Sanjaya and Other Randomness

Yes yes, Part III of the Vegas Recap is coming... hopefully this weekend.

In the meantime, the immortal Dr. Pauly had a brilliant rumination a few weeks ago, which is worth quoting here:

"Here's where I relate visiting hookers to poker. I came to the conclusion that tournaments were like long term relationships that included an arduous courting process where you put in hours and hours into foreplay without getting laid. Whereas cash games are like those ladies you pick up at the Hooker Bar in Las Vegas. You know exactly what you are getting yourself into and although the pay off down the line is not as big as a score in a tournament, you do get instant satisfaction and gratification. If taking a few bucks off the table and walking away with a freshly fucked glow is your goal, then stop playing and bubbling out of elongated tournaments and hit up the cash game orgy. Short-handed NL tables are like singles bars on a Friday night. Everyone there just wants to score. Quickly."

For those of you wondering why the fuck Sanjaya hasn't been voted off on American Idol, it's simple: American Dreamz. The 2006 movie was a satire of American Idol where the crappy Arabian kid beats the blonde all-American girl. Yeah - I know Sanjaya isn't Arabian - but the movie is still proving prophetic.

Other things to keep you busy while you wait for my Vegas Part III:

-Peter "Duke Sucks" Rosenberg has another hot parody video "Bowlin'"

-The classic Phil Hellmuth blow-up from Poker After Dark. three part series here. Pay special attention to Phil's attempt to act tough, by ordering the waitress: "Give me a White Russian - make it a double!" Impossible to imitate.

- The Poker Lesson series - pretty frickin' funny stuff.

-All of Oscar's videos!

Until next time,

KD

Vegas: March 2007: Part II: DYKWTFIA?

If you haven't read Part I, what the fuck are you waiting for?

Friday In Vegas.

I awoke with a number of thoughts and burning questions rushing through my head:

1: Man, I'm so lucky Mrs. Dynamite lets me jaunt off to Vegas at will. Being a softy, I lob her a text message: "I miss you." Yeah, Kid Dynamite is whipped. Completely.

2) Why does my calf hurt? Oh yeah - I almost forgot about the Mirage's attempt to tilt us last night: We were dominating the double deck blackjack game late night, and they decided to close the poker room crapper "for cleaning," around 2:30 am... for about THREE hours! We retaliated by dashing off to the sports book head instead, whenever the situation warranted. Since we were drinking heavily, and I have a bladder the size of a baseball, this resulted in frequent trips to the inconvenient bathroom. On one of these junkets, I missed one of the steps by the circle bar, and tweaked my left calf. While it appeared the Mirage may be succeeding in their attempt to take me off my game, and had even managed to inflict a calf injury somehow in a double deck blackjack game, we re-gained the upper hand when our dealer mentioned: "You know, there's a nice bathroom right behind this table in the high limit slots salon."

Big Show and I looked at each other, and dashed to check out this new found oasis. I beat him to the solo-bathroom: a luxe escape, with real linen towels, air freshener, mints and hair products! Jackpot! Suck it Mirage!

where was I... oh yeah.. Friday morning...

3) Where the fuck is Big Show? In all of our trips to Vegas, which now number almost 30 I believe, I don't think Big Show has ever awakened before me. This must be the result of his 3 hour power nap the night before. I knew I'd find him in the Office, and quickly showered and pumped myself up for some Mirage No Limit domination, and hopefully some serious sigmas.

I arrived in the Mirage poker room around noon, and found Big Show sitting in the 1-2NL game which I cannot beat. Danielle, my favorite floor person in all of Vegas, didn't have a 2-5NL seat for me yet, and I ran through the list with her: "10-20 limit?" "It's full." "Omaha eight?" "You're too young," she laughed, and I regaled her with the story of how I tilted the crap out of the game last trip by playing a non-nut hand and nearly caused 3 heart attacks and oxygen tank failures at the table. Since I didn't want to play heads up 40-80 limit hold'em with some resident cock chugger, I decided to destroy the 1-5 stud game while waiting for my 2-5NL seat!

Yeah baby - DYKWTFIA? I will take on any game at any time. This seems like a good time to mention that I've never played more than 10 minutes of stud in my life. Still, that couldn't stop me from crushing the game for $35 (BOO YAH!) in 15 minutes before Danielle called me for the 2-5 NL game.

The 2-5NL game was unspectacular. As usual, I was the dominant force at the table, but, even with my headphones on, I was steadily building into a state of full TILT, on account of Mr. "What's It Look Like?" Normally, being a Beantown original myself, I love people from Boston: the ignorant accents, the passion for the Sawx, etc. This doucheball, however, was driving me fucking crazy by asking "What's it look like?" every time someone bet. I'd say "THIRTY," as I stacked off red chips, and he's still say "WHAT'S IT LOOK LIKE?" What? Did you read a book or see a movie that made you think that was a cool thing to say? It looks like fucking THIRTY - that's why I said "THIRTY" when I bet it, so you wouldn't have to ask me what the fuck it looked like.

There was a multi-sigma Chinese guy to my immediate left, whose only English consisted of: "All in," "No pair," and "first time poker." He'd push all in, win a pot. Then he'd push all in, get called, declare "no pair," and nod as his opponent raked in his chips. Then, he'd reach into his pocket and buy another $400 in chips, and laugh "First time poker!" "Yeah, keep trying," we commiserated, as I begged for the chance to get a piece of the action: The guy was in for 2 grand, and I had none of it so far.

I finally captured some of the sigmas in this hand: Mr. "What's It Look Like" (WILL from here on) opens for $15 in EP. He gets called twice, including a call from a woman who hasn't played a hand yet to my immediate right. I am on the button with QQ and a $650 stack. I make it $60 to go. Chinese Maniac (CM) cold calls $60 from the small blind, and the big blind cold calls also. Now WILL surveys the situation, and calls, as do the two players between him and I. I can immediately put the big blind and the lady to my right on pocket pairs, and WILL has either 99-JJ, AK or AQ. CM can have any two cards. I know full well I'll have no clue where I stand in this pot, and can only hope that I'll be able to gain some insight from my position on the button.

The flop is a beautiful: T-T-T. To the FELT! Everyone checks to me. Ok, I bet $200 into a $300 pot, begging that one of these idiots will call me with their under-full. CM quickly moves all in for $340 total, the BB folds, and now it's on WILL. "Holy crap - this is so sick," he's whining. Jeezus you dipshit - you've clearly watched too much poker on TV. Just because Antonio and Phil Laak say "this is so sick" a lot doesn't mean THIS hand is sick. You have AK and you should throw it in the muck you fucking cockchugger - what do you think I have? DYKWTFIA?!??

He eventually mucks (AK), as do the other two players. I call, and turn my hand over. CM nods, says "no pair" and I drag a nice pot. WILL then pipes up "that woulda got interestin' on the turn - I had haaaaaahhhhts too," as he would have picked up a heart draw. "Congrats - I flopped a full house," I pointed out, and he nodded: "Ohhhh yaaaahhhhh."

Shortly thereafter, CM got up to go get some food, and I didn't want to wait for him to come back - the game was boring, and although I'd love the chance to attack his stack again, I couldn't be sure he'd return, and there was negative EV awaiting us all over the strip. I prodded Big Show out of his 1-2NL slumber, and we went off to fuel up... at.. CHIPOTLE!!!! The Chipotle rebuy! A patented, and highly risky play.

Big Show executed the Guac Freeroll AGAIN, but I settled for a guac-less fajita burrito, and we planned our assault. We decided to head over to Caesar's, where the National Heads Up Poker Championship (NHUPC) was being filmed.

The Caesar's poker room was abuzz, as poker royalty was all over the place. We quickly walked right into Shawna Hyatt, and Gus "The Great Dane" Hansen, as Big Show hypothesized on the lines Gus was feeding to her. Fossilman was eliminated from the tourney, which we couldn't really get close to, and wandered out seeming somewhat annoyed. "Twenty bucks if you tell him a bad beat story," I propped to Big Show, but he only laughed.

Scotty Nguyen took a lot of time to glad-hand with his fans outside the poker room, as did Shannon Elizabeth. I quickly texted MO, who has a collection of blurry, impossible to identify pics of celebrities on his cell phone: "standing next to shannon elizabeth." He replied instantly: "200 bid for cell cam pic of shan e-liz," and Big Show and I laughed hysterically, as Big Show realized, "we could just take a pic of a random person - you can't tell anyway on the cell phone cam!"

After gawking at the poker pros for 20 minutes, we got bored and decided to keep moving up-strip. I called Chops on our way out the door and he explained that he was on his way into Caesar's to pick up some press credentials for the NHUPC. Hmmm... The wheels were turning as Big Show and I agreed it was worth a shot to stick around. We quickly found Chops at the entrance to the poker room. He was with a coworker from RawVegas.TV, and they quickly claimed their passes. The press guy then turned to me, "and you are?" "Kid Dynamite," DYKTWFIA?!?!? I didn't miss a beat - but he simply stared at me. "With WickedChopsPoker," Chops filled in, and just like that, Big Show and I had all access passes too, courtesy of the immortal Chops.

We blazed past the crew of NBC doucheballs, flashing our passes in their mugs, and Chops introduced me to the smartest man in the room, Brian Balsbaugh. Balsbaugh formed a company, Poker Royalty, to act as agents for the poker pros, to help them optimize their bankrolls, fame, and exposure.

I tried to help Chops come up with an idea for a RawVegas Prop Bet that Gavin Smith could win, as Joe Sebok had been kicking his ass. Tug of War? Hot dog eating contest? I eventually settled on belly flop contest, and Chops seemed to like the idea. Hopefully it will come to fruition.

Chops, Vegas mover and shaker that he is, had to go back to "the office," so Big Show and I decided to take a break from the NHUPC scene as they were going on lunch break anyway. I couldn't focus on poker at the moment, with so much buzz in the room, so we decided to instead crush the THREE CARD POKER table right near the sports book and poker room. On the first hand, I refused to play the "pairs plus" sidebet, severely tilting our old school dealer, Billie. After clarifying the rules, I got on board with the pairs plus, and manged to spike 6 straights, and take about 25 units out of the game. Our dealer, Billie, who'd been dealing at Caesar's since 5 years after they opened, also threw us these monstrous Caesar's medallions, which would surely come in handy as intimidating bling later, especially when combined with our NHUPC press passes.

We cruised back inside for the start of the next session of the NHUPC, featuring Scotty Nguyen vs. Phil Gordon, Jamie Gold vs. Jennifer Tilly, Michael "The Grinder" Mizrachi vs. John Juanda, and Mike "The Mouth" Matusow vs. Kid Poker Danny Negreanu as the feature match. This really isn't much of a tournament, as rapidly escalating blinds and antes quickly turn it into a push-fest.

As I confidently strode to the set, some uninformed NBC cockchugger put his hand out: "Can I help you?" I thrust my chest out, attempting to intimidate him with my pecs (I'd done some push ups before getting dressed that morning) and giving him a clear view of my all access press pass. "I'm just going up there," DYKWTFIA?!?!! I explained. "Who are you with?" What is this? The Spanish Inquisition?

"WickedChops," I explained patiently, but was somewhat unprepared when he retaliated with:

"What's that?" What? DYKWTFCI? (Do You Know Who The Fuck Chops Is?!?!?!) I thought "I'm with Chops" would open up every door in Vegas - places only the highest of high roller and inside men get to see - but here I was, being cock blocked by some NBC flunkie, even after busting out my "open sesame" pass code.

"It's a website," I explained, being elusive, and taking another step forward, not to be denied.

"Oh, do you need access for your laptop?" Was he trying to trick me?

"No thanks, my map is in my head," a la Sean Connery in The Rock. Kid Dynamite does not need a laptop. He writes a running diary real time in his head.

Thus, we scampered onto the set, and took a spot in the bleachers. It's pretty friggin' boring to watch, as we quickly realized, but were able to share several exciting moments when Negreanu twice went runner-runner to suckout on The Mouth and stay alive, before finally sucumbing to The Mouth. Over at Phil Gordon's table, Phil had Scotty all in, and drawing dead to three outs. Scotty spiked a miracle on the turn, and Phil slumped in his seat, but Phil re-sucked out on the river to slam his own 3 outer, and claim the match. "NICE SUCKOUT," I bellowed over the crowd, hoping to set Phil up for a vicious circling.

We exited the NHUPC set, and there was only one thing left to do: Circle Phil Gordon. This is where I, Kid Dynamite, became a complete pussy and blew the opportunity of a lifetime. I had a black $100 Caesar's chip in my pocket, which was the perfect bait to use for Phil: "Hey Phil - Roshambo for a hunge," I'd say, as I pulled the black chip out of my pocket with my thumb and forefinger around it. He'd look at it, I'd shout "BOO YAH!" and slug him right in his rotator cuff.

Perhaps it was his guido-esque Full Tilt leather jacket that intimated me, or the fact that I was worried I wouldn't be able to reach his shoulder, as he's about 6'9". I was somewhat concerned that he'd decide to pummel me if I ambushed him like this, or, more likely, I just completely pussed out and left shaking my head at my own incompetence - another optimal opportunity blown. I fear I'll regret this non-circling for a long time.

We proceeded over to the Flamingo, for an extended double deck BJ session, which will be recounted in Part III, along with the conclusion of the trip, featuring:

-The only six deck shoe we played all trip: at Harrah's

-Wynn Peach Chip cold decks

-Hollywood preflop action in the Wynn Peach Chip game

-Mirror ceiling heat at the Frontier

-a first class upgrade for the flight home

until next time,

KD

Answer Me This

Pete Rose broke the rules. He bet on baseball. He is also, unarguably, one of the greatest baseball players of all time. Today, he admitted that he bet on his Cincinnati Reds every single night, not 4 nights a week as he had originally claimed. Interestingly enough, Rose was making this admission as a means to show that he was not acting against the interests of the team, for example, by saving his closer for Saturday night's game, in case he hadn't bet on Friday night's game.

"I bet on my team to win every night because I love my team, I believe in my team," Rose said. "I did everything in my power every night to win that game."

Especially in today's error of thuggery and criminal activity by athletes, Rose really isn't the devil some make him out to be. He wanted to win. He was incented to. Is that so wrong?

-KD

Meanwhile

Vegas trip report Part II will be coming this weekend. In the meantime, check out this hot video, "This Is Why You Suck," to the tune of the immortal "This Is Why I'm Hot"

-KD

Vegas: March 2007: Desperately Seeking (negative) EV: Part One

Dear car service driver,

I've never thrown up in the backseat of a car before. Never ever.

However, if you don't stop gunning it to thirty and then hitting the breaks back down to zero as a method of negotiating this bumper to bumper traffic on the Long Island Expressway, I will christen the backseat of your Lincoln with today's lunch.

best,

Kid Dynamite.

Although I arrived at JFK nauseous, I was on time, and my flight actually landed in Vegas on time too. The problem was, they made us wait on the taxi-way for 40 minutes because there was a plane at our gate. What the fuck is the deal with this? There are about 20 other empty gates, but we NEED to wait for gate B22... while tables all over the strip are calling my name... "Kid Dynnnnnnnamite," they whisper. "Negative EV awaits you!" I hear their seductive callings, but am helplessly stuck in seat 17C. I hit Big Show and Chops with text messages: "The eagle has landed," and am rewarded with almost immediate replies. Big Show is in The Office, aka, the Mirage Poker room, and Chops tells me how he'll be crushing Caesar's tomorrow for the National Heads Up Poker Championships.

As a Vegas professional, I was able to keep my plane taxi-way tilt to a minimum, knowing that there would be ample time for me to absorb all the negative EV I could handle. The lack of a cab line further placated me, and I found Big Show just as he was called for a 2-5NL seat at the Mirage. Since it was midnight on Wednesday, and I wasn't yet ready for the poker table, I convinced him to chill for a while in the Pai Gow pit, where, as we all know, it's impossible to take too much of a beating... Errr, at least, that was the plan. After dropping my bags and 1/2 my cash stash in the room, we hit the quarter Pai Gow table downstairs.

After losing the first hand, Big Show obviously employed the invincible Marty Up strategy, aka, the Martingale, doubling his bet after each loss. Within an hour, I was down over a dime, big show was down three large, and we were shaking our heads "what the fuck just happened?!?!?" There was only one thing to do: return to the room to get more cash.

We headed over to the notoriously soft, yet tilt-inducing Venetian double deck blackjack game. We crushed the Venetian game for several hours, earning a comp to the Grand Luxe Cafe in the process, but I then tilted off another buy-in at the Venetian Pai Gow table. Fuckin' A - so much for Pai Gow being a game where you can't really lose a lot. Serious leak. Several hours into the trip I was still keeping my "no Red Bull," vow alive - I had promised not to indulge in a single Red Bull for the duration of the three days - attempting to avoid the feeling of lying in bed with my eyes open, unable to stand, yet unable to sleep, twitching like a cockroach.

In the midst of the blackjack assault, we had this unusual encounter in the Venetian bathroom at around 2am: Coming out of the bathroom, a middle-aged middle American guy wiping off his hands inquires eagerly, "You boys want to have some fun?"

"Dude, you have to be careful asking that at 2am in the bathroom," I explained.

"See that big Alaskan-headed woman over there?" He continued, pointing to a 50-something woman sitting on a stool right outside the restroom. I don't know what Alaskan-headed means, but anyway...

"That's your wife," I cut him off right away.

"NO, NO. She's a hooker!" He practically shouted, "She thinks she's coming to bed with me! Go over to her and tell her you want to fuck her silly!"

"No thanks," I shrugged, recognizing a no-win situation at once.

Big Show and I returned to the blackjack pit to see him talking to her as we left. I'm almost certain it was his wife.

Thursday

Before Big Show woke up, I had time to hit the Office, and absorb the effects of a 1-2NL cold deck, where I backdoored the second nut flush at the same time my opponent back doored the NUT flush, and I still somehow managed to not get stacked. Big Show arrived soon thereafter, and we went in search of food.

To fuel up for the 2pm Venetian tourney, we hit the Chipotle next to Harrah's for breakfast at around noon. Big Show worked his first expert angle-shoot of the trip, when he executed the patented Guac Freeroll. When the burrito maker scrawled the "G" on the foil wrapper of his meal to denote that he had guacamole on it, Big Show calmly placed his thumb over the "G" as he went to pay, and wasn't charged the buck fifty extra. For a guy worth more money than most people will ever dream of having, it was still a moral victory. "Hey, you have to get something for free in Vegas," he explained. I lacked the experience to pull off the Guac Freeroll, being a Chipotle Virgin, and was left to consult with Dirty Dave on the matter later: "A bead of sweat would form on my forehead, and the cashier would catch a pip of the G" Dave admitted, and had me laughing out loud at the thought.

With an hour to kill before the Venetian $330 "deep stack" tourney, we went back to basics and decided to annihilate the 4-8 limit game! Big Show executed another angle shoot, when he called a raise from the BB with A-4. He bet a flop of 9-4-2, and was raised. He bet the brick on the turn and was raised again. When the 9 paired on the river, Big Show checked, and his opponent checked behind him. "Two pair," Big Show declared, and tabled his hand. His opponent nodded and MUCKED! I was sitting on the opposite side of the table from Big Show, next to his opponent, and commiserated "Ace king?" "No, pocket jacks," he admitted, still not realizing that he'd mucked the winner.

I managed to get into this monster situation, which, tragically, was in 4-8 limit, against a complete and utter pussy. I raised in early position with pocket fives, and a late position guy 3 bet me. I called, and led out when I flopped a set on the 5-T-Q two heart board. My opponent called. The turn made me QUAD fives, and I led out again. He called again. On the river, the jack of hearts completed all possible draws, and I bet out again. This time, he raised me, and I calmly three bet. My opponent thought for 10 seconds before calling and tabling... POCKET JACKS! "What?" I practically jumped out of my seat, "How do you not lose more bets there?!!" I was in shock. "Well, I don't have anywhere near the nuts, and you have all those chips sitting there." He drawled back. I had bought in for $300 in $1 white chips, $200 of which were still in their racks, stacked on the rail.

"You can BUY these at the cage!" I whined, as Big Show laughed out loud. I couldn't believe my big stack had intimidated an opponent at 4-8 limit! I later called E-dub, master of all things limit hold'em, and explained the situation to him without telling him my hand, asking him how many bets he would have lost there. "At LEAST 5 more big bets on the river," he answered, on account of my expert flop-a-set-and-bet-it-out play.

Big Show and I hunkered down for the deep stack tourney, which is somewhat of a misnomer: you start with 6k in chips, with 25-50 blinds, and 40 minute levels, but I quickly recognized that such a stack doesn't give you too many pot sized bets to play with. I was eliminated at the end of level one when my A-K ran into KK on a king high flop, and my pot sized bet (3/4 of my stack) left me no escape.

I have to hand it to the Venetian poker room: they really do a great job. The floorman thanked the players at the start of the tourney, and provided food comps for all tourney participants. The service is great and most importantly: FRIENDLY, and they seem to genuinely care about the players. Dealers were competent, and floormen got the job done right - I was impressed when one boss, responding to a complaint from a player that the remains of a nearby veggie and dip platter were stinking up the table, quickly removed the platter himself, instead of calling for an underling to do it. The platter was also another nice gesture: one of several free snacks (cookies, fruit) for the tourney participant.

Big Show toiled in tourney hell for 5 more hours as I demolished the 2-5 NL cash game. He finished well short of the money, as I carried racks of chips to the cage, and we went in search of blackjack negative EV.

We pounded our way through several more double deck shoes, but Big Show would not make the mistake of sitting down at the Pai Gow table again. Big Show was in desperate need of a nap, and executed the patented 10pm short-buy. Still keeping the No Red Bull vow, I was dying, and hit the room at midnight, nabbing an hour of shut-eye as we listened to the sweet sounds of Big Show's latest Ghetto Mix XIV. Properly motivated, we then got dressed and decided to check out Jet.

We got the the door at 1am, where there was no line, and a dude at the desk asking for a $30 cover. "Is there a discount for hotel guests? We just want to check it out real quick," We explained. He tried to sway me by showing me his little clicker which said there were 700 people inside. "Seven hundred dudes," I muttered to Big Show, as he laughed. Of course, being completely under the spell of Mrs. Dynamite, it wouldn't matter to me. He suggested we ask the cashier girl about hotel guest discounts, which she promptly shot down, so we paid the cover and went in.

Despite an absolutely incredible sound system, Jet was mediocre. Granted, it was Thursday night, and there was no line, but the house music was a total nuisance. Also annoying was the sweat hog who kept trying to push me out of the way to get to the bar, as I was scooping my drink. I mockingly yelled at her (in Big Show's ear) "Hey, look, I know you think you're a ten, but you're more like a five and a half. If you touch me again I'm going to dump my drink on you," and he cackled in approval. The funny thing was, the music was so freaking loud that I could basically yell that right at her (which I did), and she had no clue what I was saying.

After two drinks, we retreated to the comfort of the double deck blackjack pit, where we punished the Mirage until they yielded us comps to the Caribe Cafe for a 6am nightcap. I devoured a buffalo chicken sandwich, which I washed down with a bread pudding. ON THE HOUSE baby.

We stumbled up to the room to refuel on sleep, and prepare for a legit poker cash game assault on Friday

stay tuned for Part II.

-Kid Dynamite

Certified Stud

The O-dog did it. Under the masterful tutelage of Mrs. Dynamite, who taught Oscar to heel using two serving spoons taped together and coated with frozen peanut butter, Oscar passed his therapy dog test, and is now an official Delta Society Pet Partner. Now, he can go to nursing homes and hospitals and make people happy.

Mrs. Dynamite has been working with Oscar on this for several months - we've been driving all the way uptown every Saturday morning for two months, with the goal of Oscar becoming comfortable enough to pass the test: he can do the test items no problem, but when he's in the testing room, he gets antsy, and, without the benefit of food rewards, sometimes just wanders off to smell all the dog smells in the room. He's also a little skittish around medical equipment (walkers, wheelchairs).

On Sunday, however, despite the attempts of the testing evaluators to tilt us by running 30 minutes late, we had time to settle down with Oscar in a side room and do some treat-reward training with him before the test, so that when he walked in for the actual test, he heeled like a true pro, looking up at Mrs. Dynamite the whole time, waiting for the treat that wouldn't come until later.

The funny thing is, that while I've repeatedly stated that I might want to pursue a career in dog training, it's Mrs. Dynamite who's really done all the work with Oscar! I taught him to shake, but that's about it. She used the same powers of persuasion which get ME to obey, and taught Oscar a variety of tricks and commands which he happily shows off.

Unfortunately, Oscar had to get his haircut today, and the groomer really took my boy to the FELT! He's shaved completely, and FURIOUS about it. Oscar wouldn't even come over to greet me when I walked in today - instead simply glowering at me from his bed in the kitchen. The only time that's ever happened before is when he was sick. Man - the little dude hold's a friggin' GRUDGE! Mrs. Dynamite was pleased that at least he wasn't just pissed at her, as she was the one who actually took him to the groomer. This is an old picture, but he's giving me and the Mrs. the same angry scowl today.

Later in the week I'll publish my Vegas trip report, which includes:
- Mirage PaiGow Marty Up debacle
- annihilating random low limit poker games (Mirage 1-5 Stud, Venetian 4-8 limit hold'em)
- Wynn Peach Chip cold decks
- National Heads Up Poker Championships
- Mirage and Venetian 2-5NL dominance
- Foiling the mirrored ceiling pit boss heat at the New Frontier double deck blackjack game

until next time,
KD