The long night is over, the day of life is here.

Well, Happy Easter everyone. This week has been fairly quiet for me. I played cash at the poker club on friday and had a humorous session. I had been running bad all night, three times walking into flopped sets from the same person lol, and unable to flop a set myself. But I was about even with £200 in front of me. A limped pot brought a flop of J97r which looked good for my 8Thh. I flat called a bet and a raise. Then called an all-in on the turn which was a 5. The pot was about £200. The guy had J9 and the river brought him an ice-cold Jack. It was then the very next hand when I looked down at 44. There was a straddle, a raise to £14 and an under-raise all-in for £25. I called, a limper called and the raiser called so we saw the flop four handed. It looked a rather pleasing 489. I had finally flopped a set. The raiser bet £49, I went all-in for £90, the limper called all-in and the raiser called. It was about a £350 pot I think. Turn was a 5, River was a King. I show 44, the two shorter stacks both muck, the raiser shows KK. Chortle Chortle! I decided not to rebuy after that and went home and watched a film. I figured it just wasn't going to be my night.

I haven't really played online much either this week. I have been organising my bankroll in preperation for the next few months so I cashed out all my dollars in Full Tilt, Stars and Betfair. Over the next two months I plan on playing on VC. This is largely due to my very valuable VIP deal which earns me a lot more money than playing on any other site, and the new VC Poker Olympics promotion that is going on over the next 10 weeks. It is basically a series of Rake Races for cash players. It is exclusive to VC, unlike the double up promo which was all of iPoker, and it awards some nice prizes. I will be playing six tables of 50c/$1 PLO 6-max cash for hopefully 40 hours a week. I am not going to play higher stakes or more tables to try and win a bigger prize as I made that mistake in the double up promotion, and it will no doubt result in me not playing my best and losing money. I will play the games I am happy with and I will try to earn a high VIP bonus. Any prizes earnt in the promotion as a result will be seen as a welcome extra.

After cashing out of PokerStars I had about $43 sent to me from a friend who owed me £30, which is apparently below the minimum cashout amount on Stars. So, being bored one day this week I played a $2 rebuy sat to the Sunday million, and a $10R. I luckily won a seat in the million and I finished 30th out of 5000 in the rebuy for $150. I was very unlucky, I ran AK into AA preflop with 50 left, then I rebuilt and got above average stack again before running QQ into AA preflop to go out. In between I got dealt AA, and took the blinds lol. I unregistered from the sunday million as it was on Easter sunday and I couldn't play it, and won 7 out of 10 $20.80 double up sngs to turn the tournament dollars into $280 cash. I spent the last few $T on a step sng ticket, and cashed out the money. Turned out to be a good thing that Stars have a minimum withdrawal anmount.

The step sng that I played in turned out to be interesting. The 9-handed steps usually have a payout of 5th goes down a step, 3rd-4th get another buyin for the current step, and 1st-2nd get a ticket for the step above. Well I ran fairly well and won the first two levels so I got a step 3 ticket. After finishing 3rd then 4th, on my third attempt I won a step 4 ticket. Step 4 is $215 to buy in to, and so it takes a long time to fill up. I waited until saturday night to play it. I played a step 4 satellite to the Sunday 500, which paid top three $530, and 4th got $210. It started very tight and after an hour we still had 8 players, but the blinds started to get big and people stated shoving. Six handed a PokerStars Pro shoved for 1.2k from the cutoff when blinds were 100/200/25, and I reshoved from the button for 2k with QQ. He had QJo. The pot would have put me second in chips five handed on the bubble, but when the board came AT3K5 I was crippled and finished in sixth for nothing. A highly frustrating hand to lose, I couldn't have been much further ahead.

I spent Easter Sunday with my family, and the first line of the first hymn in church was the title of this post. I rather liked it and adopted it for my blog. We had an excellent Sunday Lunch and it was nice to spend the day with my family as I don't see them very often these days. I am currently packing for my trip to Birmingham and Coventry. Birmingham will be a lot of fun, and Coventry will be an excellent tournament. £550 is a large buyin, however I have put sufficient money into my VC bankroll for the next two months and as I have been running good lately I decided to play in a decent tournament to give myself a chance for a big win. So I'm hoping the next week will be enjoyable, with plenty of banter, and the weekend will be fruitful. When I return I will be hitting the VC cash tables and hopefully earning some money at a consistent rate. That, at least, is the plan ;)

Rich x