I had been watching the room for a while,  folding the first few hands as I determined the quality of play,  not getting any playable hands,  when something occurred to me.  This was not the loose-passive room that I thought it would be.  In fact,  this room was very,  very tight.  Few if any hands reached Fourth Street.  None reached the River.  Two players seemed to be a little more aggressive than most  --  the 2 and the 7 seat.

I decided that the proper adjustment to my typically loose and then aggressive style was to be more aggressive up front  --  even with my large drawing hands.  Raising before the flop had a high likelihood of success.  Those blinds added up.  So I decided to steal me some.

I succeeded.  I was dealt Ah Kd in mid position,  raised to $7 and won the blinds.  The next hand,  with Qh Jh,  I raised from mid position again and won the blinds.  Three hands later with 5-5 in the small blind,  against just the big blind I won the blinds and one caller.  I was on a roll.

But good players make adjustments to your adjustments.  On two subsequent hands opponents re-raised me when I was on some suited connectors,  and I had to release my hands.  I realized that they were alerted to my propensity for stealing and decided to take countermeasures.  So I once again had to adjust.  I slowed down.  I folded many hands in a row  --  trying to reset my image in their minds.  I knew that if I raised the blinds again it would need to be for value.  And it was.

I had Qh Qd in mid position.  I raised to $9  --  the customary raise in this game.  Sure enough,  one of the more aggressive players sitting after me didn’t believe me  (due,  no doubt,  to my earlier raising frenzy).  He re-raised me to $30.  I re-raised him to $100 and he called.

I feared A-K.  Fortunately,  the flop was low: Jd Th 3d.  I went all in for my remaining $120 or so.  He thought for a while and folded.  Maybe he had A-K.  Maybe he had a smaller pair and called my initial raise to a hundred hoping to get lucky.  Who knows?  But one thing seemed pretty clear to me:  My adjustments made sense.  Had I blindly stuck to one style of play based on my initial read of the table,  I would not have been as patient or been able to play back at this guy.