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Tuesday, June 7, 2005

Vegas, Part I

UA Flight 1492 landed in Vegas around 11:40 (PM) Friday night, after being delayed a bit out of LA. I made my way to the tram. A quick calculation told me I’d be waiting there for at least 25 minutes before actually being able to get on one of them. The place was packed. As the next one pulled up, I made my way around to the exit side, and got on as the last people were getting off. Four or five other people followed. The employee who was working on some of the electronics in it looked up and laughed. I entertained myself playing solitaire on my Treo in the 45 minutes I was waiting for a cab. Finally, I arrived at the Plaza. Joaquin had already checked in, so I just had to pick up a key at the desk. I dropped my bags in the room, and headed back downstairs.

After a little internal debate, I decide to just play some poker at the Plaza instead of head over to the Aladdin to see if people are still there from storming the castle. Sadly, I had forgotten that I had a list of everyone’s phone number in my bag up in my room. I played decent poker, but got a little greedy on one hand and got outdrawn. I limped in the cutoff with 76s, and called a raise from the button, with two other players in. The flop was 767, and there’s a $10 bet and a $30 raise in front of me. The guy who raised to $40 was bad, and only had around $15 left behind him. The original preflop raiser was still yet to act behind me, and had me covered. The guy who bet out the initial $10 had around $150 left. I just called the $40. The button dropped, and the other guy called. The turn is a ten, and puts three hearts out. Checked to me, I bet $40. They both called (one all in for less). On the river, I pushed the other guy all in for his last $75, and he of course calls with his TT, and takes my money. The button then told me he knew exactly what I had, and folded KK. The bad player all in had JJ. If I had known I was against three overpairs, I probably would have just pushed all in there on the flop and taken it down, but I’d probably play that exactly the same 90% of the time. Other than that, it was a pretty uneventful 8 hours of poker. I did win one hand with a $50 bluff bet on the river when I could barely beat the board with my hammer. Of course, I had to show the bluff, but it doesn’t get quite the same reaction at a non-blogger table.

Around 9:15 I grabbed a cab to the Aladdin, and finally got to meet some of the bloggers. I drew table 8, seat 8, with Felicia to my right, and Bobby Bracelet to my left. I figured my blinds were toast. Also at the table were Joe Speaker, G-Rob, and other people I should remember, but don’t.

The very first hand of the tournament, I hear someone scream “hammer!” at a table behind me, and see the other geek standing and taking down the pot. Other madness at that same table involved AA vs KK all in preflop. AKx flops, and KK hits runner runner spades to take it down. I didn’t get much in the way of hands. I somehow saw a free flop with QJo from the big blind in a multiway pot, bet out with top two pair, and got no callers. I defended my blind against Felicia once with 55, but the flop was all overcards and probably hit her, so I had to check-fold. With 100/200 blinds, I raised to 600 from early position with 66. G-Rob went all in for only 200 more, and I was forced to call when it folded back to me. He flips up AA. Someone says they folded A6, so I’ve got one out in the deck, and of course it hits on the flop to bust him. Oops.

After the first break, they split up my table. I got moved to the 1 seat, which I hate. At this table, I had to deal with Derek, Eva, Felicia again, and … other people. I really should have taken notes. Didn’t do much interesting here, either, though. Pushed in once with AK, someone says they folded 33. Folded ATo UTG when I had only 5 big blinds left. 99 and AQ get all in, and of course the flop is JQK and I could have tripled up. I finally pushed all in with AK, got called by AQ, and couldn’t avoid the damn queen on the flop. Payback for my set of sixes. I gave the guy who busted me the JOPKE hat, but neglected to actually find out who it was. No one else who was there seems to remember, either. If you busted me, leave a comment!

After busting out, I joined played the 1/2 NL game at the Aladdin with Geek, BadBlood, G-Rob, Russell Fox (buy his book! I will be, after watching him play), and eventually Otis sat down for a little while. There may have been other bloggers, too, I don’t remember. I played terribly at this game, after feeling like I played pretty well in the tournament. I did get my money in with the best hand a few times and get outdrawn, but in general, I just played badly. It was all a ton of fun, though, playing and talking with the bloggers. At some point while I was playing this game, Bill won the Blogger tourney. Congrats, again!

At around 5, we headed over to the La Salsa Cantina for the after-tourney-party planned by AlCantHang.

…to be continued…