BuddyDank Radio

After doing so much traveling this summer I have found it difficult to get back into the swing of things. Poker has taken a backseat to searching for jobs, TV and just casual life. I still have plenty to write about my adventures in Europe and from The Bash but it’s taking longer then I would like to get it into words.

Tonight we get back to poker with The Mookie! BDR will once again be broadcasting the event.

We also have an announcement for a new tournament that Numbbono has set up for us.
NumbBlowMe Invitational
Tournament # 63820195
10/23/2008
8:30 pm CST
NLHE - 0.10 + 1.00
Unlimited dime rebuys until first break
Dime add-on of 1500 chips at first break
password = bdankradio

See you all at the tables tonight!

Tune in for Mookie Madness and a complete recap of The Bash. We’ll be playing snippets from The Pub Olympics show we did Saturday. It includes interviews with Otis, Recess Rampage, Bobby Bracelet and The Rooster. Plus much much more.

My last minute plans for The Bash went into effect Friday morning on a very early flight. A short layover in Chicago and I arrived in Philly. Luckily I got a txt msg from Riggs that Drizz was coming in around the same time. Quick call to Drizz and we’re off to the closest bar to wait for BadBlood and Otis. Capn Cokes, burgers and the wonderful company of Drizzle. Hour or so later and we get the call that they have arrived. Off to the car rental place and we’re ready to go. Met BadBlood for the first time and Otis for the second.

BadBlood is the master of the 12 point turn. Otis is one hell of a navigator and by that I mean we only got lost 2 or 3 times. During the drive I was exposed to the wonderfulness of XM Radio. They all seemed to have favorite channels but we managed to find something we could all enjoy. During the conversation about my ignorance of the latest satellite technologies was apparent and I let it slip that I didn’t actually even have a radio in my car at all. Otis’ response, ‘BuddyDank Radio doesn’t have a radio in his own car?’ I felt ashamed. Ok not really but it still struck me as pretty humorous.

After a few minor detours we arrived in Pheonixville PA! Tyler James Pub was easy enough to find and who else would be standing out front other than the main man Alcanthang himself. It was still early enough that most of the group wasn’t there but slowly but surely they arrived. Bam Bam, Pebbles and the Tuckfards Carson and DonK somehow snuck in the country from Canada. Big hugs from CK are the bestest. I hadn’t played Buck Hunter in a long time but I had a good run and somehow still lost to Drizz.

Superfantabulous Poker Time!
Needless to say but I was feeling good. Good and Drunk! Fawking good thing this was a rebuy. Pushed a couple times could never catch up. REBUY! Raised like I was a rich man. REBUY! But our table was actually fairly quiet compared to Al’s. I think he pushed the first 5 hands and about a half hour in, Al Drizz and Falstaff had 15 to 20 buyins between them. I had BadBlood, LuckTruck, KevinwithanAK, Carson and some cranky old dude at my starting table.

My most notable hand gave me a pretty shitty image. The details are skectchy but here goes. I look down to see K-9os and raise. 1 or 2 callers and the flop comes out 88x. Checked to me so I figure I can buy it. I bet and get 1 caller. No help on the turn so I bet it again. Same guy calls but I can’t give up now. Ace on the river is a shitty card. Fawk it! I again bet it, he tanks and calls showing his Ace for a pair on the river. I look at the guy and say ‘Good call, I was bluffing’ but my drunk ass decides to show my shitty bluff. As I turn over my cards I didn’t even look at them but Badblood points out that I have trip 8’s. Whoops. Guess I should have taken another look at my hand. My K-8 takes the pot and my opponent is crushed and the table is shocked. I’m pretty sure that put a permanent bullseye on my forehead for the rest of the game. It was right about this time I became ZombieDank. Little sleep, too much drink and a little smokey smokey turns Buddy into the walking dead. Dead money that is.

I did get the better of cranky old dude though when I pushed my flush draw against his TPSK. Flush hits on the turn and he’s ready to lose it. Seriously wouldn’t shut up about it for the next half hour. Acting like I’m the first schmoe to ever push his flush draw. Yes I invented it! Whatever. I eventually went out after getting short and pushing my AQ into Spaceman’s AA. GG.

The rest of the evening was spent waiting for the game to finish. There might be a few pictures of me sleeping in a chair but at least I didn’t set up a bed of chairs like Drizz who was passed out way before me. The cash game seemed like a bad idea in my state plus crank old dude was in it and I really didn’t want to have to kill him.

Early morning Saturday after it was over a bunch of us headed over to a little diner for first breakfast. No clue what I ate. I do remember the waitress being the only one working the place and Rooster trying to get her to be my date for the Bash. Plus to get back to town 7 of us had to jam ourselves into the Man Truck. It was ugly but we made it.

Next up! Day 2 and the Pub Olympics.

A few delays during the trip back to cornytown but I am back.

Obviously I had a great time. What the fuck else do you expect? I guess I’ll start with a small number of highlights and try to tell more detailed stories later cause I’m a whiny tired little bitch.

1. Meeting some bad asses that I had not had the pleasure with before. Tuckfards Carson and DonK! Evy! Dawn Summers! Big Mike! LuckTruck! Perticelli! Riggs! MillerD! Corron10! BadBlood! DocChako! Spaceman! Fuck this list is just going to keep going. Links and stories soon I promise.

2. Got to spend way more time with others I had met before! A huge advantage during a smaller event like this where we are pretty much all together all day!! That list is everyone else!

3. Crashing at Casa de Al! What a guy! My last minute plans left me scraping to figure out what to do and he was kind enough to take me in. Good thing he told me a story about having to break into his own home cause I had to do it Saturday when we couldn’t find him. Luckily the neighbors didn’t call the cops.

4. Drunk and drunker! FAWK! First breakfast rocks the house!

5. Boobies!!! I won’t give that one away quite yet but I saw boobies!

6. MillerD and Jordan are my boyees! Perfect timing! Cough cough

7. Lost numerous bets but it was worth it. Sorry Rooster.

8. Quote from Otis ‘BuddyDank Radio doesn’t have a radio in his own car?’ Busted.

9. Sleep is overrated.

I could just keep going but I need to give some mojo to my Steelers cause they are sucking right now. WTF happened to the offense?

Fuck it! I’m going to the Bash. It’s all a little last minute but I found a cheap flight and am now leaving tomorrow morning to go to Philadelphia. Drunkenness will ensue, fun will be had, and poker will be played.

If you are not going make sure and check for updates and live coverage over at BuddyDank Radio. I guess I’ll be picking up my media pass and covering the Pub Olympics. What? No one wants me on their team? Good call cause there is no way I’d be of much help to either team. Everyone knows I can’t drink for shit. Last night was a good example. Fuck I don’t even remember who won The Mookie last night.

Now I just need to do a little laundry, get the computers and some minor equipment ready.

Of course you do!

Join everyone tonight and play The Mookie. Waffles needs 80 people to have a shot at winning his big bet. Plus he’s adding $109 to the prize pool if that happens for a buyin to one of the Sunday majors.

BuddyDank Radio will be covering all the action once again so you can’t miss that. Maybe we should start up a prize pool to buy Waffles a new sound card for his computer so we can get him back on the air. The last time we had him on we broke all sorts of records for BDR.

EDIT!!!!
I HAVE A HUGE ANNOUNCEMENT TO MAKE TONIGHT!!! HOLY SHIT THIS IS CRAZY!!!!

My trip to Europe started off with my dad offering me a plane ticket to England where he was staying for a good part of the summer. Plans were to tour around just England but changed to include Paris the more we got talking about it. 2 weeks of museums and beautiful countryside views.

But a few days into the trip we got word that my step mom was not feeling well and had gone to the doctor. Tests showed that she may have a problem with her heart. My grandfather had passed away last year while he was overseas and he was not sure he’d be able to finish off the trip with me. After talking to a few more doctors my dad decided to head back early and changed his flight. The final arrangements were being made while we were in Paris so I had to decide what I was going to do. I chose to stay in Paris and looked into catching a train to Holland. Turns out that it’s very easy to travel around once you’re already in Europe to other areas of the continent. So I said my goodbyes to my father and got on a train headed for Amsterdam.

Most everyone I had spoken to about my trip before leaving couldn’t believe I was going to be so close to Amsterdam and not going there. Why not right? It wouldn’t have been quite the same journey if I had family with me but now I was in a great situation to let it all hang out. My dad even warned me that some coffee shops cake might have ‘marijuana’ in it before I left. He really is clueless sometimes.

Coming into the station and getting off the train with no plans, no hotel arrangements and no idea how to get around the city was a bit frightening at first. Now I have lived in large cities before so I wasn’t all that concerned but I do admit to being a bit clueless myself. I wandered around for a short time. Took in the sights of the canals and such and finally decided I better find a place to stay before partaking in any of the smokables.

It didn’t take long to find a suitable hotel so I got rid of my backpack and headed back out into the streets of sin. First coffee shop was The Green House. It sat along one of the canals and seemed comfortable enough. Little did I know that I would spend the next 2 hours in this place just trying to make sure I was good enough to be out on the streets again. First joint kicked my ass!

That’s all I’ve got time for today but come back soon for more.

Some of my pictures are up over at my Picasa page for right now. Check em out!

Don’t forget that tonight is The Mookie and my first broadcast in a long time. I’m dubbing it the Official Relaunch Party for BDR! Come hang out and stay awhile.

Before I get into countless stories of my trip I thought I’d share one that was actually poker related.

After a week of traveling around England I arrived in London for just 1 day before heading off to Paris. That evening I headed down to the Leicester Square area of town to check out one of the many casinos. I chose to take a look at The Casino at The Empire. A rather fancy place filled to the brim with Asian gamblers. Very few slots, a moderate amount of your every day table games, and a poker room.

Face to Face is their poker room and I had to check it out. I had arrived late in the evening and there were only 2 cash games going as well as the final table to one of their nightly tournaments. Put my name on the list and got the lowdown on the games. They had 2 options. Both games going were 1/2 NL but only one of them had a dealer. The other was self deal and had a lower rake. The rake? 6 pounds collected every hour from all players sitting at the table. The dealer table cost 8 pounds an hour and had a much longer list to get through in order to play. Max buyin of 250 pounds.(still not sure how to make the funky pound symbol with my keyboard) 20 minutes later I was able to sit down at the self dealt table.

9 players. I was not forced to post out of position. And a table captain willing to battle it out with all takers interested in the job. Honestly I was happy he was on top of things as the game was generally a mess of incorrect bets, people dealing before all the action was finished and a drunken Asian lady who played every hand.

I choose to play tight and didn’t really have many memorable hands for the evening. QQ with an ace high flop and two raisers was the only premium hand and an easy fold. The action was all on 2 Isreali brothers who were fast and furious into any raised pot. I was the only American in the room and the rest were either British or other worldly travelers from Japan, Spain and one hilarious guy from Australia.

Some interesting things were going on that evening. Tipping in Europe is a mixed bag. It’s normally not expected in most situations. But at this casino they had just changed the rules to allow dealer tipping, THAT DAY. Of course at the self dealt table no one was tipping the other players as that could get weird. But when I was moved to the dealer table very few knew of the rule until Helen, the crazy Asian gambler, brought it up time and time again. ‘Tip the dealer!’ she would shout with a drunken slur. Almost noone tipped. Seeing how I won very few pots that night, neither did I. But Helen was on a rampage to get people to tip. When she would win a pot, her tip was usually close to 50% of her winnings. And on the last hand she played when she went all in with her last 40 pounds with 10-3 and was called by A-10, she almost got violent when the winner wouldn’t tip her entire 40 pound bet to the dealer. ‘Why do you think I went all in with 10-3?’ she shouted over and over. We were all greatful when she finally left the room and there was finally some peace and quiet.

Most of the evening I was just chatting up the others at the table. A few knew where or what Iowa was. And most also played online. But after losing more than 100 pounds of my initial buy in I decided to call it a night.

I would be back in this room though toward the end of my trip. But that is a story for another day. Let me just throw out a teaser that it was for a tournament. And Helen was seated directly to my left all freaking night.

I’m Home! A day late and many dollars short but I am home.

God bless American football. So great to relax and catch up on things.

Many many stories to come….soon.

Made some changes to my flight home and now I’m staying in Amsterdam until Wednesday. Then back to London for 2 days and finally back in the US on Friday.

This whole experience has been incredible. I was a bit concerned traveling by myself and such. But I have met new people almost every night. Last night I hung out with 4 guys from Spain and they spoke about as much english that I speak of spanish. Yet we spoke the common language of the stinky green and drank all night.

Tonight is my last night in Amsterdam so it may be a late one. Live it up! Right?

Today’s post brought to you by ‘The Cheese’.