Brad-o-ween - Final Phase

Phase 3 - More Poker, More Drinking

Saturday morning at 9am rolled around and I woke up to the sound of someone sawing through our downstairs ceiling right below my bed. A friend of the family was fixing our ceiling that had been ruined by my leaking shower. I had only 6 hours of sleep, but it would have to do. All the other bloggers staying at the house, Iggy, Pauly, Derek and Daddy were still sound asleep and snoring. My plan was to let them sleep as long as they wanted, I didn't want to wake anyone up.

While waiting, I fired up Noble Poker and quickly doubled my buy-in at a NL ring game table. Nice way to start off the day I thought. We were due over at Otis' house by 12:30, so at around 11:00 I began to knock on people's doors trying to get them up. No dice. I'll wait a little more. By 11:30, I think Pauly made his way into the shower. We were going to be cutting it close, but hopefully everyone could get ready.

Mercifully, we made it to Otis' house in time to get things started. I installed some tourney tracking software on Otis' laptop and then determined the starting chip count with the now famous Barbie Fashion Poker Chips. I never saw so many pink, purple and yellow chips in my life. I hear Otis intentionally picked those colors to confuse AlCantHang and his color blindness.

The structure of the tourney was designed to last about 7 hours at the request of Otis. I usually have a set structure and vary the starting chip count and level time to hit the target. I'm not too far off usually. From what I was hearing, people seemed to like the structure as it allowed them to play some interesting post-flop poker rather than become an all-in fest after 2 hours.

After I had heard that Otis busted out first, I couldn't help but smile. Certainly not because he was busted, but rather because I wasn't surprised. Anytime I'm hosting a tourney/party, my mind is not fully 100% on poker. There are just too many people with whom I'm concerned about having a good time for me to concentrate at the levels required for me to play well. My gut told me that Otis was probably going through some of the same feelings since Brad-o-ween was pretty much the be-all end-all of parties.

I managed a piss-poor 36th place finish or thereabouts. My demise came in the form of pocket T's. On a board of 356 rainblow, I put Frank the Tank's reraise on a straight draw and pushed. He had a set of 3's and my two-outer didn't hit.

Off to the cash games. Or rather, wait until Otis approves that a cash game can commence, then off to the cash games. He and G-Rob were off chasing cheez ball ghosts so it was a bit of time before we could actually start. Once we did, I tried to play the cash game and keep my duties as tournament director in tact. I think by the time I managed to condense the tables to 3, CJ stepped up and took the helm. It was much appreciated since I had just got stuck for a buy-in when G-Rob, me, and Maigrey all made flushes on the river and the three of us were all-in. G-Rob's ATd beat my KJd and Maigrey's 45d. Crap. Give G-Rob a stack and it's all but over.

I managed to build my stack back a bit, just shy of $10 of the $140 I bought in for. Until The Mark and his no limit Omaha-8 game. Ugh. After a few 3-handed maniacal hands of this blasphemous game (along with Squint from PokerStage), the cash game broke up and I took what was left of my chips and vowed not to play The Mark at no limit Omaha-8 again. Until next time, that is.

The tourney was winding down and the drunk-a-lympics were going to start. I was missing two things: Drunkeness and entrance music. I was pretty sure that I was going to be chosen for the arm-wrestling portion of the show; since that was my feature event, I was coming in WWE-style. I made a quick stop back at casa Blood to grab my iPod and return my poker table to it's natural resting place. While home, I tossed back a Hydroxycut pill in anticipation of staying up real late. Packed with ephedra, I wasn't going to let last nights minimal sleep affect me. I got back to Otis' house in time to watch the final table in all its glory. I did have my iPod, but I still didn't have my drunk. This wasn't the sober-a-lympics. Time to get started.

First step, car bomb. Thanks Eva. Second step, half a plastic cup of vodka, half a plastic cup of V8. Not quite an official bloody mary, but it will do. Third step, a couple of beers. Only then could the drunk-a-lympics begin. Without re-hashing the gory details, let's just say TEAM EVIL came out victorious. How could they not when Slayer's Bloodlines blasted to my entrance prior to arm-wrestling Derek. Even his Revenge of the Nerds-style countermeasures couldn't compete against the forces of Evil.

While Team Evil did lose some events, forcing some shots of SoCo into my system, we did win the overall competition. Time for some bubbly. I tried to douse G-Rob with some champagne, but I wasn't very successful. No recourse but to finish off the bottle. Then things got hazy. I do remember the wet t-shirt contest. So did Mrs_Blood. I got in a bit of trouble for being too close to the action. Penalty: one night in the dog house. Such is life. I'll be there again I'm sure.

Unfortunately, that Hydroxycut pill I took earlier didn't work. I became, shall we say, "tired." I wandered off to the edge of the driveway and sat down. Soon lying down became a much better option. Not soon after, my better half made the command decision that my state was irrecoverable and drove me home. I am a lightweight.

Apparently, the McGrupp's made it back to the house around 3am while Iggy and Daddy hung out 'til daylight at Otis'. I hope I didn't miss too much. I probably did.

Sunday, we finally regrouped a bit with everyone prior to their departure. Heather, April and the CantHangCrew stopped by for a bit and got to play a couple of Chip Challenges(tm) with the minis. It was nice to see miniBlood taking a pot from Iggy and taking AlCantHang out of a game. miniMsBlood won both challenges and had a great time too.

In all seriousness, thanks to you guys who came by on Sunday and humored us and the mini's. That meant a lot to yours truly.

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It seems hard to believe that weekend was over a week gone by. Truly a monumental weekend that will be difficult to replicate. But I'm sure, when next year rolls around, Otis will try. I be there.