So I'm doing pretty well this session in the Poker League I've been playing in. I play about 1/2 as much as most of the participants and I'm in 43rd place (out of 6000+ players). The big goal is to be in the top 100 players by the end of each quarter.

I've typically finished in the top 200, but I never played really serious before, often making poor decisions in the final moments of a game, taking me from 1st place to like 8th place. The league I play in is free, we play for points.

At the quarterly tournament the top 100 players, venue leaders, and highest skill rated players are invited. There you're playing for prizes, typically entries to larger tournaments (that pay out big cash), or visa cash cards.

During normal nights, typically 20 - 30 people play, each starting w/ 3,000 - 3,900 in tournamnet chips. The blinds start at 100 - 200 and about double every 18 or so minutes. Tournament play is one of the few times you can actually just fold a lot, and move up in position. Even though it's free to play it's ultra competitive. The kicker is, that it's a timed game, at the end of 1.5 hours, it's over. Whoever has the highest amount of chips is the winnner. This forces you to play harder, and puts you to a decision more often.

So back to my comment about making bad decisions. There have been plenty of times I've had enough chips to just quit playing with 20 - 30 minutes remaining in the game. But being the nice guy that I am, I've opted to make marginal calls, etc. and I've lost because of it.

This sesssion I decided to play to win. We're more than 1/2 way through the session and I'm doing quite well. The last two matches have not been great, but I've had a 1st place finish, and several 2nd and 3rds. The higher in finishing position the greater payout in points, very similar to a cash payout structure.

I'm 43rd overall, I have the 4th HIGHEST (again out of like 6000+ people) skill rating. Like I said earlier, some guys play every night, I'm lucky if I get 2-3x per week. So guys that have 60 matches in, I have maybe 30. This is good when you have a lot of final table top five appearances, and directly attributes to why my skill rating is so high. I'm also the venue leader at the main place I play out of. I'm about 400 points ahead of the 2nd place person. So any one of these three things will get me into the final tournamnet.

While this is all 'small scale' compared to the World Series of Poker (WSOP) and televised tournaments, it's still a hell of a lot of fun. Poker is something I never thought I'd be good at; sure there are runs where I do really well, and times where it seems no matter how good I think I'm playing I get played, but I really enjoy every aspect of the game. Of course winning is more fun than losing, but even when I lose, I have fun.

So on the 5th, me, a buddy from Portland, and two friends from Seattle are headed to Vegas. I'm not expecting to win, in fact, I have a certain amount of dough set aside that is acceptable to lose. Most of it has come from poker games played here in Portland! But it would be fun to win a few hundred bucks. One of the guys here at work always jokes about it as a "Mancation".

One thing you always hear when people talk about Vegas is how much money they won. Yeah right.... you never hear someone come back and say "Man I lost a grand...." I'm honest, last year when I went, I lost about $400. But I had a hell of a good time. Some people don't get it, but for me it's relaxing. Sure, it's a car payment, or something else that may last longer, but this is my thing. This year I feel better taking winnings from several games with me. It's all about odds, the more you play, the more likely you are to do well.

We'll probably play some tourneys ($40 - $60 buy in) and probably some $1/$2 no limit. I'll most likely play some Black Jack too. Our trip was a deal in itself, 2 Nights @ Treasure Island and roundtrip airfare for $255 per person!

Wish me luck.