tilted behaviour

It had been a while since I’ve been up to Melbourne – and with a going away ‘party’ and a friend’s 21st – there was no reason why I shouldn’t journey up the highway.

I say ‘party’ because it was actually my mate Oatsy’s farewell APL Tournament at the Veneto Club in Bulleen where he has been the Tournament Director for the last few years.

Driving up to Melbourne I planned to meet James in the city at around 6pm before waiting round for Mat to finish work at 7pm. I found a park on Spring Street and met James at Parliament station before we headed down Collins Street to meet up with James’ new Bec.

We grabbed Mat outside of his work and made our way in peak hour city traffic to the Veneto Club a little late, but thanks to the huge turnout, the event was behind schedule.

James, Mat and I were all bounties for the night and Oatsy introduced us – along with the other few bounties – as we took our seats at our assigned tables.

Luckily for me us bounties started with a 5,000-chip starting bank compared to the other players 3,000 as I got stacked early on. With a few limps ahead of me for 50, I made it 325 to holding A♠ A♥ and was called by both the blinds. The flop fell down J♠ 8♥ 3♥ and I made it 775 to go. The lady in the small blind check-called as the big blind folded to see the Q♠ land on the turn and a check from both of us. The river fell the 2♥ and she fired out 2,000. I shook my head threw in two chips and called out to the Tournament Director for a rebuy as I held my rebuy card up in the air. The lady turned over J♥ J♥ to rake in the pot as I topped up another 2,000.

Mat was out shortly after the first break when he found the old King-high and made his way home to get changed, as I got moved to a table to take up Bec’s seat. I shoved dark a few times before eventually calling off my chips in a three-way all in pot after sweating just the 8♠. My 2♠ to go with it did me poorly after one of the all-ins flopped top set of Jacks as I exited the tournament to now go and sweat James.

We poked and prodded at his continued folding until he finally called off his chips with a dominated A♥ 2♥. Everyone shared a shot with a very wasted Oatsy as we made our way to the city to hit up our 21st party.

Mateusz Pater, Andrew Oataway, Bec Hoult, James Bernard and Brendan White

The original plan was to meet one of my fellow poker friends Michael Palti at the Red Hummingbird on Russell St, but due to some dress code complications, Palti and his entourage were forced to move to the cocktail bar Mai Tai’s just down on the corner.

We began our night with all of us ordering a surprisingly strong mix of Long Island Red Bull’s and Long Island Ice Tea’s as we did what everyone does when consuming alcohol . . . talking shit!

Palti was busy entertaining his friends, but eventually found some time to come talk to us before leaving us to continue chatting on about everything and anything. Another round of cocktail’s followed as Palti and some of his mates headed to Maccas for a late-night snack. We eventually finished our drinks before deciding that Stalactites was our answer to some hunger!

Bec and Mat had never been before, and a fantastic garlic-covered souvlaki later, they had been broken in the Stalactites way!

We called it a night, and after driving Mat and Brendo home, I drove the two lovebirds to the station where James had left his car, and I made my way back to Geelong at the healthy time of 4am . . . now to catch a few hours sleep before cricket!

With no poker tournaments to cover, why wouldn’t I want to play one myself for a change!

I headed down to Melbourne to play a home game with the usual crew, and for something different we decided on playing a $5 rebuy tournament with unlimited rebuys at the end of the rebuy period – so if you wanted to plonk down $50 you could get ten rebuys!

We started with the game with eight of us and $5 would get you a 1,000-chip starting bank. The whole aim was to be able to have more fun shoving all in for the same amount (we . . . well I . . . was estimating a $50 spend) that it would have cost for a normal freezeout.

I chipped up crazy during the rebuy period after getting stacked on the third hand, and decided not to add to my gazillion chips after the first three levels – therefore seeing me only in for $10 while a few others hit the $50 mark.

In the end I ended up coming third and shipping a min-cash of $40 when I opened Ace-King before open-shipping the flop and running into trip nines.

With only four of us remaining at Mat’s house, we watched some of last year’s Aussie Millions highlights before decided that a prop bet was in order.

We headed to McDonald’s where Mat would have to down a Big Mac, Fillet-O-Fish and 6 Nuggets while Brendan would have to finish 4 Cheeseburgers and a Sundae. The quickest would win $20 and have their meal paid for . . . check out the video to see who prevailed!

The next night we decided that some free pub poker degeneracy was needed and made our way to one of PokerNetwork co-workers APL venues which he runs.

Oatsy is a great character and always makes the night fun.

Like normal I lasted the longest until my Ace-Queen was one-outered and then my suited connecters failed to flop and we left the venue in search of something else to do.

We decided that a visit to the 24-hour KMart was the best option and opted with that before heading to Princes to play some table tennis.

It was never in doubt that I would be crowned the single and doubles Champion as I pawned Brendo, Mat and Stefan with ease. I then continued my dominance in a heads-up game of Risk with Mat before turning it in for the night.