Degen Stories....
01-08-2013
, 07:32 AM
01-08-2013
, 03:32 PM
01-08-2013
, 04:20 PM
01-09-2013
, 04:04 AM
The two week vegas vacation, degen style.
My last post was a pretty depressing degen story so I thought i'd write about my trip to the states back in 09.
I had only been playing poker for a year and I was pretty terrible. But naturally I thought I was a pro, right from the get go. I had a good friend john who was also into gambling. He had just watched the movie 21.
He convinced himself he could count cards, and coincidently on a heater from 3k to 13k in a week playing BJ.
He also started getting people to call him "rainman". So john was the next wannabe MIT card counting pro. And I was convinced I could crush. What better way then to go to vegas.
Naturally john lost his 13k playing baccarat in one session. I was absent but he said that player hit 10 times in a row. Talk about luck drying up. The irony was he played a game that didn't use his expert counting edge..
Anyways, so the plan is to work for the next six months and save a 5k bankroll a piece.This eventually comes to fruition, hotel booked for two weeks and before we know it we are in a plane heading to the states. 15 hour flight from Australia, that was a grind but worth it. Did all the cliché things like hiring a mustang convertible. Drove through the desert. Talked about how we were going to own. Dumb kids.
First stop the luxor, we had our first week of accom booked there. Headed straight to the pit, I lost about $600 playing blackjack straight away - john won about $300 and we headed to mandalay bay.
We don't have drink service in most Australian casino's so we were taking advantage of this and were getting quite drunk. John started winning a few hands for $300 and betting big. Thought he read the table was +16 and there was "no way he could lose. Puts $2k down on the end box. Dealer looks at him and gives him the eye. You know the eye, when the dealer looks at you like your crazy and your going to lose your money.
So he gets a hard 16 and dealer has a 10. He hits, picture card. -$2k.
I end up losing about $1300 for the night. All the cash I was carrying. and John was -2.3k.
It is day two and we are pumped. We think this is the day and our luck definitely will have changed. I end up playing a bit of poker and break even. John lost another 2k + horrendous withdrawal fees. He is down to 800 and change, and its the second day of the trip. We still have another 12 days to go!
We head over to MGM casino, where john puts down $400 on a BJ table he thinks is hot. I still remember the pit bosses face when he checked johns ID. It was the biggest "Good luck kid, youre going to lose - mhahahahahaha, loser!!!" smirk I have ever seen. You just needed subtitles under his face and it would of been priceless. John loses $400, then quickly puts his last $400 down. Loses to a BJ straight up. John looked so anxious, I couldn't really blame him. I offered to give him money but he was only to play poker at low limits.
I give john 1k and it leaves me with about 2k. 12 days to go. We head to poker, play bad, get drunk. Club. Go to sleep.
It's day Seven now and we managed to get through the week without going busto. Living off the awesome buffets at Bellagio. Having a blast for two poor idiots.
I have 1.3k left and john has his last 300 riding on a NFL game(which I didn't know about at the time). We head to planet Hollywood for a bit and Bellagio sports lounge and stay there for hours getting drunk and watching NBA.
I lost about 300$ in the session and I joked to john that I paid $50 a drink while I was there.
We head back to the hotel room and john is so drunk he passes out on the floor. I am thinking "well **** you then I am still ready to party!! I head down stairs(our rooms for the last week are at the MGM) to the MGM's main floor and decide to play my favourite drunken BJ style. I lost 1k in about five minutes. Walk to poker and sit down at a 2/4NL table and lose 300$ in the first hand. pushing all in bluff with a9 and getting called down by someone who wasn't an idiot.
Head back to the room and proceed to pass out.
It is day eight and I wake up with the worst hangover and It hits me. I did something very stupid last night. I have about 5 bucks in dollar bills left. ****!!!!!!!!!
I felt stranded, like I was on the other side of the world and Helpless with no money. It was a scary ****ing feeling!
John wakes up and I tell him I went busto last night and he looks shocked. But we laugh about it for a bit and he comes clean about the $300 ticket he bought betting on NFL. I freak out, if he loses he has $0 and I have $5. So It looked like I would be eating for one at the bagel stand... We head to the MGM's sports lounge and he takes his ticket to the cashier. The bet was a Tie and he got his original bet back. Haha, we cant catch a break. But I am still relieved we have $300.
We go halfs for $150 each and buy into poker. I lose my buy in with AA VS KK caller who rivered me with a K. I couldn't believe my luck. Busto again. John lost his $150 painstakingly slowly and I had to wait like a busto'd degen. Two hours later he is busto. We are well and truly ****ed now.
We head back to the hotel room, get drunk and go to sleep.
Day nine, we sit down and work out our finances. I had holiday pay from my work going into my account in three days for the sum of $630. John had to use his fathers credit card that he had for emergencies only. I had to borrow some money and John said that there was a 5k limit. John withdrew 1k and we split it.
Skip to the last day in vegas. We had maxed out the credit card. I had $0 left and john had $0 left. We had no money to get the hire car we needed to get back LA for our flight. Let alone breakfast.
I am officially in freak-out mode at this stage. The stranded feeling comes back. On the other side of the world with no money. Feeling like crying. John decides he wants to try an ATM for lower denominations to see if he can get any money out of the credit card. He tries for $500. $400. $300 Bingo! I cry with relief. We are saved! We go to the hire place and they say "oh we don't accept cash, you need a valid credit card". ****!! so no hire car then. We ask the hotel staff and manage getting the information for greyhound buses. We taxi there and buy tickets and we are on the home stretch.
We have 8 hours until our flight boards and we are on the greyhound heading back. We are both tired and we sleep. We wake up and there is no movement, we look out the window and there is traffic banked up. Someone says something about an bad accident. And I am thinking ****!!! Just what we need. We end up being stuck there for a long time. By the time we reach the stop in LA we only have 50 minutes until the flight leaves.
We get in a taxi and gun it for the airport. Get to the LAX terminal run our asses off to the check-in desk. We are joking and laughing about making it, then the staff member lets us know that we are 5 minutes late to check-in and wont be going on the plane. We try everything but they wont let us go. She says that the next flight that can put us on to Australia is in 24 hours.... Ok ****, we don't even have money for accommodation. Then she makes it worse by telling us that there is a $500 per person fee for changing flights.
****!!!!!!!!
I will leave it there, but the end of the story is we spent 24 hours straight in LAX airport. Felt like tom hanks in the movie terminal - sleeping on the floor and chairs. and I had to make an embarrassing phone call to my family to arrange for the $1000 to be paid to the airline.
What happens in vegas, stays in vegas.
My last post was a pretty depressing degen story so I thought i'd write about my trip to the states back in 09.
I had only been playing poker for a year and I was pretty terrible. But naturally I thought I was a pro, right from the get go. I had a good friend john who was also into gambling. He had just watched the movie 21.
He convinced himself he could count cards, and coincidently on a heater from 3k to 13k in a week playing BJ.
He also started getting people to call him "rainman". So john was the next wannabe MIT card counting pro. And I was convinced I could crush. What better way then to go to vegas.
Naturally john lost his 13k playing baccarat in one session. I was absent but he said that player hit 10 times in a row. Talk about luck drying up. The irony was he played a game that didn't use his expert counting edge..
Anyways, so the plan is to work for the next six months and save a 5k bankroll a piece.This eventually comes to fruition, hotel booked for two weeks and before we know it we are in a plane heading to the states. 15 hour flight from Australia, that was a grind but worth it. Did all the cliché things like hiring a mustang convertible. Drove through the desert. Talked about how we were going to own. Dumb kids.
First stop the luxor, we had our first week of accom booked there. Headed straight to the pit, I lost about $600 playing blackjack straight away - john won about $300 and we headed to mandalay bay.
We don't have drink service in most Australian casino's so we were taking advantage of this and were getting quite drunk. John started winning a few hands for $300 and betting big. Thought he read the table was +16 and there was "no way he could lose. Puts $2k down on the end box. Dealer looks at him and gives him the eye. You know the eye, when the dealer looks at you like your crazy and your going to lose your money.
So he gets a hard 16 and dealer has a 10. He hits, picture card. -$2k.
I end up losing about $1300 for the night. All the cash I was carrying. and John was -2.3k.
It is day two and we are pumped. We think this is the day and our luck definitely will have changed. I end up playing a bit of poker and break even. John lost another 2k + horrendous withdrawal fees. He is down to 800 and change, and its the second day of the trip. We still have another 12 days to go!
We head over to MGM casino, where john puts down $400 on a BJ table he thinks is hot. I still remember the pit bosses face when he checked johns ID. It was the biggest "Good luck kid, youre going to lose - mhahahahahaha, loser!!!" smirk I have ever seen. You just needed subtitles under his face and it would of been priceless. John loses $400, then quickly puts his last $400 down. Loses to a BJ straight up. John looked so anxious, I couldn't really blame him. I offered to give him money but he was only to play poker at low limits.
I give john 1k and it leaves me with about 2k. 12 days to go. We head to poker, play bad, get drunk. Club. Go to sleep.
It's day Seven now and we managed to get through the week without going busto. Living off the awesome buffets at Bellagio. Having a blast for two poor idiots.
I have 1.3k left and john has his last 300 riding on a NFL game(which I didn't know about at the time). We head to planet Hollywood for a bit and Bellagio sports lounge and stay there for hours getting drunk and watching NBA.
I lost about 300$ in the session and I joked to john that I paid $50 a drink while I was there.
We head back to the hotel room and john is so drunk he passes out on the floor. I am thinking "well **** you then I am still ready to party!! I head down stairs(our rooms for the last week are at the MGM) to the MGM's main floor and decide to play my favourite drunken BJ style. I lost 1k in about five minutes. Walk to poker and sit down at a 2/4NL table and lose 300$ in the first hand. pushing all in bluff with a9 and getting called down by someone who wasn't an idiot.
Head back to the room and proceed to pass out.
It is day eight and I wake up with the worst hangover and It hits me. I did something very stupid last night. I have about 5 bucks in dollar bills left. ****!!!!!!!!!
I felt stranded, like I was on the other side of the world and Helpless with no money. It was a scary ****ing feeling!
John wakes up and I tell him I went busto last night and he looks shocked. But we laugh about it for a bit and he comes clean about the $300 ticket he bought betting on NFL. I freak out, if he loses he has $0 and I have $5. So It looked like I would be eating for one at the bagel stand... We head to the MGM's sports lounge and he takes his ticket to the cashier. The bet was a Tie and he got his original bet back. Haha, we cant catch a break. But I am still relieved we have $300.
We go halfs for $150 each and buy into poker. I lose my buy in with AA VS KK caller who rivered me with a K. I couldn't believe my luck. Busto again. John lost his $150 painstakingly slowly and I had to wait like a busto'd degen. Two hours later he is busto. We are well and truly ****ed now.
We head back to the hotel room, get drunk and go to sleep.
Day nine, we sit down and work out our finances. I had holiday pay from my work going into my account in three days for the sum of $630. John had to use his fathers credit card that he had for emergencies only. I had to borrow some money and John said that there was a 5k limit. John withdrew 1k and we split it.
Skip to the last day in vegas. We had maxed out the credit card. I had $0 left and john had $0 left. We had no money to get the hire car we needed to get back LA for our flight. Let alone breakfast.
I am officially in freak-out mode at this stage. The stranded feeling comes back. On the other side of the world with no money. Feeling like crying. John decides he wants to try an ATM for lower denominations to see if he can get any money out of the credit card. He tries for $500. $400. $300 Bingo! I cry with relief. We are saved! We go to the hire place and they say "oh we don't accept cash, you need a valid credit card". ****!! so no hire car then. We ask the hotel staff and manage getting the information for greyhound buses. We taxi there and buy tickets and we are on the home stretch.
We have 8 hours until our flight boards and we are on the greyhound heading back. We are both tired and we sleep. We wake up and there is no movement, we look out the window and there is traffic banked up. Someone says something about an bad accident. And I am thinking ****!!! Just what we need. We end up being stuck there for a long time. By the time we reach the stop in LA we only have 50 minutes until the flight leaves.
We get in a taxi and gun it for the airport. Get to the LAX terminal run our asses off to the check-in desk. We are joking and laughing about making it, then the staff member lets us know that we are 5 minutes late to check-in and wont be going on the plane. We try everything but they wont let us go. She says that the next flight that can put us on to Australia is in 24 hours.... Ok ****, we don't even have money for accommodation. Then she makes it worse by telling us that there is a $500 per person fee for changing flights.
****!!!!!!!!
I will leave it there, but the end of the story is we spent 24 hours straight in LAX airport. Felt like tom hanks in the movie terminal - sleeping on the floor and chairs. and I had to make an embarrassing phone call to my family to arrange for the $1000 to be paid to the airline.
What happens in vegas, stays in vegas.
Last edited by SouthernCross; 01-09-2013 at 04:18 AM.
01-09-2013
, 06:25 AM
01-09-2013
, 06:33 AM
01-09-2013
, 08:43 AM
I see by your profile you are a writer, That is awesome!
feel free to write that short story,
Thanks mate!
Unfortunately didn't walk around that much, sort of stuck to the same spot. We happened to be right in front of a Mexican food stand. As time crept on they started to close up for the night. 8 hours later the exact same workers came back to start the morning shift. They laughed at us.
We couldn't help but laugh.
Thanks a lot, glad you enjoyed reading!
feel free to write that short story,
Thanks mate!
We couldn't help but laugh.
Thanks a lot, glad you enjoyed reading!
01-09-2013
, 01:38 PM
01-09-2013
, 09:49 PM
01-09-2013
, 09:52 PM
01-09-2013
, 10:15 PM
01-10-2013
, 02:32 AM
01-10-2013
, 03:30 AM
