Had an odd situation come up yesterday. I'm playing two tables on Full Tilt. On one table I get dealt two black kings just as the flop gets dealt on the other table. Two red kings show up on that table and I think to myself how nice it would have been to see that flop on my other table.

It gets raised to me and I 3-bet with my black kings and the initial better callers. The flop comes 2 red kings for quads on the flop! Anyway, the hand was pretty uneventful. I raised the flop hoping that he wouldn't believe I had a king. I find that more often then not people will reraise you when you bet a paired board. Anyway, the guy folded so it was just an normal hand, but the coincidence was worth noting. Or perhaps the random card dealing software was stuck!

I really enjoy listening to the Circuit radio broadcast. I listen to it via podcasts. You go to the itunes music store and download the broadcasts to your PC and then sync with your ipod. They are free. The show is hosted by a young guy named Scott Huff and two poker pros -- Gavin Smith and Joe Sebok. Joe is Barry Greenstein's son. These guys have really good chemistry and it's a lot of fun to listen to them discuss hands, tournament strategy, the latest poker news and basically have a good time while talking poker.

Gavin and Joe are very loose aggressive players and they have both had good tournament success. Gavin was the WPT player of the year last year and Joe is fairly new to tournament poker but has had some really impressive results in the short time he's played. Listening to them discuss their aggressive style is pretty interesting and has helped open my eyes to the benefits of playing a more aggressive style. Gavin is a big advocate of playing small pots. He likes to call raises in position with both good and so-so hands and then put people to the test with raises and even calls PF. His thought process is that he can freeze the pf raiser by calling post flop and then moving in for the kill with a raise if the PF raiser blinks and slows down. It makes a lot of sense and has worked well for him. Give the broadcasts a try. I think you'll really enjoy them.

Today is Monday, and I really miss my weekly fix of High Stakes Poker. Not only is this my favorite televised poker show, it's probably my favorite TV show. Period. The show is just so entertaining and fun to watch. Much more so than the typical poker show. The tournament shows are just not that entertaining to me any more. They always turn into all-in fests because of the fast structures and the TV editing. Most of these shows do too many interviews and other features -- I guess to appeal to the non-poker players.

Contrast this to High Stakes Poker where we get to see how poker is really played. We see both pre and post flop play. Most of the players are really good and we can learn what these professionals do and don't do. I guess it's also fun to see how some of them players goof up and don't necessarily play as well as we believe they should. There is real money on the line; sometimes hundred of thousands of dollars, which makes for some interesting 'train wreck' moments as there is true pain in the big freefalls.

A close second to High Stakes Poker would be the Heads Up Championship on NBC. It also features mostly professional players and to a large extent we get to see many interesting hands.

Season 3 of High Stakes Poker will be on in January. It looks like Phil Ivey, Jamie Gold and a few other new players will be joining the mix. Even Gabe Kaplan will be playing this time. It should be fun.

I haven't played since the Anti-gambling legislation was signed. Since I usually play on Pokerstars there is nothing really stopping me, but I guess I'm just a bit tired with poker and I thought a break would be a good thing. In fact, I haven't played live in a few month too.

I played in about 6 events during the World Series and really got burned out by it. The World Series was a big zero for me this year. Last year I didn't do very well either during the events, but I had a great run in the satellites and actually came out ahead. Plus, in most of the events when I did get knocked out it was usually the result of bad beats or just getting cold decked. For example, I lost in the Main Event when I hit a full house on the turn only to find out that my opponent flopped quads!

This year I just didn't play well. Now sometimes, bad play can be easily masked by getting lucky. This year I had no luck AND I played poorly. Not a good combination.

I do want to play again soon, and will probably ease back into it with a trip to the Hustler one day next week. I like the Monday night tournaments and will shoot for that. The Hustler runs a very professional tournament. The structure is typical of weekly, one day tournaments -- fast structure, not a lot of chips, etc. However, what I like about it is that I can play fast, loose and aggressive with no fear because I love their NL cash games. So if I do get knocked out early, no big deal. I'll just play the cash games. This no fear attitude has served me well in the past. I have made the final table about 30% of the time I have played. Not too bad.