Vegas Diary - 2011 - Part 1

Well, I better get going here and put my thoughts, memories, and summaries on to paper before they all get lost in the haze of my mind. Let me get some text down on the blog first - then maybe later I can embellish with pictures and other decorations.

Tue Mar 15
You know it's a weird Vegas trip when it starts on a Tuesday - actually, I left work in Guangzhou around 1 pm - so my trip actually started 10 pm Monday, Vegas time. Caught a train to Hong Kong, where I actually worked for about 4 hours in the hotel room before the early morning flight.

Besides working, the other main activity in the hotel room was to create my own tournament guide. For some reason, the publishers of the Blue Ribbon tournament guide decided not to write one this year. Now what will I do? Well, I signed up for the ESPN Insider account, found a preview page for each of the teams, copied those into a Word document, cut out the 68 pictures of Joe Lunardi contained in each preview, shrunk it down to 6 pt font - and voila! An 80 page tournament guide.

Now, printing it out at the hotel cost HK $10 a page, so I have started my trip about US $100 in the hole before even boarding an airplane.

Wed Mar 16
Flight leaves at 8, it's an international flight - so be there 2 hours early, 40 min taxi to the hotel: Gees, that's a 4:30 wake up call. What jolted me awake? I was in the shower and realized: "the next shower I will take will be in Vegas". That always brings a smile....

First leg: Hong Kong-Tokyo. March 16, 5 days after the earthquake. There was NO ONE on that plane. Each row was 3-4-3, and there was literally 1-2 people per row. A bit scary. However, when I landed in Tokyo, it seemed to be business as usual. Nothing seemed out of place.

Boarded the plane for LA at 4 pm local; I brought my NyQuil so I can sleep! Smart! I got 4 hours of sleep before my 4;30 wakeup call, I'll be dead tired on the plane and I can crash.

Dinner comes, darkness on the plane, and I comfortably fall asleep.....

....and then I wake up. Hmmmm, I wonder what time it is.....it's still dark out....

I was asleep for 90 minutes.

I took another nap on the plane for 30-40 minutes, and that was it.

Land in LA - gees, the lines at US Immigration are at least 3x as long as other airports - and Layup picks me up - and off we go to Vegas!

The ride was not as long as I thought; after the first two hours, I tried to get in a quick nap - and I got three naps in. Each was about 4 minutes long.

But before we get to the Mirage, we needed to do twoside trips: one to a Wal Mart to go medicine shopping, and to a US Bank to get loaded for the trip. The Wal Mart trip was uneventful, except for the occasional stares as two men were circling the pharmacy with a shopping cart half-full of Children's Motrin, NyQuil, and Benadryl.
The bank was an adventure, as the "bank" was not a stand-alone branch but one of those mini branches inside a grocery store. There was just one teller, with another lady who was in and out of the back room hanging up decroations out front. She seemeed to be a janitor of some kind.
It's my turn, I give her the check and withdrawal slip - and the teller makes this smirk. That's not good. Then she calls over the janitor - who apparently is the branch manager, in between her St Patrick Day deocration duties - who looks at my account on the screen, chuckles, and approves it. I am still baffled by that turn of events.

I don't remember much of gambling that night - I think the opening game was Pai Gow Poker with Don and Mike and their golf bage along side. I remember being half asleep as I tried to eat a 3 lb roast beef sandwich at the deli; I lost $500 at UTH waiting for Wiz and Leland to arrive. Not the greatest of starts.

Thu Mar 17

Started the day - after placing sports bets; the first "big bet" of the day was Old Dominion -2 vs Butler. Butler can't handle the physicality! - with Craps. I think I played more craps with Leland on this trip than the rest of the trips combined.

As we played, I got 4 texts and 2 phone calls from Wiz, who was in hiding watching Clemson.

It was 1:10 pm Eastern; I knew exactly what he was calling for.

"Is anyone near the book?"

I'm here now. What do you want?

"What's the Clemson halftime line?"

WV by 1 1/2.

"How much do you have?"

Um....it's all at the table.....

"Do you have $1000????"

No, sorry. I got $250 for you.....

Of course, I didn't place any money for me on West Virginia's 2nd half bet, which was an easy winner.....

First real winning session was that afternoon at UTH...nothing stands out there. However, we all had our first experience with the power of the Gold Card - the players club card. Layup was at the Gold level (the third level out of four), and we all went to California Pizza Kitchen for lunch. There was a significant line - 10? 15 people?

Layup flashes his card - "um, can I get a table for 6??"
We were seated in 60 seconds. It was amazing.

An afternoon jog (yes, first time that has happened for me in Vegas) amid watching another Big Bet game go down in flames ("Yes! Santa Barbara has the experience to stay close to Florida") and then it was off to dinner.

I don't know if it was the food, or the fact that I haven't had a filet in 9 months - but the filet that night at Mesa was memorable. Just wonderful.

(And the fact that no one in Vegas thought that Cincinnati would beat Missouri except for me .....that helped too.....)

Ended the day with (apparently) a craps loss and the annual tradition of losing at Pai Gow to John the Dealer......

Fri Mar 18

A strong 6 hours of sleep, which could be a record for me in Vegas. Layup recommended Excedrin PM, which was extremely helpful all week.

Golf in the morning at Southern Highlands - and that was wonderful. I keep thinking about that course. It is the perfect definition of a "fair, but difficult" course. There are no tricks. The greens are not unfair; I thought (and still think) that I can 2 putt from anywhere out there (and I did, on some holes!) You get rewarded for good shots and punished for bad shots. The course is right there in front of you - there's not a lot of hidden hazards lurking.

I would gladly go back there again in a future year. I just hope I am not blackballed after yelling at the TV in the men's locker room during the end of the Arizona-Memphis game. The members sitting 3 tables away shot several dirty looks in our (my?) direction......and then quickly left the room 5 minutes later. Well, the ends justify the means, correct?

Friday, after golf, was a wild day gambling. Another losing session at craps (I think this time was with Mike) - I put my chips in my pocket and headed over to the UTH table where everyone was located. We talked about the games, and the fact that I just put in a second half bet on VCU vs Georgetown. Layup wanted some of that action, so he gave me some money to place the bet.

As I walked over there, I cashed in my two black chips from craps and put that money in my pocket and headed over to the book. I took out Layup's money and my wallet - placed his bet - and then took out my green book to look at other games.

It was when I was ready to place another bet for myself when I realized - I didn't have the $200 from my two chips I cashed at the cage.

I checked each pocket 5 times - no luck.

I felt like an extreme idiot as I went back to the same counter in the sportsbook.

"Can I help you, honey?" she said.

Um, yeah....um......did anyone, um, turn in $200?

"What? You mean turn in found money?"

Yeah....I just dropped it here 5 minutes ago.....

She checked around and - no, no one turned it in. Of course not - but I had to ask.
As I left the counter, I saw some middle aged, 5'6" man look at me and smirk to himself. I am 90% positive that he found the money on the floor of the book (while I was fumbling around) and pocketed it. But what in the hell am I supposed to do? It is my fault - that's why I always put the money in my wallet after cashing at the cage.

Anyway, the day got a little better when I won a big bet when - again - I seemed to be the only one at the casino who liked Georgia and the points (+5- which moved to +6 by tip) vs. Washington. A late 3 by the Bulldogs gave me the cover. And I didn't collect from the casino - I collected from Wiz! Even better.

Then I sat down at UTH as we had a long session. It was 5 of us - Leland was off playng his marathon of craps. From left to right, we had

Layup
Wiz
Me
Mike
Don
and....the Danish Pirate

This guy at the end of the table was 50 or so, glasses, beard, and he grunted with every bet. He said he was in Vegas for 2 weeks and was losing money, but he loved the UTH game.

All of a sudden (his hot streak probably started when Wiz and I got into a spitting fight and I was banished to the Phat Cats cafe), this guy was on fire. He started playing a $50 ante. Then $75. Then $100 every once in a while. Then $100 every hand.

And he kept winning.

He started with, oh, $500. By the end of the 3rd hour at the table, he had $3,000 on the table and AT LEAST - AT LEAST - $5,000 in his pocket. He spit out a tooth at one point into the cards - no matter, that didn't break the string. Everything he touched was gold.

(And how did I do? Well, it was the classic case of someone shooting a 59 at a golf tournament. When someone shoots a 59 on the PGA Tour, all the attention focuses to that golfer. Every move they make is magnified and lauded.

They don't see the golfer in the group behind shooting a 62.

I tripled my money at that table, by far my best outing at UTH. And this was a $15 minimum, so we are not talkig tripling $50 into $150.

I got up to the cage, cashed in my chips - and before they took the money out of the drawer, they asked:
"Do you have any markers you want to settle?"

I don't know why, but I was offended. Hell NO! I didn't take any loans out to win this money! This is from my own sweat and blood!



Well, I'm out of steam for tonight, but Friday's diary is not complete.
Here's what you can look forward to in the next installment:

"Let's make some money!"
I only play the hard 4 and 10
Afternoons in Vegas: a Taxi to Target
Brandt Snedeker costing me $25
"Security!" and the 70 year old waitress on Saturday night
My first foray into the Salon
Cleanup on aisle 9
Sean Connery will star in "Entrapment"