Vegas Weekend Recap - Part 2

From Saturday morning until Sunday night, it was one big blur. The exact timeline and many of the details cannot be recovered from my memory, but I'll do my best.

Woke up at 7 Saturday morning, head pounding and throat parched, and decided that 4 hours of sleep just wasn't going to do it. Couple painkillers and a bunch of water and back to bed until 9:30. I grabbed breakfast from the IP Burger Palace as all I needed was a few calories and some caffeine. For $4, that's about all I got, but it was enough. Anyway, I have no idea what I did while I waited for Falstaff and Special K to come down, but I don't think it was that long.

The three of us grabbed a cab to the Venetian, where Falstaff found a 4/8 table while Special K opted for 1/2 NL. At that point, I wasn't really up to jumping back in the deep end as I'd gone through more of my cash the previous night than I had really hoped to and knew it was still going to be a long weekend. So I kind of meandered around, occasionally railing each of them, and eventually Easy, April, and StB made appearances and we decided to go check out the Rio.

There, I saw Phil Laak and Jamie Gold and got to meet Pauly once we got his attention. Once old friends finished catching up and some had to get back to work, we headed over to the Rio poker room / sports book. While the other 4 played some poker, Easy tutored me in the fine art of handicapping the races. Evidently, Big Brown losing ruptured something in the horse racing universe as we didn't win a single bet, despite the obvious expertise of those present. And so, at 5:30, it was back to the Venetian for dinner (Grand Lux Cafe) and then the IP for some 2/4 HORSE.

The head guy in the poker room told us that, for consistency sake (and not to confuse his dealers), he wanted all of the stud games with a $1 ante and a $1 bring in. For someone who had never played any RSE in his life, this was not good news. I was just lucky enough to win enough in HE and O8 to keep me ahead. I would have done much better except for one interesting HE hand. I was in lp with AQc and Zeem raised UTG. There were a couple callers, I decided to see a flop, and the blinds also called. Flop came KTx with 2 clubs. It might have been checked around, or there might have been a single bet called by most in the hand. I don't remember. Anyway, a non-club J hit the turn, giving me broadway and a royal redraw. BB bet, Zeem raised, fold, fold, I 3-bet, fold back to BB, call, call. River paired the K and BB checked. Zeem bet and I raised. BB 3-bet and Zeem capped. I immediately put him on TT or JJ and mucked. BB called and Zeem tabled jacks full against BB's trip kings. Ah, what could have been.

By then, a waiting list had developed and, since we were about to enter the stud games again, I gracefully gave up my seat to one of those waiting taking with me a small profit. So, I wandered back and forth from the poker room to the dice tables for a while, making back some of the prior night's losses before finally deciding to try my luck at a 1/2 NL cash table. I tried to keep up with the aggressive table, but absolutely none of my speculative hands came anywhere close to developing enough on the flop to continue. Eventually, I went broke on a hand with KQ when I had top pair after the turn and two players both called my all in with the same naked flush draw. So, even with 2 fewer diamonds available, one of the 73 still left in the deck rivered my dreams of a successful session.

Back to the pai gow table where I sat for a while. It's amazing how many $1 drinks you can get through, even with just a $100 buy in at a $15 table. Similarly to the prior night, when I got down to half a buy in left, I put it all at risk. This time successfully. Wash rinse repeat. Another 8 beers, back down to half and another double up. This time, I walked away. Up a little. By now it's somewhere in the middle of the night, and it's back to the dice tables. Played there until 7:30 AM and left with a modest profit.

Check out is in like 2-3 hours. Uh oh. What to do? Upstairs, shower, change, pack, check out and begin another day. I didn't really go to Vegas to sleep anyway. I can do that at home.

And with that day two was concluded. Sort of.

And there go another 5 minutes of your life you're never getting back.