My successes thus far in poker

Why do I continue to believe I may some day win a million or more in a Poker tournament like the World Series or a World Poker Tour event?

After making the final table at more than one $35 121+ person tournament and a $100 – 64 person tourney at the Muckleshoot in Auburn, I thought I’ve repeated my success enough to possibly to take it to a higher level. I also made a few final tables at smaller casino events in the Puget Sound.

So, I went to the mother of all gambling places: Las Vegas…

A little poker on this blog

I’ve decided in addition to the stories about my blackjack highs and lows, I would write a bit about my experiences and thoughts about poker — more specifically No Limit Texas Hold ‘em poker which is what the World Series of Poker uses for it’s primary main event.  This game has grown to huge proportions throughout the world due to an amateur winning the event 4 years in a row having a first place prize of over $10 million dollars — more than any professional sports event today.

This is a way for me to keep track of my thoughts on the game and to sort of rant about the game since I just want to make sure this time used on this game is wasted 100%.  I’ve invested a lot of time and money into this game.

Chapter One: 25 over 21 – The rules of this funny game we call Blackjack

I occasionally dabbled in this game a mutual friend of ours Paul calls “21.” Not only did Paul call it by the name, but a movie was titled the number starring Kevin Spacey in early 2008 about a handful of Massachussetts Institute of Technology students led by their MIT Professor counting cards on their way to Las Vegas riches. There was definitely more to the story, but I’m not writing about them.

In most versions of the game Blackjack, players are dealt two cards face up with the dealer dealt one card face down and one up for players to see. You’re competing against the dealer to get a higher card count up through the value of 21. If you go over that amount, you bust and automatically lose your wager. Before you are dealt the two cards against the dealer, you have to bet the minimum amount the table requires you to the maximum limit. In some situations, you’re able to split your two cards to double your bet by adding the same amount of your original bet and getting an additional card for each of the two cards you split. This is a bit advanced, but for it’s important to understand for a later story that I heard when Brandon supposedly made more than six times the money he started with.

Chapter One: 25 over 21 – Just another night for Brandon

Brandon’s this 34 year old Asian American I met at an Indian Reservation casino in Auburn, Washington. He smiled his fair share when we talked making him very likeable on top of the fact when he trusted you, he opened up about many of the very private things that plagued or excited him in life.

When I first went to the Muckleshoot Casino to find some personalities I thought I could write about for my first venture into Biographical stories of every day people in the U.S., I never anticipated meeting someone like this guy who grew up in Puyallup of all places. He told me he worked for Expedia.com who many locally and even nationally admired at the time since their stock was at all time highs and was the leading travel website online. It was also associated with Microsoft, the local boon to the economy after it spun off from the company several years before. I thought anybody would be lucky to have landed a job like he did just 6 months before I met him.