Thanks brothers! Top 10 out of 120 got $1000 each, up from $500 for top 20. I open folded aces pre with a medium-big stack when we were at 11, and I couldn't be happier with that play.

No I didn't show, in case anyone was wondering.



595 Craft & Kitchen Pub on Trop and Rainbow. Anyone who likes good beer needs to visit.

Hmmm...top 10 get $1000...aces preflop...on the payjump bubble...

Yeah, I can see doing that #manies

Not playing SJ?

Did you play the Bally's freeroll on Saturday.

I was there playing cash. Big +$13 for the night!

I've been goofing off for the last few days

I didn't make the hours for the freeroll

Heading to the Orleans tonight for a few hours of $1/$3 challenge play.

Wow I just hit another room share of the bad beat jackpot at the Orleans

That's my third in about 40 hours of play here. A dealer told me that some regs have been playing here for months on end without being around for one.

It should be somewhere between $120-$300.

What game set it off?

It appears to have been $2/$4 LolLHE. They're busy enough here to have a separate bbj for Omaha, and even one for Stud.

I know, I love the Orleans. The lOlmaha is strong with that place and the players are hilarious.

But to get set off by 2/4...bless you, Orleans.

I had planned on waiting until the NFL playoffs to take my first $2/$5 shot, but success in the Challenge has preempted this, so I will be playing $2/$5 for the Challenge next week, likely Friday or Saturday.

I have my eye on Red Rock Casino for this. It's in a wealthier neighborhood than is the Orleans, so I've come up with a hypothesis that Red Rock may have more $1K+ stack punters on any given weekend night.

Why not Aria or Bellagio, since I've already given my opinion that on average the locals are better players than the tourists? The locals seem to have a higher variance in ability, so that it's actually more likely to find a Live One at a locals table, blithely doing his thing while everyone else sits with their forks and knives out and waits for the plate to be passed their way.

Related to this is seeing a player going on monkey tilt, which is a rare event, so I may not have enough hours in yet to make this assertion, but it seems to me that when a local goes on tilt, he or she does it in a more thoroughgoing and grandiose fashion than does a tourist.

Today, a local around my age lost a two outer to an OMC on the river and instantly went from being a fun Live One to being a play-money style no-look spewape. I was in position to pick up $400 from him, turning a losing session for me into a winner.

Orleans:4 hours: (Bad Beat Jackpot room share $217):
+$600

Three Stacks $600-$60,000 Challenge:$1/$3 Level:

Link to Challenge Rules

Starting bankroll: $600
Last bankroll: $1375
Challenge day progress:$+600
Current bankroll: $1975
Bankroll needed for $2/$5: $1875 - Level Cleared

Next week: $2/$5 starting with a $1600 bankroll ($375 will be taken out for a vig, see the challenge rules (or don't, as they are overly complicated.))

Not much to report from the tables, yesterday. I played the overnight at Harrahs and ran into two successive Live Ones on two different tables, both of them were heavily intoxicated and one of them was sometimes opening or 3-betting pre without looking at his cards.

I was in position both times, but unable to capitalize on these spots during the session, and that's poker. Sometimes the Live One leaves with a mountain of chips, and we should all be thankful for that, as that means he'll be back.

While heading home from work every day, I am dropped off on the other side of Rainbow Boulevard, and I need to cross at an occasionally defective crosswalk intersection. Rainbow is a major thoroughfare and busy with traffic.

When the walk signal is working right, I have plenty of time to amble across; when it's not, the light turns green for the cars and stays red for me the pedestrian, but I still have around eight seconds to book my ass at top speed (for a middle-aged guy wearing a backpack) across the road before the crossing traffic gets their green light.

This morning the walk signal failed and I booked it, and a lady in her 30's limping heavily on a cane tried to follow me across the boulevard.

I caught her in my peripheral vision just as I'd make it across about two seconds before the light was going to change on her. She was not even halfway across. I swore loudly and turned around and jumped back into the road with my arms spread out wide, hopping sideways like a suicidal idiot who was daring the traffic to take him down.

The light changed against us and no one hit me, thankfully. I reached the lady and walked her the rest of the way across with my arms still spread out wide, as I couldn't think of anything else to do with them.

No one beeped their horn at us--that's what struck me--even though we wasted most of everyone's green light cycle parading across their right of way. I can only think that they must have seen the crisis play out in front of them, had seen the spot that I'd gotten us into, and had decided to show some forbearance. Bless them.

Harrahs: 7 hours:
+$19

Just busted the MGM 10pm tourney and am heading back to Cosmo for a smoke and a drink - if you’re mid-strip tonight how are the games?

At Harrahs waiting to get on.

If in can drag my ass all the way over there I’ll buy you a drink (or put a $20 in the VP machine at the bar)

Thanks Nat, but it's pretty reg infested atm. 2 or 3 to every table. Ill give it 2 hours to see if they clear out.

Regs are starting to thin out. Outplay, or outlast if you can't outplay. I'm leaning towards staying for the overnight and making my hours.

Finally got a cowboy at the table, but he's absolutely owning my soul.

I’m very impressed with how you can grind overnight. I have tried many times but I’m at best on my c game and then in a terrible funk the next day.

SJ saving old woman. Standard.

She was in her 30's, which make us a pair of ancients, fid

Hi 3aces!

I'm sure we've run into each other on the circuit without knowing our online s/ns. I'm usually good on the overnight until the end of the session--and that's when I start making mistakes--but some of that has to do with me drinking on the job. I limit myself to one every 2 hours, but it still catches up with me by the end of a 6-8 hour session.

So yeah, Harrahs drink service is particularly generous. Their typical shot measures in at around 2.5x, so if I'm working 6-8 hours that's 3-4 shots, or 7.5-10 units. Yesterday, I had finally figured out Cowboy Hat's game (though mostly the cards fell so that I managed to avoid him) then I had worked past breakeven and up to $+100 by the time that I had only fifteen minutes left to play in the session.

Then the bottom dropped out. I took a standard beat for around $180, then I lost another medium pot, and then I made a $55 error on a flop.

I called a short-stack's all-in with an express odds draw, but I missed the fact that a full stack a few seats to my left still had cards, and that the full stack had me covered.

I even announced that I had a draw, which is hugely embarrassing.

With the full stack still in play, my correct play was to either fold or shove on the flop, and never to overcall. The full stack overcalled with a better draw, my straight vs his nut flush. His draw hit on the turn and I check/folded to his $100 bet.

I slinked out of there, down and chastened. I am imposing a two drink max per session. I should quit entirely, but I'm not ready yet. There is no quitting until you're ready. That is the simple and sad fact of addiction.

Harrahs: 6 hours:
(-$220)

What's the poker plans for X-Mas/New Year?

Is there more action at the tables at that time of year?

This will be my first Christmas playing live poker. From my blackjack days, I can tell you that it should be slow from now up until Christmas, as people are saving their money for buying presents, then it will pick up for New Years Eve.

I read somewhere that people play crazy on New Years...up until midnight, when they apparently resolve to start playing better, and the tables turn into deserts of nittery. I wish that I could find that passage again, but I can't remember who wrote it.

In any case, I'll be playing on New Years, simply to find out if there's any truth to it.

This might be a good format for bad beat stories, to go along with this one.