10
#479 – Same Story, Ending Yet Unwritten – Part I – Late Entries and Professional Angst
I have to confess, though careful readers of this journal have no doubt noticed, that I am facing a professional crisis.
I enjoy playing poker and I think I have become pretty good at it, but I never set out to become a professional poker player. But here I am anyway, making all my money off poker – more from playing than writing this Blog – since the last book I published was in June 2007 and the last manuscript deadline I met was November 2006.
Even writing about poker wasn’t something I intended. My friend Ted C got me back into playing in 2003 and I was minding my own business in a $20-$40 hold ‘em game at the Mirage when players started buzzing about a big game up the street where two players had $15 million on the table. I had actually given up writing because it didn’t seem I could make a living at it. But the idea of The Big Game stuck in my head. A year later, almost to the day, I turned in the manuscript for The Professor, the Banker, and the Suicide King.
Even then, I was sure it was the last thing I’d ever write about poker. I had lots of stories I wanted to unearth and tell, and Suicide King just happened to be the first, and just happened to be about poker. But like the ragged step-sister who becomes Cinderella, it’s hard to leave the dance when you’re so darn popular.
So I keep asking myself, What do I really want to do? I enjoy writing the Blog, but there are so many great stories out there calling for my skills: the Italian policeman who is being considered for sainthood, the four people who caught a serial killer in their spare time, the 1948 London Olympics, and countless others.
With the World Series of Poker concluded, I’ve been increasingly thinking about what I should do next. This was still on my mind on Saturday morning, when Jo Anne got out of bed. She beat me to the shower, so I had a few minutes to kill. It was about five after nine so, wearing just a pair of sweatpants, I wandered into my office and saw that the $100 + $9 NLHE $12,500 Guarantee had just started.
I hope you’ve noticed that Full Tilt’s latest software has allowed late entries into tournaments. For those of you scouting for overlays, maybe that’s not good. But for the rest of us tournament players, it’s a phenomenal development. In fact, the only reason I can think I why Full Tilt waited until now to implement it is that they forgot that their goal is to MAKE MONEY. Apart from the obvious convenience, it has fattened prize pools incredibly. Most tournaments I’m playing are suddenly 10-20% bigger than they were a week ago, and some even more.
So I signed up for the $12,500 Guarantee. After all, I finished second in the tournament just last week. Even though I rarely play at 9 AM, why not give it another try?
