Vegas.... Day 2....

Day #2 saw Pebbles and I get up pretty early once again. Just another couple of hours of sleep, and it seemed our Vegas motors were all charged up and ready to rock and roll. Since she hit for about $46.00 on an impulse played nickel slot, (we hadn't even made it 200 feet from the elevator!) something told me that this was going to be Pebbles day.

After a little bit of messing around with the odd machine hear and there, we bought in to the 10:00 am NLHE tourney at the Riviera. 26 runners @ a $50 buy-in, made for an $1100 pot. We like the Riv's game, as it offers the auto 6% to the dealers and then a 90% payback of the entry fee as well. Also at only $50.00, the play can still be soft enough that you can go in feeling pretty confident in making it fairly deep. Of course my confidence wained just a touch, as I drew the same table as Peb's and she pulled the seat just two to my left. Yikes ! I smell a "chaaaark!"

It ended up not mattering where we sat for the most part. I hit a pretty sick run of crap cards. In my BB, I finally woke up with K-K to two limpers. I made a 3x raise and only UTG made the call. A flop of J-3-7 rainbow came out and I check-raised my opponents bet of 2 BB's, to a total of 6 BB's. He called. The turn brought out a second Jack and I could tell that he hated this card with a passion. I bet out pot and watched, as he squirmed in his chair like a school kid that just got caught writing his girlfriends name on his desk. He then called. (?) I'm lost as to where I stand now and, I seriously needed to re-evalute the hand. My first instinct was A-A. The river brought total crap to the board and I needed to make a decision. The one I decided upon, was the appearance of a value bet. I figured if it looked like I was just trying to get the exact amount I thought he'd call, he might be able to put me on the set. He called and then, flipped up A-A. I was the crippled stack, instead of him. His reasoning? "I can't fold those ever. I'da called your all-in, even though I really thought you had the Jack!" I told him that this was good to know.

Several more hands of crap and I am running out of stack to fight back with. Again I get a raiser in my BB and then a re-raise from the next position. I look down at 6-6 and then consider my opponents. Both have played A-x several times and the vast majority of those hands, were with A-x under 6. I have a chance to race for a triple-up, before the blinds eat me alive. No brainer IMHO. I'm not going anywhere in the event, if I don't get some kind of chip stack anyhow. I pushed. I get both callers and they have me covered. On a craptastic flop, there is a check from seat #4, and then seat #5 bets him out of the pot. We open up, my 6-6 against A-K off. I am ahead and see a turn King, quickly followed by the River Ace. I'm out in 11th.

Pebbles final tabled and I wanted to rail her pretty bad. But she was in "that" zone if you know what I mean. If you've played against her, you probably do! I sat back instead and let her keep focused on the action. I only sent the odd blown kiss here and there, when I thought it would not be a distraction of any kind. Three spots were paying and they were now down to six players. No matter where I went to get a good look, I couldn't get an accurate count of her stack. It didn't look too healthy though, and I was a little worried. I found out later that she'd apparently taken over the position of getting dealt my cards. A run of 8-2, 9-3 etc... while there were some really big pots being developed. She was also seeing real hands win pots, so making a move would have been a fairly dangerous proposition. She ended up pushing for an additional 1/2 of her BB, with two paint cards and lost. Peb's busts out in 6th. and stares me right in the eyes and says, "We're coming back here. We're coming back to win too!" (more on that later!)

With that all over and done with, we pointed ourselves towards Freemont Street. No real plans, just to play something down at Binions or The Nugget or maybe even the Freemont itself. Once we got there, we'd decide. Peb's made the decision to focus on the left side of the street. I agreed and along we went. By the time we'd come upon La Bayou, we'd broken even at everything we'd done. The girls outside La Bayou did the bead thing they do and walked us in arm in arm towards the floor. It was all slots. Peb's and I are not big on slots at all, but they were bringing us a couple of Margarita's and you know what? The place was fun inside. "What's $20?" I said. So we picked a machine and sat down. We alternated pulls and of course,

-I draw blank
-Peb's hits for $5
-I draw blank
-Peb's hits for $1
-I draw blank
-Peb's hits for $3
(you get the picture!)

We sat at that stupid machine for over an hour.
(or utilizing the proper measurement method, 4 Margarita's each +1 Beer for me)

Properly lubed up for some more gambling adventures, we made our way towards The Plaza. As we waited for the light to change so we could cross, we noticed a casino just down and to the right. Main Street Station said the signage.

"We've never been there Peb's." I said.
"Nope." Was the response, with that ever so slight slurage I love when she's pleasantly pissed.

So we headed over. There was a Let it Ride and Three card poker table that had two seats open beside each other. The rest of the table was laughing and the dealer had a great big old smile on her face. "Presto!" I actually said out loud. We'd found our spot. Three hands after sitting down, the dealer was changed. I hate it when the dealer can't get into the spirit of the table and have fun with the folks playing. This guy had potential at first, to be the type that can make me leave a table. But things changed dramatically, as he really came around and had some fun with the entire group. About 15 minutes into his break coverage for our previous dealer, Peb's gets dealt trip 5's. A nice payday in both games, but she wasn't done yet. The case 5 comes out to, for a score of $900. WoooooOOOOOoooooT !

Peb's tosses "Tom the Dealer," $50 and says, "Thanks!" Well I can tell you something for absoloute certain, Tom hadn't seen a lot of $50 tips! Man did he beem and he continued to do so, all the way down the pit as he went off on break himself. It was good to see. Before he left for his little 1/2 hour break, he managed to deal Peb's a full house and a couple of straights as well. All no brainers so, she got maximum value out of the chips she had on the table. Together we'd bought in for $200. Pebbles had about $1200 sitting in front of her and oh yeah, another Margarita! I didn't go broke or make anything special down there. In fact, I think I ended up down $5 after hour 3 or so hours of play. That makes it about $0.50 each, for all the Beer and Scotch I drank and I think I'll take that!

We left way up and will definitely try to let Main Street Station get some of it back, the next time we're in town. It's not the party that is the IP, and it's not stuffy and hoity-toity like the Wynn. It's a damn fine mix of both and I'd recommend Main Street Station to anyone. Clean, friendly, great clientele and a staff that knows you're there to have a good time! Hell, we may just stay there next time around! (read : I sense a comp in Peb's future!)

It was now time for the slush-buckets to get some food into them. All I'm gonna' say is, Flamingo = 1/2 a cow. I'd remembered being told about the Flamingo's Prime Rib dinner a long time ago by Barney. I hadn't been back there for several years and I was suspicious about whether it would still be the same or not. When we first walked in I took a look around at the plates I could see out on the tables. "Freaks!" I said to Peb's. Everyone was having some form of green frickin' salad! I wanted to see me some COW ! We were sat in a booth with a few tables of two to four dispersed around the area. I noticed that each section almost seemed to be divided by age, as the slightly younger were in one area, the more mature in another and what appeared to be happy go lucky "our agers," all in the section in the middle.

Well I got me some cow! I'd say about 2/3 of one, and man was it good! A properly seasoned and well cooked Prime Rib, has a very special and dear place in my heart. (and in my belly!) At first, I called Peb's a freak too. But then I realized why everyone had one of those stupid salad bowls out in front of them. It was a Crab & Shrimp salad of some sort. Yeah the bowl had Lettuce and other green crap in it but on top! On top was a gazillion Crab legs and some of the best looking Jumbo Shrimp, I may have ever seen. Peb's is a Crab nut like me and she says besides being slightly watery from being served up split, the Crab was great.

Once our bellies were full to the top, we decided to take in a little more WSoP action at the Rio. All of the usual suspects were there and this would be as close as I would come to shaking hands with "Jesus." It didn't work out as planned however, as I did get my, "Hey, how's it going?" from Chris Ferguson, but someone else with large breasts managed to get his attention away from me. I am not bitter, this is one of the things I like about the man!

Then while watching and waiting for the LHE money bubble to pop and players playing in a hand-for-hand situation, Daniel was taking the time to ham it up with the crowd and pose for the odd picture. He was called back to the table and said, "sorry, I gotta' run!" and he preceded back to the table with a little skip.

"Yeah BUT, it doesn't mean you can run like a girl!" I said to him.
He glanced over with quite the look of dis-belief on his face. He looked down at his cards while kneeling on the edge of his seat, and then tossed them into the muck. It was then that he stared over at me once again.

While he was staring, I said, "I can say that. I'm Canadian!"
"Yes. Yes you can then." He responded. "What part of Canada you from?" he asked, while making his way over to me.
"About an hour North of your home town." I said, and I could tell that this got his serious attention. We had a very short window to get a few key points and comments in, but then he had to look back at the hand in play and that got his full attention for sure. The bubble had just burst and it was break time. He grabbed his gear and was gone in a separate direction to everyone else. I missed my chance to get a little one on one time right then. He took one look back and we both gave a wave, I said to Peb's, "I know he's going to win this Mother." and he proved me right.
My favorite quote of Daniels to-date?
"The heads up match was 'bam-bam' quick."

More to come....

My sincerest thanks for dropping by....