Met up with Moose earlier, have internet at my Venetian room so he might come up to post later. Either way, he's still in today's Venetian DSE with about 55K with blinds at 600/1200/100. 45 cash and about 100 players left (400 started). He didn't cash in the Aria tourney on Monday, and that's all I got for now.
Got back from Aria hoping to jump in the HORSE game, but decided it was probably not the best idea so came back to Venetian instead. Just saw Moose cash in today's DSE $350 and he's sitting short but not out.
Got back from Aria hoping to jump in the HORSE game, but decided it was probably not the best idea so came back to Venetian instead. Just saw Moose cash in today's DSE $350 and he's sitting short but not out.
Is there a 15/30 or higher HORSE running daily now?
Is there a 15/30 or higher HORSE running daily now?
It's just a Wednesday night special that TT (from 2p2) started when Aria opened. They actually play 20/40 majority of the time. I don't think it runs on another day other than that.
It's just a Wednesday night special that TT (from 2p2) started when Aria opened. They actually play 20/40 majority of the time. I don't think it runs on another day other than that.
Oh, I thought I read on 2p2 that it was a nightly game:(
Sitting in McCarran right now making use of the free internets and the wifey's desire to be here ridiculously early. But whatever. There were zero people in line at security so that was great and managed to grab a wall plug to keep the battery charged.
I don't have all my notes handy but started slow and built speed over the week, played 4 tourneys and cashed two. Then gave a pile of it back last night with a stupid 8 hour session that ended at 5 am.
So doing a few things from memory and will edit it when I find all my notes. Sun went smoothly from Detroit and arrived about 9:30 and grabbed the rental car. Checked in at Bills. It's a good flop house with decent rooms and beds but no pool or amenities so not the place to stay if you are looking for more than degenerate gambling. Nice big LCDs in the rooms but for some reason it wasn't in HD. Anyways headed up to IP to try and get in the mixed game but it didn't run that night. Too bad. They only had one seat available in the regular cash games so MMoose crashed and I began to walk the strip in search of Chinese New Year chips. Flamingo gone, IP gone, Harrahs gone, though for some reason they still had last year's chips and I snagged one for my nephew. Venetian gone and I was pretty much losing hope. Forgot to ask at the Palazzo, as I was going from memory which casinos had issued special chips. Finally hit pay dirt at the Wynn and grabbed 6 chips. Hilarity ensues when cashier can't figure out 6*$8 and has to use a calculator, then forgets result and asks me. She had to look around a bit to get my chips so I leave a buck and get about 20 steps when they chase me down to give me back my dollar. I give a strange look and tell them it's a tip. I take another 20 steps and decide to go back and get 2 more. That was pretty much the last of the CNY chips so lucky for me the IP game didn't run or else I would have played in that and missed out.
Mon morning we get up too late to get to Tix4Tonight to buy tix to Love (it opens at 9:30am). Mmoose wasn't feeling well so we went in search of a drugstore. Having the car was SOOO handy. Anyways we pass Terrible's Casino which was offering a $2.99 pancake and egg breakfast so we swing into there to get players cards so we can get the special. Since it is a holiday there is a special champagne buffet so we opt for that instead. Go figure. Anyways how stupid are we, we completely forget the free booze but do score with the 2for1 buffet coupon from the booklet we got with signing up with the players club. Also got swag tshirt #1 on the trip.
Since Love was out for tonight I decide to head to Aria to play the $120 1pm tourney. Honestly did not see much of the casino, just went straight to the poker room and sat in the cash game until the tourney started. The tourney started but I wanted to play around to my BB so I ran back and forth btwn 2 tables for a couple hands. Cashed a few bucks and sat down to concentrate on the tourney. It's a great structure but they have some screwy rules for late players that IMO are handled a LOT better in the DSE.
They put out a bunch of stacks for people who want to register late and then blind them off. However after an hour the stacks are removed BUT they still take late entries. So if you come after one hour then you can start with a full stack. Since it's a pretty long tourney all the local players take advantage of this and show up at least an hour late so that they have a full stack and can pick on the short stacks. IMO dumb rule. Anyways I make the best of the few hands I get but after dinner break I get absolutely nothing and play no hands until final table. Still manage to hit FT 6/9 or something. Then I procede to lose a flip 99<AJ against the shortest stack and I am crippled. Two hands later I outflop 55 with A9, when I spike the A on the flop, bit it also happens to include a 5. Sigh gg me. 8/55 or so and top 5 pay.
Overall, as had been said on allvegaspoker.com, the room is not busy. I found the tables a bit crowded 10 handed and the seat on the chairs is too short, giving no thigh support at all. The room is divided from the casino with a low wall and the slot machine noise detracts from the overall classiness and comfort of the poker room.
BTW, Mmoose grabbed me McDonald's for dinner break. I asked her to find the burger place Drtyore, Mario and Compuease went to on the CPF trip. I knew it was right across the street but couldn't remember the name. She comes back with McDonald's after being unable to find it. After the tourney as we drive out we see Fatburger right next to McDonald's. Go figure. The power of advertising.
So we decide to sit down at the .50/1 nl tables at Bill's. Mmoose can't outplay the donkey's and drops $197. The final straw was a 3way hand where Mmoose reraises a $25 flop bet allin for $53 on top with KK and gets cold called by middle donkey who calls with his Q6 flush draw or something, which obv hits. So she gives up and goes to bed. I play on because two hookers are slumming it up on my immediate right. A constant stream of drunk men swing by to say hello throughout the evening. Good times.
Later on I meet a guy from Toronto who drives out every week to play some sick 5/10 game in Belleville of all places. He had just recently bought a 2 b/r condo down the street for 90k or something because his wife was a sponsored pro. She plays every DSE and apparently shipped last Thursday's event, so I will have to look up who that was. Edit: I looked up the winners on the Venetian site and the only female who shipped anything top 5 was Sat Feb.6, so either that was her or he was full of shit.
Eventually the hookers switch tables and I decide I can't outplay the donkey's either. I laugh at some guy with a Dario Mineri type scarf who shoves $45 into a $30 pot and he gets all snooty and asks me not to count the pot. But he is so good he eventually loses all his chips so I guess he needed the help afterall. Anyways down $67 and with the hookers flirting with the other table now, I move on to craps. So obv it takes me 5 min to win $72, covering my cash game losses, and I head to bed. Mmoose tells me we won a gold medal so I take bad beat #1, when I decide to stay up and watch it and NBC doesn't replay it until 3 am.
Tues morning we check out of Bills and head next door to the Flamingo for the next 4 nights. We continue our daily pilgrimage to Terribles and collect on the $2.99 2 pancake, 2 eggs, 2 meat special. Before eating we make use of the degenerate coupons in our booklet. I win $7 on a pay $7 on any $5 even money bet coupon when I artfully select red on the roulette table but Mmoose clearly blows it by selecting black on the next spin, so we are up $2. Then I take my double pay coupon to the craps table and begin my downswing by losing $192. Mmoose is +15 using her coupon on BJ. We head for breakfast, and my craps losses make this the most expensive $2.99 breakfast ever.
We check in at the Flamingo and sit down at the cash tables to take advantage of their high hand jackpots and 8am-8pm $100 AA cracked promo, which is a big improvement over their previous $50 AA and $25 KK cracked promo, which previously only ran for a few hours each day. I cash $90 at 2-4L and Mmoose drop $69 at 1-2nl.
We head back to Terribles for the $9.99 16oz TBone special. and we use a $4 off coupon for dinner, making this our cheapest steak dinner ever. It was the best $5.99 steak dinner I ever had.
Since I have never had a steak dinner for $5.99, it was also the worst steak dinner I have ever had. Although, this record would only stand for a few days...
I was worried when the waitress, not only brought out the Terrible's steak sauce, but also Heinz 57 and A1. I never use these products but since the steak contained virtually no flavour, they knew obv what they were doing.
By the time we finish, and drive over to PH we are a bit late for the $80 Bounty tourney and get on the alternates list. I sit at 1-2nl and make a couple bucks before they decide to add a table to the tourney. 54 runners but we start 2 levels in. The structure is horrible but the play is so bad I'm sure this would be a very profitable tourney. Mmoose picks up one $25 bounty but neither of us cash. I especially get fucked over with 3 tables left when, as a decent stack I raise with J10 and flop J10x. I bet weak on the flop and the one caller insta shoves. He rolls A10 and of course the A shows right away on the turn. I'm crippled and shove QJ a couple hands later, only to be slowrolled by some ass in the sb who 'debates' for about a minute and then shows AK. I flop the Q but of course the turn brings the K. I sit back in the cash game and end up +$43 overall with the pretourney winnings until Mmoose busts shortly after. We head back to the Flamingo and wrap the night with another $28 for me at 2-4L and $155 for Mmoose at 1-2nl. Wed I plan to play the $350 DSE at the Venetian.
Wed we enjoy Terribles breakfast special again and I get to the Venetian just before the tourney starts. The structure is of course amazing with 40 minute levels and 12k starting stacks and I don't want to feel rushed so I take my time and get to the table a few hands in. Most of my table has prepaid but we are only 4 handed to begin. On my immediate left is the only dangerous player, a young kid with a Full tilt hoodie who is obviously some big internet player. He attacks the table endlessly. I'm not sure of the value of that at a 50/100 level but whatever, he accumulates chips though and I generally avoid playing with him.
Early on though I raise with 99 and take a good sized 5k pot or so from him when we check the turn and I set the river and he pays my river raise.
Shortly after, still in the first level I raise with JJ and the bb calls. I flop top set because I am obv so good and c-bet. sb calls. Turn is a 4 and I check. sb bets strongly so I repop and sb shoves it in. She shows 54 for a turned bottom 2. WTF? SGHN and I have 28k and 20 min in I am clearly the chip leader.
So I decide to chill out and wander the room, go to the bathroom, find some coffee etc because I have no need to fuck around with 28k and 50/100 blinds. I come back in the 2nd level and a few players have shown up and we are 6-7 handed. Internet guy has recovered from the hit I gave him and is sitting with 15k or so and the original members of the table are all left with 3-8k ea cuz they suck. Within a few hands of sitting down I stack another player with another set.
Next hand of note, I defend my BB with QJ when an aggressive player who has constantly been open raising, open raises from the cutoff. One advantage I had at this table is as the away players showed up and the busto seats get filled from other tables is that I was in the 1 seat and the 10 seat never showed, so that was one less player attacking my blinds. But on the other hand it seemed open season on my BB because there was no-one to defend the sb. Anyways the blinds are lvl 3, 200/100 and he opens to 575. The flop is Q high and figure I am only behind to KQ, as I expect AQ would check behind so I come along when he cbets. The turn brings a flush draw for me and I check/call again. River is a nice J and I bet out, get called, and take a nice 8k or so pot.
Later after he dumps the rest of his chips to internet guy, someone mentions that he had said that I had cracked his KK. But meh whatever, I'm a luckbox. Anyways I am well over 40k and still among the chip leaders. People are still registering so the ave is still hovering just over 12k.
Next: I lose my mind and dump 25% of my stack...I typed this in the car driving from Detroit so I'll pull out my tourney notes later and clean up some of the details.
I'll side note now my comments about late players and Aria vs how the Venetian handles it. As I said before late players registering after 2 levels in the Aria tourney start with a full stack. In the DSE if you register late they deduct one set of blinds per 15 min and then the dealer releases one small blind into the pot every hand until all the deducted chips are back in play. Much fairer way to handle it IMHO.
Mostly I remember from writing down what I won or lost day by day by game and casino. I haven't totalled it up yet but I expect I about broke even. It's easier to write down the gambling wins/losses than keeping track of what else I spent my cash on, especially since sometimes I was tipping from my stack and sometimes from my pocket.
During every tourney I keep a blind schedule in my pocket and every level I write down my stack and the ave stack and any extra notes.
However the night I went to see Love was very blurry...
Moose, these are amazing trip reports. Great detail leaves the reader almost following along with you. Like Wetts said, there's no way I could remember this stuff either and would never take the time to take such great notes. At least nothing that would trigger such good details at a later date. You and Comp have great TR's.
Now, as you are the resident king of finding deals...Where are you getting these coupons for seemingly anything and everything? You've got them for so many different locations, you can't just be getting them from one online site? Or can you?
Now, as you are the resident king of finding deals...Where are you getting these coupons for seemingly anything and everything? You've got them for so many different locations, you can't just be getting them from one online site? Or can you?
Vegas is the live version of online poker. Just like when you sign up at a new poker site where you get new player tournies and sign up bonuses, everytime you get a player card at a new casino in Vegas it usually comes with various new player coupons and other crap. Now all the Harrah's casinos - Ballys, Harrahs, IP, Flamingo, Rio, Paris are linked so you can get the bonuses only once. Also all the MGM casinos are linked too Monte Carlo, Mirage, MGM, Aria, Bellagio? Harrah's comps are the best because they can be used at any casino but MGM's suck because there is only one card but the comps earned can only be redeemed at the casino you earned them at. Whereas for Harrahs, all my play is on one card but for example, comps earned at Flamingo and IP are added together and can be used at the Rio, if I wanted to eat at the buffet there.
Mostly you get $5-10 free slot play but I just play them out and cash out whatever is left. Sometimes you get a even money bet pays 2 for 1 coupon good for BJ or a pass line bet at craps. At Bills, new players get a free tshirt if you earn $5 in comps in a 24hour period. Just getting the player card is worth it because they will mail you hotel promos and stuff. Of course poker players are the lowest scum of the earth so you don't get much but if you are a 65 year old slot jockey you can expect tons of free hotel rooms and stuff.
Slots eh? Finally a game I can play.... Actually that wasn't the case last time I was there! A friend of mine can play a slot machine like an ATM. She looks at the damn things and they start pissing out money like a scared dog..
This May we'll be staying at the Venetian. Doesn't sound like it's connected to any of the networks you've mentioned. Ah well. I've already checked out their site and signed up for email/deal notifications. Thanks for the heads up.
I'll definitely check out the player cards you mentioned.
So next up in the DSE, as I said I lose my mind. It's lvl 3 blinds 100/200 and I decide now the blinds are worth mixing it up with internet guy on my left. OTB I raise to 575 with KJs. I figure that since so far I have pretty much left him alone that it should be a quick muck, but he calls. So the flop is all low and I decide that I am going to bluff holding a big overpr and cbet. He calls. So I decide that I am really going to show that I have an overpr and fire the turn. He calls. At this point the monkey on my back completely takes over and I stop caring what he may be holding. The river brings a J and I completely lose my mind and fire what my monkey mind believes now to be a value bet. I even mumble something stupid like 'I rivered you' as he rolls over AA. I really don't even mind the turn bet but I was really pissed at dropping down to lvl 1 thinking with my river bet when if I had half a brain I could have checked behind and saved 4500 chips. Anyways after nicely building my stack I'm down to 25k or so. Fortunately there is lots of time to recover from my idiocy as I am still double ave stack.
I don't feel like showing the table that I am steaming so instead of getting up I sit there and do a slow burn and watch internet guy get AA b2b and stack another player. Now he has upwards of 50k and I'm no longer have the table c/l. Fortunately it is only a few minutes before break and I manage to eliminate another small stack when my AQ makes top 2 and our table breaks with 2 min before break. I head into first break with 28.4k and ave stack only 12956.
My new table I get really lucky and I sit down as the big stack again. Also the screens show the break order and my table is not listed. This means I completely luck out and my table will not break until we are in the money. It's a huge advantage because I will only have to adjust to the one or two new players as they keep refilling our table. So break comes and I can steam off and my new table is none the wiser.
After break I keep luckboxing into sets and stacking players and by the 5th level I have built my stack over 50k with ave stack 19k. Last hand before break though, the monkey comes back and I defend my BB with my new nemesis hand, KJ. Flop comes KQx and I call the cbet. Turn is another Q and a flush draw in hearts and villian fires again and I call. On the river now villian quickly fires 12.5k and I think WTF is the overbet for and tank. Now villian starts talking smack and eventually clocks me. Monkey decides that he is bluffing a busted flush draw but monkey is disappointed to see AQ. I totally got played on the river and I'm pissed at calling off such a huge chunk of my stack. Again I steam off into the break down to 31575 and ave creeping up to 23178.
Over the next couple of levels I kind of hold my own but the ave stack keeps creeping up and I end the 7th lvl at 33100, just over ave of 31725. Lvl 8 the blinds are 100/500/1000 and I can't maintain this for long.
I should have mentioned already the players at my table. As I said I joined the table as the big stack. Most of the table was unspectacular but 3 seats to my right was a solid aggressive player who was also intent on destroying a 12 pack of bud light by dinner break at 7pm. When I first sat down there was still an away player 2 seats to my right and he showed up a hand or two after me. He had preregistered but was clearly badly hung over from the previous nights activities. He kept his head in his hands and never said a word the entire time, finally after about an hour he overshoved Q8s or something, lost and was gone, having played only one hand.
There was a constant stream of small stacks filling the two seats to my right. I met some girl from Vancouver, who was sponsored to 20k by some internet site in China. I recognized her as Canadian from her card protector.
I had seriously been considering getting one from this set myself as a card protector so I instantly recognized it. Anyways, she lasted about 1/2 an orbit and was gone too. Now a solid midstacked player took her place who had the chips to make some plays.
So I had better finish this TR or I never will. I had now drifted down to just over ave. stack. Around this time, Wes shows up. Good person to decompress with on breaks. All he asks for in return is for me to mooch free drinks for him. lol. I tell mmoose to go look him up but she can't find him in the sportsbook and shortly after she decides to head back to the hotel room.
Only problem is her sense of direction is brutal so I walk her all the way back to the elevators and figure that's good enough. Wrong. 20 min later she comes back and says she can't find the car and that she is going to take a cab back to the hotel, which is completely stupid. So I sit out and RUN to the parking garage. We both thought the car was on the fifth floor. Just to be safe I start on the 4th. Nope. 5th nope. 6th nope. Now I actually believe the car is stolen. Reminder - I am sprinting btwn floors, not bothering for the elevator and running for where I think the car is, turning around and sprinting for the next level. 7th level - there is the car. Fuck me. I run back and toss mmoose the keys and this time I wait for the elevator because I'm not running back down all those flights of stairs. There must have been some big hands while I am gone, because I miss less than an orbit. But now I am sadly in need of some serious Fiji water.
Anyways it's 8th level 100/500/1000 and I start to pick up some hands. I've been playing with mostly the same people for several hours now. I had bud light, who was getting very hammered two seats to my right and a fairly solid-midstacked player on my immediate right. Bud light had been pretty liberal with his raises and he open raises once again and midstack calls. I have AQ and decide to flat and see a flop. 3 handed the flop gets checked around and I fire in pos and everyone folds. Pretty much std play for bud light.
Next hand, midstack open raises and I have AQ again and decide it's time to repop. Only midstack instashoves on me and I fold. Shortly after bud light open raises again and I repop with a small pp 95% of the time he obv has pure crap and of course he shoves it in. Our stacks are fairly even and I decide to fold again. From this point on in the tourney, no-one really challenges budlight and he liberally open raises for the rest of the tourney, constantly building his stack, and he basically cruises to among the chip leaders. It is essentially the last time I saw him put his entire stack at risk. Anyways now my stack is getting low and I finally have fallen below ave stack for the first time in the tourney.
Still in the 8th level, midstack open raises and I rr with QQ. He shoves on me again and now has me covered. I comptemplate how cold decked it would be if he has AA or KK but I can't wait any longer and call. He rolls AK and QQ holds and I cripple him. I had been playing over 6 hours and this was the first time my entire stack was at risk. I end the level at exactly 45k and ave has crept up to 36783.
Soon after the crippled guy is gone and another midstack takes his place. I chip up a bit attacking shorter stacks and end lvl 9 with 53.8k, ave 47439.
10th lvl 200/800/1600 a huge hand occurs. UTG, a short stack shoves, UTG+1, the new midstack instashoves, I look down at KK and reshove. UTG+3 comtemplates and folds. Button tanks for a long time. Shows his hand to the rest of the table and folds. BB thinks briefly but also mucks. So it is a 3 way allin. Now the dealer opens the exposed hand, and button had folded AKs. BB (budlight) says 'No way'. He had folded AK and UTG+3 says he folded AJ. Anyways all my outs are gone, UTG 99 and UTG+1, JJ. The no-out KK holds and I rake a monster pot and eliminate both players. I end up with $112,300 and I'm back among the chip leaders. But how sweet it would have been if button had come along. I head into dinner break with $111,500 and ave is $62667. I meet up with Wes and we go eat at the noodle house, right by the poker room. Great meal and not a bad price for about $13.
Also at this point I should mention that I don't see the FullTilt internet guy that I had been playing with on my first table, again, so I assume at some point he must have blown his stack.
So we resume play just after 8 pm. Once again, as in the Aria tourney, the dinner break kills me and I go completely card dead. I literally play 4 hands until the bubble breaks. Bud light, who was completely drunk at dinner break seems to have sobered up and an extremely good player has moved in beside him. Between those two players I manage to find 2 hands with which I can steal the blinds, and two more hands worthwhile to seeing a flop with and of course hit nothing. 12th lvl ends with me getting blinded away to $90300, but ave has crept up to 84600 and lvl 13 is going to 400/1500/3000. So at the 12th lvl break I wander around and look at the stacks. Top 46 pay, and there are 56 left and a lot of short stacks. The 13th lvl is a sick sort of fun because I literally get nothing worth even attempting to play and they are the easiest folds of my life.
Finally in the 13th lvl, a short stack at my table shoves 1010 and of course bud light holds AA. He has something like 250k now and the very strong player beside him has about the same. I am all the way down to 55k. We redraw seats and form 5 - 9 handed tables. I start to pick up hands again and steal a few. 12:30am and I am actually putting my entire stack in for only the second time in the tourney. Then UTG raises and I find JJ in mid-position. My M is still over 20 but not much room for reraising and I hate flat calling in mid-pos with no idea what is going to happen behind me. I really know nothing about the new players at my table. The only person that comes with me from my old table is the really solid player who was beside bud light and he is on my immediate left now. I decide I will have lots of opportunities to keep stealing and after about 5 sec of contemplation, I muck. You can rip on me for that fold if you want, but I didn't know the player, he was raising UTG, I didn't think I could get him to fold and I didn't feel like sticking a M20 stack in from mid-pos. Anyways I guess UTG could sense my dilemma, even though I really didn't think long and he flashed AK. I end lvl 13 at 66400 but ave is now 101520. Still have time though, lvl 14 is 500/2000/4000, but not much time.
Shortly after that I open raise with 88 and the solid player right beside me reraises. It seemed funny to me, especially after all the hands we had together at the other table and I muck. He flashes AA. Unfortunately now I am in push/fold mode. I take a few more hands but with 43k left and blinds going to 500/3000/6000 in under 2 min, I shove A10 into AK and IGHN. It's almost 1 am and I have been playing for 13 hours. 423 runners and I cash 30th place for $747. The really solid player beside me is the one who ends up taking it down the following day.
Of course being a chip nut. There has gotta be chips.
My winnings and registration card.
The winnings:
This one kind of shows the chip molds a bit better:
When you register you can choose from a hat, a t-shirt, a bag, a card protector or a $10 food comp. I diddn't really need any of those, so I went with the card protector and kept some chips to frame up.
I'm hungry and it's after midnight so I stop for the Midnight $5.99 ribeye and eggs special at the Flamingo. Now I have had the worst steak ever for $5.99. Ok it's just the worst steak ever, and it breaks the record set for me only a couple days ago at Terribles. The eggs and hash browns aren't bad though and meat is meat at 1 am, so I belch and move on to bed.
So on Wed I couldn't decide what I wanted for my free gift and they close up after 2:15, when registration closes. So Thurs morning we go to Denny's for breakfast to use a $5 gift card we got on our last trip. Only 4x as expensive as Terribles and not nearly as good. Then we walked over to Tix4Tonight and bought Love tix. Then mmoose dropped me off at the Venetian and I redeemed my ticket for the card protector. After dinner the night before, unfortunately, I could not find Wes at all. I walked over to the Mirage to exchange my vouchers for seats to the show and then walked to Caesar's.
On the way through the Caesar's shops, I passed Pete Rose signing autographs at some memorabilia store. He looked extremely pathetic. Not one person was interested in autographs and he sat there in a completely empty store. Anyways I had planned to play the Caesar's noon tourney but by the time I got through the line-up at the Mirage and got to Caesar's they were already in the 3rd level and I decided against it. Now you may also wonder why I was playing a lot of 2-4 limit at Flamingo - it was basically because I was chip hunting for myself. The Flamingo had brought out new racks about a week before and as I played I was sorting through the chips and finding all the new ones. After every sesssion I would take a couple racks up stairs to my room, take out any new ones that had any small chips in them and then return the ones I didn't want back to the cashier.
So at Caesar's, another chip nut had asked me to pick him up two racks of $2 chips. So I got 3.5 racks worth from the cashier and sat at an empty poker table and started to sort through them. After about 1.5 hours and about 10 racks worth of chips, I decided I wasn't going to get anymore decent chips, picked up my two racks and walked out.
On the way through the Caesar's shops, I passed Pete Rose signing autographs at some memorabilia store. He looked extremely pathetic. Not one person was interested in autographs and he sat there in a completely empty store.
He has been there EVERYTIME I've been in Vegas when I passed by the store.
I ended up going to the Nelly performance at TAO on the Thursday night you cashed (hotel guest with a VIP card I got the night before got me in for $10). Friday I ended up just playing 2/5NL (dropped about 10BB, no interesting hands really) at Venetian to check out the ruckus that was the NAPT and got a bracelet to the NAPT Opening Party at TAO hosted by Slash.
I'll pick up that $8 chip from the Wynn from you when I get back into the country in mid-March.
So I'll try and wrap my report now. I had just finished collecting two racks of Caesar's $2 chips shown above and trucked them back to my hotel room. Mmoose was playing 1/2 in the Flamingo room and I sat down at 2-4 limit to collect some more $1 chips. We needed 4 hours of play to qualify for the 9 am $2k freeroll the next day. I fell in with some friendly folks and steadily got hammered with them. Soon we realized we had to go to dinner if we wanted to make the Love show. I cashed out up $40 and mmoose +$7.
We headed to Ellis Island for the $5.99 1/2 chicken and 1/2 rack of ribs. We arrived to find a huge crowd around the craps table and mmoose got us on the wait list while I bought into the game. Some lady was on a really hot streak and at only 2x times odds I got there in time to make $49. Woot. Free dinner and my horrible craps streak had come to an end. The lady sevened out and everyone ran to the cage to cash out. It was crazy how fast the table actually emptied. We went over to the host and begged him to seat us next for dinner because we had to make the Love show. He kindly bumped us up and I think we slipped him a fiver for his troubles. Dinner was awesome as usual and I ordered another beer, which in retrospect probably wasn't the greatest idea. We raced over to the Mirage and got there 15 minutes late. Fortunately they still seated us. It was a good thing I was completely hammered because I can't think of any other way to enjoy the show. Basically take every Beatles song where you would think to yourself 'WTF was John and Paul thinking?' and this was a visual explanation for that song. Hammered, it kind of made sense. The music was good and the entertainment factor was good but that was all. It really wasn't a circus at all just basically the performers in weird costumes dancing around or floating through the air. I figure it is where they stick all their performers who are injured and can't do their circus act anymore. I guess I can say I found a Cirque show worse than Ka now. Anyways I kind of pass out for part of the show because it is so boring and come to for the end. 1:45 min show and we missed 15 min of it so pretty much not worth it.
We head for the hotel and crash with 2 days left in our trip.
The next day we get up at 8 am and rush down to the poker room to register for the $2k freeroll, then go back up to our room, shower and get back for the 9 am start. Maybe 65 runners or so. For $5 you get a $1k dealer addon, that doubles your chips. The blinds are 15 min I think and basically the goal is to get the thing wrapped in 2-2.5 hours. It's mostly push fold poker and mmoose busts after an hour or so and I play on. With 4.5k left and blinds 1000/2000 we get to the final two tables. Essentially at this point, the common thing to do is chop for $100. It looks like everyone is into this idea, so I make my favourite chip aquisition of the entire trip. I take advantage of all the clapping and cheering and I steal a T500 chip from my stack and put it into my pocket. Only problem is now one guy decides he doesn't want to chop. He is such a dick, he isn't even the chip leader at our table, never mind the tourney. So now I have basically screwed myself because I may need that chip and there is no way I can pull the chip out of my pocket and put it back into my stack. Fortunately we play one hand, two guys bust and they give the POS who didn't want to chop and the chip leader at the other table $150 and everyone else $100. I tip another $5 for the dealers and I'm up $90.
These are the chips I scored on my trip. Check out the Flamingo chip in the bottom left.
We head back to the Venetian to try and find Wes, but no luck so we pick up vouchers for the Todai sushi buffet from Tix4Tonight and have sushi essentially for breakfast. From there we drive to Boulder City to go see the Hoover dam.
So between trying to find Wes, and AYCE Sushi - and also having sushi for breakfast didn't really sit well with mmoose - so we have to pull off the highway to find some water for her, anyways we get to the dam really late, about 3:30 pm. The last $30 tour has already left for the day. There is a shorter power plant tour for $11 but DAMmit, I'm only going to come here once, might as well see everything there is to see. So we decide to bail and come back on Sat and eat the $7 parking fee, of which we parked for about 5 minutes. Nice. You would think that when you pull in they might fucking tell you no more tours or something.
Ever since 9/11 tour buses and transport trucks have been banned from driving over the dam for fear of a large bomb. Also it is only a 2 lane highway and with all the traffic and pedestrians touring the dam, crossing from one side to the other, it gets really backed up. So they are building a completely new bridge over the gorge. It will be finished in Nov 2010 and is the world's highest of its' type or something. Just wish I could have seen it before they completed the arch. That would have been pretty cool. They are actually using the original cableway used to construct the dam in 1930, to build the bridge. It is the oldest and largest operating cableway in the world.
Hey. It's the dam. Not too much traffic on this side but if you look carefully you will see the Az traffic backed all the way up the hill.
The bridge and the cableway. The hydro tower looks funny but it has to run down the gorge to the power station. There is a smaller cableway in the foreground. The cableway I'm talking about is right over the centre of the arch.
The previous picture didn't look too bad but in this picture you get a bit of a feel for how high this bridge is.
Comments
Wins @ craps
Loses @ poker
Break even week.
Is there a 15/30 or higher HORSE running daily now?
It's just a Wednesday night special that TT (from 2p2) started when Aria opened. They actually play 20/40 majority of the time. I don't think it runs on another day other than that.
Oh, I thought I read on 2p2 that it was a nightly game:(
I don't have all my notes handy but started slow and built speed over the week, played 4 tourneys and cashed two. Then gave a pile of it back last night with a stupid 8 hour session that ended at 5 am.
So doing a few things from memory and will edit it when I find all my notes. Sun went smoothly from Detroit and arrived about 9:30 and grabbed the rental car. Checked in at Bills. It's a good flop house with decent rooms and beds but no pool or amenities so not the place to stay if you are looking for more than degenerate gambling. Nice big LCDs in the rooms but for some reason it wasn't in HD. Anyways headed up to IP to try and get in the mixed game but it didn't run that night. Too bad. They only had one seat available in the regular cash games so MMoose crashed and I began to walk the strip in search of Chinese New Year chips. Flamingo gone, IP gone, Harrahs gone, though for some reason they still had last year's chips and I snagged one for my nephew. Venetian gone and I was pretty much losing hope. Forgot to ask at the Palazzo, as I was going from memory which casinos had issued special chips. Finally hit pay dirt at the Wynn and grabbed 6 chips. Hilarity ensues when cashier can't figure out 6*$8 and has to use a calculator, then forgets result and asks me. She had to look around a bit to get my chips so I leave a buck and get about 20 steps when they chase me down to give me back my dollar. I give a strange look and tell them it's a tip. I take another 20 steps and decide to go back and get 2 more. That was pretty much the last of the CNY chips so lucky for me the IP game didn't run or else I would have played in that and missed out.
I'll post pics as soon as I can. On to day 2.
Since Love was out for tonight I decide to head to Aria to play the $120 1pm tourney. Honestly did not see much of the casino, just went straight to the poker room and sat in the cash game until the tourney started. The tourney started but I wanted to play around to my BB so I ran back and forth btwn 2 tables for a couple hands. Cashed a few bucks and sat down to concentrate on the tourney. It's a great structure but they have some screwy rules for late players that IMO are handled a LOT better in the DSE.
They put out a bunch of stacks for people who want to register late and then blind them off. However after an hour the stacks are removed BUT they still take late entries. So if you come after one hour then you can start with a full stack. Since it's a pretty long tourney all the local players take advantage of this and show up at least an hour late so that they have a full stack and can pick on the short stacks. IMO dumb rule. Anyways I make the best of the few hands I get but after dinner break I get absolutely nothing and play no hands until final table. Still manage to hit FT 6/9 or something. Then I procede to lose a flip 99<AJ against the shortest stack and I am crippled. Two hands later I outflop 55 with A9, when I spike the A on the flop, bit it also happens to include a 5. Sigh gg me. 8/55 or so and top 5 pay.
Overall, as had been said on allvegaspoker.com, the room is not busy. I found the tables a bit crowded 10 handed and the seat on the chairs is too short, giving no thigh support at all. The room is divided from the casino with a low wall and the slot machine noise detracts from the overall classiness and comfort of the poker room.
So we decide to sit down at the .50/1 nl tables at Bill's. Mmoose can't outplay the donkey's and drops $197. The final straw was a 3way hand where Mmoose reraises a $25 flop bet allin for $53 on top with KK and gets cold called by middle donkey who calls with his Q6 flush draw or something, which obv hits. So she gives up and goes to bed. I play on because two hookers are slumming it up on my immediate right. A constant stream of drunk men swing by to say hello throughout the evening. Good times.
Later on I meet a guy from Toronto who drives out every week to play some sick 5/10 game in Belleville of all places. He had just recently bought a 2 b/r condo down the street for 90k or something because his wife was a sponsored pro. She plays every DSE and apparently shipped last Thursday's event, so I will have to look up who that was. Edit: I looked up the winners on the Venetian site and the only female who shipped anything top 5 was Sat Feb.6, so either that was her or he was full of shit.
Eventually the hookers switch tables and I decide I can't outplay the donkey's either. I laugh at some guy with a Dario Mineri type scarf who shoves $45 into a $30 pot and he gets all snooty and asks me not to count the pot. But he is so good he eventually loses all his chips so I guess he needed the help afterall. Anyways down $67 and with the hookers flirting with the other table now, I move on to craps. So obv it takes me 5 min to win $72, covering my cash game losses, and I head to bed. Mmoose tells me we won a gold medal so I take bad beat #1, when I decide to stay up and watch it and NBC doesn't replay it until 3 am.
Tues morning we check out of Bills and head next door to the Flamingo for the next 4 nights. We continue our daily pilgrimage to Terribles and collect on the $2.99 2 pancake, 2 eggs, 2 meat special. Before eating we make use of the degenerate coupons in our booklet. I win $7 on a pay $7 on any $5 even money bet coupon when I artfully select red on the roulette table but Mmoose clearly blows it by selecting black on the next spin, so we are up $2. Then I take my double pay coupon to the craps table and begin my downswing by losing $192. Mmoose is +15 using her coupon on BJ. We head for breakfast, and my craps losses make this the most expensive $2.99 breakfast ever.
We check in at the Flamingo and sit down at the cash tables to take advantage of their high hand jackpots and 8am-8pm $100 AA cracked promo, which is a big improvement over their previous $50 AA and $25 KK cracked promo, which previously only ran for a few hours each day. I cash $90 at 2-4L and Mmoose drop $69 at 1-2nl.
We head back to Terribles for the $9.99 16oz TBone special. and we use a $4 off coupon for dinner, making this our cheapest steak dinner ever. It was the best $5.99 steak dinner I ever had.
Since I have never had a steak dinner for $5.99, it was also the worst steak dinner I have ever had. Although, this record would only stand for a few days...
I was worried when the waitress, not only brought out the Terrible's steak sauce, but also Heinz 57 and A1. I never use these products but since the steak contained virtually no flavour, they knew obv what they were doing.
By the time we finish, and drive over to PH we are a bit late for the $80 Bounty tourney and get on the alternates list. I sit at 1-2nl and make a couple bucks before they decide to add a table to the tourney. 54 runners but we start 2 levels in. The structure is horrible but the play is so bad I'm sure this would be a very profitable tourney. Mmoose picks up one $25 bounty but neither of us cash. I especially get fucked over with 3 tables left when, as a decent stack I raise with J10 and flop J10x. I bet weak on the flop and the one caller insta shoves. He rolls A10 and of course the A shows right away on the turn. I'm crippled and shove QJ a couple hands later, only to be slowrolled by some ass in the sb who 'debates' for about a minute and then shows AK. I flop the Q but of course the turn brings the K. I sit back in the cash game and end up +$43 overall with the pretourney winnings until Mmoose busts shortly after. We head back to the Flamingo and wrap the night with another $28 for me at 2-4L and $155 for Mmoose at 1-2nl. Wed I plan to play the $350 DSE at the Venetian.
Early on though I raise with 99 and take a good sized 5k pot or so from him when we check the turn and I set the river and he pays my river raise.
Shortly after, still in the first level I raise with JJ and the bb calls. I flop top set because I am obv so good and c-bet. sb calls. Turn is a 4 and I check. sb bets strongly so I repop and sb shoves it in. She shows 54 for a turned bottom 2. WTF? SGHN and I have 28k and 20 min in I am clearly the chip leader.
So I decide to chill out and wander the room, go to the bathroom, find some coffee etc because I have no need to fuck around with 28k and 50/100 blinds. I come back in the 2nd level and a few players have shown up and we are 6-7 handed. Internet guy has recovered from the hit I gave him and is sitting with 15k or so and the original members of the table are all left with 3-8k ea cuz they suck. Within a few hands of sitting down I stack another player with another set.
Next hand of note, I defend my BB with QJ when an aggressive player who has constantly been open raising, open raises from the cutoff. One advantage I had at this table is as the away players showed up and the busto seats get filled from other tables is that I was in the 1 seat and the 10 seat never showed, so that was one less player attacking my blinds. But on the other hand it seemed open season on my BB because there was no-one to defend the sb. Anyways the blinds are lvl 3, 200/100 and he opens to 575. The flop is Q high and figure I am only behind to KQ, as I expect AQ would check behind so I come along when he cbets. The turn brings a flush draw for me and I check/call again. River is a nice J and I bet out, get called, and take a nice 8k or so pot.
Later after he dumps the rest of his chips to internet guy, someone mentions that he had said that I had cracked his KK. But meh whatever, I'm a luckbox. Anyways I am well over 40k and still among the chip leaders. People are still registering so the ave is still hovering just over 12k.
Next: I lose my mind and dump 25% of my stack...I typed this in the car driving from Detroit so I'll pull out my tourney notes later and clean up some of the details.
I'll side note now my comments about late players and Aria vs how the Venetian handles it. As I said before late players registering after 2 levels in the Aria tourney start with a full stack. In the DSE if you register late they deduct one set of blinds per 15 min and then the dealer releases one small blind into the pot every hand until all the deducted chips are back in play. Much fairer way to handle it IMHO.
But.....
How the fuck do you remember all this stuff?
I couldnt tell you in detail what I did this morning.
During every tourney I keep a blind schedule in my pocket and every level I write down my stack and the ave stack and any extra notes.
However the night I went to see Love was very blurry...
That's cause you are so into that pissing excellence in the morning routine. (if ya shake it more than twice you're playing with it)
Nice rough draft on the trip report Moose. Sounds like you had a very good time.
Now, as you are the resident king of finding deals...Where are you getting these coupons for seemingly anything and everything? You've got them for so many different locations, you can't just be getting them from one online site? Or can you?
(well, almost)
Vegas is the live version of online poker. Just like when you sign up at a new poker site where you get new player tournies and sign up bonuses, everytime you get a player card at a new casino in Vegas it usually comes with various new player coupons and other crap. Now all the Harrah's casinos - Ballys, Harrahs, IP, Flamingo, Rio, Paris are linked so you can get the bonuses only once. Also all the MGM casinos are linked too Monte Carlo, Mirage, MGM, Aria, Bellagio? Harrah's comps are the best because they can be used at any casino but MGM's suck because there is only one card but the comps earned can only be redeemed at the casino you earned them at. Whereas for Harrahs, all my play is on one card but for example, comps earned at Flamingo and IP are added together and can be used at the Rio, if I wanted to eat at the buffet there.
Mostly you get $5-10 free slot play but I just play them out and cash out whatever is left. Sometimes you get a even money bet pays 2 for 1 coupon good for BJ or a pass line bet at craps. At Bills, new players get a free tshirt if you earn $5 in comps in a 24hour period. Just getting the player card is worth it because they will mail you hotel promos and stuff. Of course poker players are the lowest scum of the earth so you don't get much but if you are a 65 year old slot jockey you can expect tons of free hotel rooms and stuff.
I'll get on with the TR tonight or tomorrow.
This May we'll be staying at the Venetian. Doesn't sound like it's connected to any of the networks you've mentioned. Ah well. I've already checked out their site and signed up for email/deal notifications. Thanks for the heads up.
I'll definitely check out the player cards you mentioned.
I don't feel like showing the table that I am steaming so instead of getting up I sit there and do a slow burn and watch internet guy get AA b2b and stack another player. Now he has upwards of 50k and I'm no longer have the table c/l. Fortunately it is only a few minutes before break and I manage to eliminate another small stack when my AQ makes top 2 and our table breaks with 2 min before break. I head into first break with 28.4k and ave stack only 12956.
My new table I get really lucky and I sit down as the big stack again. Also the screens show the break order and my table is not listed. This means I completely luck out and my table will not break until we are in the money. It's a huge advantage because I will only have to adjust to the one or two new players as they keep refilling our table. So break comes and I can steam off and my new table is none the wiser.
After break I keep luckboxing into sets and stacking players and by the 5th level I have built my stack over 50k with ave stack 19k. Last hand before break though, the monkey comes back and I defend my BB with my new nemesis hand, KJ. Flop comes KQx and I call the cbet. Turn is another Q and a flush draw in hearts and villian fires again and I call. On the river now villian quickly fires 12.5k and I think WTF is the overbet for and tank. Now villian starts talking smack and eventually clocks me. Monkey decides that he is bluffing a busted flush draw but monkey is disappointed to see AQ. I totally got played on the river and I'm pissed at calling off such a huge chunk of my stack. Again I steam off into the break down to 31575 and ave creeping up to 23178.
Over the next couple of levels I kind of hold my own but the ave stack keeps creeping up and I end the 7th lvl at 33100, just over ave of 31725. Lvl 8 the blinds are 100/500/1000 and I can't maintain this for long.
I should have mentioned already the players at my table. As I said I joined the table as the big stack. Most of the table was unspectacular but 3 seats to my right was a solid aggressive player who was also intent on destroying a 12 pack of bud light by dinner break at 7pm. When I first sat down there was still an away player 2 seats to my right and he showed up a hand or two after me. He had preregistered but was clearly badly hung over from the previous nights activities. He kept his head in his hands and never said a word the entire time, finally after about an hour he overshoved Q8s or something, lost and was gone, having played only one hand.
There was a constant stream of small stacks filling the two seats to my right. I met some girl from Vancouver, who was sponsored to 20k by some internet site in China. I recognized her as Canadian from her card protector.
I had seriously been considering getting one from this set myself as a card protector so I instantly recognized it. Anyways, she lasted about 1/2 an orbit and was gone too. Now a solid midstacked player took her place who had the chips to make some plays.
Next up AQ, AQ and then QQ and BOOM!
did you see the 25/50 NL Hi Low Omaha going on at the venetian? Gavin smith Joe Hachem and others. Probably 800K on the table.
Only problem is her sense of direction is brutal so I walk her all the way back to the elevators and figure that's good enough. Wrong. 20 min later she comes back and says she can't find the car and that she is going to take a cab back to the hotel, which is completely stupid. So I sit out and RUN to the parking garage. We both thought the car was on the fifth floor. Just to be safe I start on the 4th. Nope. 5th nope. 6th nope. Now I actually believe the car is stolen. Reminder - I am sprinting btwn floors, not bothering for the elevator and running for where I think the car is, turning around and sprinting for the next level. 7th level - there is the car. Fuck me. I run back and toss mmoose the keys and this time I wait for the elevator because I'm not running back down all those flights of stairs. There must have been some big hands while I am gone, because I miss less than an orbit. But now I am sadly in need of some serious Fiji water.
Anyways it's 8th level 100/500/1000 and I start to pick up some hands. I've been playing with mostly the same people for several hours now. I had bud light, who was getting very hammered two seats to my right and a fairly solid-midstacked player on my immediate right. Bud light had been pretty liberal with his raises and he open raises once again and midstack calls. I have AQ and decide to flat and see a flop. 3 handed the flop gets checked around and I fire in pos and everyone folds. Pretty much std play for bud light.
Next hand, midstack open raises and I have AQ again and decide it's time to repop. Only midstack instashoves on me and I fold. Shortly after bud light open raises again and I repop with a small pp 95% of the time he obv has pure crap and of course he shoves it in. Our stacks are fairly even and I decide to fold again. From this point on in the tourney, no-one really challenges budlight and he liberally open raises for the rest of the tourney, constantly building his stack, and he basically cruises to among the chip leaders. It is essentially the last time I saw him put his entire stack at risk. Anyways now my stack is getting low and I finally have fallen below ave stack for the first time in the tourney.
Still in the 8th level, midstack open raises and I rr with QQ. He shoves on me again and now has me covered. I comptemplate how cold decked it would be if he has AA or KK but I can't wait any longer and call. He rolls AK and QQ holds and I cripple him. I had been playing over 6 hours and this was the first time my entire stack was at risk. I end the level at exactly 45k and ave has crept up to 36783.
Soon after the crippled guy is gone and another midstack takes his place. I chip up a bit attacking shorter stacks and end lvl 9 with 53.8k, ave 47439.
10th lvl 200/800/1600 a huge hand occurs. UTG, a short stack shoves, UTG+1, the new midstack instashoves, I look down at KK and reshove. UTG+3 comtemplates and folds. Button tanks for a long time. Shows his hand to the rest of the table and folds. BB thinks briefly but also mucks. So it is a 3 way allin. Now the dealer opens the exposed hand, and button had folded AKs. BB (budlight) says 'No way'. He had folded AK and UTG+3 says he folded AJ. Anyways all my outs are gone, UTG 99 and UTG+1, JJ. The no-out KK holds and I rake a monster pot and eliminate both players. I end up with $112,300 and I'm back among the chip leaders. But how sweet it would have been if button had come along. I head into dinner break with $111,500 and ave is $62667. I meet up with Wes and we go eat at the noodle house, right by the poker room. Great meal and not a bad price for about $13.
Also at this point I should mention that I don't see the FullTilt internet guy that I had been playing with on my first table, again, so I assume at some point he must have blown his stack.
So we resume play just after 8 pm. Once again, as in the Aria tourney, the dinner break kills me and I go completely card dead. I literally play 4 hands until the bubble breaks. Bud light, who was completely drunk at dinner break seems to have sobered up and an extremely good player has moved in beside him. Between those two players I manage to find 2 hands with which I can steal the blinds, and two more hands worthwhile to seeing a flop with and of course hit nothing. 12th lvl ends with me getting blinded away to $90300, but ave has crept up to 84600 and lvl 13 is going to 400/1500/3000. So at the 12th lvl break I wander around and look at the stacks. Top 46 pay, and there are 56 left and a lot of short stacks. The 13th lvl is a sick sort of fun because I literally get nothing worth even attempting to play and they are the easiest folds of my life.
Finally in the 13th lvl, a short stack at my table shoves 1010 and of course bud light holds AA. He has something like 250k now and the very strong player beside him has about the same. I am all the way down to 55k. We redraw seats and form 5 - 9 handed tables. I start to pick up hands again and steal a few. 12:30am and I am actually putting my entire stack in for only the second time in the tourney. Then UTG raises and I find JJ in mid-position. My M is still over 20 but not much room for reraising and I hate flat calling in mid-pos with no idea what is going to happen behind me. I really know nothing about the new players at my table. The only person that comes with me from my old table is the really solid player who was beside bud light and he is on my immediate left now. I decide I will have lots of opportunities to keep stealing and after about 5 sec of contemplation, I muck. You can rip on me for that fold if you want, but I didn't know the player, he was raising UTG, I didn't think I could get him to fold and I didn't feel like sticking a M20 stack in from mid-pos. Anyways I guess UTG could sense my dilemma, even though I really didn't think long and he flashed AK. I end lvl 13 at 66400 but ave is now 101520. Still have time though, lvl 14 is 500/2000/4000, but not much time.
Shortly after that I open raise with 88 and the solid player right beside me reraises. It seemed funny to me, especially after all the hands we had together at the other table and I muck. He flashes AA. Unfortunately now I am in push/fold mode. I take a few more hands but with 43k left and blinds going to 500/3000/6000 in under 2 min, I shove A10 into AK and IGHN. It's almost 1 am and I have been playing for 13 hours. 423 runners and I cash 30th place for $747. The really solid player beside me is the one who ends up taking it down the following day.
I'm famous now.
Robert Schaaf - Poker Player Profile
My winnings and registration card.
The winnings:
This one kind of shows the chip molds a bit better:
When you register you can choose from a hat, a t-shirt, a bag, a card protector or a $10 food comp. I diddn't really need any of those, so I went with the card protector and kept some chips to frame up.
I'm hungry and it's after midnight so I stop for the Midnight $5.99 ribeye and eggs special at the Flamingo. Now I have had the worst steak ever for $5.99. Ok it's just the worst steak ever, and it breaks the record set for me only a couple days ago at Terribles. The eggs and hash browns aren't bad though and meat is meat at 1 am, so I belch and move on to bed.
So on Wed I couldn't decide what I wanted for my free gift and they close up after 2:15, when registration closes. So Thurs morning we go to Denny's for breakfast to use a $5 gift card we got on our last trip. Only 4x as expensive as Terribles and not nearly as good. Then we walked over to Tix4Tonight and bought Love tix. Then mmoose dropped me off at the Venetian and I redeemed my ticket for the card protector. After dinner the night before, unfortunately, I could not find Wes at all. I walked over to the Mirage to exchange my vouchers for seats to the show and then walked to Caesar's.
On the way through the Caesar's shops, I passed Pete Rose signing autographs at some memorabilia store. He looked extremely pathetic. Not one person was interested in autographs and he sat there in a completely empty store. Anyways I had planned to play the Caesar's noon tourney but by the time I got through the line-up at the Mirage and got to Caesar's they were already in the 3rd level and I decided against it. Now you may also wonder why I was playing a lot of 2-4 limit at Flamingo - it was basically because I was chip hunting for myself. The Flamingo had brought out new racks about a week before and as I played I was sorting through the chips and finding all the new ones. After every sesssion I would take a couple racks up stairs to my room, take out any new ones that had any small chips in them and then return the ones I didn't want back to the cashier.
So at Caesar's, another chip nut had asked me to pick him up two racks of $2 chips. So I got 3.5 racks worth from the cashier and sat at an empty poker table and started to sort through them. After about 1.5 hours and about 10 racks worth of chips, I decided I wasn't going to get anymore decent chips, picked up my two racks and walked out.
Anyways these are the chips I collected:
He has been there EVERYTIME I've been in Vegas when I passed by the store.
I ended up going to the Nelly performance at TAO on the Thursday night you cashed (hotel guest with a VIP card I got the night before got me in for $10). Friday I ended up just playing 2/5NL (dropped about 10BB, no interesting hands really) at Venetian to check out the ruckus that was the NAPT and got a bracelet to the NAPT Opening Party at TAO hosted by Slash.
I'll pick up that $8 chip from the Wynn from you when I get back into the country in mid-March.
Not a lot of hooker n blow detail though...
We headed to Ellis Island for the $5.99 1/2 chicken and 1/2 rack of ribs. We arrived to find a huge crowd around the craps table and mmoose got us on the wait list while I bought into the game. Some lady was on a really hot streak and at only 2x times odds I got there in time to make $49. Woot. Free dinner and my horrible craps streak had come to an end. The lady sevened out and everyone ran to the cage to cash out. It was crazy how fast the table actually emptied. We went over to the host and begged him to seat us next for dinner because we had to make the Love show. He kindly bumped us up and I think we slipped him a fiver for his troubles. Dinner was awesome as usual and I ordered another beer, which in retrospect probably wasn't the greatest idea. We raced over to the Mirage and got there 15 minutes late. Fortunately they still seated us. It was a good thing I was completely hammered because I can't think of any other way to enjoy the show. Basically take every Beatles song where you would think to yourself 'WTF was John and Paul thinking?' and this was a visual explanation for that song. Hammered, it kind of made sense. The music was good and the entertainment factor was good but that was all. It really wasn't a circus at all just basically the performers in weird costumes dancing around or floating through the air. I figure it is where they stick all their performers who are injured and can't do their circus act anymore. I guess I can say I found a Cirque show worse than Ka now. Anyways I kind of pass out for part of the show because it is so boring and come to for the end. 1:45 min show and we missed 15 min of it so pretty much not worth it.
We head for the hotel and crash with 2 days left in our trip.
The next day we get up at 8 am and rush down to the poker room to register for the $2k freeroll, then go back up to our room, shower and get back for the 9 am start. Maybe 65 runners or so. For $5 you get a $1k dealer addon, that doubles your chips. The blinds are 15 min I think and basically the goal is to get the thing wrapped in 2-2.5 hours. It's mostly push fold poker and mmoose busts after an hour or so and I play on. With 4.5k left and blinds 1000/2000 we get to the final two tables. Essentially at this point, the common thing to do is chop for $100. It looks like everyone is into this idea, so I make my favourite chip aquisition of the entire trip. I take advantage of all the clapping and cheering and I steal a T500 chip from my stack and put it into my pocket. Only problem is now one guy decides he doesn't want to chop. He is such a dick, he isn't even the chip leader at our table, never mind the tourney. So now I have basically screwed myself because I may need that chip and there is no way I can pull the chip out of my pocket and put it back into my stack. Fortunately we play one hand, two guys bust and they give the POS who didn't want to chop and the chip leader at the other table $150 and everyone else $100. I tip another $5 for the dealers and I'm up $90.
These are the chips I scored on my trip. Check out the Flamingo chip in the bottom left.
We head back to the Venetian to try and find Wes, but no luck so we pick up vouchers for the Todai sushi buffet from Tix4Tonight and have sushi essentially for breakfast. From there we drive to Boulder City to go see the Hoover dam.
Ever since 9/11 tour buses and transport trucks have been banned from driving over the dam for fear of a large bomb. Also it is only a 2 lane highway and with all the traffic and pedestrians touring the dam, crossing from one side to the other, it gets really backed up. So they are building a completely new bridge over the gorge. It will be finished in Nov 2010 and is the world's highest of its' type or something. Just wish I could have seen it before they completed the arch. That would have been pretty cool. They are actually using the original cableway used to construct the dam in 1930, to build the bridge. It is the oldest and largest operating cableway in the world.
Hey. It's the dam. Not too much traffic on this side but if you look carefully you will see the Az traffic backed all the way up the hill.
The bridge and the cableway. The hydro tower looks funny but it has to run down the gorge to the power station. There is a smaller cableway in the foreground. The cableway I'm talking about is right over the centre of the arch.
The previous picture didn't look too bad but in this picture you get a bit of a feel for how high this bridge is.