Cashing in.

Last Friday night saw the return of cash game play to my humble home game.

But for one other player at the table (Svengolly), save for myself, I have to say - I sat down and saw a lot of dead money. Of course, as I've said on this blog before, and I will repeat again; this opinion of mine has no bearing on my poker opponents as people. Indeed, as it is my personal home game, there were and will probably always be fellow players beside me who are some of my oldest and dearest friends.

Still, thankfully for my bankroll, not a wit of them know how to play poker. (Again the lone exception being Sven) Poker is, simply, war - and one must prey on the weak to succeed. But with a smile of course.

Quite simply, I knew by betting for value against the weak passive lot of them, and staying out of Sven's way - it was all but short of automatic for me to make money.

I didn't have the greatest night that I could have imagined, I was fairly cold decked, and yet when I cashed out at the end of the night, I had nearly sixty more dollars in my wallet. Crazy.

Sven was the big winner, finishing with nearly a c-note in the black.

I have to say, when I cashed out, I was surprised. I didn't feel I played especially great, and like I said, I wasn't exactly on a heater when it came to the cards. But I guess it always boils down to game and opponent selection.

Firstly, we played mixed games. As much as my NLHE skills have leaped and grown, I'm still an old school limit stud player at heart. I crushed in Razz, as well as the very wacky 2-7 Triple Draw. I also have to say I got paid handsomely in the limit version of Hold-Em as well as good old evil Omaha/8.

The games that kept me from moving up an income bracket or two were the high version of seven stud (always my weakest stud game) and believe it or not Pot Limit Omaha (that's high only folks!) and Pot Limit Hold-Em as well. I didn't exactly take a beating in these games, but I definitely felt much rockier.

Good times. Looking very much forward to a probably very chaotic mixed game tournament at home next Saturday.