Snow in Vegas

Here are some pictures of the Great Las Vegas Snowstory of '08. Compared to the kinds of storms I experienced in New Hampshire this really wasn't a lot of snow, but keep in mind, THIS IS VEGAS!!

This poor tree eventually collapsed under the weight of the snow:

Poker

Last night I participated in the infamous 3-6 mixed game at Imperial Palace with Las Vegas Michael and others from AllVegasPoker.com. Somehow I ended up drinking about 4 vodka tonics and 2 Jagger bombs. I hadn't planned on drinking any Jagger bombs and in fact I've never even had one before, but somebody at the table (I think Cindy) ordered them and so I really had no choice. My opinion -- it tastes like Red Bull. You don't taste the alcohol at all. It would be pretty easy to drink quite a few and not even realize you are getting drunk, but of course that is probably the point. I ended up losing $220 in the 6 or 7 hours that I played the game. There are so many crazy games that I am not very good at, in particular Badugi and Baduci. I really have to think about what is a good hand, what cards to discard, when the fold, etc etc. Sometimes I would figure out which card to discard but accidentally throw away the wrong one. I guess the alcohol can be blamed for some of that. Anyway, I had a good time, and my losses were offset a little by the $120 I won in about a half hour playing 1-2 NL while waiting to get seated in the mixed game.

Another one turns 30.....

I don't think I know anybody who is still in their 20's anymore. Well Cat's 30th birthday party was a huge success. The only thing missing was LeRoy walking around asking people if they wanted to do shots. Sadly I took very few pictures, but here are a few that I have...

Here's Bertha and the legs of some unknown people. As you can see Bertha was the life of the party:

Cat and some friends. She is so popular that I can't even keep track of who all her friends are:

Here's Dan before he got drunk and started throwing up on my mom's tomato plants:

This is me the next day between trips to the bathroom to throw up:

Cat with some of the abundant Chargers swag she got. Go LT.

Jersey Boys and a $1000 win at the Wynn

Cherise finally got her free tickets to see Jersey Boys at the Palazzo (pictured above), so we went last Saturday after having dinner at California Pizza Kitchen at the Mirage. I didn't have very high expectations going into the show and was actually fully expecting to fall asleep. I wanted to get coffee to keep me awake but instead I had wine at dinner and then we got more wine at the show before it started ($9 per glass or something ridiculous like that). Probably not too smart, but it turned out to not matter because the show was great and I didn't come close to falling asleep once. The show basically tells the story of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons.... how the group came to be, how they broke up, all of the inner turmoil that went on in the band, etc.. I had no idea there was so much drama in that band but they could easily make a VH1 Behind the Music about them. The songs were good for the most part. The audience was into the show and there was a wide range of people, both young and old. I think the show might appeal more to people of our parent's generation but I still enjoyed it...

After this we went across the street to the Wynn to play some penny slots and get mojitos. Really the only reason to play at the Wynn is to get the mojitos..... other than the Bellagio I don't think there are too many casinos that comp them. I don't know how it happened but somehow I dropped $140 on a penny slot while Cherise was still on her original $10. I sometimes think I'm the unluckiest person in the world. Who else can lose $140 on a penny slot in under an hour. I'm also pretty stubborn because after we left those machines I decided to put another $100 into a triple play video poker machine just to lose it all or at least win my money back. I wouldn't have really cared if I lost that $100, I was more pissed about losing all that money on a penny slot. Anyway, it's funny how gambling works because one minute you can be the unluckiest person in the world and the next you are the luckiest. On like my 3rd or 4th hand on this machine I got dealt four cards to a royal flush. Since it was a triple play machine this meant that I would have 3 shots at hitting the royal. Sure enough I got dealt the Jack of spades on the 2nd hand which was good for a cool $1000! I was in shock for a minute and then elated. Not only had a I wiped out my losses on the penny machine but this gave me an overall profit of almost $900.

'Twas a good night.

more graph humor and song chart memes

My second time ever....

At a concert that is. Cherise got us tickets to see COLDPLAY on Saturday night at MGM. The concert rocked! The crowd was really into it and they played all of the songs I wanted to hear. It said the start time was 8:00 but they didn't end up going on until about 10:00 because there were two opening acts. The first was a DJ who spun while some crazy hypnotic animation appeared on a big screen. I found it entertaining for a while but it went on too long. I have no idea who the next band was cuz they never introduced themselves. Funny thing is we only saw the first song and spent the rest of their set standing in line to but a t-shirt. What a mess that was. There were like 60 people in line and only two workers to help them. When people finally got to the front they took forever to decide which freakin' shirt or shirts they wanted. Coldplay played for about two hours.... they finished up with Fix You and then did one encore.

Anyway, I've been to two concerts now and I've liked both of them. No idea when my next one will be... probably in a couple years. Before the show we had dinner at a sushi place not far from my house. It was good although I've had better sushi..... I did like the saki which we ordered a small one of. I ended up drinking half of it myself and we had to leave the rest because Cherise did not like it. I guess it is an acquired taste.....

Party time!

I had Mandy, Spencer, Kiefer, and Cherise over for dinner on Friday to celebrate Mandy's birthday. A good time was had. I made pasta and Cherise made a cake. We played some Wii, mainly bowling and tennis. Mandy has never played before but somehow managed to bowl over 200 on her first game and completely own Spencer. I then owned Spencer at tennis but the game was cut short because next thing we knew Cherise and Mandy were lighting the birthday cake and starting to sing. I guess I didn't realize how much I had to drink because after the birthday cake we brought out Dance Dance Revolution and it was all kinda a blur from there. My only regret is I still have that nasty little bottle of Patron in the fridge which I couldn't get anybody to drink.

Mandy bowling

Kiefer

I've been sick the last couple of days. I am feeling a lot better tonight but yesterday I was pretty much bed-ridden the whole day. I know it wasn't the drinking because I was perfectly fine on Saturday. My only guess is it was something I ate at the Silverton buffet on Saturday night. Maybe the stuffed crabs or shrimp cocktail? It all tasted fine, so who knows.

One more time...

I gotta go down to the Rio to pick up my last paycheck. I don't know if they're going to make me give back my badge and name tag. I hope not because I would like to keep them as souvenirs, plus you can get discounts to some things in town by showing a casino employee badge (for example you can get into Voodoo Lounge for free when it normally costs like $20).

For some reason last night I got the urge to play poker so I went down to Treasure Island for their 10:00 PM $65 tournament. I don't know why I play tournaments at TI because I never seem to do well there. The only time I've ever cashed is when I got two $50 bounties in the $125 headhunter tournament, which meant I only lost $25. I've played the $65 tournament probably five or six times now and bad things always seem to happen. Case in point.... last night I went the whole first level without winning a hand. Midway through the second level I pick up AA in the small blind. There's a raise to 300 and 3 callers. Awesome. I shove all in for about 1800 and the guy on the button calls and turns over JJ. Awesome. His buddy says "I had one of your outs" meaning he folded a jack. Awesome. Flop comes x-x-x. Awesome. Jack on the turn. Wow. I always handle myself well when I get knocked out of a live tournament, but this really had me steaming. It's been that kind of month so far both live and online. July's must be bad for me because last year at this time I went on a horrible downswing mainly playing $20 heads up PLO8 matches. This month I'm down $619 already, half of which came from a $300 loss the other night in a 1-2 game at the Gold Coast (most of which came from me getting KK all in vs my opponents aces pre flop which cost me about $150, and then on my last hand of the miserable night I got AA all in against 3 people and one of them flopped a set which cost me almost $100)..... Ugly. But it always gets better. I'm pretty much done playing live for a while until I get my windfall...... which should be coming very soon now. Oh it will feel so nice to be out of debt....

I'm done...

Well I've officially joined the ranks of the unemployed again. My temporary job at the World Series of Poker ended on Sunday. I had originally been scheduled to work through today but our boss came in on Saturday and told us that Sunday would be our last day. It was understandable given how that was the last day of registration for the main event and there really wouldn't be anything for us to do after that.

Things I will miss NOT miss about the job:

• The job itself. Entering data into a computer all day gets to be really boring. This was nothing intellectually challenging or stimulating about doing that.
• The food. There were basically two choices on where to eat lunch -- in the dealers' break room or at the employee dining room. The break room was closer but the food was awful -- all they had was pre made sandwiches that were about as dry and bland as cardboard. Sometimes they would have salad that usually consisted of lettuce, a tomato, and a cucumber. All I really liked about the break room was that they had coffee there. The employee dining room was better in that they had actual hot food, but after a while I got sick of it and it reminded me of eating in a school cafeteria.
  
• Having to iron my clothes every morning. This is the first job I've had where I actually could not show up in jeans and a t-shirt. I got better at ironing as time went on but to this day I still suck at it. I have no idea how I can spend 10 minutes ironing a shirt and then I put it on and see it still has wrinkles on it. I suppose it would help if I actually had an ironing board.
  
• Marian's excessive talking. This woman was very nice but she had no concept of quiet time. I am all for chatting but in the course of an 8 hour day there are times when I just want to sit there quietly and not talk. This was rarely possible with Marian as she would constantly feel the need to talk to me even when there was nothing to talk about or I was not responding.
  
• Dominic's lack of work ethic. This was my other co-worker. He didn't talk nearly as much as Marian but he hardly worked either. He would spend most of his day making personal cell phone calls, doing homework, or looking at apartment on his personal laptop. The worst part was having to sit right next to him and listen to his long phone conversations.
  

Thing I will miss about the job:

• The paycheck. This is self explanatory. It is nice to make money. :-)
• Being part of the World Series of Poker. As a poker enthusiast it was just cool being able to say that I worked at the sport's biggest event of the year. It was always fun to walk down the hall or through the Amazon room and just about always see at least one famous player every time.
• Having something to do 5 days a week. Before I got this job I was really getting bored with not having a job. It may sound nice to be on vacation every day but after a while it gets old. It's only been a couple days but already I am starting to feel bored and depressed about being unemployed.
  

Not meant to be....

So I got out of work at 3:30, raced down to Binions and changed my clothes in the car when I got there. I went down the scary elevator and into the casino with about 10 minutes to go until the tournament started, and there was a huge line of people waiting to sign up. I didn't end up getting signed up till a few minutes after the tournament started but it was no big deal as they put a bunch of the late sign-ups at their own table so we didn't miss any hands. As for the tourny itself I never got anything going. I was kinda card dead at first and then when I finally got a decent hand I misread the board and didn't realize I had a straight to go with my second nut low. Basically the way the hand played out, it was me and one other guy, and he made a medium sized river bet and I just called and ended up scooping. If I wasn't such an idiot and had seen my straight I would have popped it and based on what he showed down he probably would have called. Oh well.... Other than that there was only once critical hand where I lost most of my chips and it was pretty much over from there. I've been thinking about the hand quite a bit and I'm pretty sure I played it the right way based on what my chip stack was at the time and what the blinds were. If i had had more chips it probably would have been an easy fold, but I was pretty short. I won't go into any more details than that because this is not a poker blog (but this is, even though it hasn't been updated in forever), and I don't want to bore or confuse the few readers I have.....

So they had about 310 players in the tourny and I finished somewhere around 160th. Maybe next year.

RETURN TO BINIONS!

Tonight I am getting off work early to go down to Binions and play the $150 Pot Limit Omaha 8 or Better event, which is part of the ongoing Binions Poker Classic. I played this event last year and finished 20th out of 389 people so hopefully I will do as good or better this time. When I saw my boss this week I asked her if I could get out early on Sunday and told her I had family coming into town and needed to meet up with them. I didn't want to tell her that I was going down to Binions to play a poker tournament...... bwahaha.

That was disgusting

Tonight I heard one of the most disgusting things I've ever heard in a public restroom. I went to Bill's Gamblin' Hall & Saloon (formerly the Barbary Coast) to check out their new poker room, and I stopped in the bathroom to urinate. There was a guy in one of the stalls telling the bathroom attendant to call his friend up in their room to bring him a new pair of shorts because "this is just a mess." The attendant seemed anxious to help him perhaps because he was expecting a nice tip after assisting in the messy situation. Seriously though, I don't even want to know what happened there or how it came to pass that this guy needed a new pair of shorts.

Anyway, Bill's now has two poker tables but neither one was in use. Sunday nights are slow, and Vegas is dead right now, so I guess I wasn't shocked. I ended up walking down to Imperial Palace and played short handed 1-2 NL for about an hour before that game broke. I saw Las Vegas Michael and a couple of other AVP'ers there playing a mixed game. I was tempted to join, but as low as my bankroll is right now, I can't afford to play anything that I don't feel like I have a decent chance of winning at...

Classic Las Vegas Part I: The Plaza

The Plaza (formerly known as the Union Plaza) has anchored Fremont Street since it opened in 1971. At the time of its opening, it was billed as the "Largest Casino in the World." When you walk through today you would have a hard time believing that it was ever considered large given the scope of all the mega-resorts that populate Las Vegas today. Perhaps the Plaza was considered upscale when it first opened but I believe it's been a long time since it was considered anything other than a cheap place to stay and gamble. In recent years as the scars of time have grown more pronounced and the bar has been raised higher and higher by the newer resorts, the Plaza is quickly approaching that inevitable "dive" status.

We went there to play bingo recently and the first thing that struck me was how scary the parking garage was. I felt like if my car was a couple of feet taller it would have been in danger of scraping the roof. When we first entered the garage I couldn't help but notice that a pimp dressed in bright red and holding a pimp stick appeared to be trying to break into a 1970's era Cadillac. It could have been his for all I know, but it wasn't something that I wanted to stick around to find out. Walking through the casino in search of the bingo room you almost felt like you were back in the 70's, or at least that's the last time it seemed like the place had been cleaned. We finally found the bingo hall upstairs, and after playing in many bingo rooms in this city I have to say that the Plaza's does the best job of perpetuating the stereotype of what bingo is all about and who plays it. Here everybody was truly old, smoking, and often wearing polyester. OK not everybody, but a higher percentage than at any other place I've played at so far. That being said, it was a good experience overall and I enjoyed the many different variations they presented, including something called Crazy Kite and Wild Postage Stamp, or something like that, which I'm still not sure what it means.

Needless to say, we did not win.

On the way up to the bingo room (or of course on the way down after your hopes and dreams have once again been crushed and you are stuck $7 or $8), you pass what can only be described at the most depressing wedding chapel in Vegas.

The main thing that I find so saddening is that it appears to be a very large prison call. I really don't get the bars or why they need to be there. I should hope that they open the gate up when there is a ceremony going on, or perhaps you can request that it remain shut after everybody has entered to ensure that person you are about to marry doesn't get cold feet and try to escape. I'm not sure how drunk you have to be to decide it's a good idea to get married at the Plaza, but really, is it any worse than the drive-thru chapel on Las Vegas Blvd?

The Plaza has been featured in some movies over the years. Most memorable for me is the scene with Robert De Niro and Sharon Stone in Casino where they are eating in the dome restaurant and they start arguing and De Niro almost knocks over a glass of water because he's like mad at her for being a lying, cheating whore with drug problems.
We wandered over to the dome and sadly it appears that it is no longer a restaurant and has been converted to a sports bar. Apparently the sports bar is not very popular among visitors to downtown because it was largely deserted on a Saturday afternoon. Of course that could be because the only sporting event going on at the time was golf...

We also observed the buffet while walking through the casino. It is called the 777 Buffet and the gimmick is that the price is $7.77 all day, every day. If I had to choose between eating here and eating at the Circus Circus buffet, I'd probably choose the Circus. Then again, if starvation was a third choice, I'd have to go with that. This buffet looked downright scary...

If it sounds like I am bashing the Plaza, please, don't get me wrong. I tend to favor the dives over the sparkling new generic mega-resorts, and the Plaza does have it's own special kind of.... attitude. It's an attitude that basically says: "If you want class, go to the Wynn. If you want to play the penny slots and get drunk on cheap booze, come on in!" I can see going back there to play bingo, or perhaps play some drunken blackjack, but I won't get married there or eat at the buffet. I have to draw the line somewhere.

WTF is wrong with me sometimes?

Only in Vegas...

I have this number on speed dial...

Poor Las Vegas...

Times are really tough out here for the casinos. For instance, in the month of March, they only won a paltry $1.04 billion from gamblers. This is a 1.5% decline when compared to March of 2007. I don't know how they can continue to operate with a take barely above $1 billion. I think everybody should do their part and wager a little extra on the penny slots next time they come. As a local I'm going to do my part and take all the money I would use to play poker and instead bet it all on the Bix Six wheel. If I win I'll feel bad and go over to the craps table, where I'll lay the whole thing on the hard six (which has something like a 10% house advantage) and if by some bizarre happenstance I win again, I'll keep doing it 'till I lose. I have to do my part...

RETURN TO THE TABLES!

Tonight I played live poker for the first time in over a month. It's not that I can suddenly afford it or anything, I was just bored and didn't feel like staying home again tonight. I went down to the South Point and played about 3 hours of 1-2 NL, and I finished ahead about $160. It was a good feeling to have a winning session after such a long layoff, but my lack of play lately made me feel rusty and I never really felt like I had a groove going. Most of my proft came from one hand where I called a $10 pre flop raise with JT (which I don't normally do) and flopped an opened ender. The original raiser bet $20, I called and then pushed all in when I hit my straight. He called right away and when the board paired on the river I thought he might have a boat, but he mucked and I never got to see what he had. That was about a $250 pot. Nothing else too memorable, except an older guy at the table got mad at a younger guy over something and called him a "young punk." For a minute it looked like they might come to blows but thankfully nothing happened. By the way, the old guy looked and talked a lot like Vito Corleone in The Godfather which made the incident all the more scary....

Derby Day!

Sunday was the Kentucky Derby and there was a lot going on here in Vegas. The day started down at Binion's where we had breakfast. It's been a long time since I ate at Binion's coffee shop, but nothing much has changed. It's still pretty good even though Binion's itself is no longer one of my favorite hangouts.

From there we took a walk over to what I expected to be the seedy El Cortez, but it turned out to be not nearly as trashy as I always thought it was. This was the first time I ever step foot in the place, and we were drawn there by the promise of a free glass with any wager of $20 or more on the Derby. I've bet on the race online in years past but this was the first time I've ever wagered in an actual casino. After getting some help from the friendly book maker I placed $20 on..... gee, I can't even remember what horse I bet on, but I bet it to show meaning it only had to come in 3rd place or better, it didn't actually have to win. This kind of bet pays out less than if you bet the horse to win outright, but you have a better chance of winning. Cherise bet on some other horse I can't remember, but needless to say neither of those bets ended up paying off. We did get our glasses though!

We headed back to Binions and Cherise signed up for a Club Binions card. They promised her a free t-shirt if she earned 100 points (carrot on a stick approach) and like a true sucker (haha) she headed to the video slots to try to rack up those points for the free t-shirt. I'm not sure how much she ended up spending but in the end she did get that free t-shirt. I have to say I was a little jealous...

Next it was off to the South Point where an official Kentucky Derby party was being held. We made our way upstairs to one of the ballrooms and it was packed with several hundred racing aficionados, or perhaps people like us who just wanted to be part of the whole scene. I placed two more bets, both on horses to show, for $20 each, and I got a free hat, free beer, and a free hot dog coupon! Woo hoo! We got our beers (we both passed on the food) and found an empty table to sit down and watch the race at. Some guy sat down next to me and asked me if my hat belonged to me, because somebody stole his. I told him not to touch my hat or I would call security and have him escorted out of the building. Then I stared him down and made a gesture of a knife across the throat. Shortly after that he got up and found another table to sit at.

Finally, after much anticipation, the race began. It's funny that the biggest racing event of the year only lasts a couple of minutes, but those two minutes really are exciting while they last, especially when you have money on the race. When all was said and done the favorite, Big Brown, finished in 1st place. They always say never bet on the favorite, but in this case it would have been a good idea. As for me, one of my two bets was on Eight Belles to show, and she ended up finishing in 2nd which gave me a payout of about $60.00 on my $20 bet. Overall that $40 profit ended up canceling out the two losing $20 bets I made, so all in all the day was a wash for me. Can't complain about that.

In a tragic note, my horse, Eight Belles ended up breaking both of its front ankles at the end of the race and had to be euthanized on the track. I've never understood why horses are usually put down whenever they break legs or ankles. If a dog breaks its leg it can recover. Why can't horses recover from broken legs? I'm not a vet, so I have no idea. I'm sure there's a good reason though. The tragedy of Eight Belles put a somber note on the whole event, but I guess that's a risk involved with the sport. Just like a boxer can be killed in the ring, or a football player can suffer a deadly injury on the field, horses are also at risk.

My winning ticket...

That's all for tonight. Happy Cinco de Mayo.

Luke the Babysitter??

Today Cherise had an appointment to look at an apartment kinda down near here so she dropped Kiefer off at my place and I watched him for about a half hour. I was kinda nervous about being alone with a young child but thankfully everything went OK. He was still alive and in one piece when she returned. She also made sure that he was fed and changed before she left, so I really didn't have anything to worry about other than entertaining him. He seemed to enjoy sitting on my exercise bike even though he's about 9 feet too short to be able to use it. I tried to show him how to play the Wii (by the way, I got a Wii!) but he didn't really seem to understand the concept. The main thing he was into was going into my storage closet and dragging all of my moving boxes out. He even climbed into one of them and had me pushing him around in it. I remember being into that when I was a kid!

It has been forever since I blogged. Hope my readers have not given up on me.

I got entered into a free slot tournament at the Palazzo a couple weekends ago. First place paid something like $5,000. You had to finish in the top 40 or so in order to get paid anything, and I finished around 60. Still, not too shabby considering that there were about 300 people in the tournament. Maybe next time I'll practice my button pounding technique a little more. In the above picture I had just hit triple blazing 7's good for 1199 points. Alas it was not enough.......

Here's a picture of me with my people at Caesars Palace. Cleopatra or whoever there was trying to cop a feel and I had to tell her to please move here hand up.

Kentucky Derby tomorrow! This is the one day of the year that I pay attention to horse racing. Check back to see how I did...

Buffet and Blue Man

I had two more free buffet passes plus a buy-one-get-one-free for the Gold Coast buffet so I went there on Saturday night with Cherise, Mandy, Spencer, and Kiefer. Five people and only one of us had to pay! Gotta love all the free crap you get in this town. I got a bottle of Foxhorn merlot which I think is now my favorite wine, but alas I've been unable to find it in Smiths, Vons, or Albertsons. It's good to know that it's always available at the Gold Coast buffet, although probably at a pretty steep markup. I really want to get some to enjoy at home, so I'll probably make a trip to Lee's Discount Liquor because they're bound to have it somewhere in their extensive selection.

The buffet was good as always, and this time it was not seafood night which was good because I'm not a big fan of eating seafood from a buffet. It's also nice not having to watch people stuff their fat faces with crab legs. Mandy and Spencer (and Keifer for that matter) don't drink wine so I had about 3/4 of it and Cherise had the rest. I was feeling pretty good by the end of the meal when we seperated with the Farstads and then Cherise and I took the free shuttle bus down to the strip and started walking to Venetian where Cherise had two free tickets to see Blue Man Group courtesy of the company. We stopped at O'Sheas on the way to get out 2 for 1 beers at the Dublin' Up bar but that place was completely packed and music was blasting so we skipped it. Next we went into Harrah's and after some wandering found Toby Keith's "I Love This Bar & Grille" which I had another 2 for 1 drink coupon for. The country music was a-blastin' and there were even some folks doin' some line dancin' out on the dance floor, but I couldn't tell if they was doin' the two step or the East coast swing...

Finally we made it to Venetian and stopped in front of Tao to see if perhaps my landlord was working, but we were quickly ushered away by a large black man who was obviously in charge of making sure the riff-raff didn't get too close. So we headed into the Blue Man theater and down to our seats which were in the 5th row, just a couple rows behind the people who were in the "splash zone" and covered in protective plastic. This is actually the 4th time I've seen BMG, and the third time I've seen it in Vegas. I really love the show and I don't think I'll ever get sick of seeing it. This time was memorable because we actually got to be part of the show! As we were sitting there waiting for it to start we were approached by a man who asked us if we had ever seen the show before and if we'd like to help them out with something. I thought he was going to ask one of us to go up on stage and with my crippling shyness there was no way in hell I wanted to do that, so I started to say no, but then he said we'd be helping out with the "late arrivals" thing. I had to think for a second but then it finally sunk in. In every show there's a point at which some "late" audience members arrive for the show, and as they are walking to their seats the entire show stops and a huge spotlight shines on them. Not only that, but they are put on a huge video screen on the stage which flashes a huge sign saying "LATE ARRIVALS!" The entire audience then laughs at the poor embarrassed people.

I never knew if this was real of part of the show, but now it's clear that the people are pre-chosen because on Saturday night we were those people! The guy took us from out seats and led us to the back of the theater where we were seated behind everybody so that nobody could see us. He then left us and told us an usher would come get us when it was time. Cherise had no idea what was going on and didn't want me to tell her. I was nervous as hell and regretting my choice to accept as each minute went by. Finally about 15 minutes into the show an usher came and grabbed us. He took us down to the floor where it was pretty dark and we stood in the entranceway for a few minutes, and then all of a sudden the show stopped, the lights started flashing, and the Blue Men stopped and stared. The usher started leading us to our seats, and after a few seconds I guess the audience caught on to what was happening and started erupting in laughter. I was trying to hold myself together by just walking and staring at the floor. When I did look up I saw our big fat faces right there on the massive video screen for all to see. What a strange feeling....... Finally the excitement died down and they went back to their show as I tried to melt into my seat.

So I've seen the show four times but I can say that this was definitely a first! For those who have never seen the show, sorry if I just spoiled one of the "secrets" for you!

Oscar Disaster

I'm not sure it's possible to ever do as badly as I did in an Oscar pool. This was the first time I've ever participated in such a thing, and I have to thank Catherine for giving me the opportunity to embarrass myself so spectacularly. Out of 27 total categories, a got a whopping 3 correct. That's an 11% success rate. I think I had only one correct pick through the first 23 or so awards, when I went on an amazing hot streak and racked up two big points for Best Original Screenplay (Juno) and Best Actor (Daniel Day Lewis). My only other winner was for Costume Design (Elizabeth: The Golden Age). I guess it's a good thing I wasn't able to find any sportsbooks here in Vegas that were taking Oscar bets, because if I did then I probably would have lost even more money. And no, that's not a joke, I actually did look at a couple places to see if they had Oscar lines posted, but no, I didn't actually make specific trips to casinos just for that purpose. I am not that sick.

By the way, congratulations to Catherine, the pool organizer, for getting 12 right and walking away with $60 in cash. Recount!

Depressed by the news......

Haven't blogged in a while, but I'm still here.

I try to keep up with what is going on locally by watching at least one newscast a day. Also since I don't have cable there really isn't much other choice. It's not like I can watch CNN or MSNBC. Lately I've been shocked and disgusted by the amount of violence that occurs in Las Vegas on a daily basis. This past week a 16 year old high school student was shot and killed in an apparent random drive by shooting. This happened in Summerlin which is known as an upscale area of Vegas. Apparently the boy was walking with a large group of students and it looks like he may not have been the intended target. The shooter and the driver of the car were eventually caught and both are awaiting charges.

Yesterday a man in his 20's was murdered during a home invasion robbery. He and his wife came home late and night and were ambushed by two men wearing bandanas. A struggle broke out and the man, who has a young daughter, was shot and killed in front of his wife. The suspects are still at large. This happened in the Southwest part of the valley, a couple miles from where I live.

I know that stuff like this occurs every day in the large cities of our nation, and the truth is that senseless violence can occur anywhere. Just look at the latest college massacre in a tranquil part of Illinois. I guess it's all a bit new to me given the fact that I lived in New Hampshire for 7 years where stuff like this was very rare. Here it seems like you turn on the news and there's someone getting killed everyday. In New Hampshire you had robberies and the occasional rape or what not, but it was very rare that somebody was murdered in cold blood during the commission of a crime or, in the case of the high school student, for no reason whatsoever. I do remember going home to San Diego to visit and being shocked when watching the local news at how much violence occurred every day. I guess living in Nashua was like living in a bubble for all those years.

Sorry for the depressing blog entry. The next one should be better. I'll give an update on how things have been going poker-wise as well as the ongoing job hunt.

Frontier

Yo Cat this one is for you. Cold beer & dirty girls are just a memory now...

My car...

Here's a couple of pics for those of you who haven't seen it yet.

Superbowl...

What the hell was I thinking??!!

Congratulations Cat and all others who had the guts to go with the Giants. My sympathies go out to all my former New England brothers and sisters. I'm sure a lot of you are feeling suicidal right now.

This is hilarious!

My status....

To those of you wondering, yes, I am still an unemployed bum, still waking up every morning with nowhere in particular go and nothing to contribute to society. At least I ain't sucking off the government's tit yet, though. No, in all seriousness, the job hunt is continuing. This week I applied for a position as an Information Technology Assistant at the Clark County Library. It's a pretty good paying job but I imagine I'm just one of dozens if not hundreds of people who applied. They stopped taking applications on Wednesday, so if they are interested in me I should be hearing something soon.

I also applied to be a software quality tester for MGM-Mirage. I have an application pre-screening with them next week.

And just for something completely random, I applied to be a poker room supervisor at the Stratosphere this week. Perhaps it speaks to my lack of sanity and disregard for money that this is actually the job I want the most. When I apply for computer related jobs out here I find myself asking myself why I left my job in New Hampshire and moved out here if I'm just going to get another computer job. If I really wanted to work w/ computers why didn't I just stay in the Granite State?

And now some pet peeves about job hunting:

• MGM-Mirage, which owns about half the hotel/casinos on the Strip, only lets you apply for one job at at time with them. This is not just one job at one hotel, it's one job at ALL of their places. The stupid part about this is you can apply for a job, wait for weeks with no response, only to find out that the job has already been taken and you could have applied for another job during the time that you were waiting. There was a job at the T.I. poker room that I applied to, but when I talked to an actual employee in the poker room last week I find out that someone was already in the process of being hired for the job but that the job stays on the website until the person is 100% hired. How do people have any way of knowing this? How many people apply for a job and then waste their time waiting for a response that never comes, only to have another job that they could have gotten slip away because they aren't allowed to apply to one while waiting to hear about another? Why not just let people apply for multiple jobs at once? Lame....
• Stations Casinos is a large company that owns a whole bunch of locals' casinos in the valley. They have a reputation as a very good company to work for and they are consistently in the Forbes Top 100 Companies To Work For list. My complaint about them -- you are only allowed to apply for 2 jobs with them in a 90 day period. So if you applied for 2 jobs and didn't get them because perhaps you applied to late, or perhaps you were just as qualified as somebody else but they had to pick somebody so they picked the other person, you are out of luck for 90 days. Lame....
• Websites that list job openings but give absolutely no description as to what the job entails. Over a month ago I applied for a job at the Palms as a database analyst. I have no idea what I would be doing as a database analyst but it sounded like something that might be up my alley, so I applied. I guess it doesn't matter anyway because I still haven't heard back.

Well that's enough bitching. For now.

Long Night at The Orleans

On Monday night I played the 8:00 PM $80 tournament at The Orleans. Just to clarify, the stereotype about players at the Orleans is pretty much true. It's basically a lot of old men, many of whom are grumpy. I saw a couple of players abuse dealers and act generally unpleasant. Late in the tournament an older woman got knocked out and actually threw her chips across the table at the player who had eliminated her. There were a few younger people in the tournament (i.e. under 50) and I think there were a couple people who were actually younger than me.

I got off to a great start when somebody who obviously didn't have a clue doubled me up. I limped into a multiway pot with 89. The flop came 56T and it was checked around. The turn brought a 7 which gave me the nuts. An early position player bet, I raised to 1200, and the player in the small blind when all in for about 4000. The original bettor folded and I of course called. Shockingly the other guy turned over JJ and he was drawing dead. I don't think it would have been possible for him to play the hand worse, but his ineptitude was my good fortune.

There was another pretty big hand I won but I don't remember the details. All I remember is that we started with 4000 chips and about 30 minutes into the tournament I was up to about 12,000. There were about 130 people in the tournament and if I wasn't the chip leader at that point I'd be surprised.

At one point a new player got moved to our table. He was wearing sunglasses and a leather jacket, he was from Jersey, and he was pretty brash. He started in on me right away. The conversation went like this:

Jersey: Are you a pro?
Me: No, I'm an amateur.
Jersey: All those chips you have would say you're a pro. You look like a pro.
Me: No, I just got lucky.

I was playing pretty tight at this point, and he must have noticed because next he comes at me with this.

Jersey: What are you waiting for?
Me: Aces. Or kings.
Jersey: Yeah, I bet you are.

What would happen on the very next hand is one of those great ironies that happens from time to time in life. Jersey-boy raises in early position which is actually pretty standard for the way he's been playing. I look down at two kings. There were two callers behind him so I put in a pretty big re-raise to 3000. It gets back to Jersey-boy and he goes all in. I have him covered and I call pretty much right away. The other two players were gone at this point. As the dealer is straightening the pot I ask him if he has aces, and he responds in the affirmative. The board gives me no help.... I double him up and now my massive stack has been cut down to a modest 4 or 5 thousand.

So I was honest when I said I was waiting for aces or kings.

I thought it would be downhill for me after this, but I eventually managed to chip my way back up to a pretty good sized stack. It seems like me and this guy from Jersey tangled in a lot of hands. He was playing really loose and aggressive, and I couldn't tell out if I was enjoying his presence or if he was just being a jerk. He was definitely arrogant, and he was making some comments to other players that bordered on being out of line, but he also seemed like he was just having fun at times. It's hard to tell with some people.

Eventually we were down to 3 tables Jersey-boy still had a pretty good sized stack while i was hovering right around the 10 BB area. I got dealt AQ and limped, and he raised about 3x the BB. I called as did one other player. The flop came Qxx and I immediately went all in for my last 10,000 or so. He sat and thought about it for almost two minutes before finally folding reluctantly. He revealed that he had KQ and I kicked myself for playing the hand so strong. If i had check raised him I probably would have doubled up. For the next hour or so he kept asking me what I had and was having fun denying him the information. It seemed like he was going to lose sleep over it, so I told him that as soon as he or I got knocked out I'd tell him what I had. He got eliminated later doing a stupid bluff and stormed off before I could tell him. I hope he didn't lose sleep.

Anyway, to cut to the chase, we eventually got down to two tables and I was in all-in mode, just waiting for an ace, a pair, or even a good king. Eventually I get dealt A9 and go all in. The guy behind me goes all in, AND the big blind goes all in. Great....... They turn over JJ and AK, so I'm basically hoping the flop comes A9x or 99x. I actually caught an ace on the flop but could not hit my 3 outer and the AK held up. I was gone in 20th place. Only the top 10 paid.......

A quote

Shallow men believe in luck, believe in circumstances -- it was somebody's name, or he happened to be there at the time, or it was so then, and another day would have been otherwise. Strong men believe in cause and effect.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Vermont to arrest Bush/Cheney?

I think Bush and Cheney suck just as much as the next guy, but this is just STUPID:

BRATTLEBORO — Brattleboro residents will vote at town meeting on whether President George Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney should be indicted and arrested for war crimes, perjury or obstruction of justice if they ever step foot in Vermont.

The Brattleboro Select Board voted 3-2 Friday to put the controversial item on the Town Meeting Day warning.

According to Town Clerk Annette Cappy, organizers of the Bush-Cheney issue gathered enough signatures, and it was up to the Select Board whether Brattleboro voters would consider the issue in March. (more...)

Monte Carlo on fire.....

I'm sure everybody has heard about this by now. The good news is nobody was hurt.

The bad news is the whole place is still shut down while repairs are made. MGM-Mirage has now instituted a hiring freeze for all new employees. Sucks for me because I just applied for a job at the Luxor last week! Hopefully it opens back up later this week (as they say it will) so current employees can return to work and new employees can continue to be hired. For MGM to institute a hiring freeze is a pretty big deal given that they own about half the f'ing places on the Strip.

I thought this was funny, from an article in the local paper.

Inside the Monte Carlo poker room, the gambling didn't stop even after a casino floor television came on with live footage of the fire, said Rich Vetterl, a 53-year-old chemist from North Carolina.

"It was strange playing poker and watching the building burn," he said. "It was almost like being on the Titanic as it was going down. It was surreal."

After several minutes, the dealer at the table waved her arms, stopped play and told everybody to evacuate. The poker players calmly stood up and left, with many taking time to cash out their chips, he said.

Good to know that people have their priorities straight.

Busted...

I decided to take a shot at the $100 + $25 buy-in Head Hunters tournament at Treasure Island tonight. In this tourny $50 goes to the prize pool and the other $50 is put on each player's head as a bounty. Anytime you knock a player out you collect their $50 bounty. Before the tourny started I bought a $5 cappuccino from Starbucks. Who are the bigger suckers, those playing the slots or people like me who spend $5 on coffee?

I started out pretty slow. I caught some decent hands pre flop and raised with them but pretty much missed when the flop came out and I check-folded or bet-folded after getting raised or check raised. Eventually I was down to about 2500 chips from a starting count of 5000. I finally won a decent pot when I turned a nut flush draw and open ended straight draw and went all in, forcing the other player in the hand to fold and scooping me a pot of about 2000. Nothing much happened until my last hand of the tournament....

We were in level 3 with blinds at 75-150 and I was in the big blind with about 3500 chips. I got dealt K2 and about 4 players saw a flop of K25 with two diamonds. I checked it and the next player bet 400. It was folded to me and I check raised to 1000. He went all in pretty much right away and I called. This player had been bitching for most of the tournament about how he was not getting dealt any hands and to his credit he was not playing the garbage he claimed to be getting dealt. He'd only played a few hands that I was aware of so when I c-raised him to 1000 I thought he had to have a high quality king, something like AK, KQ, or KJ. I had no intention of folding the hand at any point after I raised. I did not think this player would be able to get off of his king and I honestly thought that he would double me up.

I guess I was disappointed when he turned over A6 of diamonds. I was still a favorite but not as big a favorite as if he had had a king with another kicker. On the flop I was a 67% favorite.

The turn brought a non-diamond 4 which gave him three additional outs.

One of those outs came on the river, as a black 3 fell and I was sent packing.

I'm disappointed, yes, but what can I say.... I got all my chips in as the favorite and he got lucky. If people want to risk their tournament lives on a flush draw I certainly can't complain about that. Maybe he was counting 3 aces for outs too?

Fortune Cookie

When did God start showing up in fortune cookies?

I got this one at the Rio buffet on Friday night. Whatever happened to the separation of church and Chinese food? Ridiculous, I tell you.

Anyway, the Rio buffet was not bad. I'd give it a 7 on a scale of 1 - 10. The selection was enormous, but some of the food was of marginal quality. One major complaint was how tightly packed all of the tables were and how crowded it was. Definitely not a buffet for those who feel claustrophobic. So far my favorite buffet is still the Silverton. I do have to give the Rio credit for featuring an item I have yet to see at any other buffet in town: corn dogs. You won't find those at the Bellagio!