Peter
09-07-2004, 08:49 AM
On June 14th I would finally make my first trip to Las Vegas. In fact, it would be my first trip to the states. Pretty exciting. I would stay in Vegas for a little over 5 weeks.
Trying to obtain a certificate for dealing blackjack is my main reason for staying that long in Vegas. Being a magician, I started dealing blackjack at private parties a year ago, while cheating the players as much as I could. Of course, we would play for play money and there were prices for people that still managed to win. I never had an actual education in dealing blackjack though and I figured it would be kind of cool if I could say I was trained in Vegas.
Next to going to dealer school I would of course try and see as much shows as possible, mainly magic shows. And I planned to play a lot of poker as well, since poker is what allowed me to pay for this trip. It will be my first time playing live poker, so that’s going to be pretty exciting as well.
Since I didn’t win that much with playing online poker, I had to stay at the Budget Suites. Upon arrival I had my first trouble with the language. Some guy came up to me asking if I partied. Thinking he was going to tell me where I could find some nice places to dance and drink I replied with a happily “Of course”. This resulted in him offering me all kinds of stimulating herbs. Almost the same happened a couple of minutes later where some guy asked if I liked girls. Being curious of what I would get offered this time, I again replied with the cheery “of course” line I had used with so much success just a couple of minutes earlier. This time the guy would offer me all kinds of stimulating girls. After turning down his offer I proceeded to my room, knowing that if I ever needed any kind of stimulation during my trip I was at the right place. Welcome to America.
Walking on Las Vegas Blvd, there were all these people handing out flyers, just like they do in the Netherlands. However, these flyers don’t offer the typical commercials for restaurants, they offer something entirely different. Now I know why they call it the Strip.
Something I learned about Vegas: The roads are much wider than in the Netherlands, so if you enter a crossroad with your bike and the light turns yellow, you are not going to make it to the other end of the road, so don’t try.
The dealer school I was going to was about a 35 minute walk from my hotel, so I figured it would be a good idea to buy a bicycle. It was a good idea, until it got stolen at Mandalay Bay after one week. I decided to buy another one, which had a flat tire after two days, had a flat tire again after 4 more days and got stolen after 2 more days.
Something I learned about Vegas: people don’t ride bikes, but they do steal them.
The dealer school looked like I imagine an illegal gambling house would look like. Some gaming tables packed close together, full with all kinds of people gambling. The first thing they were going to teach me, was how to shuffle. They were surprised how quickly I learned. Of course being in magic for over 9 years helps a little. The thing I did have trouble with was pitching. Of course I could pitch cards, but not with the right technique. This was pretty interesting to learn. The most I learned though was procedures. A lot of the procedures I will never use in my own blackjack game, either because they are impractical or make cheating to difficult. For example, the way you have to hold the deck makes second dealing almost impossible.
After four weeks I passed the final audition, so I’m now the happy owner of a blackjack dealer certificate.
It turns out that you don’t need such a certificate to work at casinos. A couple of people already worked at casinos and were still doing the blackjack course. In fact, there was one guy doing the blackjack course who was a pit boss at a casino. I also got offered a job twice before I got the certificate, but I wasn’t allowed to work in the states. I don’t think I would have done it if I was.
All the teachers at the school still worked as dealers at casinos, but I only had the pleasure of seeing one dealing at her casino. This was a delight to watch, not only because she was hot. She dealt very fast and very efficient. I especially liked the speed with which she would put the cards in the mirror to look if she had a blackjack when she had a ten up.
Something I learned about Vegas: Say I Do Drive Through Wedding Chapel ( I think that says it all).
I also went to a lot of shows. Most of them were really good. The first show I went to was World’s Greatest Magic. It had about five different performers, two of which I had seen before. One of them was Kevin James, who did some great magic. In one of the illusions he would cut his assistant in half and the upper half would run on it’s hands into the audience. This looked really freaky. The other one was Juliana Chen, world champion manipulation in 2000. She showed some great manipulation with cards.
MacKing had his own comedy magic show in the afternoon. He was extremely funny and did some great magic. If you’re in Vegas you should definitely go see his show.
I also liked The Amazing Jonathan, although I felt he wasn’t that interested in his audience. He just did his thing and that was it. The first hour was very funny, but the last half an hour wasn’t all that great. Also, the performer that opened for him was not very good.
Showgirls of magic was a topless magic show. The magic wasn’t good, but who cares about magic if you see boobs. I also went to Skinthight, another topless show, which wasn’t too good either, but again, who cares, they showed boobs.
Lance Burton was of course a good show, although at the start I thought he was trying to keep his toothpaste smile a little too hard while talking, which made it look like he was doing ventriloquism. A lot of his stuff I had seen on TV, but he did do some illusions I hadn’t seen before and I had no idea how he did them.
Ronn Lucas was an extremely funny ventriloquist. Can’t say much more about it, just go and see him when your in Vegas.
Penn en Teller also did a great show, no need to tell what they did, it was all good.
V, the variety show started real good with an acrobatic act with two people that did some amazing things. After them there was a juggler, who juggled 5 balls, while bouncing a 6th ball on his head… and that was his start. I think it was the best juggler I have ever seen. Unfortunately, the acts after that weren’t that good, they were ok, but couldn’t compete with the class of the first two acts.
I also played lots of poker. I played about 115 hours and ended down about $ 1000 for poker and about $ 150 for other gambling. I mostly played 3-6 and 4-8 holdem. I don’t think I played as well as I do on the internet. It was my first time playing live and it kind of intimidated me. There were quite some pots where a bet by me would have given me the pot, and on the internet I would have put that bet in, but somehow it’s a lot more scary to bluff when you can see the people. I did win a jackpot hand at Mandalay Bay. I hit 4 kings which paid $94. The pot was bigger than that, but still.
Before I went to Vegas, I read Mike Caro’s Book of Tells so I knew that if someone bet and his hands were shaking, he probably has a good hand. So for the first week, every time I bet, called or raised, I must have had a great hand, because I couldn’t stop shaking.
The good thing about playing live is that I now know what a TOM looks like, they’re barely alive. Maniacs kind of look normal though.
I did play one session of 6-12 at the mirage, and I found the game much thougher than the 3-6 game. In my first round the blinds got chopped 3 times, while I had only seen it once in the 3-6 games during the 80 hours I had played by then. I did end up in the 6-12 game, so clearly I'm better at playing the higher limit instead of the lowest limit where people will draw out everytime /images/graemlins/grin.gif.
Something I learned about Vegas: Chip runners don’t actually run.
After 5 weeks it was time to go back home. Spending that long in Vegas is just a little to much. I did have a lot of fun though and I will definately come back someday, but for a shorter period.
Peter
Trying to obtain a certificate for dealing blackjack is my main reason for staying that long in Vegas. Being a magician, I started dealing blackjack at private parties a year ago, while cheating the players as much as I could. Of course, we would play for play money and there were prices for people that still managed to win. I never had an actual education in dealing blackjack though and I figured it would be kind of cool if I could say I was trained in Vegas.
Next to going to dealer school I would of course try and see as much shows as possible, mainly magic shows. And I planned to play a lot of poker as well, since poker is what allowed me to pay for this trip. It will be my first time playing live poker, so that’s going to be pretty exciting as well.
Since I didn’t win that much with playing online poker, I had to stay at the Budget Suites. Upon arrival I had my first trouble with the language. Some guy came up to me asking if I partied. Thinking he was going to tell me where I could find some nice places to dance and drink I replied with a happily “Of course”. This resulted in him offering me all kinds of stimulating herbs. Almost the same happened a couple of minutes later where some guy asked if I liked girls. Being curious of what I would get offered this time, I again replied with the cheery “of course” line I had used with so much success just a couple of minutes earlier. This time the guy would offer me all kinds of stimulating girls. After turning down his offer I proceeded to my room, knowing that if I ever needed any kind of stimulation during my trip I was at the right place. Welcome to America.
Walking on Las Vegas Blvd, there were all these people handing out flyers, just like they do in the Netherlands. However, these flyers don’t offer the typical commercials for restaurants, they offer something entirely different. Now I know why they call it the Strip.
Something I learned about Vegas: The roads are much wider than in the Netherlands, so if you enter a crossroad with your bike and the light turns yellow, you are not going to make it to the other end of the road, so don’t try.
The dealer school I was going to was about a 35 minute walk from my hotel, so I figured it would be a good idea to buy a bicycle. It was a good idea, until it got stolen at Mandalay Bay after one week. I decided to buy another one, which had a flat tire after two days, had a flat tire again after 4 more days and got stolen after 2 more days.
Something I learned about Vegas: people don’t ride bikes, but they do steal them.
The dealer school looked like I imagine an illegal gambling house would look like. Some gaming tables packed close together, full with all kinds of people gambling. The first thing they were going to teach me, was how to shuffle. They were surprised how quickly I learned. Of course being in magic for over 9 years helps a little. The thing I did have trouble with was pitching. Of course I could pitch cards, but not with the right technique. This was pretty interesting to learn. The most I learned though was procedures. A lot of the procedures I will never use in my own blackjack game, either because they are impractical or make cheating to difficult. For example, the way you have to hold the deck makes second dealing almost impossible.
After four weeks I passed the final audition, so I’m now the happy owner of a blackjack dealer certificate.
It turns out that you don’t need such a certificate to work at casinos. A couple of people already worked at casinos and were still doing the blackjack course. In fact, there was one guy doing the blackjack course who was a pit boss at a casino. I also got offered a job twice before I got the certificate, but I wasn’t allowed to work in the states. I don’t think I would have done it if I was.
All the teachers at the school still worked as dealers at casinos, but I only had the pleasure of seeing one dealing at her casino. This was a delight to watch, not only because she was hot. She dealt very fast and very efficient. I especially liked the speed with which she would put the cards in the mirror to look if she had a blackjack when she had a ten up.
Something I learned about Vegas: Say I Do Drive Through Wedding Chapel ( I think that says it all).
I also went to a lot of shows. Most of them were really good. The first show I went to was World’s Greatest Magic. It had about five different performers, two of which I had seen before. One of them was Kevin James, who did some great magic. In one of the illusions he would cut his assistant in half and the upper half would run on it’s hands into the audience. This looked really freaky. The other one was Juliana Chen, world champion manipulation in 2000. She showed some great manipulation with cards.
MacKing had his own comedy magic show in the afternoon. He was extremely funny and did some great magic. If you’re in Vegas you should definitely go see his show.
I also liked The Amazing Jonathan, although I felt he wasn’t that interested in his audience. He just did his thing and that was it. The first hour was very funny, but the last half an hour wasn’t all that great. Also, the performer that opened for him was not very good.
Showgirls of magic was a topless magic show. The magic wasn’t good, but who cares about magic if you see boobs. I also went to Skinthight, another topless show, which wasn’t too good either, but again, who cares, they showed boobs.
Lance Burton was of course a good show, although at the start I thought he was trying to keep his toothpaste smile a little too hard while talking, which made it look like he was doing ventriloquism. A lot of his stuff I had seen on TV, but he did do some illusions I hadn’t seen before and I had no idea how he did them.
Ronn Lucas was an extremely funny ventriloquist. Can’t say much more about it, just go and see him when your in Vegas.
Penn en Teller also did a great show, no need to tell what they did, it was all good.
V, the variety show started real good with an acrobatic act with two people that did some amazing things. After them there was a juggler, who juggled 5 balls, while bouncing a 6th ball on his head… and that was his start. I think it was the best juggler I have ever seen. Unfortunately, the acts after that weren’t that good, they were ok, but couldn’t compete with the class of the first two acts.
I also played lots of poker. I played about 115 hours and ended down about $ 1000 for poker and about $ 150 for other gambling. I mostly played 3-6 and 4-8 holdem. I don’t think I played as well as I do on the internet. It was my first time playing live and it kind of intimidated me. There were quite some pots where a bet by me would have given me the pot, and on the internet I would have put that bet in, but somehow it’s a lot more scary to bluff when you can see the people. I did win a jackpot hand at Mandalay Bay. I hit 4 kings which paid $94. The pot was bigger than that, but still.
Before I went to Vegas, I read Mike Caro’s Book of Tells so I knew that if someone bet and his hands were shaking, he probably has a good hand. So for the first week, every time I bet, called or raised, I must have had a great hand, because I couldn’t stop shaking.
The good thing about playing live is that I now know what a TOM looks like, they’re barely alive. Maniacs kind of look normal though.
I did play one session of 6-12 at the mirage, and I found the game much thougher than the 3-6 game. In my first round the blinds got chopped 3 times, while I had only seen it once in the 3-6 games during the 80 hours I had played by then. I did end up in the 6-12 game, so clearly I'm better at playing the higher limit instead of the lowest limit where people will draw out everytime /images/graemlins/grin.gif.
Something I learned about Vegas: Chip runners don’t actually run.
After 5 weeks it was time to go back home. Spending that long in Vegas is just a little to much. I did have a lot of fun though and I will definately come back someday, but for a shorter period.
Peter