So, I wasn't quite sure how it would shake out or what had been decided upon before showing up last night. We didn't play a tournament, which was a relief to me. Look, I'm an insurance guy -- I have an inherent instinct to mitigate large losses. The idea of likely being out $300-$600 or walking away with a one-in-7 chance of $3000 or so is not the pool I usually swim in. (Not to mention a few of these guys are borderline degenerate gamblers -- they were betting on first halves of the ACC-SEC Challenge while we played card.) Anyway, we had a finite time because the dealer was "on the clock" from 8-midnight. So the deal was, initial buy-in for $300 with the opportunity for another buyback if you busted out before the end of the night. I had an extra $100 with me but hoped to not get to that point so I played very conservatively. I don't need to be losing $600/night in a monthly card game -- that shit's not fun to me. I also was unaware how "experienced" the table is/was. I haven't played in several years so maybe I'm the patsy at the table. So my plan was to play some, have a good time, not chase things and try to get out of there with something close to what I started with. I didn't get very good cards for the first couple of hours. I chased a couple "inexpensive" pots and didn't win any and I was the last of the seven at the table to finally win a hand. Two guys won at the beginning but busted out a couple hours in -- and bought back in at $300. I'd already decided I was only buying back in at $100 more -- if at all. Hell, at that point I planned to sit back and sip Blanton's or E.H. Taylor and watch the rest of them take each other's money. Good buddy had a large stack early, lost it all and then threw another $150 on the table at 11:45. He was pretty soused at that point and was chasing a last-minute miracle. I wasn't going to indulge that and let him lose it to somebody else because ... At any rate, I won a small hand or two about halfway through but was still a little underwater before hitting on a big pot that I slow-played. I had a suited pair on the draw and got two more diamonds on the flop. Like I said, the pot wasn't huge but it was a decent payout and everybody folded but me and my good buddy above, who as I said was up big early. Fuck it, let's see this one through. I checked and damned if another diamond didn't come out on the turn. So I raised a modest amount. My buddy had a good hand -- can't remember what he wound up with but do remember I could've been boned on the river. Luckily, the last card did nothing for either of us. That pot made the night for me. I won a few more as we were down to five players by the end. The guy who came in saying he knew next-to-nothing about Hold 'Em hit some big ones early and was the big winner on the night, which infuriated (in a funny way) the guy to my immediate left (he lost $600 total). He was playing everything 100% right but couldn't get the cards to work in his favor. He finally went out on his buyback with KK on the draw. (He lost to AA draw. That was a fun hand to watch play out.) The inexperienced guy was in big on a pot and threw his cards on the table thinking he'd lost since he didn't hit his flush draw (but had a straight or something). I think he cashed out for nearly $1200 at midnight. (He had way more than that at one point.) I cashed out for $640 total so a $340 profit on the night. Sounds like this will be an every-other-month game, maybe once per quarter.