The Crooked Link

Life of a Low Stakes Gambler...

Thursday, February 28, 2008

Be Kind, Rewind



WOW, worst movie ever? Maybe not, but definitely one of the worst movies I've personally ever gone to see at a movie theater. And that might be an understatement. I walked into the movie theater undecided about what I wanted to watch.

Yea I go to the movies by myself occasionally. It's fun, you should try it sometime.

Anyway, like I said, I walked in not really knowing what I wanted to watch. I thought about watching Vantage Point. Then I wanted to watch Cloverfield but changed my mind also, and when I couldn't make up my mind, I was like, screw it, I'm watching Juno again! But I'd already watched that twice. (Great movie. I think I'm in love with Ellen Page).


So I finally settled on Be Kind, Rewind. Why? I have no idea. I didn't even find the trailers on tv funny, but I went with it anyway. I've never been a fan of Jack Black, and still aren't after this movie. Without ruining the plot, the movie was just...well boring. Sure it had a couple of laugh out loud moments, (two that I can recall) but overall it was just a drag to watch. So much so that I literally fell asleep for like 20 minutes. When I woke up, I had no trouble knowing what had transpired during my nap because the story is just so predictable.

Eventually it became too dull to keep watching so I walked out with like 30 minutes left. It's not like those last thirty minutes were going to change my mind. And even though I was plot committed, I decided to fold. LOL, see what I did there?

Riiiight so, yea the funny thing is the movie has been generally well received by the public and so far it's accumulated a 69% fresh rating at RottenTomatoes.com

I don't care what Rotten Tomatoes says...I should have gone to see Juno a 3rd time.



Monday, February 25, 2008

Slow Monday

It was a slow and uneventful weekend and it's been a slow and uneventful Monday. Last Friday I had a horrible gambling day by losing 3 out of my 4 sports bets and then dropping an additional $31 at work in poker ad blackjack. Played three Heads Up matches with my guy Furcio and I went 1 for 2, mostly by playing too loose and calling when I knew I was beat. A sick hand came up when I KNEW that my Kings were up against pocket Aces and still pushed.

Saturday and Sunday I didn't end up doing much either. I decided to hold off on the money transfer to my new accounts on Bookmaker and 5Dimes until later next week, since I've got a couple of bills I need to take care of.

So today I woke up at 7am. Decided I was to tired and hit the snooze til 10. Finally got to school around 11 and it turned out to be a pretty slow school day as well. Had weight training where I was on the bikes for the most part and then in Lifetime we're beginning the rock climbing unit, which should be kind of fun. Last class of the day, Aquatic and Marine Science was a complete drag.

Got out of school at 3:14 and drove to work. Super slow day at work. Pretty standard for a Monday though. I worked a total of 6 hours and took 11 Delivery Orders and 9 Pick Ups. Considering that on average I take a minute and a half with each order, that equates to 30 minutes of actual work. The other 5 and a half hours? Youtube, The Rx and FCP. Can't complain.

Anyway I got home an hour ago and decided to blog about my draggy Monday. I did manage to get one thing done though. I moved my television across my bedroom and into my computer desk.




Why? Because I'm sick of being online and having to keep turning my head to watch tv. Multi Tabling on PokerStars and not having to keep turning to watch the Bulls game is definitely +EV, lol. Granted this can't be good for my eyes, as I'll be sitting less than two feet away from the tv screen, but I'll try it out for a couple of days and see how it works out.

Friday, February 22, 2008

Goodbye Mr. Bodog

It's really weird how I can get bored of poker and then decide to shift my attention to sports betting, and then that gets boring and I start to crave poker. I've played a lot of online poker the last couple of weeks because of the FCP challenge and although I still have a couple of tourneys left I think I'm going to take a break for a little bit.

So sports betting here I come. I really want to stop using Bodog for two reasons. Number one, they keep giving me shit when ever I try to make a deposit saying I have an outstanding balance at BetUs.com when I don't even have an account there. And number two, because when I first opened my Bodog account last summer I was still 17 so I had to make up a bullshit date of birth. This will probably come back to bite me in the ass if I happen to run good and build a roll there only to end up having them freeze the account.

So instead I'm planning on opening an account at a couple of other books using my real birth date now that I'm actually 18. After a whole lot of researching Bookmaker.com seems to be a decent book so I'll go with that. I also want to have a second book just to have more line choices in tight games so as of right now its between TheGreek.com and 5Dimes.com. Again both top notch sports books but right now I'm leaning more towards 5Dimes because they offer low juice on Baseball games. Since opening day is only a couple of months away I may go with them.

I've still got $25 on Bodog so I'll just do some random picks tonight and then I'm going to wire some money to my new books over the weekend and start keeping record of my picks then.

Here's what I've got for tonight:

Kings -1

Celtics +1

Nuggets v. Bulls Under (208)

Veracruz v. Toluca Under (2.5)

Tuesday, February 19, 2008

You've Been Traded for a Hot Dog Eater

This gave me a good laugh last night. It's Phillies' second year rookie Kyle Kendrick getting pranked by his teammates. He was led to believe he'd just been traded to Japan for a player named Takeru Kobayashi.

Kobayashi is that Japanese dude who always owns everyone in the hot dog eating contest. Anyway, it was a well orchestrated prank given the fact that EVERYONE was in on it, including players, managers, agents and the media.


Monday, February 18, 2008

Running Over a Table

Have you ever been at a poker table, where you are running so good, that it changes your style of play? Well that was me yesterday in a Stars $6.60 SnG. I was hitting flops left and right. I started off doubling up in the 1st hand with AK and then I get AA the second hand. After that I just ran over the table and it got to a point that I was making some really weird plays like raising out of position with rags because I just KNEW that I was going to hit the flop, and I did. Anyway I ended up winning the SnG eliminating 4 out of the 5 other players.

I also managed to Final Table a 180 $4.40 for the FCP Challenge. But I ended up busting in 9th when my two pair didn't hold up to an open ended straight draw. It was so sick because if I manage to win that pot I'd be up to almost 60k and with a decent shot of winning the whole thing. But oh well, I did scrape up 58 much needed points for the challenge. My partner has gone AWOL so I guess I'm on my own the rest of the way. A 4th place finish is still not out of the question but I'll have to run amazingly good with a few more Final Tables to even have a shot.

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I wasn't up to much else over the weekend. I lost $50 on the Chivas v. Tigres game, which really sucked. I mean, it was essentially the best team in the league against the absolute worse. The final score was 0-0 but I went with the Money Line instead of the Pick, so the draw was scored a loss by Bodog.

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Gonna go back to school tomorrow. Time to hit the books hard I guess. I've also gotta start looking for a way to complete the 40 hours of community service learning that I need for graduation. No idea what I'm going to do there.

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I just finished writing an article for the News from the Felt section so make sure to check that out.

Thursday, February 14, 2008

Dear Bodog

Had a rough start with some early soccer picks, going 1-2 in the afternoon, and then threw some money on the Suns before I left for work. When I got to work I was trying to log onto Bodog to see if maybe I'd place a bet on the Heat as well, but the site was down. It really wasn't a big deal because I felt a little shaky on playing the Heat tonight anyway, but I sent Bodog an email just for the hell of it:


Dear Bodog,

I was wondering if there is a place on your site where I can find out the schedule for these "Regularly Scheduled Maintenance And/Or Software Updates."

As far as I'm concerned, I, as a Bodog costumer was not informed of such event occurring today. I must say I'm disappointed with Bodog's failure to notify its costumers when the website will be going down, especially when it will be done for such an extended period of time (almost two hours and counting.)

I am also left to wonder why you would choose such an inconvenient time to do so, since I am guessing a majority of your clients are U.S. players, taking down the site during the evening hours seems to make no sense what so ever.

I missed out on a few games I planned to wager on, which I will only perceive as lost equity if my projected picks end up winning. Again, all because of not being notified the site would be going down. A simple Email would have sufficed.

Please reply to my concerns. Thank you

Victor Ortiz

lol like I said, I was not being serious at all, as they probably couldn't care less what a $5 bettor thought. But I did receive a quick response:

Dear Mr. Ortiz,

We understand your frustrations with regards to the site issues we experienced earlier today. There was a brief outage with our Network, causing many players to have difficulties in placing their wagers online, which also resulted in our maximum call volume to be exceeded. The situation has been since rectified and you should be able to access the website now; you may have to open a new browser window. If you continue to have any issues please contact our Customer Service department via phone.

We can assure you that we will be funneling all our resources to making sure that such an incident does not occur again. It is in our best interest to make sure we can take all players wagers, and if we are unable to do so, this equates to lost revenue for players and us as a company.

We will be working as hard as we can over the next few weeks to make sure your experience at Bodog is an enjoyable one. We thank you for your patience and understanding in this matter and apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.

Should you require further assistance, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Best Regards,

Costumer Service.

Yea yea, notice they did not address the issue of not notifying the players that the site was experiencing technical issues which is what originally pissed me off slightly. But the funny thing is, they actually ended up saving me money, because the Heat ended up losing.

Anyway these were my day's plays. Another Even Steven Day:


Zurich v. Hamburg Under (2.5)

Rosenborg v. Fiorentina Over (2.5)

Bolton (Pick)

Suns -7.5

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Played in another Pot Limit Omaha Tourney today from a stake, with another early finish. A couple of hands before my eventual finish I managed to flop 2 pair but a player in early position moved all in for a lot of chips and then an immediate call by a 2nd player prompted me to think for a bit and eventually fold, thinking one of them had to have a set for sure. Nope, they had shit, and I ended up folding the best hand. It really hurt cause that pot would have brought me up to almost 5k.


So a couple of hands later I find myself down to about 800 in chips with 150/300 blinds. Gets folded around to me in the small blind and I get Ah Js 2d 5h. Not the greatest looking hand and I thought about folding for a bit, but it was too expensive to forfeit me blind, given my stack so I called and BB checked. Flop comes something 2x 3x Jx and with only 500 behind me, it was an automatic push on my part. BB calls me with a pair of Jacks so I was ahead momentarily, but he caught up with a 10 on the river, and I was out. Ouch.

I was also planning to play a couple of 4.40s but the SnGs have been down all day on Stars and they won't be running until tomorrow morning.


Wednesday, February 13, 2008

1-1-1

Hadn't made a blog in a while, basically because I hadn't been up to anything. I hadn't had any sports betting action since the Super Bowl and I hadn't played much poker either. I did manage to go a bit deep in a $5.50 Omaha Multi Table yesterday on a stake from an FCPer but I busted out in like 30th out of 200 or so when my opponent outdrew my top two pair on the river to make a straight.


I wanted to bet on the Santos v. Chivas game tonight but Bodog was still insisting on declining my Credit Card deposits so I had to call them up again. I was just going to say screw them, and open up an account on BetUs.com but the lines for the game were much jucier on Bodog. So they finally accepted my deposit and I placed three bets:

Santos (Pick)

Santos was down 2-0 for most of the game until they finally woke up in the last 15 minutes of the game to tie it up 2-2. Then with 5 minutes to go Chivas scores the go ahead goal and that was that.

Santos v. Chivas Over (2.5)

This was the most confident of my picks and I was gonna bet it HUGE but decided to play it conservative at the last minute, which I obviously regret.

NBA Teaser
-Suns v. Warriors Over (238)
-Jazz -2.5

I barely squeezed out a push on this one. I lucked out when Monta Ellis, normally a 77% FT shooter, missed a free throw with 2 seconds left in the game, which gave me the push instead of the loss.

So I ended up going 1-1-1 on the night, breaking completely even, which kind of sucks but whatever.

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I went to see the movie Untraceable this morning which actually turned out to be pretty decent, although a bit predictable. But Diane Lane was looking very M.I.L.F. like, so that was a plus.

Something happened at Borders today that cracked me up for some reason. So I go inside and grab a magazine and then sit down in one of the couches, next to this old black dude. I could have sat one seat away from him, but the sun would have been in my eyes, so that's why I decided to sit right next to him instead. Besides, the couches there are huge, so it's not like I was all up in his face.

Anyway, I sit down next to him and the following conversation ensues:

Old Man: Should I move?

Me: No, that's ok.

Old Man: Huh?

Me: You don't have to move, I'm fine.

Old Man: Well, I'm not.

Me: Uh...ok, so move.

Old Man: Ok.

So he gets up and moves one seat over. Then 15 seconds later some guy takes the seat in between us and the old guy immediately gets up and walks away, cursing under his breath. I don't know why I found this so funny, lol. I guess old dude likes his personal space.

Friday, February 8, 2008

Welcome to the Crooked Link

When I first started this blog, almost 10 months ago, I did it with the intention of just having a place to jot down my ideas on a whole lot of things, but it was mostly a blog for myself. I really wasn't looking to put it out there for the world to see, not because of not wanting people to know what I was all about, but really because I did not think anyone but myself would find my thoughts the least bit interesting.

But when Kev asked me to become a part of the Crooked Straight, I jumped at the opportunity. He's really put together a cool site which has the potential to blow up into something big. He's got some great contributors. Whether it be music, poker, sports betting or whatever, these people know their shit.

So in case you don't feel like scanning through my older post to see what I'm all about, I'll make a bit of an introduction. My name is Victor, I'm 18 years old, and currently in my Senior year of high school. I'm originally from Mexico but have been living in Chicago my whole life.

Unlike most of the blogs on the Crooked Straight, mine really has no specific topic. I'll talk about anything, from poker to sports gambling, to just personal shit that happens to me. Sometimes even I won't know what the fuck I'm talking about.

But the main focus will be on gambling, as I'm a self described degenerate. I first got into poker probably around two years ago, and since then my love for the game has just grown exponentially. I mostly play online at PokerStars and Full Tilt, with an occasional trip to the charity casino, when I feel like playing live. After the poker came the sports betting. I've had far less success there, but it's mostly been due to a lack of discipline.

When I'm not playing poker or analyzing the lines for the nights basketball games, I just like doing the usual stuff. I love music, watching movies and I've been known to read a book or two. I also have a part time job that supports my gambling ways. You can also find me messing around on the forum at fullcontactpoker.com where I'm an active member there, usually making some less than stellar contribution to the discussion.

So that's about all there is to know about me. I hope you guys enjoy reading the blog and leave some feedback if you'd like.

Thursday, February 7, 2008

Oh, There's the Snow!

Man, I really shouldn't have stayed up all night. I was extremely tired at school and all I wanted to do was sleep. I'm in this class called D.E.A.R. (Drop Everything And Read) where all we do is...well, read. We sit around the library for 3 hours just reading whatever we want.

I'm currently reading Reymundo Sanchez's sequel to The Making of a Latin King, called Once a King, Always a King. I actually read both these books a couple of years ago but I thought I'd re read the sequel just for kicks. It's a good book, but it was just so hard to try to read today because my eyes couldn't stay awake. After class all I wanted to do was go home and sleep but I hung out with a friend for a while.

When I finally left school the snow storm was finally hitting the streets, and it was falling hard! I think we're supposed to expect something like 6'' of snow or something like that but we dodged a big bullet because the storm hit most severely just north of us where upwards of 14'' of snow was expected.

Anyway, I got home around 2 and was hungry ass hell so I ate something and then went straight to bed. Ended up waking around 9:30pm and I managed to catch the last 15 minutes of the Mexico v. USA game. Final score was 2-2 so that $30 bet was a push.

So it's 12:14 am right now and I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to fall back asleep so I might have to end up pulling yet another all nighter. This shit can't be healthy man. Maybe I'll go to sleep after Poker After Dark around 3ish and at least sleep for a couple more hours.

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Here's a few pictures I shot from outside my house and bedroom window:









Wednesday, February 6, 2008

Where's the Snow?

I'm on no sleep. I woke up like at 4pm yesterday so there was no chance in hell I was going to be able to go to sleep early last night and decided to stay up instead. I haven't even been doing much, just looking at stupid things online. I was actually reading through some of my old entries on my Xanga site that I used to blog in. Man, reading some of the stuff I wrote in 8th grade I just can't help but laugh out loud. FoR SoMe rEaSoN I uSeD tO tHinK tHaT wRiTiNg lIkE tHiS WaS CoOl.

Anyway we were supposed to be getting hit with a major snow storm over night but I just looked outside and there's nothing there. Weird, lol. I think I just heard on the news that the storm was just delayed and it should hit throughout most of the morning. I've got class from 9:30-12 so we should have a few inches accumulated by then. So, I don't feel to sleepy now, but I'm guessing by the time I get home from school I'm going to want to crash, which is going to completely destroy my sleeping schedule. Blah, I'll try to stay awake til' at least 6pm.

This means I'll probably miss the Mexico v. USA soccer game tonight. I've got $30 on the USA only because they haven't lost at home in a long time.

Oh yea, reading back on my old Xanga entries reminded me of a really weird phone call I received one night about 4 years ago. It was some chick claiming to know me saying I met her online and apparently we became pretty close because she said I told her she could call me whenever she needed someone to talk to. So she starts telling me that she is pregnant and that she has no idea what to do and she wants to run away. Mind you, even to this day I still have NO IDEA who this girl was, but she really sounded distressed so I did my best to try and calm her down. We talked for a long time and she told me about her situation and I think we ended with her saying she would call me the next day or something, but I never heard from her again. Weird stuff man.

Monday, February 4, 2008

2nd Royal and Taqueria El Chorrito

I've been playing online poker for almost a full year now and I'd never ever gotten a royal flush until last week, and now I hit another one yesterday, lol. That's pretty funny I would say. I go a year without one and then get two in less than a week. And both times I managed to get the most value out of it. Sure, I finished out of the money in the tourney, but hey, I got my royal!



Oh yea, so I lost a lot of money in the Super Bowl yesterday ($195.) The only bets I won were the under and the coin flip, lol. But man, what a game! Especially the 4th quarter. How the hell did Eli manage to get outta that sure sack, and then for him to just launch it in the air and have David Tyree catch it was so sick. Definitely one of the most intense 4th quarters in Super Bowl history, I would venture to say. And yea I lost money, but I actually don't mind Eli and the Giants winning it. They outplayed the Patriots who I think came to this game with a little bit of an arrogant side to them so whatever, congrats to the Giants!

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Ok, I've never done one of these before but I decided I'd do a restaurant review today. See, I woke up today and I drove to my usual Coffee shop place that's got free wireless internet. This is where I usually come to chill and play some poker. Well, when I got there it was still closed. They probably stayed open later than usual for the Super Bowl party. Anyway I was a little hungry so I walked a couple of blocks to this Mexican place called Taqueria El Chorrito.

Now to start off, the place is small. It's a small shack with a small counter and a couple of tables. The place did look clean enough though, not grimy looking o anything, although the decor was a bit tacky with tons of valentines hearts hanging from the ceiling. I took a seat on one of the counter stools and scanned over the menu. Pretty standard choices for a Mexican restaurant.

It was till fairly early, probably around 10am so I was going to order some chilaquiles, a typical Mexican breakfast dish, but I've had some bad experiences with chilaquiles at other restaurants so I decided to lean another way. I ordered two chorizo con papas tacos and a flour quesadilla with chorizo.

The place was dead so I got my food pretty fast, and I was not impressed. For starters, the tacos were tasteless and somewhat cold. Presentation wise they were very unpleasant as well. It looked and tasted like something that I would have done at home myself in 3 minutes. I had higher hopes for the quesadilla and although a bit better than the tacos, still a disappointment. The chorizo was overcooked and again, no real flavor and not a whole lot better than what I could have done myself at home.

It took the better of me to try and finish my meal but I only managed to eat about half of it. My total came to $9.45. The only real positive comment I can say about the place was that the waitress was pretty cute. She was Mexican and a bit on the older side, but she had a body on her, which is the only reason I decided to leave a decent tip.

So again, overall, Taqueria El Chorrito, a big let down although I can't judge the whole place by a couple of tacos and a quesadilla. I'm sure there's something on the menu that I would find decent, but I won't be going back to find out.


Taqueria El Chorrito: 4/10

Sunday, February 3, 2008

FCP 4.40 Challenge and Super Bowl

The February 4.40 challenge began on FCP last Friday but I hadn't had a chance to play any until yesterday. I actually did manage to find a partner, which is good because we ended up splitting the $50 buy in. Anyway, my personal goal for the challenge was 200 points, which I figured would be attainable if I managed to final table at least 4 tournaments and then just do decent in a couple others.

Well, to say the least I started off very badly. I played 6 torunamtents yesterday for a grand total of 7 points. This has to have been the most card dead I've been in a single night and I ran into so many coolers and took so many beats that the 7 points almost seem like an accomplishment. It's a good thing my partner has been doing pretty decent otherwise we would be in the bottom of the table right now. But I still need to pick up some of the slack. We are currently sitting 8/20 but we've already played around half our games and the leading team has over 300 points with only 8 games played. Oh well, like I said, we need some final tables and we need them fast. I'll probably get a couple of 4.40s in today as well.

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Oh yea, so today is SUPER BOWL SUNDAY! I obviusly have some money riding on the game, and then some. Here's what I've got so far:

Patriots Money Line: $30 @ even money

Patriots Money Line: $100 to win $25

Patriots Money Line: $80 to win $20

Total Score Under 54: $10 @ even money

Coin Toss= Tails: $5 @ even money

So besides the even money I was able to get on the first bet, from some guy from work who knows nothing about football, I had to lay 4:1 odds on my other two bets, but I still think there's some value in that, and since all these bets where made with the guys from FCP, I don't gotta worry about the extra juice from the sportsbook.

Anyway I really don't see the Pats losing tonight, but if they do oh well, I'm still planning to have a blast watching the game.