I started in Fontana. The second heat of the $25,000 Championship Tournament was in progress and I dealt three tables of it before they stopped for the night. This was my first experience with $10,000 chips. Crazy. I’ve worked with $25,000 chips in live games but never $10,000 chips. I skipped through the tournament without a scrape or light bruise. Sweet!

I was back in the Poker Pit at 9 p.m. and my first game was an over active little $2-5 NLH game. Lots of chips moving around. One of our regular players was in the 6s. He’s got a great poker attitude and plays very well. He ended up going to war with the 1s in a hand that cost him all of his chips and he started with the best of it – ain’t that the way it is thought? He was the BB, the 1s put in a moderate raise. He went all-in for $131 more. The 1s thought about it and called. He held K-K. The 1s showed 7-7.
Continue reading Wednesday, April 20, 2005 →

Check these beauties out. They were hovering behind the glass at Shintaro where I met Tony G. for dinner. No we didn’t eat them. That was Sunday night but I’m getting ahead of myself.

Saturday evening/night was spent with my Pan buddies and buddettes. We started with four, expecting two others later and the way it turned out, we played in shifts because everyone couldn’t/didn’t get there at the same time.
Continue reading Monday, April 18, 2005 →

HA! My last post was Friday – early a.m. – before I went to sleep. Yup, the day that everyone in the USA is running around at the last minute, preparing to file their tax forms and get them in the mail. Sheesh! I waited way longer this year than I have in the past few years but mine were done, and on their way by Wednesday, and I was singing a lighthearted tune. I owed – I owed – I owed, but it wasn’t something I couldn’t deal with and it’s out of my hair for another year.
Continue reading Saturday, April 16, 2005 →

I finally managed to find the brush strewn, rocky path up and out of the Bitchy Mode. Thank God I made it into the light after way too many glasses of wine. I managed to wake up with a hangover, no attitude for work, and a planned trip to help a friend with computer problems before work. I knew as soon as I shotgunned that first blast of coffee into my system, my body would take over where my brain left off and I would be OK!
Continue reading Friday, April 15, 2005 →

When I got up today, I thought I would be screaming, “Help! Throw out a rope…I’m on my way to Kansas and my name isn’t Dorothy!”

The wind was doing it’s terminal rip, snort, shred, huff and puff and blow your house down.

But tonight…ahhhh…tonight, the air is incredible, a delicate, tantalizing, wisp of satin that moves across your flesh, just cool enough to raise your nipples and send a quivering shiver across your thoughts. It’s a beautiful night in Vegas. The perfect night to savor life, the stars, what we are and aren’t, and the terminal, neverending question…why? That’s how I spend quite a bit of my brain waves…trying to sort out why. It doesn’t really matter to anyone but me.
Continue reading Thursday, April 14, 2005 →

Kee-rist! I couldn’t wait to walk through the door of my sweet little home, tucked away from the madness of the world, and indulge. Yes…that first tantalizing aroma, that delicious sip of wine as it slides across my tongue and escapes down my throat, exhaling the perfume of the bouquet, and wanting to chug the glass but telling myself it’s best to savor, sip, relish every drop.

That is the way life is supposed to be, living every second of it and feeling the aroma of the bouquet engulf your being, jumping head first into the heady rush, never trying to slow down the acceleration with the drag of negative thoughts or surrounding yourself with people that can’t get into what it’s really all about.
Continue reading Tuesday, April 12, 2005 →

While I’m impatiently waiting for FTP problems with the new server to be resolved – so a post that shows as being published is actually on the menu and readable – a few honorable mentions from dealing the tournament in Fontana.

Each day of Bellagio’s Third Annual Five-Star World Poker Classic brings a new NLH Tournament. The day before each tournament, satellites begin. Each tournament plays down everyday until there are nine players left or 3 a.m. arrives, whichever comes first. When the new NLH Tournament begins at noon, the final of the tournament from the day before unfolds at 3 p.m. Keep in mind that while dealing in Fontana, it might be a satellite, the final of the day before, or the day’s tournament, or a super satellite for the final event.
Continue reading Saturday, April 09, 2005 →

Server change, no email, and no FTP access has had me out of sorts and behind on posts. This post could be really long…as in trying to catch up for a week…or short because I don’t have the energy. Gamble! Gambling on energy.

Tons of confusion and lots of noise would be the best way to describe the mayhem of all the bodies and continual motion going on in the Poker Pit. There are actually 39 tables in the Poker Pit and 17 in Fontana.
Continue reading Friday, April 08, 2005 →

Help Mr. Wizard! It’s tax time and I’m not ready – mainly with the new corporation I started in September. My son came over a week ago and diligently sorted out a zillion different receipts, deposit slips, and other things, had them neatly stacked with a labeled paper beside them, and during the night, I opened my windows and doors. Don’t think that damn wind hasn’t been out to get me…it took me 15 minutes just to pick them up – completely unsorted – cursing all the while at what an idiot I was at not thinking that gentle breeze wouldn’t turn into an ugly tornado.
Continue reading Tuesday, April 05, 2005 →