Son and dad enter an afternoon tourney at the Trop. approx. 18 runners, it's wed. or thurs. of week 2. Both make the final 5, dad goes out 5th, son gets 3rd..$158 if I remember correctly.

Fast forward to college football on Saturday. Dad has a pile of parlays going. One of the key teams on almost all tickets is Boise State . Nice to see the football Gods heard about my bets and Boise allows a 70 yd TD pass with 42 seconds left to crush me.

But wait, there are afternoon games too so back to the windows I go. I bet a bunch of combo. tickets with both college and NFL games. I have Wisconsin, Alabama, Texas, Stanford, Notre Dame and 2 NFL games for a 7 team parlay. 50 bucks. Son plays along the same teams. There is one difference however. Dad has reading glasses but not enough sense to bring them to a dark sportsbook. Get back to the room that night after hitting all 5 college games. I guess the football Gods didn't get the memo that I had bet the afternoon games.

Now I love my two NFL teams until I get back to the room and check the tickets. (I have about 5 of em..all live) and then I see it. MY MISTAKE...every game is by the spread except one team on each of the tickets. I had 4 tickets with the Saints and one ticket with the Falcons. I ALWAYS BET AGAINST THE SPREAD, NNNNEEEEVVVERRRR THE OVER/UNDER. There it was though, the Saints tickets were all with the SAINTS and OVER. The other ticket was the Falcons OVER!!!! OMFG!!!!! Now how I could do that on every single ticket and only one team with the OVER/UNDER is inexplicable. However. I did it.

The sons tickets ALL had the Falcons and every other team by the spread. The Falcons were up 21-7 early. The OVER was covered by early in the 3rd QTR..This left me with only the Patriots to win over the Raiders by 4 1/2. Son had 5 or 6 live tickets worth around $10K..the problem was, the Falcons got the memo late and won by only 3 instead of the 4 1/2 points needed. Watching that collapse and the kid having to sit through that with 10K on the line and then watch the Patriots cover easily was really painful in spite of what it meant to me. End result dad cashes a 7 team parlay @ $50 bucks for a cool $4500!!! Son, rips up his tickets.

I tried to give him some cash but he wouldn't take it. Why do I feel so bad after a $4500 hit?? In a word- LOVE. This trip was all about him (for me) and there's nothing that would have made me happier than him having that parlay ticket. Like I said, as all poker players know, EVEN THE IDIOTS GET PAID SOMETIMES.

Monday was a quiet day really. Bit of running around, some shopping, sight-seeing on the strip and finally what was supposed to happen the first night. The NYNY roller-coaster.

Some background, when the kid was about 9 or 10 yrs old, dad finally put a big effort into getting him on a roller-coaster. He would never do it.....until this one day. So he finally says OK dad. Well, the short story is dad made a critical error. The roller-coaster was NOT your average run-o-the-mill coaster. This coaster was called THE WILD BEAST!!!! I was thinking go big or go home, might as well get the full experience. UUUmmmm , bad parenting is all I can say. I know this because the NYNY roller-coaster is the first roller-coaster he is going to attempt since that day 10 yrs or so ago.

So we roll into NYNY and I can tell he's nervous. This is where the bad parenting kicks in again. I just can't help myself sometimes. I insist we ride in the front car. Go big or go home right???? Finally he agrees but he's shitting. Of course we get to the line and the front car line-up is 6 people deep. Of course he has 3-4 rides to wait and think about it the whole time. Finally we get in the front car. They load everyone else, shoulder- harness down, lap-harness down...locked in and it's GO TIME. It seems like an eternity to him. But wait...it's gonna be a little longer to think about it.

Dad displays the bad parenting skills yet again. I was prepping my IPHONE to video-record the ride but I didn't see the snot-nosed, wet-behind the ears, COASTER-NAZI coming from behind to make sure we were all buckled down. He says, "hey. you can't ride with that"..I say I'll turn it off, nope, not good enough..I say, well here then, you hold it, I'll grab it when the ride is over, nope not good enough...why don't we just get dad unharnessed and out of the car in front of everybody who has been patiently waiting this whole time. But wait,,, "YOU NEED TO PUT IT IN A LOCKER"....what??? over there, you know, just past where you have to walk to go by EVERYONE already locked in the coaster-cars. GGGGGrrrrrr...I walk by everyone, over to the lockers,,,fck me, NO CHANGE!!!! Now he asks me if I have a dollar, and to go into the gift shop and get change. I get the change, lock my phone in..and whisper something not very nice to him as I get back to the front car...You know, that's the car where you have to walk by EVERYONE who has been sitting in their seats for the last 10 mins that you've already walked by once...have I mentioned bad parenting yet??

Off we go, chug chug click click into the night...hold on, can it be?? Why yes it can and yes it is.....RAINING!! The kid looks at me and asks what rain does to metal tracks. I had to laugh. Bad-parenting yet again. So the kid who was flying down a metal cable 400 ft above a canyon and laughin his azz off, is now screamin like a schoolgirl on the NYNY roller-coaster. Go figure...BAD PARENTING.

In Summary:

-Son's 21st, first time Vegas, stretch limo pickup
-downtown/strip stays..some great meals/good meals and one that sucked
-BC Flightlines/Mystere
-Son cashed in 2 touneys, dad cashed in 3 out of 6 plus one bubble boy mercy cash
-Son gets pocket K's beat 3 times in one day vs AA, AA and QQ (which ended up quads)
- cash games , 2/4 3/6 limit mostly , small wins, small losses
-Dad covered flights/room/meals/entertainment

13 Days in Vegas with your son on his 21st b-day and doing it for net -$650 out of pocket----PRICELESS!!!!

Also want to make sure I give props to the AVP guys/ gals who were so helpful with suggestions about how to make this trip memorable. We did many of the suggestions but this thing is too damn long already to mention them all..a big THANK-YOU folks!!!!!