I was originally planning to go to Vegas with the boys for the first weekend of March Madness this year; I had the flight, car and rooms booked, but a death in the family derailed my plans. My usual Vegas running mates went on the trip, and I missed out.

Within a month or so, however, new plans started to take shape. I had a year to use up my airline credit from the cancelled trip in March, and I really enjoyed being in Vegas for the WSOP in 2009. I was offered the chance to use a week's worth of timeshare in Vegas, and things just started to fall in place. I booked the trip and the rooms, and extended the offer to my friends to join me. One by one, they all declined (some took longer than others; still waiting to hear back from some), and I was headed for my first solo Vegas trip!

I booked two nights at the RIO, a week of timeshare, and my last night at Caesar's Palace. I have stayed at the RIO before, and was pretty happy with it. I stayed at the same timeshare (Summer Bay Resorts on Koval, behind Harrah's), and was quite pleased. Caesar's was just a chance to try a new place for possible future trips.

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Taking a trip from a friend, I left a bouquet of flowers behind for my wife as I departed. Never a bad idea for those who want to go back sans spouse.

The first bad beat of the trip came as I was sitting in the Toronto airport. My wife texted me to alert me to the fact that I had forgotten my toiletries bag, along with my 'lucky' card protector. D'oh! Fortunately, I had packed my glasses and contact lens case (pre-loaded with saline) in my carry-on, in case I wanted to nap on the flight.

My flight arrived around 10:45pm on the Wednesday night. Luggage pickup was quick, the car rental counter was about a 20 minute wait, and after a quick stop at CVS, I was checked into my room just after midnight. Of course, this was 3:00am my time, and I had been up since 5:45am that morning after a semi-sleepness 'night-before-Vegas' sleep. I was already running on fumes - but that wouldn't stop my from a bit of mindless feeding of the slot machines to satisfy my gambling jones.

THURSDAY:

What better way to start off my trip than with a stop at Starbucks and to head down to the Convention Center to watch some WSOP action. I love that they're using the main hall now. As expected however, there was very little action at 8:00am. I took the opportunity to register for Day 1B of the $1000 NLHE event (#24) that was coming up that weekend. Unlike last year when I had to wait in the registration line for over an hour, I was second in line at 8:00 on a Thursday morning.

After that, it was back to the tables to get my pai gow on. Another Vegas tradition had to be observed; my first drink order at the pai gow table was my typical Vegas kickstart: hot chocolate with white creme de menthe, Bailey's and whipped cream. As it turns out, however, this was the only day that I would make this happen.

I played for almost two hours, ending up with a $100 loss. No real hands to speak of, except for the fact that I was dealt two full houses and couldn't rake a pot on either of them.

From there, I hit the Carnival World Buffet for lunch. I almost went for the Buffet of Buffets deal, but opted against it. Nothing new to report here, except that my buffet 'skills' are declining rapidly. I used to be the guy that buffet owners feared; that is no longer the case. This time, I only made it halfway around the buffet (pizza station to carvery) before calling it quits.

A little more than 12 hours after arriving, I headed back to the Convention Centre to play some poker, getting immediate seating at a $1/$3 NLHE ring game. Bad planning by me: I should have taken a run at the WSOP 1PM deepstack instead.

In the end, I was able to offset my pai gow losses, choosing to walk away when my 'stack' was reduced to nothing but three $100 bills after starting the session with two. The highlight of the session was being able to correctly ID the transvestite with the giant rack from 3 tables away. The five-o-clock shadow was a big hint, but when s/he took his/her glasses off, it was a dead giveway. A couple of floorpeople behind me were debating pre-op vs. post-op. I was able to snap a quick, blurry pic as I walked by:

[img]http://twitpic.com/1vn3j9[/img]

Went to Benihana at the LV Hilton that night. I had had a craving for teppanyaki dining for the last year or so (my wife is a vegetarian, and therefore not a lot of help in that regard), and I decided to take the opportunity to scratch that itch. The usual fare, here - lots of food, good stuff. I love the sesame sauce, and have come close to approximating it at home, from scratch.

I got back to the hotel around 10:00, and wrapped up with a few hours of pai gow and slots. Dumped another $200 into HET's coffers. However, it's a fun, social game and this is why I get room comps.

FRIDAY

Moving day: breakfast was Starbucks again, but I accessorized with a blueberry muffin and a banana this time.

Back to the pai gow tables, where another 90 minutes of play netted me a $35 profit.

Time to check out of the RIO (by the way - there has to be a better parking garage than the one I was using), and I headed over to Summer Bay Resorts.

Let me tell you: I'm quite pleased by Summer Bay Resorts. Their overall ratings are middle-of-the-pack, but if you look carefully, the more recent ratings are mostly four or five out of five. The reason for this is the substantial renovations they've been doing for the last 18 months. The only thing left to complete is their clubhouse, which I understand will be done by September. I highly recommend it: four pools, four hot tubs, mini putt, shuffleboard, activities (new this year!), gas grills and a helpful, friendly staff.

After checking into my room, I headed out to stock up on groceries. Having the ability to cook your own food from time to time made a huge difference. I was able to eat all of my breakfasts, most of my lunches and a couple of dinners at the condo, starting with grilled chicken, couscous and a salad. Not the sort of thing I'd eat if staying at a hotel.

Friday night was time for another tradition: playing in a Caesar's tournament. While I don't think much of how they promote their Mega Stack Series, I've always admired their dedicated tournament room. Unfortunately, I followed up the entry in the tourney with another Caesar's tourney tradition: deep run, no cash. This one stung a little bit more than usual, as I was an average stack, avoiding confrontations, and I got it all in preflop against the shortstack with AK against his QQ to cripple me; less than one orbit later, I shoved my SB with 55 and lost to BB's QKo, despite turning a flush and gutshot draws.

SATURDAY

After starting the day with a leisurely breakfast and dip in the pool, I headed over to the Mirage for the AVP meetup and tourney. I railed LVM and Clem as they played a pre-tourney cash game, and got about 40 minutes in at a cash game of my own before the tourney started.

I started at the same table as AlaskaGal, TexasGambler and others whose names I recognized. I picked my spots, chipped up and was in decent shape as we hit the first break. I took a couple of tough beats (KKAJ, all-in preflop.

*one hand had me, gank, Ho and Brenes as the only players to see the flop, and I took it down.

*I ran into Brenes' pocket aces twice. The first time, the money got in preflop and he beat my AK (another player in the hand also had AK). The second time, the money got in after the turn on a 332Q board, and my deuces cracked him. He wasn't a very happy camper after that.

*Maria Ho chastized me for tweeting that her KQ beat KK all-in preflop when she rivered a gutshot straight. Turns out that the gutshot hit on the TURN, not the RIVER. Not sure why it was a big deal when all the chips were in the middle preflop, but I admitted my mistake.

*as to be expected with so many pros at the table, and being right on the rail, we attracted a fair number of spectators throughout the day. I was somewhat impressed that one of them was Glenn Morshower from '24' and the Transformers movies.

*played with Tony "Bond18" Dunst after a table change. Really personable guy.

*for the first time in live tourney poker that I can recall, had AA vs. KK with all the chips getting in preflop. Finished Day 1 shortly thereafter around 200th place out of 511 left.

*played with a couple of different pros on Day 2, including Alex Jacob and Eric Froehlich

*one big hand just after the money bubble broke on Day 2: AQ>KQ>7h8h but K10. AQ giveth, and AQ taketh away.

At 400/800/100 and 27000t in my stack, UTG limped, I raised to 2500t with KK, and the button raised to 7500t. UTG folded, I waited a few seconds, then announced my all-in. The button snap called, and you know what that means.

Or maybe not. He proudly tabled his KhQh, and his face dropped when he saw my hand. Somehow, I was able to avoid the major suckout, and built my stack up to almost 60000.

I dropped a few chips, but made it to the 40-minute dinner break, and had dinner at the California.

Unfortunately, I had a bad run after dinner, and managed to run my stack down from a high-water mark of 105000t with 21 players left (avg stack was 45000t) to 28000t at 3000/6000/500 with 15 left. After doubling once, I ran AQ into a shorter stack's AK without success and busted with A9 vs. 55 despite flopping 10JQ.

I may or may not have been steaming a bit as I headed to Bill's for some low-limit cash games. Ran into AlaksaGal, who was dealing, and TBC. Again, my TBC encounter is described in a separate post. Needless to say, I managed to drop about $140.

THURSDAY:

Nearing the end of the trip, I decided to head back to the RIO for some WSOP cash action. Sat down at a $1/3 table and proceeded to drop a quick $35 when my QQ