of chips to make a long run in the tournament. And here is a photo of Gunnersaurus to indicate when everyone can start reading again.

Come on you Gunners!!!!

After the tournament, I went up to the craps table to get a change in luck, and boy did I. In little over 45 minutes I not only made back the money from the tournament buy-in, but added a little bit more to my kitty as well. I took that back down to the poker room, where I played in some sit-and-go tournaments. (These are 10-player tournaments, 1 table only, where the top 3 finishers make the money.) Of course I finished 4th in the 2 that I played, just on the bubble. Story of my night. I headed back to the room where Sage and I both had a fitful night sleeping, as the hotel was quite noisy. But the Sox had won, the Yankees had lost, and I wasn't in that bad of a mood, even with the bad luck at the poker table.

Saturday dawned and I felt middle aged finally. Well, no I didn’t, but it sounds good anyway. In the morning Sage mentioned that while she was online the previous night she noticed that there was “some sort of folk festival” in Newport this weekend. I thought she meant like a craft fair, but turns out it was the famous Newport Folk Festival, with Pete Seeger playing this year. We looked up to where it was going to be played, and realized that traffic/parking was going to be a nightmare all around Newport and decided to bag the Breakers Walk. It’s probably a nicer walk to do in the fall anyway, so I wasn’t that put off. Not knowing what we’d end up doing now, we just got in the car and headed to Mystic and figured we’d worry about the afternoon after noon.

Mystic Aquarium is a short drive (like 20 minutes) from Foxwoods, and we arrived mid-morning. The day was beautiful, and most of the aquarium is outside, so it was nice. We saw Beluga whales romping in the water, sharks and sea lions, walked through a very nice marsh area that had frogs and turtles, saw plenty of penguins, and also had fun feeding the birds in an Australian bird exhibit.

See how clever I was? I wore my Phish shirt at the Aquarium.

This one liked to bite my neck.

We took in the sea lion show, which was pretty weak, and also stopped at the ray tank to feed sting rays. It’s a good aquarium, though it’s not as good as others we’ve been to (Baltimore, Tampa, Atlanta). But still a fun couple of hours.

We hadn’t had much for breakfast, so we were both hungry for lunch and decided to drive into Mystic for lunch at the Mystic Brewery and Pub. After driving around for 40 minutes, we determined there is no place, and headed out of town to try to find something else. Unfortunately choices were limited based on my criteria. I didn’t want to stop at fast food or a clam shack, but I also didn’t want anything too nice, as I just wanted to relax and have some nice food. Seems that everything around there was either a pizza parlor, Chinese restaurant, or upscale dining for the tour bus crowd. On our way to Rhode Island we hit a ton of traffic going through Stonington and Westerly, and by the time we saw a 99 Restaurant on the side of the road we were starving and ready for anything. Lucky for us the food was really crappy. (I had soup that tasted like dishwater and a salad that had zero taste. Also, halfway through eating the salad I took a huge bite of cilantro, which ended the meal for me right there.) The day was taking a turn for the worse, so it was time to turn it all around and get into a Groove. A Weekapaug Groove, that is.

Weekapaug is a town in southern Rhode Island, right on the water. Actually, it’s not really a town, but a “district” of the town of Westerly, RI. It’s home to a couple of beaches that seem to be open to residents only, as well as some really nice houses and the famous Weekapaug Inn. Well, I’m not sure how famous the Weekapaug Inn is, but back in the 80’s Phish either played there once, or members of the band worked there one summer (the details are hazy), and they wrote a song called “Weekapaug Groove”. So of course I couldn’t give up the chance to stop by and get a photo of myself in front of a “Welcome to Weekapaug” sign. Unfortunately no such sign exists, seemingly because it’s not a real town. I did, however, find a fishing area sign that did the job for me.

Get it? "Fishing Area"....Phish....ah, nevermind.

After the photo op, we drove down the road a bit and were lucky enough to find a parking space right next to the shoreline. We stopped and walked down the rocky cliff to the rocky beach and stuck our feet in the rocky ocean.

Sage burning her feet on the hot pebbles. It may look sandy, but it wasn't.

The water felt great, and if there was actually a beach there, it wouldn’t have been a bad day to hang out for a while. But we weren’t really prepared for a beach day, so we walked around a bit, then headed back to the car.

Next stop, we weren’t sure. I had some addresses of wineries in southern Massachusetts, but at this point neither of us felt excited about that prospect. Driving along the coast would only lead to more traffic headaches, and I wasn’t ready for that. Other options that we went through in our heads (Roger Williams Zoo, State parks, etc) we figured would be packed with people by this time, and I was ready to get away from people, so we decided to be lame and head back home.

Driving home, I figured that since it was my birthday, I should treat myself to a nice dessert. So I stopped at the store to get some ice cream, and at home made some brownies. Instead of dinner, we had hot fudge brownie sundaes with mint chocolate chip ice cream as we watched the Red Sox beat the Orioles. It was great to be back in our own bed, and even though the “Weekend of Doug” ended up being about 24 hours total, I still had a great time.

So Forty is in the books, and it doesn't feel any different than 39 did. Now, all I have to do is look into getting one of these mid-life crises that everyone talks about…