more testing - such frustration, I could scream.

Saw a $5 + .50 just starting up, with over 800 players. I jumped in.

Squeaky tight play. Barely even stole blinds. Won a few nice hands. Got the double up at the right time.

We got to the third break - I was in 32nd place. The bubble was at 90, there were 121 left. I had an above average stack. Time to get more aggressive.

I tried a blind steal with 9c5c. The small blind called me, a 38/0 clueless wonder. I was planning on c-betting any flop, but hell, I actually hit this one. Kd 9s 3d. Middle pair. He thinks a long time, which tells me no king. Then he checks. I bet, he calls. He's got a pot size bet left in his stack. I plan on putting him all in as long as a big card (making possible straights) or diamond doesn't come.

Turn is a two of spades. Bingo. He checks. Time to make him pay to draw. I put him all in.

He calls.... with ten-ten, and half my stack is gone.

I make it to the bubble, but barely further. KcQc in the big blind. An UTG player raises, and there's one caller. I don't have enough to push anyone out, so I plan on the old call-shove. I change my plan when the board comes K24 rainbow. I'm ahead of almost everything. I check, and someone bets all in. I call. He has AK. The river peps me up as it's a queen, but it also gives AK a one-card flush. Buh-bye to me, in 82nd place.

$3 profit.

I make one freaking aggressive play in the whole tourney, and it costs me. Wrong place, wrong time, wrong villain. He won't reraise all in preflop with tens (then I fold), he won't fold with a king overcard on the board. He's basically hoping and praying he can beat a bluff, and me the bluffing idiot comes wandering into his life at the perfect time.

I watch idiots overplay a dozen hands in a row, and everyone folds to the aggression. Raise, raise, raise. Finally someone calls. Pot-size flop bet, pot-size turn bet. Everyone runs away. Their chip stacks go up and up. The early leaderboard is scattered with aggro-tards who won't fold if a card higher than a jack is in their hand, and bet the pot whether they have a hand or not. I play squeaky tight 14/9 all tourney, then make one move and bang.

Sorry for the whining.