Playing live for the first time

On a spontaneous trip to Pechanga on Saturday with my boyfriend and a friend of his, I was hurled into the world of live poker. The drive was a little over an hour long with my boyfriend in the front seat throwing etiquette tips and hand examples at me in the back seat. This kind of coaching isn't altogether foreign to me as I've been subjected to it on and off for over the three years I've tried to learn poker.

In 2008, I had a brief brush with online micro-stakes poker. I was introduced to all types of odds (pot, implied, blah blah) and equity (pot, fold, blah blah) Never was I the whiz at math or probability. Even the key phrases revolving around such things were tough. Figuring out what "2-to-1 against" means was a real brain bender.

The end of that chapter is simply that I gave up in frustration. Whenever my coach (read: boyfriend) tried to impart some of his wisdom, my mind just shut down and his words just flew right by me. I decided that it wasn't the game for me. Graciously, he persisted with his lessons whenever I showed the smallest sliver of interest.

Now, here we are in 2011. I just finished my degree and am on the lookout for a new job in the fashion industry. They say spending a few hours a day pimping your resume and sending out cover letters should be considered your job. The problem is the rest of the hours of the day. I ought to do something productive, yet fun. Perhaps something I wouldn't have time to do otherwise.

Thus I decided that I'm gonna play a little bit of poker. Certainly, I am smarter than the average cookie and the idea of +EV play is a completely familiar concept. To warm my engine, we played a short game of heads up at home. Then I played some Play Money Rush on FTP. And now, I was standing at the foyer of the Pechanga poker room thinking to myself "oh my god, these people going to rip me to itty bitty pieces."

My boyfriend looks over to me and says "Are you okay? You look terrified."

Thanks, dude. I'm about to play a game that relies on looking strong and confident and you tell me that I look terrified?

I sit down at a 1/2 table in seat 4 with a large man to my right, a chatty old lady in front of me and to my left a man who I'm pretty sure would be called Cap'n in another time. My heart pounds more than it ever has before while they talk about having diabetes. The blinds are messed up for some reason. There are two big blinds? And the button is paying a small blind? What's going on? How can they tell so quickly how many chips he bet from all the way across the table?

I just try to remember to breathe. And fold. Breathe. And fold. Breathe. And am I protecting my hand correctly? Is the Cap'n peeking at my hand? Am I taking too long to act? I should be observing people shouldn't I? Oh hey, AKs!

Forever I will remember this hand that I played monumentally awful. In fact, so awful I don't want to repeat it. But it includes leading out on a monotone board that was not my suit and then feeling like awful after getting called then raised a street after.

Other than that though, I would say my first visit to the poker room was an eye opening experience. Being in that setting for over three hours loosened me up a little (as did a Bacardi Coke) and towards the end, I could feel my heart returning to its normal pace. Monetarily, I didn't do well, but I think the experience itself was worth the few bucks lost.