[O Doyle Rules]

Hello Everyone!

**WARNING! THIS POST MAY CONTAIN EXPLICIT BAD BEAT/BAD LUCK RANTS OR JUST OVERALL WHINING BY THE POSTER AND MAY OFFEND SERIOUS POKER PLAYERS**

OK! I just wanted to get that out of the way early. Last week True Poker CEO basically gave me a "free pass" on the 120k hands until after I got back from the WSOP. Did I pass GO and collect my free WSOP entry? Nooooooooo! (Best John Belushi impersonation)

Being the bullheaded, driven person I am, I continued to play as if I absolutely, positively had to get this challenge completed by June 15th. (My original goal)

Well this is where the bad luck starts to creep in to the story. It's Friday night, I am playing. I am rolling along pretty good, up about 1K and generally feeling pretty good about myself and the universe. At this moment, my son's girlfriend asks me, "How's it going?" Well, my wife and son know full well never to ask me THAT QUESTION in a midst of a session. It always seems for whatever reason, when I got asked that question, I would be running fairly well, but it then would be followed by an immediate and extended downturn. Anyway, I answer, Oh, I up about a $1,000.00 and at that moment I felt the skies open up and the rain began to pour.

It seem like every time I got AA or KK it was a ticket to lose money. If I raised preflop with AK and flop QJT rainbow, it was a sure loser. One of my favorites, I raise preflop with AJ suited, flop comes JJ5. It's head ups and I'm feeling pretty good. I bet and get called. A 6 falls. Looks pretty harmless, I bet again and get called. On the river comes a 7, no flushes possible, I'm feeling real good that I am finally going take down a pot. I bet and get raised. I think for a moment, (and bear with me because now things are starting to get a little hazy and I could be wrong,) I reraise to get raised immediately back. I call and he shows 89 and he hit the the two cards running he needed to fill his 9 high straight for the winner. I know! I know! This is the exact people I want in my game. Well, at this point I think is where the severe emotional tilt started to kick in and I blow off some more money.

Well, I pack it in shortly after this and read my email. Mr. TruePoker CEO says to go ahead and buy our airfare and he will reimburse us. I spend a good amount of time Saturday looking at rates to discover that they have jumped about about 150% - 300% since about a week ago. (Especially trying to get out of Vegas on the 16th of July.) Finally, I find a "deal" with United for $861.00. My wife says she can call United and have that flight held for 24 hours and it will give me more time to maybe find something better on the net. I say OK.

Sunday night comes and I haven't been able to find anything cheaper so I log on to United's site to purchase the seats. Lo and behold it's not there. I call United and I am on hold forever and forever and finally I am told that I can't get that rate on the net anymore because since we had called in to reserve that flight it was now out of the net's inventory and I would have to book it over the phone for $ 891.00! Great! I go ahead because this is still about $ 100.00 cheaper than anything else I can find. I lost alot of vauable weekend playing time due to researching and finally booking this flight.

I get started playing again late Sunday night, thinking I am going to get in several hours of good high card count play. One of my tables is $3/$6. I get AJ suited (again) in early position and I raise an early limper. It keeps getting raised and then capped with 6 players seeing the flop with 12 big bets in the pot! Flop comes lovely JJT! I'm feeling pretty good! The small blind bets out, I raise and at the moment I get disconnected due to an approaching thunderstorm. (I am on satelite.) I don't know what won the hand, and my all-in protection is exhausted!

I know that the ones that were making fun of my miniscule win rate last week, will definitely have some fun now that I am losing after this many hands. That's alright, I have big shoulders with a large head that sits atop them and I can take it!

I will admit one thing, what I have been doing for the past 112k hands is not playing poker!

Results to date:

Hands Needed: 120,000
Hands Played: 112,680
Hands Left: 7,320

Estimated Hours: 291
Hours Played: 273
Hours to go: 18

Winning/Losings: - 200.00

Projected date of challenge completed: June 15th

AND FOLKS, please remember this is the original hand challenge to the WSOP. Please do not accept any cheap imitatons!