Plan was to fly down May 21 via united (using miles), stay two nights a Bally's with my Uncle, then move to Aria on Sunday for two days with the wife. Plan was potentially derailed at the airport due to a delay in the first leg of my United flight, which was going to cause me to miss my connection. They couldn't find another way to get me there until next morning. I wasn't having it and finally (after several trips to several desks at the airport), found a flight on SW. United agreed to give me a voucher for slightly less than the sw flight, so first potential bad beat mostly averted. I think I actually arrived an hour earlier than planned.

Got to Bally's and met my uncle from AZ who doesn't have a ton of poker experience, but absolutely loves playing. He'd been playing all day at O'sheas, Mirage, and Bally's. We decided to hit PH for our first session together. It's been a couple weeks and I didn't take any notes, but the main thing I remember about this session was getting my stack in good with AA on a Q high board to have another Q hit on the river. Other guy had AQ obviously.

Moved over to Bally's for a session before bed, I think I broke even. A couple young locals had raised pots a few times until it was heads up and then verbally agreed to check it down after. They did it to me and I told them it was BS, the dealer agreed and I decided it was time for bed.

Next morning my uncle wanted to play a tourney so we went over to PH for their 11:00? $70 donkament. I was card dead for early levels, only playing one hand with something like AQ, whiffing, continuation betting but getting checkraised by the table chipleader/captain and having to muck. I don't recall the levels, but I finally get QQ and manage to get it in on a ragged board against TT only to see a rivered ten knock me out.

Jumped into a cash game and there was a pretty bad loose player at the table and I finally get involved in a hand with him after being card dead forever. I think I'm in the BB with K8 and it's min raised and called in several places. LAG guy makes a pot sized bet on a 278 rainbow board, I'm the only caller. Turn comes a Ten and he pots it again. I don't give him any credit for a hand at this point, so I shove. He thinks forever and calls. River is a 9 and of course he turns over KJ for the rivered gutshot, I guess he had 7 outs and he probably thought he had 10, if he thought at all. Pot was around $80 prior to my shove of an additional $150 or so. At this point I'd really only played 3 big pots, two in cash games and on in the tourney, and been rivered in all 3, so I decided to take a break/walk. Uncle is still in the tourney and finally finishes that and we head to CaboWabo for a very late breakfast burrito. I head back to bally's for a nap and he decides to play in the PH afternoon tourney. He makes it back to the room after busting on the bubble and we decide to head over to Aria to check it out.

He hadn't seen city center and we're just walking around and come upon the poker room and there's an area roped off and some people milling around and we ask what's up and a guy tells us his buddy Larry is about to play heads up for the "Ivey League" championship, and if he wins he gets to play Ivey for $250k. Apparently the final table had already agreed to a 9 way chop of the prize money for $50k each. We stick around for a while and watch Larry win and then after a while Ivey comes in and it was pretty fun to watch. Shannon Elizabeth was announcing the match. Doyle and a few other pros were playing in the back room. Ivey won the heads up match.

We decide it's time to eat and head to 9 Fine Irishmen in NYNY for some guiness, fish and chips, and shepherd's pie. Snapped a nice photo of a guy passed out on a bench in front of NYNY with a puddle of puke directly below him. Couldn't handle Vegas, I guess. Dinner is delicious and we head over to MGM for a session.

My uncle put his name on a tourney list and we get seated at a $1/2 game, he wins a nice pot and gets called for the tourney (I think it was a sng). He shows up about 10 minutes later after busting the tourney on the first hand. I think he had two pair and got it all in against a flush draw that ended up coming in or something like that. He sits back in the game and we both did fairly well. I ended up stacking a young asian lag that was pimping clubs/strip clubs, etc... at the table. I don't recall the hand. I don't know how it works, but he gave out a few passes to players and said he appreciates any tips, so they threw him $10 or $20 or whatever. I was happy because they all ended up in my stack. I assume he gets some kickback from the clubs if people show up with his card, plus the tips he gets?

Anyhow, we head back to Bally's after the table fills up with about 5 off duty dealers from around town. We both have another decent session at Bally's with no real memorable hands, but we both approx. double our buyin before crashing.

Next morning uncle has to catch a noonish flight, and he has a tradition of always hitting Cravings at Mirage, so we do that and I'm pretty sure he made up for my lack of appetite overall with his appetite for champagne. On the way out, we're passing Caesars and a homeless guy is getting chased out of the fountains by security. He's dripping wet and his shoes/socks are still on, but it appears he forgot about the two packs of smokes he has tucked in his socks.... oh well, guess he can buy a couple packs with those quarters he grabbed. My uncle cracks up and I snap a couple photos on my cell phone.

I see him off and decide to head over to Aria for a session. I bleed off a hundred or so before getting it back and then some in a mostly uneventful session. I spent much of the time talking with a nice older guy from Kentucky, he said his buddy was in a high stakes game and stuck big. I left the table for a bit to go check in before wife, her sis, and sis' b/f show up.

They text me they've landed and I tell them to have the cabbie take them to Bally's. I run over there, pack, and get down to the porte cochere just as they've pulled in. Toss my bag in and off to Aria.

We get settled in, the rooms at Aria are pretty sweet. Our room overlooks the pool/monte carlo, mandalay, etc.. and of course, the In and Out. I make the obvious joke about looking down at In and Out as you're doing the old in&out on the chair at the window. Everybody agrees that joke is probably made a hundred times a day.

We head up to the Mirage to see Love after a stop in at Stack for munchies/drinks. Love the bar menu at Stack, a little spendy, but fun/tasty grub. Love was pretty incredible. We all enjoyed it. Then we walked around and gamboooled it up a bit. Tried the VP $20 at the bar trick at TI, but I think I burned through about $40 for one cocktail. Cocktail service was super slow. Then we went off to Casino Royale for some roulette/craps. Burned through another $50 or so. Finally back to Aria after a quick stop at a the liquor store by Harrah's and at Bally's for my toiletries and uncle's shirt, as well as a slice of pizza at Paris along the way. Aria is +EV for sexy time, my first suckout of the trip... ship it!

Holy moly Batman, this is getting loong, sorry.

Next day, we hit Bouchon for breakfast (strangely service sucked but food was delicious - service is usually outstanding there) then wife/sis/bf went to the aria pool while I played at Venetian. I seem to have my best sessions at Venetian. I really wish they'd get that perfume in the air situation under control, though, it is just awful. This session is good. An aggressive player in the big blind min-raises my $10 pf bet (I was in cutoff with A9s and there were a couple limpers before me). Limpers fold so it's heads up and flop comes J99 and the bb bets $50. I rarely hollywood it up, but I realize I'm taking too long, so I do my best to look really uncomfortable but then raise another $100. He snap pushes and I snap call. He doesn't show but I'm good for a $500 pot.

Later that night (after afternoon +EV session in the room) we went downtown, ate at Firefly (good food/prices), walked down to GN and played a $2-4 limit session with my wife while sis/bf lost the rest of their $ at roulette. Wife and I ended up several drinks each and down 6 bucks total between us. Got a limo back for $30 for the novelty.

Last day got up early for a session at Aria and had an interesting table. A few leftover drunks from the night before, a semi cute asian hooker that wasn't playing but was egging the table on and getting drinks from the drunks. She left but left her phone on the table, one of the drunks answered it when it rang, she came back for it later and he said "I got you some work". A young asian female local was playing and was talking to a guy who is a local that said he mostly plays $2-5 at the Wynn. She asked me where I play, hadn't she seen me around?, I said I'm just visiting and someone said maybe she'd seen me on TV, she looked at me and said "really?", I said "probably not, unless you watch any gay porn", she got the strangest look on her face before the rest of the table cracked up... nothing against gay porn for those that enjoy it, it just jumped into my head at the moment and seemed a funny thing to say. Won about $100 off the drunk lags at the table.

I had a $50 freeplay at Aria and used it on VP and turned it into $200 hitting quad 6's just as wife, etc... came downstairs for the buffet (had two free with the room deal). We got there just as they were shutting down breakfast/opening up lunch, so we got to try some of each. Food was pretty good, typical buffet, I guess.

Had a bad session at PH, where I made a couple moves on pots in situations I thought were favorable but got called. Also took one bad beat so down around $300 here.

I get in a last session at Aria. Not much to get excited about and I leave for the airport around even.

Turns out flight is cancelled, so I get us rooms at IP. First time staying here and it's a bit of a dive, but the room is fine.

The elevator won't take us down to the 2nd floor, the maid on the 3rd tells us the "old guy" must be running it again. She insists the place is haunted, and that she won't go up in the penthouses. After I leave at 4:00 a.m., my wife insists she sees a ghost in the room, then feels an arm move from under the pillow when she puts her head back down. She gets freaked out, packs up and leaves. I dunno, power of suggestion maybe, I'm pretty skeptical but lots of people believe in supernatural stuff, whatever.

Sorry so long, thanks for letting me rant.
All in all I finished down a couple hundred, but had a great time. Can't wait for my next trip, not sure when, probably late summer, though I'd like to make it again in late June for some WSOP action. See you at the tables.