Trip Report... June '07: Better Late Than Never?

[grbs1605 0]

10th trip to Vegas – June 2007 – Better late than never? (low poker content)Players: Joe A, Joe B, Joe C, me. Obviously I don’t have that many friends named Joe, but I’m concealing identities since I’m posting without their permission. Joe A and Joe B have been to Vegas many times with and without me. For Joe C it was this married man’s maiden voyage.June 2007Sunday – Arrived in Vegas at around 3pm then made it to Excalibur and headed straight to the pool. There we proceed to take down 4 buckets and observe a hot (what must have been European) 20 something in the smallest string bikini I’ve seen in public. Had she been alone who knows… After that we headed back up to the room and down to the poker room.What can I say, Excalibur is not the place to be and I just kinda hung around at 2/4 LHE until I picked up 55 UTG on what I planned to be my last orbit. I flopped the set and got into a raising war with my friend and another unknown. It went 3 ways to showdown and I now had some drinking money.Picked up some SoCo and mixer in the gift shop on the way and up and proceeded to get ready for the night ahead. Another friend had traveled out to visit some Vegas local friends and joined our crew for the remainder of the trip. Being a Wednesday we decided to go to Drai’s, but couldn’t help but sit down at the blackjack table at Bill’s Gambling Hall first. Had a great time, more drinks, some fun dealers, and all of us won except for Joe C. Headed down to Drai’s around 1 or 2am and there wasn’t much going on. It was probably too early, but we left around 4. Everyone else headed back to our hotel to gamble, but I took Joe C to show him what a good poker room looked like. We made it over to Caesar’s, but the waiting list was a little too long for me in my condition. After that we headed to the Bellagio and quickly jumped into the 4/8 LHE game. No real hands to note as I cannot remember much, but I think I met Zach at this table and I started turning down the white Russians my friend was ordering for me – that’s saying a lot. Left the poker room down a little at around 10am. Warning #1… never get so drunk that you can’t convince your cheap friend that you should take a cab (cause you’re incapable of hailing one for yourself) from Bellagio to Excalibur after drinking for 16 hours and when its 92 degrees out. When we finally made it back I guess I was blabbering something about to many “right rrrrushinzzzz”Monday- Woke up late per Wednesday night. Made it to the pool once a gain for an hour or two, then played some poker at MGM Grand. I had never played this room and heard all of the good stories, however I’m not sure if they apply to LHE or the fact that I just couldn’t scoop any pots. Was pretty card dead and just never really got involved.Later on that night we decided to go to Rumjungle because for some reason I love this place and have been there on three separate trips. It may by my obsession with go-go dancers or big bars that light up. We ended up doing bottle service to pass the line and pissing off the staff for bringing girls over to our table for some reason. The girls were definitely cut from the rock/goth mold, but what the hell we’re here to make sure we have some fun. Prior to the trip Joe A and I devised a plan to “take down” Joe B at least one of the nights. The plan was that we would each buy Joe B and ourselves a shot, but would rotate so he would drink twice as much as us. Well Joe B gave us a lot of help this night and all we needed to do was tip him over. I started to feel a little bad about what we were going to do since I just saw someone fall down the stairs from the dance floor to the main bar and get carried out, but onward we pushed. When he was off making out with some random Vegas hookup I ordered a shot of Jack and we came back we convinced him that we had done ours and now it was his turn. He took a whiff and almost lost it right there. We finally convinced him to take the double shot, got half it down and slammed it on the bar. A little more coaxing and we got him to finish it. He soon left and we didn’t hear from him until we got back to the room. Warning #2 When friend C mentions that he just did the Yellow Pages slogan while standing next to one of the previous mentioned girls at the bar…believe him and don’t let him stick his hand in your face. After the club we decided to sit down at the blackjack tables because that’s the smart thing to do at 4am. It was like Vegas Vacation all over as we just got steamrolled by the deck. I dropped about $700 in 30 minutes and only know this because I have the timestamps on the ATM receipts. I kept the receipts as a deterrent to the evil that is pit games. We finally make it back to the room and Joe B, who I didn’t think even knew how to take the monorail back to Excalibur, was passed out with a hooker magazine wide open and laying next to him. A picture is worth a thousand words. He ended up saying he walked from Mandalay to Excalibur and something about parking garages...Tuesday-Tuesday afternoon was pretty uneventful, we went and checked out the WSOP for a while. On our way to the Amazon room Ivey walked past us and Joe C slapped me and whispered “dude that’s Phil Ivey” like a starstruck schoolgirl… eh I guess I might have been a little struck the first time I saw my first pro in person too. Played some more poker at MGM and Excalibur then one of my Vegas local friends came and picked us up to go to In-N-Out. Later on that night we headed off to Pure. Our friend that met us out there had a local hook up so we were able to pass the line and get a cabana on the patio with a comped bottle. This is the second time I’ve been here and I dig the patio. It’s a little more laid back and the views are pretty sweet. We stayed until around 3 then headed back to the hotel to gamble a little more. I managed to lose a bunch then actually get it all back after another trip to the ATM. One thing I had never seen before was that the dealer was encouraging my friend to bet big…by big I mean $100 a hand. He ended up winning a good chunk after that and it ended up begin successful end to the trip. Oh and I forgot we kinda lost Joe C again, he showed up a little while later after running off with another Vegas hookup. Funny how the least likely of the bunch ends up getting the most action.All in all I wish I would have seen some better time in the poker room and it was my first trip in a while in which I finished down, but I think it was one of the drunkest and most fun Vegas trips I’ve had overall. These were the things that stuck out in my mind, I know there was a lot more but half the fun is remembering years later and the pictures. Looking forward to another good time this June.

[chgocubs99 0]

Most delayed trip report ever by a wide margin.Hinsdale is near me, that is all.

[CodyHartman 0]

Most delayed trip report ever by a wide margin.Hinsdale is near me, that is all.

nah I've been working on my masterpiece of my trip to Vegas in december of 2003 for over 4 years. I am happy to say I am almost finished with it. You know it takes time to write classics like this.watch for it soon...