Monte Carlo or Bust..

Having had a pretty turbulant year I've decided to accept a challenge from the Princess of Diamonds called 'Monte Carlo or Bust'. The clue is in the name, I've got to beg, borrow or steal to get to the EPT final in Monte Carlo in March 2008.

During my life I've only ever begged for mercy from God/Allah/Mohammad/Jah during a run of sick beats, and I've only ever stolen a few harmless blinds.The fact that I didn't like the idea of borrowing to play a poker tourney (I could picture the conversation...

Bank Manager: Yes Mr. Kidd a car loan of €20,000 would not be a problem

Gutshot Kidd: Great..where do I sign? Oh and could you make the cheque out to Mr. John Duthie C/o EPT Ltd.)

There was only one thing for it..I had to qualify the old fashioned way.This was going to be fun.

My first venture was a €500 buy-in tourney which after playing for 7 hours I managed to bust one place off the bubble by running a straight flush into a higher straight flush!!

I felt nauseous...

What do you do with a straight flush I typed?

'U Bet UR B@ll@x' came the reply.

B@ll@x indeed!

The next bad beat cost me less but hurt much more.
Being the eternal procrastinator that I am, I left registering to a 1000+ player live tourney til the last minute. The tourney sold out and tickets were like gold dust.
The night before I heard of a nearby casino offering tickets as part of their nightly prizemoney so I packed my bag of tricks and headed for Limerick on the West coast of Ireland.

I had intended in sleeping until 6pm but a surprise visit from Mummy Gutshot knocked 6 hours off my slumber schedule.
So by 8pm I was on the felt and losing friends.
By 4am I had secured a ticket and was over the moon. A few hours were spent in a crazy cash game and I boarded the Dublin train at 7am.

Arriving at the Royal Dublin Stadium at around 10:30am I quickly took up my reconnaissance position across the road in a nearby cafe. Slowly but surely the hooded warriors of deception began to amass outside the venue and by 11:45am we were seated. The final count was 1072 players over 110 tables. This was the largest field Europe had ever seen and the largest I've ever played in but the fact remained...I hadn't slept in 24hours.

The organiser informed my that over 30 dealers had let him down so in a fit of madness I bit the bullet and offered my services. In a scene reminiscent of Dodge City or a Gunfight at the O'K Coral, the cards were in the air at high noon.

I began by trying to win the tables favour by commiserating the losers while giving the winners a knowing wink. Who knew that playing both sides of the fence could be so much fun??
I was happily chipping away taking down any undisputed pot when my German Bruce Forscyth lookalike began to lean on me. This guy was serious about winning but so the damn hell was I.
He set a young guy all in so I needled him a bit by shouting @higher,higher' or 'lower,lower' as the cards came out.
When he won the hand I congradulated him by offering in my best Brucie voice 'Aw..didn't he do well'.

The Irish and English players seemed to enjoy the theatrics but the humour was lost on my Spanish,Sweedish and German tablemates.

Always on the lookout for an easy buck I spotted a unique opportunity.
Bottles of water were € but free to dealers. I sold my free water for €2 to my tablematesand everybody in the equation was a winner.
Oh the thought of it. Selling water to people in a country with possible the highest annual rain fall....marvellous.
Maybe next year I can branch out and sell my freezer scrapings to the Eskimos!
I calculated that if consumption remained a constant (3 bottles per hour @ €2 per bottle) I could afford to upgrade my hotel room to a juniour suite by 6pm.

I'm not going to bore you with every hand I played just this sick,sick one.

Nearing the end of the third level I had found my third wind by loading up on an anti-fatigue remedy and an energy drink which I refuse to advertise.

Cryptic Clue: Communist Bovine

I had a good read on Brucie and decide to trap him.
Picking up AsJs on the BB I just checked.

Flop.. Ks2s8s

Fopped the nut flush baby!!

Brucie min raised and I reraised. The other got out of the way and he called.

'I know you have a made flush but I'm wondering how high' I puzzled.

Turn Jd

Please God let him have AK.Even a set, I'll take a set. please God may he have pocket 8's. I won't even ask for a lower flush as I'm not that greedy.
I min raised and he pushed about half of his stack in.
I set him all in and he called...CAR CRASH!!

Pocket 2's..This moron was putting his tournament life on pocket 2's to make a set.

I was about 80/20 ahead and he looked horrified to see my little monster.

I burned and turned the last 2 in the deck making him quads ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

But that was 3 weeks ago and I've now regained my motor skills and power of speech.

I'm a great beliver in Karma so these sick beats can only serve as some sort of counter equilibrium.

Well this is the life I chose I suppose...