Wednesday, July 07, 2010
Three's Company (Saturday recap)
NEWS BULLETIN......................
ROBINSONVILLE, MISSISSIPPI.........
26 JUNE 2010 (SATURDAY)............
20:00 GMT..........................
"I'm not playing for the thrill of fucking victory here. I owe rent. Alimony. Child support. I play for money. My kids eat. I got stones enough not to chase cards, action... or fucking pipe dreams of winning the World Series on ESPN."
-Joey Knish, Rounders
My session on Saturday could be summed up by Joey Knish's words; I played for the better part of the night stuck $80, without gaining or losing much - but it was a fun ride...
I woke up around 2:30 to the sound of the Brazil-Portugal World Cup game. I was slightly interested, but not interested enough to lift up my head and see what the score was. Natrone had already been up and about and so we decided to saddle up and go check on how he was doing. I hit the bathroom, ready for the patented Sam's Town soft water shower and then we left room 3016, headed for the Poker Room.
Nate was already sitting $1/$3 and was doing pretty well at the moment; I think he was already up $500 or $600. He said he'd already eaten so we headed downstairs at about 3:35 and found out the bad news - the buffet closes from 3:30-4:00 to set up the dinner spread. A minor inconvenience, because that just meant that we hit the Snack Shop for another tuna sandwich. In the meantime, Tommy cashed in his free table play chips and won $25 at the dice table, then we hit the poker room at about 4:00. (I eventually did the same with mine but crapped out and lost it all.)
Outside the poker room I talked to Standard Irish Guy for a while (not Crazy Meth Irish Guy) and told him about our encounter with CIMG from the night before - he got a kick out of it to say the least. By this time my seat was ready so I sat down at seat #2. I noticed that Youth Medium's fiancee was at the table and so was holding out for a repeat appearance - and sure enough, a little while later YM showed up at our table, taking the newly vacated #3 seat.
At this time I've got to bring up "Coach" - he is a retired high school coach on vacation with his wife, and they hail from northeast Ohio. He played with us quite a bit over the weekend and was a pretty good time. BIG Cavs fan. (According to Nate, at one point Coach said, "If Lebron leaves town, he can suck my dick.") On another occasion, someone asked him what he coached and he started rattling off sports: "volleyball, track, basketball, tennis," and Tommy immediately fired off the gem, "Any boys sports?" Coach took it pretty well ("I said basketball", he responded) and I thought it was excellent mouthing. Also, Coach was definitely around for YM's show on Friday, and apparently I made it clear to Coach that I was a fan because when YM sat down next to me, Coach (in seat #9) stared straight at me and just started laughing. At one point, he walked by and whispered to me, "Just look STRAIGHT AHEAD, you're going to strain your neck!" I'm pretty sure he mentioned it to his wife as well, because they both seemed to be getting a kick out of it.
YM was a little less salacious on Saturday, but she was still bringing a lot to the table. Literally. So I felt like I was already running pretty good.... For the time being. It was fun shooting the breeze with YM and Rusty (seat #4) although I don't really remember playing a hand for a while. (Or maybe even at all - I'll have to consult with the Tough Man.) Of course, nothing lasts forever, and it came to an end when YM got stacked (technically, I suppose she was already stacked when she showed up at the table) and took off. It was too bad to see her go because she was a pretty nice gal. (And as TGTT would remind you, she was REALLY smart.) Suddenly, I felt an alarm bell go off in my head as they pulled away the chair for seat #3, because I knew who was coming up next - that's right, Wheelchair Bob was moving over to our table into the newly vacated seat. That's an enormous difference. Huge. It's like trading in a new Bentley Phantom for a rusted-out powder blue 1984 Chevette.
Before long, we had ourselves an exciting hand between Bob and Dave (who I was irritated with because he's the guy who ran YM off). On a board of 2c-3h-6h, Dave bet out $7. Bob raised to $15. Then Dave re-raised to $52. Bob made it $152, and then (finally) Dave shoved all-in for another $300 or so. They showed their hands - Bob had a set of deuces, and Dave had the 4-5 of hearts. Then the turn came down the 7 of hearts! Dave's got a straight flush, so we were waiting on the river - another 2 would hit the bad beat. The river was another seven, making Bob the loser with deuces full. I was pulling to hit the bad beat at first, but after thinking about it a while I figured that Bob runs good enough that he didn't need that bad beat. (After all, this is a guy who on Thursday night won 2 straight "high hand of the hour" prizes and then had the gall to complain that he was card dead!)
Bob then started his pouting routine and lost another hand, after which he for some reason blamed Emmer and started doing little spin moves in his chair and backed away from the table - basically, he was acting like a spoiled 6-year-old kid. (Only the kid in question is a retard who doesn't understand that the dealer doesn't pick out what cards you get.) Once again I cursed the universe for making me trade down from YM for fucking Bob. Luckily, he asked for a table change after his run of bad beats so I didn't have to put up with him much longer. As an added bonus, Preston had sat down in seat #4 and started fucking with Bob's chip stack just to amuse himself, which I very much enjoyed.
During this time span, Nate coined the term "confused irritated" when I told Tommy that I was behind him in flopping sets. I was going to clarify my statement; basically, it was my contention that I was well ahead of TGTT in the raw number of sets missed, although my pct success was still much higher. But after I made that statement, I could see the rapid progression of emotions - first confusion, followed quickly by anger and exasperation. I didn't want to ruin it so I just shut up, and Nate started laughing because Tommy had achieved a new kind of mad. I'm glad I was able to be a part of it. (I will admit that my initial phrasing was pretty retarded, and under normal circumstances I would have attempted to clarify - but this was solid gold so I let it go.) In related news, Tommy was mean to someone at the table - he barked at Rusty that the action wasn't yet to him after Rusty asked if he could raise. Not a major blowup, but it was nice to see that the name "Tough Man" still has meaning.
Meanwhile, YM returned - but not to sit at the table; she took a seat behind her fiancee in seat #10 (next to Coach and his wife). Coach and his wife started chatting up YM and #10, and I think at one point Coach got in a mention of how her talents were appreciated by yours truly. At least I'd like to think that's what Coach was up to - he seemed to have a pretty good sense of humor. TGTT was a little closer so maybe he's got some insight as well. At around 11PM, they took off and the table got a little less interesting.
I feel like I owe Harness an apology for not making any YM-related inappropriate comments, but that's not really my game. I'm sure that the Driver could have filled in admirably. Either that, or we'll have to make sure that Harness goes on the next trip - I know that Harness enjoys a good inappropriate comment or two. (Or three.) This is especially crucial if Driver is done with Tunica for good. I can't figure out if it's one of us that Driver doesn't like, or if it's Sam's Town itself he has the problem with.
Ho-hum... Back to grinding it out on my leather ass. (It's noble work I do.) In order to break the monotony, I went with the old standby: ask for some olives and then chew on the toothpick that accompanies said olives. Our waitress Donna really got the job done, though, as she returned with an entire glass full of olives - it was a nice little switch-up, and I got the toothpick I was looking for. I also killed another mosquito at the table, bringing my total for the trip to 3. (The first one I killed was Thursday night, which made it look like I had popped a ketchup packed in my hands - gross. I went over to the wall-mounted Purell dispenser and practically took a bath in Purell after that one.) Tommy tried to contribute as well, as he grabbed a mosquito (in-flight!) on Thursday night. Unfortunately, he lacked the requisite grip strength to kill the bug, and when he opened his fist it simply flew away. (That's not very tough.)
1:50AM - NEWSFLASH: I am back to even! It took 10 hours to get that way, but it was good to climb back to $0.
Around that time we had a new arrival show up in a shirt & tie - apparently he was a Security Consultant of some sort. He started talking up the idea of taking shots, which I thought was awful at first but I slowly came around to. He rounded up some support and by 3AM I found myself taking a shot of Crown, chilled. Then another. And then one more for good measure. I started feeling it after the 2nd one and I was actually up a bit more by this point. Tommy, Mr. Security, and Joe were throwing out bunches of chips and I was staying at the edges for the most part, but it was pretty entertaining. Eventually, Mr. Security took off and went to play video poker because he had dump-trucked a ton of chips, $100 at a time.
While we were still playing, Steve (the floor) headed over and pointed out a "Horseshoe Hooker" walking by. His comment was, "Man, I feel bad for her if she needs to resort to Sam's Town to try to drum up some action." I was pretty sure she was heading over to Mr. Security - he was 100% the most obvious mark in the casino at that time of night. TGTT was a little upset because he missed her, but I think he was busy scaring up big pots and didn't hear the conversation that Steve and I were having.
For some reason I was playing tight - at one point I remember flashing my hand (J-9 off) to Steve before I folded preflop and he said, "Aren't you supposed to play that hand after taking 3 shots of whiskey?" I think he is 100% correct but for some reason I wasn't anywhere near "Action Player" mode.
I had another famous Mundo "Attempted Joke" failure - Steve was in the back room and the desk phone started ringing. When he walked by the table, it was clear he hadn't heard it so Eric the dealer said, "Phone's ringing, Steve." I immediately replied, "Thank you, Donny" and received CRICKETS - I had to figure there would be at least one person who'd seen "The Big Lebowski" but I was (as usual) completely wrong and basically ruined the opportunity. I felt like Bruno Kirby in "Good Morning Vietnam": "Sir, I know in my heart that I am funny." Too bad nobody else agrees...
*** 4AM *** Tommy flopped a set of Aces! (Reset the googolplex counter again, Tough Man.)
The game broke up around 5:30-6:00AM and so we cashed out - I was up $192, which is pretty sweet. We headed down to the Snack Shop and apparently Tommy ran into Mr. Security. It had come up that TGTT was a Steelworker and that must have made him an attractive target, because Mr. S approached him and out of nowhere asked TGTT, "Do you like Xanax?" That's a weird offer if you ask me - who the hell needs Xanax at 6AM after drinking for 14 straight hours?
We got our Tuna sandwiches (the Snack Shop gals gave Tommy a hard time for not using the name "Michael" - well played, ladies) and then took another lap to see if the Horseshoe refugee was anywhere to be found, but alas she wasn't. We headed back up to the room (the STILL NOT 60 DEGREE room) and hit the sack.
We woke up right at checkout time - and headed back down to the Snack Shop with Tron for the getaway meal before the long drive home. I must say that getting 5 hours of sleep before driving home made the trip much easier - at no point did I feel like firing a GPS unit into the floorboard, which is good.
Once we were headed back to Hawesville from Owensboro, we had a nice capper on the entire trip - as we passed a red convertible with its top down, the grey-haired lady in the passenger seat suddenly tipped up a can of Miller Lite and took a big drink from it. If that image doesn't sum up our trip, then I don't know what does.
Maybe next time we can recruit some other folks to tag along, but I think that Nate, Tommy, and I have shown that we can handle our respective rigs pretty well down in Robinsonville, Mississippi!
Next up - St. Louis in September, when Driver, TGTT, Nate, Snatch, and Brian will be along for the ride as we hit up the Leftfield Landing and also Lumiere Place! I think we should call Busch Stadium and tell them that they need to start making the hot dogs right now!
Friday, July 02, 2010
Three's Company (Friday recap)
NEWS BULLETIN......................
ROBINSONVILLE, MISSISSIPPI.........
25 JUNE 2010 (FRIDAY)..............
18:00 GMT..........................
I woke up as Nate arrived to our room on Friday around 11 and there was only one problem: our room had not cooled down to the 60 degree target that the Tough Man and I had set (bad beat). TGTT jumped in the shower and then we headed down to the buffet.
After we ate, we were able to get seats right as they opened a new 1/3NL game - I ran back to the room to take a quick shower and shave. That's right - shave. Oh, have I forgotten to mention that I pulled in to Tunica with a beard and moustache? After attending the TC wedding reception at the end of May, I didn't shave for a month and the stealth facial hair was in full effect. FULL effect. When I got back to the table, Tommy asked, "What the hell took so long - did you have to shave?" I told him that I had indeed taken the time to do so. Of course, hours later he looked over at me with a surprised expression and said, "Wait a minute - you DID shave, didn't you?" Apparently, he was only joking at first - and it took him HOURS to be able to tell the difference between clean-shaven and a month's worth of growth.
While I was in the room, Tron sent me a text that said, "You have to check out this guy with a Rebel Yell shirt on at our table." What he didn't realize at the time is that it WAS Tiny Yell! And what's more, I thought I saw Mrs. Yell at the table, too! (Unfortunately, my initial call on Mrs. Yell was incorrect - I blame my initial shock from seeing the little fella at our table for my mistake.) Tiny Yell was true to himself - a rebel all the way. With cutoff sleeves and a reckless, never-say-die attitude, he basically played every pot until he stacked himself. I've got to say it was good to see the fella. It was hard to see him over the table, but it brought back good memories nonetheless.
After having a few Miller Lites, I wasn't feeling in the zone so I switched it up to Bud Light Lime at 2:15. This was a good move, and not only for the change of drink - I now believe that the less popular beers are the way to go at Sampson. Why? Since they are less frequently ordered, each one you get is colder (on average) than one of the more popular choices. (I'm open for discussion on this tactic but it worked wonders for me on Friday.) Meanwhile, Nate was busy complaining that the glass his Coke was served in was too big. (Read that last sentence again.)
A little later on, I started running good - a "smart" girl (according to Tommy) arrived at the table, wearing what appeared to be a Youth Medium shirt that left little (very little) to the imagination. And by TGTT's scale, Youth Medium must have been a member of Mensa. We're talking "replacement for Marilyn vos Savant" level here. YM's fiancee was sitting in Seat 10, which we knew ahead of time because she'd been over to talk with him on a few occasions; that knowledge prevented any awkward comments from being made. I was camped out in Seat 1, with Nate in 4 and Tommy in 5. The new arrival took Seat 6, which meant I had quite a stunning view. (Wardrobe-wise, I'm talking about something in the ballpark of this - and I think the picture is a lot less revealing than what YM was sporting. I'd like to get Tron and TGTT to weigh in, but I think this is accurate.)
This was, of course, a noteworthy event so I made the appropriate entry in the logbook (as noted): "Next to Tommy, youth med shirt - Calvary & Densch." That's right, the Zags were present. Just to further emphasize how I was running, I was dealt pocket 10's and then flopped quads just a short while later. (Disclaimer: I'm not 100% sure on most of my hands during this period because I was distracted.) When I made another note of it, YM said something to TGTT which I think was to the effect, "Why is that weird guy writing shit down?" He explained about the blog, but I got a kick out of it because as luck would have it I was just adding the additional note about the extreme degree to which YM's shirt was low-cut.
After the shift change, Justina was our waitress and stopped by the table. She was doing a fine job considering she appears to be about 7 months pregnant (I asked Brian if he was passing out cigars but he quickly shut that down). Brandi the dealer was also working that shift, but she never dealt at our table. Hell, maybe she did - it's sort of a blur at this point. (Although I do believe that I saw Johnny Appleseed wandering around the poker room.)
I hadn't played very well in this session (I wonder why) - and even when I made a hand I couldn't get paid; I think I raked about $20 on my quad 10s. I wasn't really running bad or anything, just a slow burn - and I was in the game for about $700 (and only had around $300 in front of me). I was dealt 7-7 in middle position, made it $15 to go, and got 2 callers (Nate called from the button). The flop: 7-4-2 rainbow (I can feel Tommy's anger just reading that part) and so I bet out $20 with my top set - both guys called. The turn was an 8 and I bet out $92, thinking I'd win the pot right there. The old guy in seat 2 folded and then Nate made it $200 to go. I went all-in for about $90 more and showed my set of 7's. Nate showed... pocket deuces. That's pretty gross. It was what I needed to get back even for the day, so I gladly took it.
By this time I was able to pay a little more attention because YM and her +1 had taken off. In his place was an Irish guy, probably in his late 50's, on vacation from the Emerald Isle - he was a pretty nice guy as well. At one point I bet $35 into him and he said, "that's my age," to which I replied, "If I'd known you were 35, I would have bet $36!" He laughed and thanked me for my generosity, then folded. (This doesn't have much relevance, but I've got a callback to the Irish guy later on in this post and wanted to mention his presence.)
Fast-forward to 2AM: TOMMY FLOPS A SET! Well, not really - he had pocket 8's, folded on the flop, and then his 3rd 8 showed up on the river. After that he claimed he was "getting closer" because of the phantom set's late appearance.
Fast-forward to 3AM: TOMMY FLOPS A SET! This time it's not a bluff; he really did flop a set of sevens after only 22 hours of playing. I think he may have won enough to cover the rake and dealer tip on the hand, but I didn't note the exact amount.
Now it's 4AM and I switch over to Scotch. We have a new arrival at the table, a guy who I immediately dub "Crazy Meth Guy" for pretty obvious reasons. Tommy tells me the guy is Irish and for some reason I angrily disagree. (I'm not sure why that would have made me mad; maybe it had something to do with the 16 straight hours of drinking.) CMG is basically the white, meth-using, non-effeminate, possibly Irish version of "Crazy Indian Guy" from a few trips back. At one point another crazy guy (garden-variety crazy, so no special nickname for him other than "St Louis" because he was wearing a Cards shirt) open-shoved for $100 preflop, and CMG snap-called him with K-J. Turns out the other guy had K-Q and it held up. Pretty silly action - of course, St Louis dumped his stack quickly and took off. CMG was all over the place; miscalling his hand during all-ins and generally not making sense. Once on the turn I had A-J against his A-5 on a board of A-9-5-2 and after both our hands were face up, he asked if I had the straight. Then he acted like he was losing the hand - but I couldn't quite tell if he was simply a retarded guy, or if he was just trying to act like a retarded guy. Either way, he succeded in convincing me that he was retarded.
Tommy had A-K and shoved his stack against CMG preflop, who again snap-called. Of course, since Tommy runs BAD, this time CMG had Q-Q. Just kidding about that running bad part; TGTT hit a King and stacked CMG, who took off for the ATM (again) - but not before calling the Tough Man a donkey. Very entertaining.
The game cracked up at around 6AM (I think) and Tommy and I hit the Snack Shop again. Detroit wasn't down there, but soon enough CMG stopped by and started talking to us. Turns out, the guy actually DID hail from Ireland - TGTT was right! I'll update the nickname to Crazy Irish Meth Guy going forward. (I'm still not sure why that made me mad.) CIMG's head was filled with crazy paranoid scenarios in which everyone at the table was working partners except for me and Tommy. This included the guy from Ireland on vacation BY HIMSELF, who didn't know anyone else at the table. "He was talking to the guy next to him," said CIMG. Apparently that means they were on the job or something - I tried to let him know that, um, SOMETIMES PEOPLE TALK TO STRANGERS, but he ignored that and it seemed like he was trying to figure out whether:
(a)I was telling him that because I WAS IN ON IT ALSO, or
(b)I was naive enough to believe that the Irish guy was actually on his own
Then CIMG mentioned something about the cage not being open until 8AM so he didn't have any comps - yeah, that makes zero sense. It did result with TGTT buying the guy breakfast, though. I think Tommy did it in the hopes that food might send CIMG away, which it did. Eventually. But NOT before CIMG starts talking about how we are good players and if we EVER want a game in Atlanta, to give him a call. I'm looking at his phone number right now and so if I'm ever in Atlanta, I'll make sure to.... NEVER EVER CALL THAT NUMBER. Shit, I think if we'd show up for a poker game, we'd probably end up in a re-enactment of the last 40 minutes of "Hostel" or something. No thank you, Crazy Irish Meth Guy. No, thank you.
Stay tuned for a Saturday update - Wheelchair Bob, Coach, Pest Control, and Xanax solicitation!
Thursday, July 01, 2010
Three's Company (Thursday recap)
NEWS BULLETIN......................
TELL CITY, INDIANA.................
24 JUNE 2010 (THURSDAY)............
16:10 GMT..........................
Glad to see my login info still works for And Biscuit - hopefully you all haven't been too bored in the interim.
Once again we were ready for another voyage to Tunica, but this time we were down a man - Frodaddy had some home improving to do so was on the NDL (non-driving list). Natrone stepped in to handle the driving duties, and TGTT pinch-hit by making his own version of the patented Snack Pack for the car ride. As for me, I really didn't do much of anything to help out other than bring my 25-year-old Trivial Pursuit sports cards (early indication of running good - the first question was "What is the nickname of Purdue's football team?").
I showed the Tough Man my logbook as we left his house on Thursday and he asked, "Why are you bringing that - so you can take notes and then not blog about it?"
That's some quality mouthing to start the trip, but I regret to inform tgtt that he was misinformed. I feel it's my duty to inform Driver (and Harness, too!) about our latest trip to Sam's Town. I only wish I hadn't run out of space in my Imperial Palace "Notes" book, but I am making do with a standard notepad until I get back to Vegas and claim another.
Our drive down took a little longer than expected because of some phantom road construction - we were backed up for around 30-45 minutes because of a one-lane road that never passed any type of construction. Also, Tron was denied a rest area pit-stop because the Tennessee welcome center was once again closed, and ended up waiting another hour before finding another blue "REST AREA" sign. (This was not the first inconvenience Nate faced on Thursday afternoon.)
The drive through Memphis was pretty normal (including the standard driveby of "It's All Good" Auto Sales) until we saw quite a sight: a black SUV that was flat-out full of Steelers bling. It had Steeler rims, a Steeler paint job, and even a game photo of Hines Ward tinting the windows. The Tough Man made sure to get some pictures to show Eric the dealer who as we all know is a big Steelers fan. My theory is that Roethlisberger was in town, and the tinted windows were to prevent any potential witnesses from seeing what was happening in the interior of the vehicle.
Finally we rolled in to town (around 5PM) and got our room assignments - TGTT snagged 3016, which was a straight shot to the poker room. Tron was a little farther away but still in a decent location. We headed down to the Snack Shop to grab a quick bite (Tuna sandwich ftw) and then went upstairs to grab our seats. Tron had an early couple of bad beats: first he found out he had z-e-r-o comps, and then when he ordered his patented breakfast sandwich, they forgot the "sandwich" part and just threw him some ham and eggs on a plate.
We got seats to a $1/$3 game and early on, I flopped a set of 5's and won a small pot, then I flopped the nut flush with Ad-10d and held off Tron. That was it for me for quite a while as I stayed pretty close to the +75 range. Nate was another story - his stack was bouncing around and in the first 45 minutes went from $300 down to $125 and then back up to $600. From that point on most of the action centered on Nate and I competing to get the most "Sam's Town 250" commemorative $5 chips.
We settled in to a normal rhythm, drinking some free beers (and sending proof to the Drivetrain) until we hit a dry spell. I mean "dry" as in "no beers forthcoming"; after waiting for a while, we were getting impatient. Luckily for me, the Tough Man is a "beer magician" - when he went up to get a round from the bar, our waitress magically appeared from nowhere, and so we had 2 rapid-fire Miller Lites to take care of. (David Blaine had better watch out.) The biggest entertainment of the evening just might have been watching Brian get pumped up about his South Carolina Gamecocks, who were in the process of winning a 12-inning game in the College World Series.
At one point Tommy demonstrated how he runs good - he raised to $15 with A-4 and I popped it to $40 with K-K. Tommy decided to take a look, so we were heads up for the flop - a flop that (of course) came down A-A-4. Whoops! Hey, at least it wasn't A-A-K, because given my history flopping boats against Tommy, I'm sure a 4 would have showed up on the turn and busted me. Of course, he was still irritated that out of the googol pocket pairs he was dealt, he flopped exactly zero sets.
The game actually broke up around 2:30 - I was up $100 so I felt OK about the session, but that's a little too early for my liking. We headed down to the Snack Shop and ran into a familiar face working there - the gal from Detroit who (thanks to Driver) recognized me and asked if I was still "scared". I loudly protested her claim but she was having none of it - I think that Tommy and Nate enjoyed the show.
After that little detour we decided, "Hey, we haven't shredded any money yet tonight - why not throw it away at a dice table?" The idea was not well thought out and I dropped 3 bills in what felt like 40 seconds - so I went from up on the day to down $200. Nicely done, Mike.
Coming soon: Friday's recap! Potential highlights:
- Casey Calvary and Axel Densch
- Tommy flops a set???
- One in the oven
- Irish influences
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Vegas - Once More Unto The Breach
Monday. High noon in Vegas. I woke up and checked out the alarm clock in my hotel room, saw the "12" in red LEDs, and immediately knew that it meant PM; I was already better off than the last time I'd woken up.
Buoyed by the good read I'd put on the clock, I jumped in the shower and went over the gameplan - Natrone and I were going to watch the MNF Packers @ Vikings game at the Caesar's sportsbook, which started at 5:15 local time, so I had a few hours to kill before meeting up with the newlywed.
First things first, I went in search of some lunch - I decided to go ahead and start the walk over to Caesar's and then figure out what to get. I stopped off at the Planet Hollywood (salmon ftw) in the Forum Shops because I figured that lunch at Spago would end up making the homebound set a bit jealous. There were about 4 couples from Long Island at the bar who were pretty entertaining and looked to be on their way to a pretty good day of boozing. Coincidentally (or not), I had a similar plan.
By this time it was around 3:00 so I figured I would slide on in to a NL game over in the Caesar's poker room (just outside the sportsbook) and wait until it was time to meet up with Nate. For reasons I'm not entirely sure of, I bought for $200 (the game was a 1/3NL with a cap of $500) and sat down. Most of the players at my table had between $100-$300, and a couple of stacks were in the neighborhood of $500, so I didn't feel too short. I sat down just past the button and folded my garbage until I was the big blind and woke up with rockets. UTG+2 made it $15 to go and got no callers; I popped to $45. He made it $100 flat and I went all-in (he had about $215 total) hoping that he didn't have the other 2 aces. Nope - it was K-K and the board brought nothing of interest, so my $200 magically grew to $400.
After that good fortune my cards dried up, but I had a good time priming the pump with a few Coronas (yes, Driver - with lime) and shooting the breeze with the Jerseyite next to me. At one point he flagged down the cigar/cigarette/flower chick and handed her some chips to buy a rose, then told her to give it to his wife (sitting at a different table). He watched as she walked across the poker room and then gave the rose to the wrong woman! I looked at the guy after he said something and noted, "Now THAT is a bad beat; let's just hope your wife wasn't watching that!" Luckily for him, she was none the wiser and I was spared any confrontation. In any case, he decided it would be funny to tell our waitress that I'm an alcoholic during her next visit. I gotta admit, he really sold it and she was sort of speechless. He must have felt bad because he started laughing and said, "Nah, he's got a problem - it just hasn't been diagnosed yet, honey!" Jesus Christ - thanks a pantload, Jersey. I would have been a bit worried if I didn't have to leave soon anyway.
As game time drew near, I was still just above $400 so I racked out and went out to the sportsbook floor to meet up with Nate. (I also jumped on the first half over (23.5) and the Pack -4 for the game, at 50 each.) It turns out that he had a newlywed dinner planned at the MGM Grand, so the game watching was cancelled. Naturally, I took this pretty hard and as a consolation headed back to the poker room to grab a seat.
I bought back in for the $400 I'd just cashed out and sat at the other $1/$3 game that was going. For the first half of the MNF game I was sucking down Coronas and sweating the points, and not getting many playable hands. Eventually the over hit, giving me a freeroll on the Pack. Not long after halftime, I started actually playing a few hands: I turned trip 7's with 6-7 suited and when the guy to my right bet $25 into a $30 pot I raised him to $100. He called the $75 with 2 diamonds on the board, and because I'd seen this guy fall in love with flush draw after flush draw, I started my mental chant: "nodiamondnodiamondnodiamondFUCK!" Another FUCKING diamond hit the river. Flushy immediately jammed his remaining $150 into the pot. Of course, my cards hit the muck before he even got his chips in, and he went ahead and showed me his 2 diamonds (Ten High - it's not just a whiskey!) to solve the worst-kept secret in Clark County. Awesome.
Not much later I picked up K-K in late position, popped it to $15, and got one caller. The flop came down J-7-3 rainbow and my caller bet out $20. I raised to $55 and he went all-in, for about $60 more. I snap called and he showed me Q-J offsuit, and then the dealer showed me a goddamn Queen on the river. So I'm relatively pissed at this point and I'm down about $200, which really means that I'm down nothing for the day, but I'm still not happy. In fact, I pulled another $200 out just so I'd still have the 4 stacks of red in front of me. Of course, since I run good (and apparently because there's at least some semblance of justice in the universe) I picked up A-A for the second time of the day... aaaaaand guess who had K-K at the same time? That's right - Mr. Flushy himself! I enjoyed adding his $150 to my stack and was only a little disappointed that he'd dumped some of my chips before the setup hand happened.
By this time the game was out of hand, and I was rapidly heading that way as well (tip of the cap to the very fast cocktail service at Caesar's). It was 8:30 and Natrone seemed like he wasn't going to sit at a poker game, so I said to myself, "One more round and then I'm heading to home base - to the the IP 1/2NL game."
I also said that to myself an hour later. But the waitress kept coming around right before my blind, and I really hated to see her miss out on an opportunity for a drink tip. So I waited another our. Eventually, I think I caught them in a shift change; I, too, was changing - from solid to liquid form. So around midnight I decided that I'd better rack out now or drop anchor where I was. I stood up and took $300 in red chips to the cage. I'd been in the game for $600 total, so I was down $300. Oh, wait - I also had 3 bills in cash sitting in front of me, bringing my cashout to $600 and a nice little take from the Caesar's room. (The Packers didn't cover so my sports bets were a wash.)
On the way back to the IP I stopped off at O'Shea's and grabbed a burger, and also checked out their beer pong area - they've got an entire section with official beer pong tables set up and ready to go, which I'm sure is packed on weekends. By the time I got there it was pretty dead, but I could definitely see it being entertaining to watch.
Finally I was back home at the Imperial Palace and I was able to jump right in to a 1/2NL game for the cap of $300. I played for a few hours and didn't really have any big hands, just played too loose (I wonder why) and dropped a couple hundred. At around 5AM I flopped a set of 3's and turned them into quads on the turn - total pot size? About $20. But I did get a $75 bonus from the IP for having quads.
Eventually we got down to where I was playing heads up with a guy who clearly hadn't had much experience. I went card dead for what seemed like an hour but eventually stacked the guy when my A-3 offsuit hit a flop of Q-3-3 against his Q-10. As he left, I mentioned to the dealer that I was surprised he'd lasted that long. Of course, any reasonable observer probably would have said the same for me because by this time I was once again running on fumes. I sat and shot the breeze with Derek the dealer, waiting for someone - anyone - to show up and play some cards. He asked me, "Hey, are you the guy who was playing for stacks on Saturday?" and I told him that yes, John and I had run a hand out for our stacks. He sort of chuckled and said, "Yeah, I figured it was John - I didn't know that was you, though." At this point, I feel that the IP is to Vegas what Sam's Town is to Tunica - a home away from home. Good staff, the facility is great, and the price is right as well.
Eventually another guy (Mike from NY) showed up (from Sam's Town!) and immediately started HAMMERING me with questions about Big East basketball. "Who's the leading scorer in Big East history?" I replied correctly (look it up, bitches) and also informed him of the #2 guy - Terry Dehere, baby! I also gave him the starting 5 for the 1989 Michigan national title team. Sure, these aren't that difficult, but by this time I was not exactly at the top of my game. I decided to throw it back on the guy and asked him where Joe Dumars went to college (thanks, Matt!). He IMMEDIATELY said, "McNeese St." Shocked, I basically gave up because this guy definitely knew his shit - way more than I do, at least - and decided to just shoot the breeze. So the three of us talked basketball for a while longer until I finally tapped out, satisfied in the knowledge that while I hadn't made much money (but thanks to the quads, I was only down $100 in the IP game) I had gotten my money's worth!
Monday Totals:
+$100 poker
+e^π beers (Coronas this time)
+1 waitress at Caesar's refusing to give me the Corona on her tray because it was warm (STRONG play by her) then immedately going and getting a cold one for me
+$5 on a prop bet during the MNF game on the outcome of a challenge
Buoyed by the good read I'd put on the clock, I jumped in the shower and went over the gameplan - Natrone and I were going to watch the MNF Packers @ Vikings game at the Caesar's sportsbook, which started at 5:15 local time, so I had a few hours to kill before meeting up with the newlywed.
First things first, I went in search of some lunch - I decided to go ahead and start the walk over to Caesar's and then figure out what to get. I stopped off at the Planet Hollywood (salmon ftw) in the Forum Shops because I figured that lunch at Spago would end up making the homebound set a bit jealous. There were about 4 couples from Long Island at the bar who were pretty entertaining and looked to be on their way to a pretty good day of boozing. Coincidentally (or not), I had a similar plan.
By this time it was around 3:00 so I figured I would slide on in to a NL game over in the Caesar's poker room (just outside the sportsbook) and wait until it was time to meet up with Nate. For reasons I'm not entirely sure of, I bought for $200 (the game was a 1/3NL with a cap of $500) and sat down. Most of the players at my table had between $100-$300, and a couple of stacks were in the neighborhood of $500, so I didn't feel too short. I sat down just past the button and folded my garbage until I was the big blind and woke up with rockets. UTG+2 made it $15 to go and got no callers; I popped to $45. He made it $100 flat and I went all-in (he had about $215 total) hoping that he didn't have the other 2 aces. Nope - it was K-K and the board brought nothing of interest, so my $200 magically grew to $400.
After that good fortune my cards dried up, but I had a good time priming the pump with a few Coronas (yes, Driver - with lime) and shooting the breeze with the Jerseyite next to me. At one point he flagged down the cigar/cigarette/flower chick and handed her some chips to buy a rose, then told her to give it to his wife (sitting at a different table). He watched as she walked across the poker room and then gave the rose to the wrong woman! I looked at the guy after he said something and noted, "Now THAT is a bad beat; let's just hope your wife wasn't watching that!" Luckily for him, she was none the wiser and I was spared any confrontation. In any case, he decided it would be funny to tell our waitress that I'm an alcoholic during her next visit. I gotta admit, he really sold it and she was sort of speechless. He must have felt bad because he started laughing and said, "Nah, he's got a problem - it just hasn't been diagnosed yet, honey!" Jesus Christ - thanks a pantload, Jersey. I would have been a bit worried if I didn't have to leave soon anyway.
As game time drew near, I was still just above $400 so I racked out and went out to the sportsbook floor to meet up with Nate. (I also jumped on the first half over (23.5) and the Pack -4 for the game, at 50 each.) It turns out that he had a newlywed dinner planned at the MGM Grand, so the game watching was cancelled. Naturally, I took this pretty hard and as a consolation headed back to the poker room to grab a seat.
I bought back in for the $400 I'd just cashed out and sat at the other $1/$3 game that was going. For the first half of the MNF game I was sucking down Coronas and sweating the points, and not getting many playable hands. Eventually the over hit, giving me a freeroll on the Pack. Not long after halftime, I started actually playing a few hands: I turned trip 7's with 6-7 suited and when the guy to my right bet $25 into a $30 pot I raised him to $100. He called the $75 with 2 diamonds on the board, and because I'd seen this guy fall in love with flush draw after flush draw, I started my mental chant: "nodiamondnodiamondnodiamondFUCK!" Another FUCKING diamond hit the river. Flushy immediately jammed his remaining $150 into the pot. Of course, my cards hit the muck before he even got his chips in, and he went ahead and showed me his 2 diamonds (Ten High - it's not just a whiskey!) to solve the worst-kept secret in Clark County. Awesome.
Not much later I picked up K-K in late position, popped it to $15, and got one caller. The flop came down J-7-3 rainbow and my caller bet out $20. I raised to $55 and he went all-in, for about $60 more. I snap called and he showed me Q-J offsuit, and then the dealer showed me a goddamn Queen on the river. So I'm relatively pissed at this point and I'm down about $200, which really means that I'm down nothing for the day, but I'm still not happy. In fact, I pulled another $200 out just so I'd still have the 4 stacks of red in front of me. Of course, since I run good (and apparently because there's at least some semblance of justice in the universe) I picked up A-A for the second time of the day... aaaaaand guess who had K-K at the same time? That's right - Mr. Flushy himself! I enjoyed adding his $150 to my stack and was only a little disappointed that he'd dumped some of my chips before the setup hand happened.
By this time the game was out of hand, and I was rapidly heading that way as well (tip of the cap to the very fast cocktail service at Caesar's). It was 8:30 and Natrone seemed like he wasn't going to sit at a poker game, so I said to myself, "One more round and then I'm heading to home base - to the the IP 1/2NL game."
I also said that to myself an hour later. But the waitress kept coming around right before my blind, and I really hated to see her miss out on an opportunity for a drink tip. So I waited another our. Eventually, I think I caught them in a shift change; I, too, was changing - from solid to liquid form. So around midnight I decided that I'd better rack out now or drop anchor where I was. I stood up and took $300 in red chips to the cage. I'd been in the game for $600 total, so I was down $300. Oh, wait - I also had 3 bills in cash sitting in front of me, bringing my cashout to $600 and a nice little take from the Caesar's room. (The Packers didn't cover so my sports bets were a wash.)
On the way back to the IP I stopped off at O'Shea's and grabbed a burger, and also checked out their beer pong area - they've got an entire section with official beer pong tables set up and ready to go, which I'm sure is packed on weekends. By the time I got there it was pretty dead, but I could definitely see it being entertaining to watch.
Finally I was back home at the Imperial Palace and I was able to jump right in to a 1/2NL game for the cap of $300. I played for a few hours and didn't really have any big hands, just played too loose (I wonder why) and dropped a couple hundred. At around 5AM I flopped a set of 3's and turned them into quads on the turn - total pot size? About $20. But I did get a $75 bonus from the IP for having quads.
Eventually we got down to where I was playing heads up with a guy who clearly hadn't had much experience. I went card dead for what seemed like an hour but eventually stacked the guy when my A-3 offsuit hit a flop of Q-3-3 against his Q-10. As he left, I mentioned to the dealer that I was surprised he'd lasted that long. Of course, any reasonable observer probably would have said the same for me because by this time I was once again running on fumes. I sat and shot the breeze with Derek the dealer, waiting for someone - anyone - to show up and play some cards. He asked me, "Hey, are you the guy who was playing for stacks on Saturday?" and I told him that yes, John and I had run a hand out for our stacks. He sort of chuckled and said, "Yeah, I figured it was John - I didn't know that was you, though." At this point, I feel that the IP is to Vegas what Sam's Town is to Tunica - a home away from home. Good staff, the facility is great, and the price is right as well.
Eventually another guy (Mike from NY) showed up (from Sam's Town!) and immediately started HAMMERING me with questions about Big East basketball. "Who's the leading scorer in Big East history?" I replied correctly (look it up, bitches) and also informed him of the #2 guy - Terry Dehere, baby! I also gave him the starting 5 for the 1989 Michigan national title team. Sure, these aren't that difficult, but by this time I was not exactly at the top of my game. I decided to throw it back on the guy and asked him where Joe Dumars went to college (thanks, Matt!). He IMMEDIATELY said, "McNeese St." Shocked, I basically gave up because this guy definitely knew his shit - way more than I do, at least - and decided to just shoot the breeze. So the three of us talked basketball for a while longer until I finally tapped out, satisfied in the knowledge that while I hadn't made much money (but thanks to the quads, I was only down $100 in the IP game) I had gotten my money's worth!
Monday Totals:
+$100 poker
+e^π beers (Coronas this time)
+1 waitress at Caesar's refusing to give me the Corona on her tray because it was warm (STRONG play by her) then immedately going and getting a cold one for me
+$5 on a prop bet during the MNF game on the outcome of a challenge
Saturday, October 10, 2009
Vegas - Answering the Bell
(note: the "rack" at the 2/4 from the previous post was referring to a rack of singles in a 2/4 limit game - that was the only game running at the time.)
I woke up to the sound of my cell phone beeping - incoming text message. Still groggy, I wasn't really sure where I was or whether it was day or night. I checked the clock - 7:45. "Is that AM or PM?" I thought to myself. "Nah, gotta be PM, I think - I went to bed around noon or maybe a little after, something like that." So I checked out the message and it was from Natrone, wondering what I was up to. I shot him a message saying I was good to go, then thought, "7 hours - that's damn near oversleeping for Vegas." At this point I could almost hear Dolph Lundgren saying, "If he dies, he dies" because I felt pretty rough.
TAKE 2: I woke up to the sound of my cell phone beeping - incoming text message. Still groggy, but now more certain of my whereabouts, I quickly realized that I had fallen back asleep. I checked the clock again - 8:45 this time; an hour just flat-out disappeared for me - and hopped in the shower. I met Nate downstairs and we ran to the ambitiously named Burger Palace - sure, they had burgers, but I didn't see anything that could be referred to as "palatial" in the joint. Nonetheless, as I was running on 24 hours of booze alone, and I was starving - the burger was a welcome sight because I felt like Michael J. Fox playing "Earth Angel" while watching his hand fade away.
Thus fortified, we grabbed a couple of seats at a "Texas Hold 'em Bonus" table game on the floor, close to the "Dealertainer" pit. The guy next to us was with a couple of his friends, and at one point his girlfriend asked him, "Where do you want to go next - a strip club or a real club?" The guy just started laughing at her and then made it clear that her quesion was ridiculous. I'm not sure how well that went over because we didn't see her again for probably a half hour. Sure, the guy shot himself in the foot, but at least I was there to get a kick out of it.
After an hour or hour and a half, I was pretty much fed up with the game, being down 2 bills and not really having much excitement. Don't get me wrong - I think the game is OK, but I suspect that the drunk guy dancing around and the Pai Gow table had the right idea for a slow paced game. I pushed back from the table and left Nate alone, thinking maybe that my run as The Cooler was taking both of us down (I ended up being only partially wrong) and headed over to the IP poker room for some more 1/2NL action.
The first thing I heard when I approached the floor was, "Hey, that guy isn't allowed to play here!" It was Derek, one of the dealers from my tuxed-out session the night before, and he apparently got a kick out of the tux by the sound of it. Undaunted, I pressed on and took a seat at a 1/2 table where the first thing the Russian dealer asked me was, "What - is your suit at the
cleaners?" Apparently I had made an impression some other dealers as well. Then, the guy from St. Louis (he was 100% cards gear on Saturday, but Sunday was Mizzou day for him) started giving me shit about the "$13 on a nine" thing, just cracking up about how pumped I was about being mistaken for a Caesar's employee the night before. I was in seat 1, next to the wife of a guy I had played with the night before (and, being from Wisconsin, a huge Packers fan) and ready to go again. After an hour I was up around a stack, but no real big hands happened.
One notable hand (although not too exciting) was a limp (stft tgtt) from 4th position with 10h9h (3 callers) followed by an A-10-9 rainbow flop. I bet out $15 and got a call from seat 10, who seemed like a decent enough player. The turn brought an 8 and he checked, so I bet out $25. He min-raised me to $50 - fuck. Goddamn 8 on the fucking turn and now I'm calling $25 to resuck and beat his straight. I think you could make a strong case for folding there, but I think the min-raise felt strong enough that I had some value coming on the river if I did in fact fill up. Another 8 fell on the river, and seat 10 bet out $150. I insta-fold, and then he shows A-8 for the boat. Oh well.
After that I took out a short stack with 10s against his underpair and basically stayed out of any significant pots. By the time 5AM rolled around, the game was down to 7-handed, I was up $140, and while I was able to catch a buzz, I made the call to pack it in for the night and get ready to come back strong on Monday - when Nate and I had plans to watch the Pack-Vikes game over at the Caesar's book.
Least interesting factoid: a dealer told me that Freddie Mercury was gay, like she was telling me a secret that only SHE was aware of. I should have informed her that Weed has a bit of a temper; that's about as well-hidden of a secret.
One important note - the cocktail waitresses at the IP are very much on the attractive side, and I thought that TGTT might enjoy this mention: the waitress on this Sunday night was Russian and had on some nice red-framed glasses. I think he'd have been a fan! (I know I sure was.)
Sunday Totals:
+$140 poker
-$200 Texas Hold'Em Bonus table game
+7 beers (Miller Lites, changed up from Saturday's T&T/Sam Adams tsunami)
I woke up to the sound of my cell phone beeping - incoming text message. Still groggy, I wasn't really sure where I was or whether it was day or night. I checked the clock - 7:45. "Is that AM or PM?" I thought to myself. "Nah, gotta be PM, I think - I went to bed around noon or maybe a little after, something like that." So I checked out the message and it was from Natrone, wondering what I was up to. I shot him a message saying I was good to go, then thought, "7 hours - that's damn near oversleeping for Vegas." At this point I could almost hear Dolph Lundgren saying, "If he dies, he dies" because I felt pretty rough.
TAKE 2: I woke up to the sound of my cell phone beeping - incoming text message. Still groggy, but now more certain of my whereabouts, I quickly realized that I had fallen back asleep. I checked the clock again - 8:45 this time; an hour just flat-out disappeared for me - and hopped in the shower. I met Nate downstairs and we ran to the ambitiously named Burger Palace - sure, they had burgers, but I didn't see anything that could be referred to as "palatial" in the joint. Nonetheless, as I was running on 24 hours of booze alone, and I was starving - the burger was a welcome sight because I felt like Michael J. Fox playing "Earth Angel" while watching his hand fade away.
Thus fortified, we grabbed a couple of seats at a "Texas Hold 'em Bonus" table game on the floor, close to the "Dealertainer" pit. The guy next to us was with a couple of his friends, and at one point his girlfriend asked him, "Where do you want to go next - a strip club or a real club?" The guy just started laughing at her and then made it clear that her quesion was ridiculous. I'm not sure how well that went over because we didn't see her again for probably a half hour. Sure, the guy shot himself in the foot, but at least I was there to get a kick out of it.
After an hour or hour and a half, I was pretty much fed up with the game, being down 2 bills and not really having much excitement. Don't get me wrong - I think the game is OK, but I suspect that the drunk guy dancing around and the Pai Gow table had the right idea for a slow paced game. I pushed back from the table and left Nate alone, thinking maybe that my run as The Cooler was taking both of us down (I ended up being only partially wrong) and headed over to the IP poker room for some more 1/2NL action.
The first thing I heard when I approached the floor was, "Hey, that guy isn't allowed to play here!" It was Derek, one of the dealers from my tuxed-out session the night before, and he apparently got a kick out of the tux by the sound of it. Undaunted, I pressed on and took a seat at a 1/2 table where the first thing the Russian dealer asked me was, "What - is your suit at the
cleaners?" Apparently I had made an impression some other dealers as well. Then, the guy from St. Louis (he was 100% cards gear on Saturday, but Sunday was Mizzou day for him) started giving me shit about the "$13 on a nine" thing, just cracking up about how pumped I was about being mistaken for a Caesar's employee the night before. I was in seat 1, next to the wife of a guy I had played with the night before (and, being from Wisconsin, a huge Packers fan) and ready to go again. After an hour I was up around a stack, but no real big hands happened.
One notable hand (although not too exciting) was a limp (stft tgtt) from 4th position with 10h9h (3 callers) followed by an A-10-9 rainbow flop. I bet out $15 and got a call from seat 10, who seemed like a decent enough player. The turn brought an 8 and he checked, so I bet out $25. He min-raised me to $50 - fuck. Goddamn 8 on the fucking turn and now I'm calling $25 to resuck and beat his straight. I think you could make a strong case for folding there, but I think the min-raise felt strong enough that I had some value coming on the river if I did in fact fill up. Another 8 fell on the river, and seat 10 bet out $150. I insta-fold, and then he shows A-8 for the boat. Oh well.
After that I took out a short stack with 10s against his underpair and basically stayed out of any significant pots. By the time 5AM rolled around, the game was down to 7-handed, I was up $140, and while I was able to catch a buzz, I made the call to pack it in for the night and get ready to come back strong on Monday - when Nate and I had plans to watch the Pack-Vikes game over at the Caesar's book.
Least interesting factoid: a dealer told me that Freddie Mercury was gay, like she was telling me a secret that only SHE was aware of. I should have informed her that Weed has a bit of a temper; that's about as well-hidden of a secret.
One important note - the cocktail waitresses at the IP are very much on the attractive side, and I thought that TGTT might enjoy this mention: the waitress on this Sunday night was Russian and had on some nice red-framed glasses. I think he'd have been a fan! (I know I sure was.)
Sunday Totals:
+$140 poker
-$200 Texas Hold'Em Bonus table game
+7 beers (Miller Lites, changed up from Saturday's T&T/Sam Adams tsunami)
Wednesday, October 07, 2009
Live From Las Vegas
My flight left Saturday at noon from Louisville and I popped in my headphones to kill the 4 hour flight time. After about 6 minutes my iPod's headphones died. Dead. 7 fucking minutes in to the trip. I spent the rest of the flight trying to sleep and listening to what sounded like someone intermittently clipping their fingernails. Repeat: CLIPPING THEIR FINGERNAILS. This was not a positive omen.
Finally though, the death march ended and I got off in Vegas. I needed to pick up my tux and so I grabbed a taxi to take me to the tux store and then got to the hotel. As I walked to the checkin desk, I saw Natrone, who was sitting at a Texas Hold 'Em Bonus game at the IP. I went ahead and got checked in and threw my shit in the room, then I headed back down to the casino floor. We played for a couple hours until it was time to "Suit Up" for the wedding.
I headed over to Caesar's and hung out, waiting for the groom in the lobby. That's when the first of my "hits" happened: someone approached me, thinking I was a Caesar's employee, and asked where the box office was. Of course, this pleased me to no end so I headed over to Cleopatra's barge for a celebratory drink. Tron showed up and downed what appeared to be a Big Gulp-sized shot of whiskey (I went with the T&T).
From there we headed over to the wedding chapel in the stretch Excursion limo. We waited a bit for the wedding ahead of us to finish and then it was on with the show - a quick little ceremony followed by some pics, then it was back to Caesar's for dinner.
We had some Chinese at the Noodle Bar and then we walked over to the Bellagio for the fountain show. While I was waiting down at Caesar's I fished 2 other people in to thinking I was working for Caesar's. By this point the rental tux shoes were in the process of killing my feet, and so it was a relief to finally - FINALLY get to the Imperial Palace poker room at about 10:30PM for some 1/2NL action.
I sat down at a brand-new 1/2 game, and the table quickly filled up. We started playing and I quickly started the "drunk guy in the tux" routine. TGTT would have been proud. At one point I remember announcing that I would raise to $13 each time I had a nine in my hand. In any case, I was running OK until I flopped top 2 with 8/6 against a guy with fives who spiked a seven on the turn - that cost me about $150. I reloaded at one point so I had $500 in the game when it started to die down. John (who deals at the IP) and I were basically playing heads-up for an hour, when I suggested that we shove all our chips in and deal a hand out face-up. (At this point I had about $230 and he was sitting on about $500.) He agreed and we pushed our stacks in, and... I ended up winning the hand! So I went from about $300 down to only $100 or so down. Nice.
I sat 2/4, killing some time for when the tux store opened and ended up losing a rack. Then it was time to return my tux to the store at 10AM - I grabbed a cab and when I got there it turned out the tux store didn't even open until 11! That's a terrible beat and so I cabbed it over to the Hilton's sports book to watch the Bengals take on the Browns. By this point, I was seriously dragging after drinking all night, so when the Bengals took a 14-0 lead around halftime, I took off to FINALLY return my tux. Once done, I staggered through the casino back at the IP and hit my room - I think I was asleep in about 15 seconds.
Saturday/early Sunday Totals:
-$200 poker
-$40 unnecessary cab rides
+3 people mistaking me for a casino host
+1 signed marriage license
+2 tortured feet
+150 drinks (or at least that's what it felt like)
Finally though, the death march ended and I got off in Vegas. I needed to pick up my tux and so I grabbed a taxi to take me to the tux store and then got to the hotel. As I walked to the checkin desk, I saw Natrone, who was sitting at a Texas Hold 'Em Bonus game at the IP. I went ahead and got checked in and threw my shit in the room, then I headed back down to the casino floor. We played for a couple hours until it was time to "Suit Up" for the wedding.
I headed over to Caesar's and hung out, waiting for the groom in the lobby. That's when the first of my "hits" happened: someone approached me, thinking I was a Caesar's employee, and asked where the box office was. Of course, this pleased me to no end so I headed over to Cleopatra's barge for a celebratory drink. Tron showed up and downed what appeared to be a Big Gulp-sized shot of whiskey (I went with the T&T).
From there we headed over to the wedding chapel in the stretch Excursion limo. We waited a bit for the wedding ahead of us to finish and then it was on with the show - a quick little ceremony followed by some pics, then it was back to Caesar's for dinner.
We had some Chinese at the Noodle Bar and then we walked over to the Bellagio for the fountain show. While I was waiting down at Caesar's I fished 2 other people in to thinking I was working for Caesar's. By this point the rental tux shoes were in the process of killing my feet, and so it was a relief to finally - FINALLY get to the Imperial Palace poker room at about 10:30PM for some 1/2NL action.
I sat down at a brand-new 1/2 game, and the table quickly filled up. We started playing and I quickly started the "drunk guy in the tux" routine. TGTT would have been proud. At one point I remember announcing that I would raise to $13 each time I had a nine in my hand. In any case, I was running OK until I flopped top 2 with 8/6 against a guy with fives who spiked a seven on the turn - that cost me about $150. I reloaded at one point so I had $500 in the game when it started to die down. John (who deals at the IP) and I were basically playing heads-up for an hour, when I suggested that we shove all our chips in and deal a hand out face-up. (At this point I had about $230 and he was sitting on about $500.) He agreed and we pushed our stacks in, and... I ended up winning the hand! So I went from about $300 down to only $100 or so down. Nice.
I sat 2/4, killing some time for when the tux store opened and ended up losing a rack. Then it was time to return my tux to the store at 10AM - I grabbed a cab and when I got there it turned out the tux store didn't even open until 11! That's a terrible beat and so I cabbed it over to the Hilton's sports book to watch the Bengals take on the Browns. By this point, I was seriously dragging after drinking all night, so when the Bengals took a 14-0 lead around halftime, I took off to FINALLY return my tux. Once done, I staggered through the casino back at the IP and hit my room - I think I was asleep in about 15 seconds.
Saturday/early Sunday Totals:
-$200 poker
-$40 unnecessary cab rides
+3 people mistaking me for a casino host
+1 signed marriage license
+2 tortured feet
+150 drinks (or at least that's what it felt like)
Wednesday, April 01, 2009
Tunica Was Ear-y (Part 2)
Apparently, tgtt has concluded that Part 2 won't be posted until after the May trip. Fuck, is he grumpy or what? I think a contributing factor just might be the Royal Flush suckout that smacked his quad 8's the other day. (Of course, he definitely wasn't playing at a bad-beat jackpot table; only the Driver runs that good.) Besides, what the Tough Man might not realize is that I spent the last 2 weeks in Siberia, running up snow-covered mountains while KGB agents tried to follow me. No, wait - that was "Rocky IV." But I have been productive, as the Driver pointed out: I took down the ping-pong title at Le Chateau on Tuesday, leaving me as an entrant in the 16-man Shamrock tournament; winner gets a free 3-night trip for 2 to Vegas, along with an entry into the National championship (grand prize: $100,000).
(note: I probably have the sequence of Part 2 fucked up; I really need to use the Imperial Palace "NOTES" in the future.)
Anyway, back to Tunica: after I tapped out on the first night, Crazy Indian Guy and Memphis moved over to the same table Driver and tgtt - apparently this is where the real craziness started. Multiple pots were played blind for $1000+, and at one point after losing a big pot Memphis was begging and pleading with CIG to get some of his money back. (Driver said the scene made him sick to his stomach - it couldn't have been all of those Coronas. Or all of the "with lime" additions, either.)
The next day I woke up, grabbed a shower, and met Tron for the buffet at around 12:30. (Apparently Driver and Tough Man had stayed up late because they were nowhere in sight.) After lunch, I pointed out the empty Pai Gow table to Tron and we decided to put in the much-discussed session at the Pai Gow table, where Ralph from NYC was our dealer. On my very first hand at the table, I put $5 on the "Dragon Bonus" but then thought better of it and replaced it with a white chip. Sure enough, I looked at my cards and found quad 5's sitting there - my pussy switcheroo cost me $100 on the bonus - great start!
Tron and I stayed around, shooting the breeze with Ralph and losing slowly - I think he was down a bill and I dropped 2, but we'd been playing for quite a while when Driver and Tough Man finally showed up. They were starving so we went back and grabbed the Friday night seafood buffet as I heard their story. TGTT had left around noon, but Driver said he wanted to stay - apparently, Driver came back to the room about 30 minutes later. (According to Driver, though, he thought he'd stayed for a few HOURS, which is probably somehow related to that haystack of toothpicks under his chair - that's when you know you've really taken advantage of Sampson's free drinks policy.)
At this point I really think we hit the dice table, although I was still off kilter from the ear medication - I honestly don't remember for sure - Friday night is sort of a blank for me now. Hell, something great probably happened and I am now completely in the dark about it. All I remember is going back to the room and flat crashing until Saturday afternoon, at which point I took the last of the corticosteroids hoping for a late rally.
Back to the poker room on Saturday and I sat down at Brian's table, which is a good start - he's a great dealer and is always fun at the table . I can tell that he'd like to see Snatch and The Mayor, because he makes sure to ask me about them every trip. Brian dealt me pocket deuces which turned into quads on the turn, and I (of course) made about $30 on them. Niiice hand, Mike.
Then, in the small blind I limped with 8-9 and saw a flop of 10-J-Q (2 diamonds) hit the board. I bet the pot (about $15) and got raised to $40 by the 2nd position guy. I re-raised him $100 and then he went all-in. At this point I'm thinking no way he's got AK or a set, because he'd have raised with a hand that big from early position, so I figure it's almost got to be Q-J or Q-10 - he couldn't have played K-9, right? At this point there's about $500 in the pot and I've got to call another $160 (I have about $200 back). So I call off, and immediately see the bad news - King-Nine for a bigger straight. Fuck. I watch the turn and river peel (no saving cowboy for me) and reach back in to my pocket to reload. I really don't see how I could have gotten away from that hand - I guess I could have folded there but I could definitely have seen him making that play with a hand like A-10 or A-J. I would have had to put him on AK or K9 to fold and given the size of the pot relative to what he had left, I just couldn't be that sure. Oh well, I play bad - nothing new there.
At this point I'm actually feeling pretty good and drinking up some free beers; I'm starting to get in the zone, at least a little. Then 2 guys stroll up to the table because theirs had broken. I'm sitting in seat 2 and they take seats 1 and 3. Apparently Casey and Riley are dealers at a private game in Atlanta, and they are having a blast. I got in on a prop bet with them: you pick 2 cards (I took 2 and 3) and if you make 2 pair on the flop (e.g. 2-3-K) everyone playing has to give you $5. If you flop a boat (e.g. 2-2-3) everyone has to give you $20. This might not sound like much fun but it was a blast - tgtt and Driver can vouch for this (or disagree) personally.
Casey and Riley were having a great time and their enthusiasm was really infectious, especially when you factor in the new development: I was feeling like normal - or at least normal for Tunica. I'd say I was at 90%, which is more than enough for a poker session, and way better than I'd felt on Thursday/Friday. When it came time to leave I ended up costing us a chunk of time because I didn't leave right away - I had to hike up to the room and throw my shit in my bag (only after asking, innocently, whether or not Driver/Tron had already packed for me - nice try, Mundo). I didn't consciously put it together then, but I think I was trying to make up for the lost time during the first 2 days.
Bottom line - next time we go to Tunica (and I'm hoping for a few fellas to get their dresses off and actually show up this time) I am NOT going to be on medication. Looking back at it, though, I once again have to give it up for Sam's Town - not even drug-induced GI distress can ruin a Tunica trip, and that speaks volumes for just how outstanding the place is. (Oh, and I didn't even mention that with dice, pai gow, and cards, I managed to drop about 8 bills - it's OK; Sammy is worth every penny!)
(note: I probably have the sequence of Part 2 fucked up; I really need to use the Imperial Palace "NOTES" in the future.)
Anyway, back to Tunica: after I tapped out on the first night, Crazy Indian Guy and Memphis moved over to the same table Driver and tgtt - apparently this is where the real craziness started. Multiple pots were played blind for $1000+, and at one point after losing a big pot Memphis was begging and pleading with CIG to get some of his money back. (Driver said the scene made him sick to his stomach - it couldn't have been all of those Coronas. Or all of the "with lime" additions, either.)
The next day I woke up, grabbed a shower, and met Tron for the buffet at around 12:30. (Apparently Driver and Tough Man had stayed up late because they were nowhere in sight.) After lunch, I pointed out the empty Pai Gow table to Tron and we decided to put in the much-discussed session at the Pai Gow table, where Ralph from NYC was our dealer. On my very first hand at the table, I put $5 on the "Dragon Bonus" but then thought better of it and replaced it with a white chip. Sure enough, I looked at my cards and found quad 5's sitting there - my pussy switcheroo cost me $100 on the bonus - great start!
Tron and I stayed around, shooting the breeze with Ralph and losing slowly - I think he was down a bill and I dropped 2, but we'd been playing for quite a while when Driver and Tough Man finally showed up. They were starving so we went back and grabbed the Friday night seafood buffet as I heard their story. TGTT had left around noon, but Driver said he wanted to stay - apparently, Driver came back to the room about 30 minutes later. (According to Driver, though, he thought he'd stayed for a few HOURS, which is probably somehow related to that haystack of toothpicks under his chair - that's when you know you've really taken advantage of Sampson's free drinks policy.)
At this point I really think we hit the dice table, although I was still off kilter from the ear medication - I honestly don't remember for sure - Friday night is sort of a blank for me now. Hell, something great probably happened and I am now completely in the dark about it. All I remember is going back to the room and flat crashing until Saturday afternoon, at which point I took the last of the corticosteroids hoping for a late rally.
Back to the poker room on Saturday and I sat down at Brian's table, which is a good start - he's a great dealer and is always fun at the table . I can tell that he'd like to see Snatch and The Mayor, because he makes sure to ask me about them every trip. Brian dealt me pocket deuces which turned into quads on the turn, and I (of course) made about $30 on them. Niiice hand, Mike.
Then, in the small blind I limped with 8-9 and saw a flop of 10-J-Q (2 diamonds) hit the board. I bet the pot (about $15) and got raised to $40 by the 2nd position guy. I re-raised him $100 and then he went all-in. At this point I'm thinking no way he's got AK or a set, because he'd have raised with a hand that big from early position, so I figure it's almost got to be Q-J or Q-10 - he couldn't have played K-9, right? At this point there's about $500 in the pot and I've got to call another $160 (I have about $200 back). So I call off, and immediately see the bad news - King-Nine for a bigger straight. Fuck. I watch the turn and river peel (no saving cowboy for me) and reach back in to my pocket to reload. I really don't see how I could have gotten away from that hand - I guess I could have folded there but I could definitely have seen him making that play with a hand like A-10 or A-J. I would have had to put him on AK or K9 to fold and given the size of the pot relative to what he had left, I just couldn't be that sure. Oh well, I play bad - nothing new there.
At this point I'm actually feeling pretty good and drinking up some free beers; I'm starting to get in the zone, at least a little. Then 2 guys stroll up to the table because theirs had broken. I'm sitting in seat 2 and they take seats 1 and 3. Apparently Casey and Riley are dealers at a private game in Atlanta, and they are having a blast. I got in on a prop bet with them: you pick 2 cards (I took 2 and 3) and if you make 2 pair on the flop (e.g. 2-3-K) everyone playing has to give you $5. If you flop a boat (e.g. 2-2-3) everyone has to give you $20. This might not sound like much fun but it was a blast - tgtt and Driver can vouch for this (or disagree) personally.
Casey and Riley were having a great time and their enthusiasm was really infectious, especially when you factor in the new development: I was feeling like normal - or at least normal for Tunica. I'd say I was at 90%, which is more than enough for a poker session, and way better than I'd felt on Thursday/Friday. When it came time to leave I ended up costing us a chunk of time because I didn't leave right away - I had to hike up to the room and throw my shit in my bag (only after asking, innocently, whether or not Driver/Tron had already packed for me - nice try, Mundo). I didn't consciously put it together then, but I think I was trying to make up for the lost time during the first 2 days.
Bottom line - next time we go to Tunica (and I'm hoping for a few fellas to get their dresses off and actually show up this time) I am NOT going to be on medication. Looking back at it, though, I once again have to give it up for Sam's Town - not even drug-induced GI distress can ruin a Tunica trip, and that speaks volumes for just how outstanding the place is. (Oh, and I didn't even mention that with dice, pai gow, and cards, I managed to drop about 8 bills - it's OK; Sammy is worth every penny!)
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