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April 25th, Las Vegas: About 50 feet away from the Caesars poker room I realize I’m $200 short to buy into their $2,000 event today. When I walk into the room I see Matt Stout and ask him if he doesn’t mind loaning me $200 for a day or so and that I’ll happily send him online collateral money. He’s very cool about it and just says to give it back to him in cash whenever I see him next. I head up to the cage and buy in to the event that starts us with 15,000 in chips and begins with 25/50 blinds and hour long levels, a very good structure for a 2k.

My table is mostly unknowns with the exceptions of the always polite Harry Demetriou and gregarious Will ‘The Thrill’. I spend the 25/50 level trying to see cheap flops while we’re 300 BB’s deep with hands that can flop well, but mostly blank off and only win a few small pots. It’s not until the 50/100 level that I get involved in my first considerable pot, which is against Harry who has a fairly tight image:
Effective stacks: ~15,000, blinds 50/100, I hold AKo on the CO.
Preflop: Folds to Harry in MP1, Harry raises to 300, folds to me on the CO, I call, the rest fold.
Flop: Kc Jc Ts
Harry bets 500, I call.
Turn: 4d
Harry bets 1000, I call.
River: 8s
Harry checks, I check. Harry tables Q9o and I muck. His check looks strange, but when I think it over it may very well be the best play against me. None of my one pair hands call a bet, my two pair hands value bet for him anyway, and he gives me a chance to bluff if I have a missed draw.

As the level goes on Will ‘The Thrill’ loses a major pot then starts getting bored and announces to the table “I’m going all in blind next hand! No matta what!”
“You serious over there Will?” I ask
“You know me kid, whattya think?”
“Heh, I think you’ll do it.”
Will is sitting a few seats on my left and is in the BB this hand. He stacks up his chips and sets them right behind the betting line, waiting to cram on anyone who dares raise. When I get my cards I peek down at KTo on the cutoff and when it folds to me I raise it up to 300. The button and SB fold and just as promised Will crams his stack in without looking. I instantly call and he flips his cards over one at a time to reveal Q6o.
Flop: A J A
Turn: 4
River: 2
“Good luck everyone!” he says smiling then walks away from the table with a laugh. That’s pretty fucking balla move if you ask me.

I stay quiet for the rest of the 50/100 level and don’t find myself involved again until after the break:
My stack: ~17,000, HJ: ~16,000, Button: ~20,000, blinds 100/200. I hold As6s in the SB.
Preflop: Folds to the HJ, HJ min raises to 400 and from what I’ve seen he’s been doing this with weaker holdings, the CO folds, the button calls, I call (I don’t call unless it’s a min raise or if it’s a known professional), the BB folds.
Flop: 9s 7h 2s
I check, the HJ bets 750, button folds, I call.
Turn: 5d
I lead out 1600, the HJ calls.
River: Ad
I think it over then bet 2200 and the HJ makes a very frustrated looking call. I table my hand and he shakes his head then mucks.

One unfortunate part of the structure at both Caesars and the Bellagio is that there’s no 150/300 level despite there being two levels of 100/200, one with ante and one without. The 100/200 level with ante is very quiet for me, and I don’t get involved again until it’s 200/400. The opponent in the hand is an older guy of perhaps 70, who seems very weak and straight forward:
My stack: ~19,000, UTG: ~17,000, blinds 200/400 with a 50 ante. I hold QdTd on the CO. We are seven handed.
Preflop: UTG calls 400, folds to me on the CO, I raise to 1600, folds back to UTG, UTG calls.
Flop: 8s 5d 2d
UTG checks, I bet 2200, UTG check raises to 5000. With his showing aggression I think there’s basically no chance I get him to fold anything, and even though he limps a fair bit his line of limp/calling UTG then check tiny raising the flop seems like it could contain big pairs not to mention sets. I elect to just call.
Turn: 9s
UTG fires out 4000, and given that I have 12 clean outs and am getting over 4 to 1 immediate plus the implied I’m stuck calling.
River: As
UTG looks absolutely terrified of this card and immediately checks. He has 11,000 of a 17,000 starting stack in the pot. He couldn’t possibly fold could he? Christ he looked scared of that card though. I want to find out the hard way. I quickly cram my stack into the middle and UTG looks terrified and thinks for a while before folding.
“I had pocket queens” he says
An aggressive Russian kid two on my right glances over at me and gives a knowing look. I smile ever so slightly back at him. Spazzy internet kids have no language barrier.

A couple orbits later I raise AA in late position to 1050 and a woman with 5500 on the CO shoves pre. The button and blinds fold and I naturally snap call and hold up against her KJo when the board runs out 6 T J A 7.

I stay quiet for the rest of the level outside the occasional blind steal and don’t get involved again until the 300/600 level:
My stack: ~45,000, UTG: ~20,000, MP1: ~15,000, BB: ~35,000, blinds 300/600 with a 75 ante. I hold 6h4h on the button.
Preflop: UTG raises to 1500, folds to MP1, MP1 calls, folds to me on the button, I notice the BB has already grabbed chips with which to make the call so I call as well, the SB folds, the BB calls.
Flop: 2d 8d 5s
Everyone checks to me and the BB and UTG are very straight forward players so I fire out 3600. The BB and UTG quickly fold but then MP1 shoves for 13,500 total. There’s nearly 7000 in the pot preflop, plus my 3600, plus his 13,500 which makes for roughly 24,000 in the pot and less than 10,000 to call, so I make the call and he tables 4s4d giving me a sort of clean 12 outs to win, assuming the turn isn’t a diamond.
Turn: Jd
Man fuck you turn card.
River: Ad
My stack slips slightly below 30,000 and we go on dinner break shortly afterwards.

‘Charder’ is at the final table of the WPT $25,000 event today so after quickly grabbing a sandwich I walk all the way down the Bellagio to see how it’s going for him. When I arrive I find out he’s just busted out in fourth place and my friend ‘Atimos’ is now heads up against some random fish that folded KK to ‘Charder’ preflop 25 BB’s effective (for those of you who aren’t big on poker; this basically means the guy has absofuckinglutely zero idea of what he’s doing.) ‘Atimos’ is wearing a very slick looking dark suit, which I pay him a compliment on, though I make sure to barrage him with an avalanche of profanities first for having stolen my moves, but mostly I’m just jealous that his suit is nicer than mine. I find ‘Luckychewy’ in the stands and he is quite drunk and cracking me up.

Eventually I run back over to Caesars and make it back 30 seconds before play starts up again. We restart at the 400/800 level and I wind up being incredibly card dead for the entire level. I have zero legitimate hands, and when I try to make a position open some nit comes alive with a huge reraise and blows me out. My stack slowly but consistently dwindles down, and by the time the blinds go up to 600/1200 my stack has bled into the teens.

Hand after hand I peek down at garbage and there is a raise in front of me. I find one spot to cram over an aggressive player and he folds, but other than that I am so dead I’m basically useless. My stack has dropped to 12,000 when I peek down at K6o on the button and shove when it folds to me. The SB fairly quickly calls and the BB folds. The SB tables A6o
“Awwwww crap, that’s not good” I say.
Flop: Q J 2
Turn: 5
River: 4
“Good hand, best of luck guys.” I tap the table, button my jacket (top button on a two button only people), and walk away. I take out my phone and call ‘Luckychewy’ to see where he’s at and he says I should come over to ‘McFaddens’ at the Rio. I call the girl I’ve been hanging out with and she says she’s tired and going to just relax with some room service at the Bellagio.

I arrive at McFaddens and find a group that includes Shaundeeb, Mlagoo, Lacey Jones, Maria Ho, Maria’s friend, Etay, Deebs brother Billy, Billy’s friend, Luckychewy, and Joy Miller (there was probably others, but I got drunk enough that it’s blurry.)

Chewy and I start slamming screwdrivers and scoping the place. There are numerous bridal parties in the room, so I tell Chewy to come with me and I walk up to one of them and say to the bride
“Oh congratulations! How did he propose?”
I ask her a number of questions about it all while Chewy starts chatting to the bridesmaids. After I get in good with the bride I ask her to identify which of the girls in the party are single for us to chat up. She lets us know and we hang out for a bit then return to our table for drinks. When doing bar scene stuff I do this kind of thing a lot, I chat up groups without blatantly hitting on anyone and just be fun and social, then perhaps come back to them later in the night, sort of like planting seeds all over the bar.

After we drink for a bit Chewy claims that he can dance at least 10 times better than me. He goes out onto the dance floor and starts tearing that shit up. Naturally I join him and together do our best not to look like two drunken white idiots (pretty confident we failed.) After we finish and return to our table a group of girls from another bridal party all hit the dance floor and start going nuts. Etay starts giving us shit about how the second we leave the girls all go out there. When the song finishes the girls go back to their table so I go up and ask them
“Okay quick question, was it just a coincidence you guys all hit the floor when me and my friend left or are we just the worst dancers ever?”
“No not at all, we just love that song!” says one of them
“Come on let’s go right now!” says another and three girls take me out onto the floor and we all start dancing together, including the roughly 50 year old mother of the bride, who can really grind her ass off for a woman of her age (back me up Mlagoo.)

When the song finishes I thank the girls for the dance and tell them I’ll come to chat a bit later. I go back to Chewy and we keep drinking. As I’m walking off to the bathroom the mother of the bride runs up to me and asks
“Where are you going?!”
“Um…the bathroom?”
“OK well when you get back I need you to do me a favor. You need to get on stage with the bride to be and search her body for a coupon.”
“I can assure you I’m the right man for this job.”

When we get back from the bathroom the bride’s mother comes and grabs me and brings me on stage with the bride and a few of the other girls. The DJ starts announcing what’s going on and I lean into the bride and say
“Just tell me what’s appropriate here.”
“K, just peel up clothing and look around a bit, the coupon is in my bra.”
“Gotchya.”

When it starts I immediately drop to the floor and pretend to look up her skirt, then I stand back up and start looking her up and down and slightly peeling up bits of clothing in my search. Eventually I turn my attention to the front of her dress and peek down towards her cleavage, making sure to not actually grope her. She directs my hand to the coupon and I rip it out and yell “YEEEEEEEEEA!!” and start fist pumping. Then the DJ turns on the music and a bunch of the guys come over and we all tear up the dance floor together. Chewy wasn’t lying, he’s a good ass dancer.

At some point I realize I’m starting to get too drunk so Chewy and I go back to Panorama towers. Eventually other members of the group trickle in and we meet up with other residents of the building to all go out to the hot tub and pass around a large blunt while discussing the amusing evening we’ve had. I tell them they should make sure to enjoy shit like this, that one day we’ll all be looking back with envy at the days we were in our 20’s and could get torn up in a hot tub with no consequences, that it won’t be like this in our 70’s. They tell me this is exactly what they plan to do in their 70’s, that there isn’t much else to do.
“Good fucking point.”