Zero, Except Not.
Sigh, the world continues to rotate, and yet my world continues to have a looming unanswered question.
The good news is people across the U.S. are finding out their fate left and right. Therefore my turn should be soon, probably Monday. Even if I don't receive a phone call, the list of names should be up on the internet. Either way, the end is coming. The end of the wait, that is.
Stay positive. Try to think positive.
Thursday, February 06, 2003
Tuesday, February 04, 2003
Three.
Well, at least the traditional Monday night Chumash excursion was a great distraction from what's going on.
This time headed up with a couple of the usuals, with plans for a fourth to meet us there later on sometime during or after the tournament. Started off slow, then things started moving, and ended up somewhere around $120 up entering the tournament. The three of us made sure to get different tables, but we were all at the same time, so we were able to sort of eye each other stacks during the round. By some miracle of luck, ALL of us ended up winning our table in the first round and moving on. This is especially strange given we all use completely different betting strategies, with me being the never changes his bet pansy until the final hand or two, one of them being the risks at least half of it every chance he gets, and the other being somewhere in between. Our table was late starting, so I ended up finding out they'd both won during our final hand, which took a great deal of time. With three of us left, the dealer button was at seat 1, with me being in the ideal position of furthest away. He had the most chips leading me slightly, but took a great deal of time trying to decide what to do. General strategy in my books says he should leave out my exact chip count, and bet the rest, forcing me to bet at least the minimum, and causing him to win if we both lose, which odds say is the most common outcome. He would also win if I lose and he doesn't, and between those two possibilities that's over 50% of the possible hands. For some bizarre reason after thinking about it for a good 5 minutes and with a crowd gathering around, he decides to go all in. This forces an all in bet from the middle seat, although he has less chips so is hoping for a blackjack or a situation where he wins and we don't. Being in the ideal position of betting last, I go all in other than the minimum chip amount. Therefore if everyone loses, I win. The hands dealt were all going to require hits, but the perfect ending ended up occuring, with the dealer getting blackjack and beating everyone. I've never been that ecstatic to see the dealer get blackjack before. So with a whopping single green chip of the smallest quantity, I advance from the table of seven to the semifinals, and everyone else goes home.
In the semis the table has five people, and they take two from it to go to the finals. I was quite worried towards the start, as we had someone go all in on the first hand and win. The bizarreness of it came as he went all in AGAIN on the second hand. Yet he still won. We figured he'd immediately lower his bet to the minimum and sit on his huge lead in first place for the remainder, but he went all in a third time. He pushed, still alive. At this point, anyone in their right mind would have gone to the minimum bet. He didn't, he lost, he was done. Suddenly there were only four of us, only a couple minutes into the shoe. On the fourth hand one of the players decided to go after the guy who was leading I guess, and bet half his money, and lost. He bet the other half on the next hand, and lost that too. Wham, there are three players left with at least 3/4 of the cards remaining. Unfortunately we were all using similar strategies involving very small bets. It was quite uneventful throughout the round, with the last hand eventually coming up. As luck would have it again, I would bet last. We all had around 1k in chips, the button decides to bet all but 500. Rationally, the player next to me bets all but 525. Also rationally, I bet all but 550. Unfortunately, as the cards came out, my position became very much in danger. Cheering for everyone (or at least both of them) to lose, I had a 15 versus their 20 and 21, with the dealer's 10 showing. Although the odds say hit, I was forced to stay, because a bust by me combined with a dealer bust would spell certain death. Although I'd been in the better position during the betting, I was now relying on the dealer . Normal thinking suggests a dealer 10 will give him 20 underneath. Unfortunately for me, that would cause me to lose. Unfortunately still, given I'd left the most out to hope for a loss by everyone, if the dealer busted I would still lose. My only hope was that the dealer would make, and beat at least 1 of them. Given one player had 21 and the other 20, this required a dealer 21. Bottom card flipped up, it's a 4. Dealer with 14, odds of him busting just skyrocketed, I'm in trouble. Here comes the hit, it's a 7. Simple math gives you 21, one player pushes, the other two of us lose, with me beating him in chip count 550 to 500 (not real money by the way). I come in second, and I'm now into the final round, where everyone wins money. During the hand however, even more shocking news came through. BOTH of my friends had also come in second at their tables, and were going to the finals. With only eight players in the final table, and a $2000 pot to be divied up between them, things were looking awesome.
Heh, I'll never go into this much detail again because if you don't know blackjack I'm sure it's pretty boring, but this happened to me quite the irregular tournament. So a short time later we're all at the final table, with our fourth finally showing up to watch the remaining festivities. It appears the pansy betting strategy was working that night, because in the final table that's really all you saw. There's also the fact that you're not really playing for first as much as playing to beat as many people as possible. People going out early is a godsend. Unfortunately only one person was that stupid, leaving seven of us going into the final hand. I was fourth to bet, losing my ideal position of the previous rounds. One of my friends had been losing consistently and ended up with only 300 at the end, which betting second he put all in. The chip leader bet just before me, putting in the minimum. The first bet had already kept out 1k, which was my exact chip amount. Knowing I couldn't overcut him, and the only way I was going to beat the chip leader was putting in just about everything, I decided to leave out the minimum of 25 and put the rest in. This in effect put me above my friend in the odds race, with three betters to come. Expectedly, one left out 75, and the next (my other friend) left out 500, putting 300 on the table. Can't remember what the last better did, she ended up not being important in the grand scheme of things. I end up with 15 versus a dealer 10 again, sad as it was. I hit, and manage an 18. A few people end up busting, leaving them with little or no chips. My friend snags a 21 (although not a blackjack) likely putting her chip total to about 1200. The chip leader already has about 1400 though and with a minimum bet isn't going anywhere. I personally had 975 on the table, a victory would take me to 1950 and the championship. A dealer 20, again, would kill me and put me way down in the rankings with merely 25 in chips left. Dealer flips the down card. It's an 8. We push. In a way this was good, I keep my 1000 in chips which pushed me far ahead of some people. In a way it was sad, a dealer bust or a 17 and I win the whole shebang. As it turns out, I take 4th. $250 more comes in a large tray of chips, the real kind this time. The friend of mine who only had 300 going into the final hand had busted, putting him, in last of the 7 remaining giving him 7th place and $100. My other friend though with the nice 21 at the end bounced all the way up into 2nd, taking a cool $400, not too far off the $500 prize for the table winner. So all in all, the three of us taking 2nd, 4th, and 7th, pocketed $750 of the available $2000 at the final table. Not bad, not bad at all. I spent quite a while telling the "big fish" story about how close I was to winning the top prize, but all in all I'd have to say I played well. I managed to get to the final round, and had a decent shot at winning in the last hand. As long as I have at least a shot at the $500, I can't complain. Not that $250 is a horrible deal either. Especially when you tack on the $50 from winning the initial table. That put me all the way up to $375 up on the night, with us as a group being up over $1000 thanks to the 7th place finisher's healthy machine play from earlier.
Following the tournament, we were all on a pretty huge high, with the fourth member of our group being the only slightly depressed one in that he missed out on the bank. We played just about everything for a while, all the stuff that you never get to play because the odds are poor but is fun, and can still pay thousands if you "hit the big one." We did mediocre here and there, even played a decent dose of Let It Ride, the one that gives you the possibility of $15,000 on any given $5 hand. Eventually the time grew later, our lungs gave us the signal, and we made our escape. Two of us finished up $300 and $400 respectively, which happened to be our takings in the tournament. The third who was up somewhere in the $400 or $500 range earlier, ended up with a mere $180, due to a largely unprofitable spree of playing high stakes machines during the remaining hour or two we were there. As he always says though, "you have to bet big to win big." And that "any one of those 20's" could have become hundreds or even thousands of dollars. I personally am generally satisfied with my blackjack winnings, and keep machines to a minimum during each trip, knowing that is how they build multibillion dollar hotels.
So, it was my 2nd most profitable trip ever, behind a fluke trip two years ago when I managed a $625 jackpot on one machine and then managed to win a whole lot more too, and left a whopping $760 up. Final tally from last night, three Benjamins. These soon joined the two I'd won in mid January, which puts me at a tally of up $500 in 2003 after four trips, having never left down. This is where everyone can now say "well, you're due then." Hey, they said that tonight too. Frankly though, given I don't throw around money like a jackass, I'll never lose as much as I win on big nights. It would take a gigantic losing streak of trips consistently for me to even approach losing that much money. So let that assuage your fears. I know what I'm doing, really. :) Even if I do end up losing the next time we go, I still have a blast every time I go, from the trip up through the mountains with my buds who I basically never see because they live downtown, to the chatting with the dealers, to the feeling you get every time you get a blackjack (only 11 last night by the way, the 22 from the previous week will probably stand for a long time), to the euphoric feeling of doing well in the tournament. Out of 140 players, I took fourth, with all three of us finishing in the top seven. That just rocks. Benjamins for everybody. Want to be a part of the $880 bank the group as a whole took home? Gimme a call next Monday ;)
In other news back in the doldrums of everyday life, still no news, and the rumors of there being a delay and the results not actually appearing on Friday are starting to show up. I've yet to see any forum postings by someone with actual connections say that though, and the people who call their recruiters are getting a "call back on Friday" response, so we shall see.
Well, at least the traditional Monday night Chumash excursion was a great distraction from what's going on.
This time headed up with a couple of the usuals, with plans for a fourth to meet us there later on sometime during or after the tournament. Started off slow, then things started moving, and ended up somewhere around $120 up entering the tournament. The three of us made sure to get different tables, but we were all at the same time, so we were able to sort of eye each other stacks during the round. By some miracle of luck, ALL of us ended up winning our table in the first round and moving on. This is especially strange given we all use completely different betting strategies, with me being the never changes his bet pansy until the final hand or two, one of them being the risks at least half of it every chance he gets, and the other being somewhere in between. Our table was late starting, so I ended up finding out they'd both won during our final hand, which took a great deal of time. With three of us left, the dealer button was at seat 1, with me being in the ideal position of furthest away. He had the most chips leading me slightly, but took a great deal of time trying to decide what to do. General strategy in my books says he should leave out my exact chip count, and bet the rest, forcing me to bet at least the minimum, and causing him to win if we both lose, which odds say is the most common outcome. He would also win if I lose and he doesn't, and between those two possibilities that's over 50% of the possible hands. For some bizarre reason after thinking about it for a good 5 minutes and with a crowd gathering around, he decides to go all in. This forces an all in bet from the middle seat, although he has less chips so is hoping for a blackjack or a situation where he wins and we don't. Being in the ideal position of betting last, I go all in other than the minimum chip amount. Therefore if everyone loses, I win. The hands dealt were all going to require hits, but the perfect ending ended up occuring, with the dealer getting blackjack and beating everyone. I've never been that ecstatic to see the dealer get blackjack before. So with a whopping single green chip of the smallest quantity, I advance from the table of seven to the semifinals, and everyone else goes home.
In the semis the table has five people, and they take two from it to go to the finals. I was quite worried towards the start, as we had someone go all in on the first hand and win. The bizarreness of it came as he went all in AGAIN on the second hand. Yet he still won. We figured he'd immediately lower his bet to the minimum and sit on his huge lead in first place for the remainder, but he went all in a third time. He pushed, still alive. At this point, anyone in their right mind would have gone to the minimum bet. He didn't, he lost, he was done. Suddenly there were only four of us, only a couple minutes into the shoe. On the fourth hand one of the players decided to go after the guy who was leading I guess, and bet half his money, and lost. He bet the other half on the next hand, and lost that too. Wham, there are three players left with at least 3/4 of the cards remaining. Unfortunately we were all using similar strategies involving very small bets. It was quite uneventful throughout the round, with the last hand eventually coming up. As luck would have it again, I would bet last. We all had around 1k in chips, the button decides to bet all but 500. Rationally, the player next to me bets all but 525. Also rationally, I bet all but 550. Unfortunately, as the cards came out, my position became very much in danger. Cheering for everyone (or at least both of them) to lose, I had a 15 versus their 20 and 21, with the dealer's 10 showing. Although the odds say hit, I was forced to stay, because a bust by me combined with a dealer bust would spell certain death. Although I'd been in the better position during the betting, I was now relying on the dealer . Normal thinking suggests a dealer 10 will give him 20 underneath. Unfortunately for me, that would cause me to lose. Unfortunately still, given I'd left the most out to hope for a loss by everyone, if the dealer busted I would still lose. My only hope was that the dealer would make, and beat at least 1 of them. Given one player had 21 and the other 20, this required a dealer 21. Bottom card flipped up, it's a 4. Dealer with 14, odds of him busting just skyrocketed, I'm in trouble. Here comes the hit, it's a 7. Simple math gives you 21, one player pushes, the other two of us lose, with me beating him in chip count 550 to 500 (not real money by the way). I come in second, and I'm now into the final round, where everyone wins money. During the hand however, even more shocking news came through. BOTH of my friends had also come in second at their tables, and were going to the finals. With only eight players in the final table, and a $2000 pot to be divied up between them, things were looking awesome.
Heh, I'll never go into this much detail again because if you don't know blackjack I'm sure it's pretty boring, but this happened to me quite the irregular tournament. So a short time later we're all at the final table, with our fourth finally showing up to watch the remaining festivities. It appears the pansy betting strategy was working that night, because in the final table that's really all you saw. There's also the fact that you're not really playing for first as much as playing to beat as many people as possible. People going out early is a godsend. Unfortunately only one person was that stupid, leaving seven of us going into the final hand. I was fourth to bet, losing my ideal position of the previous rounds. One of my friends had been losing consistently and ended up with only 300 at the end, which betting second he put all in. The chip leader bet just before me, putting in the minimum. The first bet had already kept out 1k, which was my exact chip amount. Knowing I couldn't overcut him, and the only way I was going to beat the chip leader was putting in just about everything, I decided to leave out the minimum of 25 and put the rest in. This in effect put me above my friend in the odds race, with three betters to come. Expectedly, one left out 75, and the next (my other friend) left out 500, putting 300 on the table. Can't remember what the last better did, she ended up not being important in the grand scheme of things. I end up with 15 versus a dealer 10 again, sad as it was. I hit, and manage an 18. A few people end up busting, leaving them with little or no chips. My friend snags a 21 (although not a blackjack) likely putting her chip total to about 1200. The chip leader already has about 1400 though and with a minimum bet isn't going anywhere. I personally had 975 on the table, a victory would take me to 1950 and the championship. A dealer 20, again, would kill me and put me way down in the rankings with merely 25 in chips left. Dealer flips the down card. It's an 8. We push. In a way this was good, I keep my 1000 in chips which pushed me far ahead of some people. In a way it was sad, a dealer bust or a 17 and I win the whole shebang. As it turns out, I take 4th. $250 more comes in a large tray of chips, the real kind this time. The friend of mine who only had 300 going into the final hand had busted, putting him, in last of the 7 remaining giving him 7th place and $100. My other friend though with the nice 21 at the end bounced all the way up into 2nd, taking a cool $400, not too far off the $500 prize for the table winner. So all in all, the three of us taking 2nd, 4th, and 7th, pocketed $750 of the available $2000 at the final table. Not bad, not bad at all. I spent quite a while telling the "big fish" story about how close I was to winning the top prize, but all in all I'd have to say I played well. I managed to get to the final round, and had a decent shot at winning in the last hand. As long as I have at least a shot at the $500, I can't complain. Not that $250 is a horrible deal either. Especially when you tack on the $50 from winning the initial table. That put me all the way up to $375 up on the night, with us as a group being up over $1000 thanks to the 7th place finisher's healthy machine play from earlier.
Following the tournament, we were all on a pretty huge high, with the fourth member of our group being the only slightly depressed one in that he missed out on the bank. We played just about everything for a while, all the stuff that you never get to play because the odds are poor but is fun, and can still pay thousands if you "hit the big one." We did mediocre here and there, even played a decent dose of Let It Ride, the one that gives you the possibility of $15,000 on any given $5 hand. Eventually the time grew later, our lungs gave us the signal, and we made our escape. Two of us finished up $300 and $400 respectively, which happened to be our takings in the tournament. The third who was up somewhere in the $400 or $500 range earlier, ended up with a mere $180, due to a largely unprofitable spree of playing high stakes machines during the remaining hour or two we were there. As he always says though, "you have to bet big to win big." And that "any one of those 20's" could have become hundreds or even thousands of dollars. I personally am generally satisfied with my blackjack winnings, and keep machines to a minimum during each trip, knowing that is how they build multibillion dollar hotels.
So, it was my 2nd most profitable trip ever, behind a fluke trip two years ago when I managed a $625 jackpot on one machine and then managed to win a whole lot more too, and left a whopping $760 up. Final tally from last night, three Benjamins. These soon joined the two I'd won in mid January, which puts me at a tally of up $500 in 2003 after four trips, having never left down. This is where everyone can now say "well, you're due then." Hey, they said that tonight too. Frankly though, given I don't throw around money like a jackass, I'll never lose as much as I win on big nights. It would take a gigantic losing streak of trips consistently for me to even approach losing that much money. So let that assuage your fears. I know what I'm doing, really. :) Even if I do end up losing the next time we go, I still have a blast every time I go, from the trip up through the mountains with my buds who I basically never see because they live downtown, to the chatting with the dealers, to the feeling you get every time you get a blackjack (only 11 last night by the way, the 22 from the previous week will probably stand for a long time), to the euphoric feeling of doing well in the tournament. Out of 140 players, I took fourth, with all three of us finishing in the top seven. That just rocks. Benjamins for everybody. Want to be a part of the $880 bank the group as a whole took home? Gimme a call next Monday ;)
In other news back in the doldrums of everyday life, still no news, and the rumors of there being a delay and the results not actually appearing on Friday are starting to show up. I've yet to see any forum postings by someone with actual connections say that though, and the people who call their recruiters are getting a "call back on Friday" response, so we shall see.
