Vegas in July vs. the planet Mercury

My first photo op! We be stylin', yeah!

Fossilman, Ozzie Joe and The Poker Brat. I guess when I get better, I'll get a nickname.

Attending the WSOP Academy was fun, exciting and informative, so what else could you ask for? I learned a lot and I'm positive I've got more game.

I didn't win a satellite tournament this year, so I didn't get to play in the WSOP Main Event, but out of 180 attendees, I finished 20th in the academy tournament and I used a lot of my newly acquired knowledge.

I won all three times I played in the Caesars Palace poker room and then after I got home, I won a online sit-n-go tournament, so it hasn't completely paid for itself yet, I'm positive it will in the future.




Here's an easy riddle: What's the difference between Las Vegas in July and the planet Mercury? A: Las Vegas is hotter.


Since I had workshops & tournaments from morning to evening, I didn't leave Caesars Palace for 4 days and I had my car in valet parking. They had obviously parked it in the direct sun and July 5th set a record for the date at 116 degs, so the inside of the car was probably 150+. I had a plug in car fridge that I got from OSIsoft for my 15th anniversary and that melted and warped. I'm just glad the Red Bulls inside didn't explode. I had to toss it because I was afraid that the motor that cooled it off was damaged.

When I started to drive the car, it felt like that tires had melted into the pavement because it would only go really slow. Also the button that lets me lock & unlock the doors didn't work until I got back and went to the car wash, so I guess something was deformed and the cool water made it work again...

I had the water bottle you see below in the cup holder and the bottom softened and deformed, so now it's convex and won't stand up any more. The gum that I had changed it's chemical composition and turned into something really yucky. So the moral of the story is to self park and not on the roof.








The last two night I spent in Vegas, I stayed at the Renaissance Las Vegas Hotel. It's an excellent hotel and less expensive than the hotels with a Casino. The beds are very comfy and the showerhead pressure is massive compared to most hotels and they had a nice plasma TV with free HBO.

The best meal I had in Las Vegas was at the hotel restaurant - Envy The Steakhouse. I met a very nice server, Alina Gold, and I had never met anybody named Alina. She told me it's a common name in Russia and also now in Cuba and the latin community because Fidel named one of his daughters Alina. Her mother defected from the USSR and Alina was born in Nepal and I'd never met anybody born in Nepal... We had a very enjoyable evening as it wasn't very busy and I told her about the poker and about reading people. The next night I went back for dessert and she treated me to some excellent raspberry sherbert.

I'm sure to go back next time I'm in Vegas.

This is the end of 2007 WSOP trip reporting - here's a link to all the photos I took.

WSOP 2007

Read Em and Reap - Learning about non-verbal communications

I think this was the most fun day of the Academy - having ex-FBI profiler, Joe Navarro, tell us how to use non-verbal communcation to read your poker opponents. I had gotten his book and read it over the weekend and it's amazing how many things people to subconciously that give away what they are thinking. We found out that the most honest part of the body is the feet and the least honest is the face.

I was able to use what I learned right away in the very nice Caesars Palace Poker Room. One guy would rub his nose when he was bluffing and a woman scrunched up her lips when she saw a card she didn't like. I used this to my advantage and won a few bucks. They also have an excellent Chicken Caesars Salad that they bring to the poker table - it makes sense, eh?

4th of July & Annette_15

Today, we had several hours of presentations about strategy, we played and analyzed hands with pros dealing. We had Scotty Fishman and Annette "Annette_15" Obrestad at our table.


Annette is an online poker phenom. She's from Norway and she started playing poker online when she was 15 (she's 18 now) and never deposited a single Krone because she started playing free roll tournaments. She's won about $3.5 Million in online poker tournaments so far. She can't play in the USA because you have to be 21.


ESPN filmed the simulated games for a future WSOP show. I didn't get on film this time.

I think that Greg Raymer was the most helpful of the poker pros. Joe Hachem was also fun to listen to. On the final day Phil Hellmuth Jr. told a bunch of stories and basically said that since he, Greg & Joe play completely different styles, you just have to find your own style and the more you play, the better you can get.

Be A Sponge

Day 1 of the WSOP Poker Academy at Caesars Palace. The main message was: "Be a sponge". The more information you can get about the players, their betting strategy and their tells, the better.

I learned quite a bit already and today is a full day with a tournament in the evening.

After the workshop, we went to the fancy nightclub, Pure, for a reception. I sat down to a guy that didn't have a badge and we talked for about 45 minutes before Phil Hellmuth Jr. came by and asked if there was any food in the joint and then I found out that I'd been talking to Phil Hellmuth Sr. For the non-poker players, Phil Hellmuth Jr. won the WSOP Main Event in 1989 and has won more (11) bracelets than anybody. Phil Sr. & I talked about everything from Scooter Libby to Paris Hilton to Oakley Sunglasses to Wisconsin (he said he's from Madison, so politically he's left of left) to poker to how it is to have a famous son and more. I thought I was going to go for about 30 minutes and bail, but I stayed for 2 hours.

World Series of Poker Academy

I'm going to Las Vegas on July 2nd to attend a 3 day workshop on No Limit Texas Hold Em. I don't have a seat in the Main Event yet, but there are still a few more chances.

Here are the details of the workshop. Even if I don't get into the Main Event, this should be way fun.

The WSOP Academy will hosts its next event, the Main Event Primer, at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, starting July 3 and ending July 5 - on the eve of the 2007 World Series of Poker Main Event. Spaces are still available for the comprehensive, three-day poker school that is specifically designed to prepare participants for the WSOP Main Event, poker's richest and most prestigious competition. On hand as instructors will be an unprecedented team of world class instructors, including past Main Event Champions Phil Hellmuth, Greg Raymer and Joe Hachem, multiple WSOP-bracelet winners Mark Seif and Scott Fischman, Joe Navarro and many, many more.

At the end of the first day of the Main Event Primer, participants will receive VIP treatment at an exclusive Opening Night Party at PURE nightclub in Caesars Palace. The second day of the Academy will be capped with a private tournament where participants will battle it out for a $10,000 seat to the WSOP Main Event and other prizes. On the final day, another $10,000 seat to the Main Event will be given away in a shootout tournament. Finally, on the closing night, a special banquet will be held that will include the final table of the first tournament, taking place on stage under the lights and cameras for all to watch.

2 Cents Question: Has online gambling caused you any grief?

I can no longer vote for Senator Feinstein. She is trying to stop online poker.

"While the advent of the Internet has clearly been beneficial to American society, the same cannot be said for Internet-based gambling activity. Internet gambling is too easily accessible to minors, too subject to fraud and criminal misuse, and too evasive of state gambling laws. For these reasons, I have supported legislation aimed at curbing Internet gambling during my tenure in the Senate. For example, in the 108th Congress I co-sponsored the “Internet Gambling Funding Prohibition Act” (S. 627), which was introduced by Senator Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.). Unfortunately, this bill was not signed into law, however, I plan to continue to support limits on Internet gambling should any legislation be considered by the Senate in the 109th Congress.

Again, thank you for your letter. While we do not necessarily agree on the particular topic, I hope that you will continue to write on matters of importance to you. Should you have further questions or comments on this or any other issue, please do not hesitate to contact my Washington, D.C. office at (202) 224-3841."

Sincerely yours,

Dianne Feinstein
United States Senator

My letter to Senator Dianne Feinstein:

Dear Senator Feinstein,
While I agree with you on most issues and have voted for you each time you ran for state or federal office, I can't vote for you in the future while you are supporting legislation banning online poker.

Poker is not gambling, it's a skill and luck game and if it was gambling, it wouldn't be legal in California and I'm sure you know there are plenty of card clubs in California where you can play poker and other skill games. Obviously, it should be regulated so that underage kids can't play online, but you and the government shouldn't not infringe on my civil liberties.

I'm not sure how you can stop it anyway, since it's all overseas unless the US sets up a ban like China or Iran does on their internet services. I'm sure you'll agree with me that it isn't in the best interest in our free country. The site where I play has it's HQ on an Indian Reservation in Canada.

California has Lotto and Mega Lotto and Horse Racing and online Horse Race betting, so I'm not sure what is your point. Many other states have casino gambling as we saw when they all washed ashore in Mississippi during Hurricane Katrina. California has lots of citizens going to Nevada or the local Indian Casinos. So gambling is everywhere... Why ban Poker online?

I have a personal interest because I won an online poker satellite tournament that got me a $10,000 entry to the World Series of Poker and I hope to do it again next year.

WSOP 2006 Guarantee

Before I left for the 2006 WSOP, I guaranteed that I would be on TV. Nobody would bet me because they all said that if I didn't cash or make the final table, I would make it in "The Nuts" section of the ESPN show.

Well, I didn't have to get nutty to get on TV, I just had to be sitting behind someone that wanted to get on TV by wearing a Finding Nemo hat.

Click here for all the images.

I made the final table

It wasn't the World Series of Poker and it didn't cost $10,000 to play and there weren't over 8,000 players and the top prize wasn't $12,000,000, but I still cashed.

I played a $55.00 tournament at the California Grand card club in Pacheco today. There were 50 players, the top prize was $1,500 and they paid the top 10. I made it to the final table of 10 and was knocked out first, so I got $75.00.

I had been down to my last 200 chips (starting with 500), but I beat the same guy 3 times in a row by going all in and I knocked him out of tournament. My buddies, Glenn, Mike & Jesus also played, but they finished out of the money.

I wish I was still playing

My mind is still in the game... I didn't really get a chance to play some poker. Seven hours is way too short. I didn't get to give anybody a bad beat. I did knock one player out, so at least I've got that going for me.

It's hard to explain, but it's not out of my system yet. I'd been thinking about it and working on it for over 2 months, so I wish I had more time at it. I guess that when the tournament is over on August 10th, I'll be able to move onto the next thing..

Heads in plastic bags, loud noises, Capt. Crunch and tomato trucks

After I finished with poker and was awake at 4am, I decided I should end my trip with a big fun bang, so I went online and bought a ticket for the Blue Man Group.

If you don't like loud and I mean very loud music or are claustrophobic, do not see the Blue Man Group, but it is a very funny and fun show. I saw it about 3 years ago, but about half of it was new. They use Capt. Crunch in the show. I don't recommend getting a seat in the first 6 rows as those are called the Poncho seats. If you've never seen the show, they bang on drums with paint, so there is a bit of splatter.

As I was walking through the Venetian Casino, I saw a weird sight - about 500 women dressed in black walking towards me and they all had mannequin dummy heads inside plastic bags with bad wigs. It took me awhile to figure out that they were at a Paul Mitchell hairdressers convention. Very bizarre!

The Venetian is a very beautiful place to hang out. It's got the canal with the gondolas and St. Marks Square with singers and performers.
Click on the photos for a larger image.

Finally, driving to Las Vegas was good for me because it was nice to be able to get around where I wanted and when I wanted. The only problem is coming back up Highway 5 with the super slow tomato trucks. They can only go about 55 MPH, so there is always a traffic jam around them with other trucks pass. The worst time was when one tomato truck was passing another and it was only going around 1 MPH faster, so the pass took about 2 miles.

The evil Lady Canada gets the boot

Wed Aug 02 17:59:00 PDT 2006

Monica Reeves Eliminated - Monica Reeves is all-in with K-Q against her opponent's 10-10. Neither player improves and Reeves is eliminated from the Main Event.

Actually, she was very nice and we both made the exact same amount of cash.

Final Poker roundup

Well, I'm back home in Dreamland with stories to share, hats to wear and some new refrigerator magnets (Excalibur, NY NY & WSOP 2006). This is a photo of the ESPN Featured Table. Last year's champion, Joe Hachem is on the monitors.

Here is my WSOP rundown:

1. After 2 hours, I had about 12,000 chips after starting with 10,000
2. After 4 hours, I had about 19,000 chips as I busted out a loser with a big unlit cigar, who mumbled all the time and had showed up about 40 minutes late. For some reason he was trying to stare me down, but I've already been stared down by the King of Stares, Jay Lakumb, so I was immune. I guess he thought I was bluffing because I had a Queen high flush and he had a pair of Jacks and there was also another Queen on the board.
3. After 6 hours, I had about 15,000 chips and it was dinner break
4. I goofed on dinner and got stuck in a really slow restaurant and got back late to the table and missed a couple of hand. I wasn't back in the same groove as before. I should have slowed down, looked at my rules again.
5. Monica Reeves, the poker & blackjack pro from Canada, was sitting to my right and to her right was another pro from Australia. I just didn't realize that they both were "the Grinder" because I hadn't heard of them. They were the ones I needed to stay away from on day one. She went all in for her last 10,000 chips and was doing some big time "Hollywooding" (over-acting), but my mind was just wasn't ready to figure it out and for some reason, I thought she was trying to bluff me out of the hand and I should have realized that she knew I was playing tight (conservative), so the only way she was going to risk getting knocked out was if she knew she had the best hand, but c'est la vie, I didn't figure that out and I lost about 13,000 of my chips and only had about 2000 left, which lasted me about another 45 minutes. I wasn't pot committed and if she bluffed me out, I still would have only been a little bit under the average chips.
6. I stole some blinds twice without getting called. Unfortunately, one time I had pocket Aces and wanted to get called, but then I went out when the pro from Oz had pocket Kings to my A-Q and didn't improve. I ended up playing about a little over 7 hours.
7. Today would have been my second day of playing and after getting a good night's sleep in my own bed, I was still tired, so it would have been all adrenaline and power bars to get through day 2.
8. I think that whoever wins will really deserve it and it's just as mentally & physically gruelling as the Tour de France.
9. The final count was: Players 8,773 Prize Pool $82,512,162
10. I was sitting right behind the guy with the Nemo hat. I guess he wanted his photo taken, so it worked
11. PartyPoker.net paid $22 Million to have their logo on every table, so all logowear with .com was banned, hence the need for massive duct tape as seen on my hat below.
12. I didn't get on TV, at least not that I know of, but I did get mentioned in the PokerStars blog - http://www.pokerstarsblog.com/2006/07/wsop-main-event-day-1c-begins.html
13. The third photo below is Daniel Negraneau getting interviewed - he said he thought the final table would be at least 8 out of 9 players that nobody had ever heard of.

Click on the photos for larger images.

It's 4am and I can't sleep

It would have been nice to be blogging now after surviving the first day, but I didn't. I got knocked out after the dinner break. I made the fatal mistake of not getting settled down after having to rush eating and getting back late to the table.

I didn't follow my rules. My mind was in a fog and I didn't take time to analyze a simple play. I had 3 pro players at my table - from Denmark, Australia & Canada. Monica Reeves, who's going to be on TV in the fall playing elimination Blackjack on CBS is the one who took most of my chips. She's got 44,000 chips (about 13,000 from me) after day 1.

T.J. Cloutier, Antonio Esfandiari, Phil Gordon, Mike Matusow, Jennifer Harmon, Jennifer Tilly, Steve Dannemann & Sammy Farha also got knocked out today.

I'll do a final WSOP blog when I get home.

Some of the Mighty Have Fallen

Phil Hellmuth, Doyle Brunson, Howard Lederer and several other big time professional poker players are gone after the first day.

I found out that the 2005 winner, Greg "Fossilman" Raymer and Mike "The Mouth" Matusow will be playing today, so I might run into them...

Everything happens for a reason

I was coming back from watching the big time fun movie, Pirates of the Caribbean and I wanted to eat at the Excalibur, but their valet parking was full. There is obviously zero competent traffic engineering staff in Las Vegas, so I was stuck just trying to get out.. I got so fed up, that I decided to bag it and just go back to the Monte Carlo, but I got into the wrong left turn lane and I found myself going into the New York New York parking. There is a walkway above the street over to the Excalibur, so I redecided to go eat English like I'd planned...

Because of all the delays, I ended up getting to the Zagat award winning Steakhouse at Camelot at the exact same time as Humberto the Bertmeister, well known king of Palm Springs recycling. He was also solo, so while chatting as we waited, we decided to dine together. He's a big time crap shooter and he had a bunch of hotel points he needed to use, so after an excellent dinner, he treated.. that was very nice of him and keeps my lucky winning streak going.

Tomorrow is going to be the second craziest thing I've ever done and those that know me understand that I'm just saving the first crazy things place just in case.

No more blogging until I get home from the Rio, hopefully around 3am or so.

My Ticket to Play

Here is my ticket to the 2006 WSOP. PokerStars has a breakfast for the players each morning. It's almost getting exciting.

Yowzer... I'm going for a swim.

Day 1A ended at 3:12am. I'm going for a morning swim, then breakfast, pick up the pokerstars.net stuff, then it's back to the burbs for Pirates of the Caribbean, then to the Excalibur to complete my British Isles eating tour at the Sir Galahad's Pub & Prime Rib House and early to bed.

Here is the Monte Carlo pool, the Rio Casino where the WSOP is being held and as I said earlier, all of Las Vegas is under construction.


The Monte Carlo has a wave pool, a Lazy River (which if you are taller than about 4 feet, is hard to swim in, so rent a tube), a hot tub spa and a regular pool. It's nice in the morning because the hotel puts the whole pool area in the shade until about 10:15am. The weather in Vegas today is sort of mild - it's only 86F this morning. I think that the massive thunderstorms cooled things off. I'm finally getting a clue and wearing shorts. What was I thinking?

Shuffle Up and Deal

The 2006 World Series of Poker has begun. I checked it out before the Penn & Teller show. I had my first poker celebrity sighting - Scotty Nguyen. Currently, he's got about 30,000 chips.

It's after 12:30am and there are still 990 players left out of 2,138 and they have to get down to 800, so it's going to be a late night. I'm going to bed really early on Saturday.

Here is what it looks like. I got to the Rio right as they were getting their dinner break and I basically got run over. There were so many spectators earlier, nobody could move, so hopefully, when I play on Sunday, the novelty will have diminished...

The Penn & Teller show was a lot of fun.. Not too much blood.

One major snafu - Pokerstars gave out PokerStars.com logowear and anything with .com on it is banned from the WSOP and always has been, so now I guess I get another set of pokerstars.net swag. Everyone today had a bunch of duct tape over the .com part of the logo. It looked very tacky and lame...

Tonight I ate at the Twisted Kilt pub in the Rio. So last night it was Irish and tonight it was Scottish... I guess I better heard over to the Excalibur for dinner on Saturday night to make a complete British Isles circuit..

At least 8,200 WSOP 2006 players

There are officially at least 8,200 participants, over $82,000,000 in prize money and the word on the street is that there will be up to 500 alternates per day.

Lucky for me, the "Grinder" is playing on day 1A, so I can easily stay away from him until the 2nd day.

Here is the link to follow "live" events. http://www.cardplayer.com/tournaments/live_updates/3229

Look for me on Sunday.

Less Than Urban

As I've said plenty of times, I'm a suburban (less than urban) kind of guy, so today, just to keep things a bit normal before I head over the Rio on Sunday and hit the mother of all unreality, I decided to head out to the 'burbs of Vegas...

Luckily, my Garmin GPS gizmo, which I call Ma'am (as in Yes, Ma'am when it tells me where to go and gets me there even if I make a wrong turn), got me out the Summerlin NV, home of the Suncoast Orleans casino and Century 16 movie theater. I saw the new Miami Vice movie starring Jamie Foxx & Colin Ferrell with a south Florida mullet. It's a typical slam bang action flick by Micheal Mann, so if you liked "Heat" and "Thief", you'll like it... it's even got a flagrant Jackson Pollock reference. Although because I'm me, my favorite part of the whole movie was when in the last 5 minutes or so, Sonny says: "A guy named Frank will come and pick you up in a boat". I know all of my movie group people know about my claim that 80% of all movies have a character named Frank, so even though you didn't really see Frank and he's not in the credits, there still was a character named Frank, which is all that counts.

Here is an observation about Las Vegas - all men's room floors are always wet no matter what time of day or what casino you're in and all Las Vegas roads are under construction...

I'll report back later after I get back from the Penn & Teller show.