chesspain
02-02-2004, 09:41 PM
My first trip to Vegas began with a fair amount of angst, as the forecast for my connecting city of Detroit was for freezing rain to be followed by heavy snow. In fact, my mood became more jangled the morning of my trip when I saw that the earlier flight out of Manchester, NH to Detroit had been cancelled, although by the time I was set to leave, the weather had improved enough so that I was able to fly to Detroit, and then on to Vegas, without a hitch. In fact, one of the two guys meeting me in Vegas, who is a commercial pilot named Jon, was released from work early that day in PA due to his flight being grounded, although it took him four different airlines through five cities before he was able to touch down in Vegas a couple of hours after I did.
Since we played among four different casinos, I will simply present the highlights and lowlights of my experiences in each place, rather than present an account in diary form:
The Bellagio: We made the mistake of arriving here on a Thursday night at 8:00pm. The waiting list for the 4/8 game looked to be at least fifteen deep. Although the room looked nice enough, it was crowded and hot, and my other buddy who was accompanying me preferred playing 3/6 or lower, so we high tailed it out of there, but not before I espied Jennifer Harmon in the high stakes room sitting at a table in the back and talking on her cell phone during play. When I came back after a trip to the bathroom, she had left. I guess she was on to me.
The Mirage: My friends and I were all suitably impressed with the classy tropical motif throughout. I was especially impressed by the cocktail waitresses’ uniforms, which looked like they came from the set of Naughty Executive Secretaries Do Vegas. My buddies and I were all placed at different tables, and I received few playable cards for the three hours I was there. This was especially frustrating considering that during the last half of my time there we had one very loose aggressive player who was bullying his way to many pots. Unfortunately, I never had cards to go up against him. I won a couple of hands, surrendered a bunch of blinds, and had KK cracked after I correctly isolated a straight draw who rivered me. I ended my single session there down approx. six BB.
Circus Circus: My pilot buddy and I checked out this desert big top our first morning in Vegas, before our third friend arrived. I wanted to see if I could find a soft game filled with beleaguered dads, whereas my friend wanted to see if this would be an appropriate place for a family vacation with his wife and two children, ages nine and two. I found the entire place to be grungy, dark, and tired looking. Jon and I agreed that the only children who were likely to be amused here were those whose prenatal diets consisted of boxed wine and lead paint dust.
The poker room was even drearier than the rest of the casino. There was one 3/6 game going when we arrived at 11am. Even worse, although the game seemed fairly fishy, I did not win a hand for the first three hours, and only managed to end up down approx. seven BB after winning a couple of hands near the end. My most memorable hand was early on and prominently featured Jon. I received KK in EP1 and bet, three players coldcalled, and Jon called in the BB. Then on a 36Tr flop, Jon bets, I raise, and its folded back to him, and he calls. The turn is a rag which we check-call. On the river a 9 hits, check-bet-checkraise, and I call to be shown 78o. Over lunch a few hours later, I had to explain to my newbie friend that he should not have bet into a PF raiser on the flop when he only had a gutshot draw, which allowed me to isolate him. He took well both the advice I gave him as the good natured ribbing for sucking out on me.
Monte Carlo: I played here for a good part of my last three days, mostly due to my friends’ desire for 2/4, and the relatively pleasant playing atmosphere. In fact, on our last night, my buddy Barry hit two progressive jackpots in the space of four hours playing 2/4: quad sixes for $150, and then the Str8flush wheel for $500. Oh yeah, a few hours earlier while I was playing 4/8, I limped with A /images/graemlins/heart.gif 2 /images/graemlins/heart.gif, and folded to a flop bet on a 5 /images/graemlins/heart.gif 8 /images/graemlins/spade.gif K /images/graemlins/spade.gif, only to see the 4 /images/graemlins/heart.gif and 3 /images/graemlins/heart.gif hit perfect-perfect...UGH...
I won approx. $50 playing 2/4 the first day, and won another $50 playing 4/8 the second visit after initially being down close to $150 playing first 2/4 and then 4/8. During the first hour playing 2/4 on the second day, my two buddies and I were seated at a table with a dealer from the Cannery named Melissa, who exhibited early on a boisterous, quirky charm one would find among the denizens of the better trailer parks. I soon left them to play at a 4/8. At the moment when I walked past their table six hours later on my way out of the room to make a call home, Melissa jumped up and began screaming at a man at her table “I had aces...you God Damn Iranian...you are Iranian aren’t you!...M@ther-F*cker!...
As I was outside talking on my cell phone, two casino cops on bikes raced by me, dropped their bikes, and ran inside, after which she was escorted out. My friends told me afterwards that players at the table as well as multiple dealers had been complaining about her, especially as she became increasingly more drunk and obnoxious, although the brushes did nothing but simply ask her to play nice with the others.
Another incident my final night at the MC soured me on this place for good. One of the fairly new arrivals at my 4/8 table, who appeared to be a regular, was a weather-beaten blond man in his mid forties who looked liked a sundrenched, coked-out ski bum. His wife looked only slightly better. During a hand in which I was not involved, a young, drunk in seat one showed his cards, which caused ski bum to seemingly muck his cards. As his cards were in the air, his wife shouted “You had a straight!,” which caused ski bum to immediately shout “I had a straight!.” One card landed face down in the now accordian spread of the muck, whereas the other card was never even identified after it hit. Ski bum then claimed “I meant to toss them down and they flipped over.” The dealer then calls over the Asian brush, “T.V.”, who after hearing the story, turns to the drunk kid and says “Is it O.K. for you to only get half of the pot, since he had the straight?” Mind you, not only were both cards in the muck, but no one actually even saw his hand! The kid seemed bewildered and agreed, muttering “I don’t want to a jerk about it; if he had the straight he had the straight.” I was in shock, but since I was neither involved in the hand nor asked for my opinion, I did not say anything. I left soon afterwards, disgusted with the obvious “home court advantage.”
The Orleans: Since this was within walking distance of our off-strip condo, it became my home away from home. I was pleasantly taken by the fairly friendly, Cheers-like atmosphere here, where everyone knows your name, even if they want to leave you penniless. I found the 2/4 games as soft and profitable as the 2/4 games back at Foxwoods. In fact, I won enough at the 2/4 games here over the week so that I still ended up $75 at the end of my stay, despite mostly losing at the 3/6 and 4/8 games.
My most memorable hand involved my having QJs, and hitting the str8flush on the river. Even better, my heads up opponent three-bet me on the river, although I was such a retard that I failed to see that I had the supernuts, believing that I only had the Q-high flush. Not only did I only call this three-bet, but I almost mucked when he showed the A-high flush. Even worse, since the Orleans has a bad beat jackpot and not a progressive high hand jackpot, I only received an ill-fitting baseball cap in return.
Overall, we all had a good time, and I look forward to a return trip in the next six or so months.
Since we played among four different casinos, I will simply present the highlights and lowlights of my experiences in each place, rather than present an account in diary form:
The Bellagio: We made the mistake of arriving here on a Thursday night at 8:00pm. The waiting list for the 4/8 game looked to be at least fifteen deep. Although the room looked nice enough, it was crowded and hot, and my other buddy who was accompanying me preferred playing 3/6 or lower, so we high tailed it out of there, but not before I espied Jennifer Harmon in the high stakes room sitting at a table in the back and talking on her cell phone during play. When I came back after a trip to the bathroom, she had left. I guess she was on to me.
The Mirage: My friends and I were all suitably impressed with the classy tropical motif throughout. I was especially impressed by the cocktail waitresses’ uniforms, which looked like they came from the set of Naughty Executive Secretaries Do Vegas. My buddies and I were all placed at different tables, and I received few playable cards for the three hours I was there. This was especially frustrating considering that during the last half of my time there we had one very loose aggressive player who was bullying his way to many pots. Unfortunately, I never had cards to go up against him. I won a couple of hands, surrendered a bunch of blinds, and had KK cracked after I correctly isolated a straight draw who rivered me. I ended my single session there down approx. six BB.
Circus Circus: My pilot buddy and I checked out this desert big top our first morning in Vegas, before our third friend arrived. I wanted to see if I could find a soft game filled with beleaguered dads, whereas my friend wanted to see if this would be an appropriate place for a family vacation with his wife and two children, ages nine and two. I found the entire place to be grungy, dark, and tired looking. Jon and I agreed that the only children who were likely to be amused here were those whose prenatal diets consisted of boxed wine and lead paint dust.
The poker room was even drearier than the rest of the casino. There was one 3/6 game going when we arrived at 11am. Even worse, although the game seemed fairly fishy, I did not win a hand for the first three hours, and only managed to end up down approx. seven BB after winning a couple of hands near the end. My most memorable hand was early on and prominently featured Jon. I received KK in EP1 and bet, three players coldcalled, and Jon called in the BB. Then on a 36Tr flop, Jon bets, I raise, and its folded back to him, and he calls. The turn is a rag which we check-call. On the river a 9 hits, check-bet-checkraise, and I call to be shown 78o. Over lunch a few hours later, I had to explain to my newbie friend that he should not have bet into a PF raiser on the flop when he only had a gutshot draw, which allowed me to isolate him. He took well both the advice I gave him as the good natured ribbing for sucking out on me.
Monte Carlo: I played here for a good part of my last three days, mostly due to my friends’ desire for 2/4, and the relatively pleasant playing atmosphere. In fact, on our last night, my buddy Barry hit two progressive jackpots in the space of four hours playing 2/4: quad sixes for $150, and then the Str8flush wheel for $500. Oh yeah, a few hours earlier while I was playing 4/8, I limped with A /images/graemlins/heart.gif 2 /images/graemlins/heart.gif, and folded to a flop bet on a 5 /images/graemlins/heart.gif 8 /images/graemlins/spade.gif K /images/graemlins/spade.gif, only to see the 4 /images/graemlins/heart.gif and 3 /images/graemlins/heart.gif hit perfect-perfect...UGH...
I won approx. $50 playing 2/4 the first day, and won another $50 playing 4/8 the second visit after initially being down close to $150 playing first 2/4 and then 4/8. During the first hour playing 2/4 on the second day, my two buddies and I were seated at a table with a dealer from the Cannery named Melissa, who exhibited early on a boisterous, quirky charm one would find among the denizens of the better trailer parks. I soon left them to play at a 4/8. At the moment when I walked past their table six hours later on my way out of the room to make a call home, Melissa jumped up and began screaming at a man at her table “I had aces...you God Damn Iranian...you are Iranian aren’t you!...M@ther-F*cker!...
As I was outside talking on my cell phone, two casino cops on bikes raced by me, dropped their bikes, and ran inside, after which she was escorted out. My friends told me afterwards that players at the table as well as multiple dealers had been complaining about her, especially as she became increasingly more drunk and obnoxious, although the brushes did nothing but simply ask her to play nice with the others.
Another incident my final night at the MC soured me on this place for good. One of the fairly new arrivals at my 4/8 table, who appeared to be a regular, was a weather-beaten blond man in his mid forties who looked liked a sundrenched, coked-out ski bum. His wife looked only slightly better. During a hand in which I was not involved, a young, drunk in seat one showed his cards, which caused ski bum to seemingly muck his cards. As his cards were in the air, his wife shouted “You had a straight!,” which caused ski bum to immediately shout “I had a straight!.” One card landed face down in the now accordian spread of the muck, whereas the other card was never even identified after it hit. Ski bum then claimed “I meant to toss them down and they flipped over.” The dealer then calls over the Asian brush, “T.V.”, who after hearing the story, turns to the drunk kid and says “Is it O.K. for you to only get half of the pot, since he had the straight?” Mind you, not only were both cards in the muck, but no one actually even saw his hand! The kid seemed bewildered and agreed, muttering “I don’t want to a jerk about it; if he had the straight he had the straight.” I was in shock, but since I was neither involved in the hand nor asked for my opinion, I did not say anything. I left soon afterwards, disgusted with the obvious “home court advantage.”
The Orleans: Since this was within walking distance of our off-strip condo, it became my home away from home. I was pleasantly taken by the fairly friendly, Cheers-like atmosphere here, where everyone knows your name, even if they want to leave you penniless. I found the 2/4 games as soft and profitable as the 2/4 games back at Foxwoods. In fact, I won enough at the 2/4 games here over the week so that I still ended up $75 at the end of my stay, despite mostly losing at the 3/6 and 4/8 games.
My most memorable hand involved my having QJs, and hitting the str8flush on the river. Even better, my heads up opponent three-bet me on the river, although I was such a retard that I failed to see that I had the supernuts, believing that I only had the Q-high flush. Not only did I only call this three-bet, but I almost mucked when he showed the A-high flush. Even worse, since the Orleans has a bad beat jackpot and not a progressive high hand jackpot, I only received an ill-fitting baseball cap in return.
Overall, we all had a good time, and I look forward to a return trip in the next six or so months.