[Sparks]

I took a short nap after the Super Bowl because I was a bit tired, and I only had one day left of my 8-day trip to Vegas. The Mirage, for whatever reason, is still my favorite place to play.

I walked over from the IP at midnight, and buy into a 10-20 game with a rack of red, as the 20 and 40 games were full with a list for each.

Eight hours later I notice the senior citizens making their way into the casino to play the slots, and a few poker players sitting at empty poker tables reading the paper and drinking coffee, and it's nice and quiet and peaceful, and pure poker at our table, not much gabbing - and I just take it all in and enjoy the moment -- of sitting at the Mirage in Las Vegas at 8 am having played all the way through.

Four hours later at noon, I'm in the BB and look down at A9o, and call a MP raiser, with one other LP cold-caller in the pot. I guess the Texan to my left, who kept needling me all night that I was too tight finally got to me.

Flop comes 972 rainbow, and I bet. The PF raiser folds, and the LP calls. Turn is a 3, and I bet. LP raises, I 3-bet it, he 4-bets and I call. River is a J, I bet, he raises, and I call. He shows a set of deuces.

I look down at my red stack of 150 BB's piled rectangularly in 9 towers of 66 chips each, and decide that I'm tired and played the hand poorly on every street.

I rack up, cash out, walk out past the white tigers, and back to the IP to check out and catch a taxi to the airport. It's back to L.A., land of the cantakerrous, loud mouthed, rude, totally uncivilized world of poker in Southern California.

The thought of quitting my job, moving to Las Vegas, and reading the morning paper with a cup of coffee at The Mirage, is like heaven.

Sparks