DAY 1
So three of us headed down to Vegas March 20-23. Names have been changed to protect the not-so-innocent. I have to apologize as there is not as much poker in this trip report as most would like, and I second that. Attendees were:
Black-Jack-Boy (BJB), known for his uncanny ability to cover the money he dumps on horribly played poker and the peelers with red hot blackjack runs (to his credit he only plays poker like 3 times a year, and one of those is during our trip to Vegas)...

Tighty-Whitey (TW), an online poker addict on his first trip for live casino play. His name comes from his home game reputation for being tighter than Borat’s infamous sister...

And yours truly, Da Fish, (DF) known for being committed to consistently dumping my poker winnings on blackjack and (bowing my head in shame) slot machines (not to mention the aforementioned peelers)... that and for my beer farts that traditionally start about a half day into the trip...

Trip starts out with BJB and DF arriving in Vegas about 1 hour before TW. We are staying at the Planet Hollywood because I found a great deal online (3 nights for a total of $350 bucks for the room). Well, that, plus when someone asks where I am staying I get to answer “At the Pee Ho”. You can’t beat that with a bat...

We get to the lobby, and check in using the twenty dollar trick. She works the computer for a bit, and we get an upgrade from a regular room to a “resort room” which is a slightly bigger room (this seems to be the standard upgrade people get). Bonus, it was on the 21st floor (of 23 in the south tower), and was a renovated room. The Pee-Ho looks great post renovation; the casino was funky-cool, kinda the same vibe as the Palms (but bigger). Only downside was that the casino air seemed more smoke infused than other “first tier” casinos, must not have upgraded the ventilation system.

The hotel room itself was large and well appointed (i.e. huge plasma with actual HD channels) only problem was lighting, even with them all on it was a bit dark. Huge bathroom, with a separate room for the crapper (great touch on a boys trip). Shower looked like it was tiled back in the Aladdin days though, and the height of the shower head had me belting out “We welcome you to the lollypop guild”. Our room turned out to be the Dead Poets Society room. So, after dropping our bags off, it was “Carpe Diem” (fish rule the day?) and off to the Heart Bar to test Boofer’s theory of video poker drinking.

I explain this theory to BJB, and we each buy in for $20, and proceed to rapidly slam back drinks. BJB chooses the option on his machine of playing video blackjack and begins to tap the buttons equally quickly. I remind him repeatedly of the need to play slowly to maximize EV, but BJB must believe his magical powers extend to video 21 as well.

Unfortunately they don’t, and he has to reload for another $10. I start out on Jack and Cokes, him on Gin and Tonics. We wanted to have Mojitos, but apparently throwing leafs in our drinks would take them out of the comp range. Go figure.

TW shows up about an hour later. By the time he does, the total tally is $50 into the machines, 7 Gin and Tonics into BJB, and 6 Jack n Cokes and 2 Newcastles into me. I buy a drink for TW when he shows up, and learned from the price of that drink that our bar tab would have been about $130 bucks, so we are ahead of the house already!!!!! Screw card counting, we have already figured out how to break Vegas in the first hour.

We go up to the room so TW can drop his bag and we can have a few rounds of the Macallans 12 year old that I brought with us. Like Madonna in the Bulls locker room in the 80’s it went down easy, and then we were off to grab some grub.

Tried to have late lunch (it was now around 3) at Todai, but it was closed during the gap between typical lunch hour and the dinner hours. Instead had an orgasmic meatball sub at Earl of Sandwich (we liked this joint a lot for a quick break from the sports book or poker room).

So, off to play poker at the MGM, which so many on here have said good things about, but BJB and I had not played in during our last 2 trips to Vegas. We get there and the place is PACKED, with all tables full and 30 names on the 1-2 NL waiting list. We put our names on the list. I mention to the guy working the check in that we are somewhat parched having walked one whole casino length on the strip and all, and he gets the cocktail girl to come by and comp us drinks even though we are just standing around waiting. Nice touch, score one for the MGM. Again based on AVP, we order some “Fat Tires”. It was good, but a bit full flavoured to drink over the long haul.

I get bored waiting, so keeping my name on the list for 1-2 NL, I jump into a 2-5 NL game for the first time in my life. I buy in for 400 (I believe the max was 500), and away we go. I look around after sitting down, and there are 4-5 guys sitting with like 3K behind. As Scooby-Doo would say “RUH-ROH!!!” Order a drink, and sit folding. About ten hands in, I raise preflop with AQ in middle position. Get two callers, one to my left and one to my right. Flop comes rags, I continuation bet in hopes that no one has flopped a set, and both guys fold. NICE!!!!! Try and limp into a couple of pots after that , but big raises keep coming behind forcing me out. Fortunately for me my name gets called shortly thereafter for 1-2 and I am saved from damaging my bankroll beyond repair.

Sit down and TW is at my table having also just been paged. BJB is nowhere to be seen. Turns out, he is, where else, off at the Blackjack tables, and can not be torn away from his muse. Anyhow, our table has 1 or 2 good players, the rest clearly are weak. I normally play quite tight, but I have had at least a dozen drinks, and so am playing the part at the table of happy-to-be-in-vegas-drinking-party-guy. After a few folds I play my first hand, making a substantial raise in the cutoff to get a whole bunch of limpers to fold and table something redonkulous like 9-3 and say “but its sooooted” in hopes to get action when I catch cards later. Problem is, the cards never come. And any plays I make are now called down due to my earlier showboating and the operator-esque nature of the other players.

Over the next 2 hours I lose about 100 getting ground down, buy back up to 200, grind back down to 175. By that time BJB has resurfaced, up about 400 bucks, asking “why didn’t you guys come get me?” We decide it’s time to eat and head off to Todai for supper (we were still craving the Sush). Me, -$125 and TW his usual variance of about 8 dollars one way or the other (but still positive drinking value). Overall impression of the MGM room was that it was lively, and probably quite fishy, although a bit too chaotic and noisy for me (this might have had to do with it being the start of March madness).

Todai was a bit of a disappointment, I mean, it was fine for what it was, which is a buffet, but for some reason I had been expecting slightly better sushi. It was also around the price of the Bellagio buffet (30 bucks) which sets the buffet standard pretty high. We still managed to thin the world salmon population, and with bellys full of grade “c” fish it was off to play more poker, this time at the Pee-Ho.

I really liked the poker room there, it was large enough that it didn’t feel cramped and claustrophobic, but wasn’t a stadium like the MGM. Comfortable chairs. Only negative was there were large stretches where there was only one server working the room but also responsible for the Extra Lounge next door. They have to work on this.

So I buyin for $200, TW his standard $100, and BJB $200. We all get seated at the same table and break out the commemorative chip protectors that BJB had made for us before going on the trip (a very nice touch which sounds kind of dorky as I write this, but almost brought a degenerate tear to my eye when he broke them out as a surprise when we checked in). During this trip we played a few times all on the same table, but no one ever made mention about the matching protectors. Shows how observant your standard player was in the rooms we played.

Seated at the far end of the table from me was the most aggressive player I have ever played against in a live game. In addition to reckless overbetting he did however possess a high quality chip shuffle. The combination of the two initially made him quite intimidating, until I got a read that he was simply an “aggrodonk”. We played about 3-4 hours, and I went on a rush, hitting my junk when I snuck into pots, taking down pots with continuation bets, and calling Aggrodonk with hands I wouldn’t normally. To me the highlight was the following: I am holding AK in middle position. Aggrodonk limps UTG, and two more limp after him. I pop it up to 15, it folds around to Aggrodonk, and he pops it to 30, two limpers fold, and I call. Flop comes 7 8 8. He checks, I bet 30, he calls. Turn, a deuce. He checks, I check behind. River is a third 8. He throws 50 into the pot, far too quickly. I look at him and say, I think my ace high is good. Something about his body language tells me I am, and I toss in my 50 bucks and table my AK. He quickly mucks and I rake a nice pot as he reloads yet again. My stacks hits about $750 at its high point and I wind up cashing out about $700. BJB loses about $100 and TW cashes out with about a 100 dust covered dollars. It was 2:00 a.m and we called it a night, due to the combination of booze, jet lag, and wanting to play the 10 a.m. Pee-Ho tourney. TBC....